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Jamaica LIRR station to get gap fix

BY REID J. EPSTEIN | Newsday Staff Writer

11:47 PM EDT, October 18, 2006

A large gap between the platform and the LIRR train car on Friday, September 29, 2006 in Lawrence. (Photo by Howard Schnapp)

Track adjustments at the Jamaica LIRR station to lessen the space between trains and platforms are scheduled to start next week, the latest effort to address the railroad's systemwide gap issue.

As reported in Newsday yesterday, the Long Island Rail Road shifted 2,000 feet of track at the Shea Stadium stop to help close the gaps at the station, where 30 percent of gap-related incidents occurred in the last two months.

After Jamaica, the next stations in line for track adjustments are Deer Park, Hicksville, Huntington, Merillon Avenue, Mineola and New Hyde Park, in that order, said LIRR spokeswoman Susan McGowan. She cautioned that while schedules may change, work at the Jamaica station is slated to begin next week.

Newsday yesterday found gaps of 111/2 inches at New Hyde Park and 10 inches at Mineola. At Shea Stadium, where railroad officials had said most of the tracks are now in compliance with its gap standards of 7 to 8 inches, a gap of 9 inches was found on the eastbound platform.

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so tonight's accident victim was a graffiti "artist". ONLY the NY Times cares! Send his "parents" the bill for tying up working people trying to get home!

Submitted by Tired of it all

9:56 PM EST, Jan 5, 2007

tonights incident is the equivalent of "snow days" in the public school system! viva la mexico! if you see something, say something!

Submitted by Freeport

9:49 PM EST, Jan 5, 2007

one "accident" strands 200,000 commuters in their tracks! Makes you feel REAL confident about the homeland security & evacuation plans we continue to pay for!!!!

Submitted by Freeport

9:47 PM EST, Jan 5, 2007

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McGowan said she could not estimate the cost of adjusting the tracks at each station, and she could not say how much was spent to adjust the tracks at Shea Stadium because the work is being done as part of regular track maintenance.

"It may be captured later on," she said. "But the track work is being paid for in the normal track maintenance .budget."

McGowan spoke after the regularly scheduled monthly LIRR/Long Island Bus committee meeting yesterday in Manhattan. Officials at that meeting said no single solution will solve all the gap issues.

"What can work at one station may not work at any other stations," said committee .member Mitchell Pally.

Raymond Kenny, the railroad's acting president, said the preliminary investigation has found gaps ranging from 2 to 15 inches. The railroad measured 40 stations manually after the National Transportation Safety Board requested the figures. Those measurements were not available yesterday.

The LIRR -- as well as state and federal officials -- began studying the problem after the Aug. 5 death of Natalie Smead, 18, who fell through a gap at the Woodside station, crawled under the concrete platform and was struck by a train on the other side. A subsequent Newsday investigation found gaps as wide as 15 inches at some stations. In recent years, there have been an average of 60 gap-related incidents annually.

At the committee meeting yesterday, Kenny said that preventive measures the LIRR is taking include exploring mechanical gap-fillers used in some New York City subway stations. It remains unclear whether the gap-fillers can be effective when exposed to the weather and other outdoor elements, he said.

Kenny said he hopes to develop solutions to the gap issue before the NTSB and the state Public Transportation Safety Board deliver their reports on the Smead incident. The latter is scheduled to release its report next month.

Staff writers Sophia Chang and Carl MacGowan contributed to this story.