LIRR rider satisfaction rebounds to pre-Grand Central Madison levels
LIRR riders at Jamaica station in March 2023, after the opening of Grand Central Madison. Satisfaction has increased as the railroad has increased transfers across the platform at Queens station. Credit: Craig Ruttle
Long Island Rail Road customers are more satisfied than at anytime since Grand Central Madison opened in February 2023, which caused a major overhaul in service and a plunge in riders' ratings, according to the LIRR's latest customer survey.
According to the LIRR’s spring survey, taken over three weeks in April and May, 81% of customers are satisfied overall with the railroad, the same percentage as in the fall of 2022.
The opening of the station — the culmination of a two-decades long, $11 billion East Side Access megaproject — caused major upheaval among Long Island commuters, as serving a second Manhattan terminal resulted in major delays, trains operating with fewer cars than usual, and the railroad’s decision to do away with scheduled transfers, meaning trains no longer waited for connections.
In its spring 2023 survey, customer satisfaction fell 13 points to 68%. It's gradually climbed back, as the LIRR has made several schedule adjustments to address customer complaints.
The improvement came after the LIRR enacted several changes over the last year to minimize missed connections, including more frequent service to Brooklyn, clearer information on the MTA’s TrainTime app and more opportunities for transfer across the platform at Jamaica, instead of having to go up the stairs, across and down to a different platform.
"What we learned was that customers that missed their connecting train because their train arrived late to Jamaica just by a few minutes, it upsets them — even if they don’t have to wait very long for another connecting train," Tatyana Levina, senior director of market research for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, said at a Manhattan meeting of the MTA’s railroad committee Monday.
Among the 17,536 LIRR riders surveyed, some of the largest gains in satisfaction were among those who travel the most frequently, "indicating that the improvements in service reliability are being noticed," Levina said. She noted among customers who always transfer, satisfaction grew from 50% in the spring of 2023 to 69% in the latest survey.
Satisfaction grew among riders on all of the LIRR’s branches and those using all of the LIRR’s New York City terminals. Among riders traveling to and from Brooklyn, satisfaction rose 29 percentage points from spring 2023, from 41% to 70%.
LIRR President Robert Free attributed the improved satisfaction among Brooklyn riders to several schedule tweaks, including increasing the frequency of shuttle trains between Brooklyn and Atlantic Terminal to eight minutes during the rush hours, making the service "very reliable."
"I think we’re in a good place," Free said.
Alfonso Castillo has been reporting for Newsday since 1999 and covering the transportation beat since 2008. He grew up in the Bronx and Queens and now lives in Valley Stream with his wife and two sons.
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