However, the MTA admitted that the rollout had been bumpy. “These new schedules are the largest overhaul of timetables in the LIRR’s history.” “We’re closely monitoring train operations and ridership data every day,” said Rinaldi. The MTA said it will add more customer service reps to Jamaica to help commuters who were used to going direct to Penn exactly which track that must use now that they have to change at Jamaica.Īs complaints mounted, MTA Chair and CEO Janno Lieber and LIRR Interim President Rinaldi visited the LIRR’s center of operation in Jamaica to observe the third day of the new schedules’ operations. In Jamaica, commuters were also forced to rush through the aging and cold station up and down stairs without escalators to find their transfers under the new schedule. 28, the LIRR had to skip the new terminal and drag the unhappy commuters who wanted to disembark at GCM to Penn Station due to switch problems. To add to problems in some instances on Feb. The trains heading to Penn Station were therefore uncomfortably overcrowded, while many traveling to the new station were nearly empty. LIRR interim president Catherine Rinaldi told reporters that when the schedule was originally conceived, it was expected that about 40 percent of passengers would use GCM and only 60 percent would go Penn Station. The other 71 percent went to Penn Station. The MTA released statistics showing that on Wednesday, March 1, the third day of the new schedules, 29 percent of those traveling to Manhattan via LIRR chose to disembark at the newly opened Grand Central Madison station and the number of commuters to the new terminal topped 60,000 riders in the morning rush hour.

She also directed the MTA to increase Jamaica-Brooklyn Service to cut the lengthy wait times that some commuters complained were added 40 minutes or more to their commute time.

Governor Kathy Hochul, trying to stem the growing outrage, said she directed the MTA to make changes starting with morning rush hour March 6 by adding trains to Brooklyn and lengthening trains to Penn Station, and adding cars to all trains that were reporting serious overcrowding problems last week. “We’re trying to get riders back on trains, not give them reasons to get into cars or stay home.” “To be sure, signal issues on the first two days added flame to the fire, but it’s clear regardless that improvements must be made,” Bringmann said. “This first week, we’ve seen overcrowded trains–at a time when ridership is at about two-thirds of pre-pandemic levels and service increased 41 percent mad dashes to make missed connections over jam-packed escalators and staircases at Jamaica and commutes made longer, rather than shorter, by the new service,” said Gerard Bringmann, chairman of the LIRR Commuter Council and an MTA board member. The first few days of the new LIRR service to and from Grand Central Madison have gone less than smoothly, with constantly changing track times and overcrowded trains infuriating commuters.

Grand central station trains