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BMT Sea Beach Line
The BMT Sea Beach Line is a rapid transit line of the BMT division of the New York City Subway, connecting the BMT Fourth Avenue Line at 59th Street via a four-track wide open cut to Coney Island in Brooklyn. It has at times hosted the fastest express service between Manhattan and Coney Island, since there are no express stations along the entire stretch, but now carries only local trains on the N service, which serves the entire line at all times. During rush hours, several W trains serve the line north of 86th Street.
The following services use part or all of the BMT Sea Beach Line:
The modern line begins as a split from the BMT Fourth Avenue Line at a flying junction immediately south of 59th Street. Between the station and the split, crossover switches are provided between the local and express tracks of the Fourth Avenue Line, and then the express tracks curve east under the northbound local track to become the beginning of the Sea Beach Line. After emerging from the tunnel under Fourth Avenue, the two separate Sea Beach tracks rise on either side of a ramp which formerly connected to the original line to the Brooklyn shore at 65th Street in Bay Ridge.
After passing the former junction with the line to the shore, the Sea Beach widens to the width of four tracks. All stations have two side platforms with no platform access to the express tracks anywhere on the Sea Beach right-of-way.
Before and after Kings Highway, there are crossover switches to the southbound express track from the northbound express track. On both sides of Kings Highway, crossovers exist to allow express trains to switch to the local tracks before the station or local trains to switch to express after the station. The express tracks end south of 86th Street as the line becomes double-tracked, and cut diagonally adjacent to the Coney Island Yards. After several yard connections, the line ends at the Coney Island–Stillwell Avenue terminal.
The express tracks were originally intended to host the Coney Island Express. Service was carried on these tracks twice in the line's history — for summer weekend service to Chambers Street from 1924 to 1952 and again from 1967–1968 to provide a fast rush-hour Broadway Line express service for Coney Island riders (NX). Though these expresses are thought of as being Sea Beach Expresses, they did not serve a single station on the Sea Beach Line.
The express tracks on the Sea Beach had other uses over the years. Most new equipment, especially experimental cars, was broken in on these tracks. The tracks were used for motorman training and set up with a short stretch of 1950s-era automation to test the ill-fated system later used on one track of the IRT 42nd Street Shuttle.
Historically, the two express tracks were an absolute block, that is, there was no signal control between one end of the tracks near Sixth Avenue and Kings Highway. A train was not supposed to enter the block until any train in front of it had departed the block.
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BMT Sea Beach Line AI simulator
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BMT Sea Beach Line
The BMT Sea Beach Line is a rapid transit line of the BMT division of the New York City Subway, connecting the BMT Fourth Avenue Line at 59th Street via a four-track wide open cut to Coney Island in Brooklyn. It has at times hosted the fastest express service between Manhattan and Coney Island, since there are no express stations along the entire stretch, but now carries only local trains on the N service, which serves the entire line at all times. During rush hours, several W trains serve the line north of 86th Street.
The following services use part or all of the BMT Sea Beach Line:
The modern line begins as a split from the BMT Fourth Avenue Line at a flying junction immediately south of 59th Street. Between the station and the split, crossover switches are provided between the local and express tracks of the Fourth Avenue Line, and then the express tracks curve east under the northbound local track to become the beginning of the Sea Beach Line. After emerging from the tunnel under Fourth Avenue, the two separate Sea Beach tracks rise on either side of a ramp which formerly connected to the original line to the Brooklyn shore at 65th Street in Bay Ridge.
After passing the former junction with the line to the shore, the Sea Beach widens to the width of four tracks. All stations have two side platforms with no platform access to the express tracks anywhere on the Sea Beach right-of-way.
Before and after Kings Highway, there are crossover switches to the southbound express track from the northbound express track. On both sides of Kings Highway, crossovers exist to allow express trains to switch to the local tracks before the station or local trains to switch to express after the station. The express tracks end south of 86th Street as the line becomes double-tracked, and cut diagonally adjacent to the Coney Island Yards. After several yard connections, the line ends at the Coney Island–Stillwell Avenue terminal.
The express tracks were originally intended to host the Coney Island Express. Service was carried on these tracks twice in the line's history — for summer weekend service to Chambers Street from 1924 to 1952 and again from 1967–1968 to provide a fast rush-hour Broadway Line express service for Coney Island riders (NX). Though these expresses are thought of as being Sea Beach Expresses, they did not serve a single station on the Sea Beach Line.
The express tracks on the Sea Beach had other uses over the years. Most new equipment, especially experimental cars, was broken in on these tracks. The tracks were used for motorman training and set up with a short stretch of 1950s-era automation to test the ill-fated system later used on one track of the IRT 42nd Street Shuttle.
Historically, the two express tracks were an absolute block, that is, there was no signal control between one end of the tracks near Sixth Avenue and Kings Highway. A train was not supposed to enter the block until any train in front of it had departed the block.