   #copyright

New York City Subway nomenclature

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Railway transport

   Entrance to the IRT Lexington Avenue Line at Wall Street, leading to
   the southbound ("Downtown & Brooklyn") platform
   Enlarge
   Entrance to the IRT Lexington Avenue Line at Wall Street, leading to
   the southbound ("Downtown & Brooklyn") platform

   New York City Subway nomenclature describes terminology used on the New
   York City Subway system as derived from railroading practice,
   historical origins of the system, and engineering, publicity, and legal
   usage. These include line names, which refer to individual sections of
   subway, like the BMT Brighton Line; service labels, like the B, which
   is a single train route along several lines; and station names, like
   Coney Island–Stillwell Avenue.

Current status

              Trunk line            Service bullets
   Broadway (BMT) Line
   IRT Broadway-Seventh Avenue Line
   Canarsie Line
   Crosstown Line
   Eighth Avenue Line
   Flushing Line
   Lexington Avenue Line
   Nassau Street Line
   Shuttles
   Sixth Avenue

   Each section of subway has three identifying characteristics, line,
   service and colour. The most constant is the line, the physical
   structure and tracks that trains run over. Each section of the system
   is assigned a unique line name, usually paired with the division (
   Brooklyn-Manhattan Transit Corporation (BMT), Interborough Rapid
   Transit Company (IRT), Independent Subway System (IND)). For example,
   the line under Eighth Avenue is the IND Eighth Avenue Line. Some lines
   have changed names (and even divisions), but this happens relatively
   infrequently.

   Public usage of the line names varies widely. Internally, the MTA uses
   the names, both for legal reasons and to describe lines, services and
   locations without ambiguity. Even the terms BMT, IRT and IND are still
   used in line, structure and building descriptions and capital contract
   specifications.

   Each operating service or route is assigned a letter or number. This is
   a path that the train service uses along the various lines. These are
   the most familiar names among the public, but may change frequently
   during construction or as services are rerouted to make best use of the
   network. Former IRT services (now known as Division A) are assigned
   numbers, and former BMT and IND services (now known as Division B) are
   assigned letters. IRT trains and tunnels are narrower, so the two do
   not mix in revenue service.

   Each service is also assigned a colour, corresponding to the downtown
   Manhattan trunk line it uses; the Crosstown Line, which doesn't carry
   services to Manhattan, is colored light green, and all shuttles are
   colored dark gray.

   Stations usually bear street names, but may also be named after
   neighborhoods or prominent locations (e.g., " Brighton Beach", "
   Cypress Hills") or combinations of these (e.g., " Times Square–42nd
   Street", " 47th–50th Streets–Rockefeller Centre"). Many stations share
   names, so to uniquely identify a station, the line name or cross street
   must be specified. (For example, there are three stations at Kings
   Highway in Brooklyn.) Usually, identifying the service is also
   sufficient, but as services are transient, this is not a permanent
   label.
   A rollsign reading on a R68A car. The sign reads:Midtown57 St/7 Av-----
   Coney Island
   Enlarge
   A rollsign reading on a R68A car. The sign reads:

                                   Midtown
                                 57 St/7 Av
                                    -----
                                Coney Island

   In addition to the typical street or location names assigned to most
   stations, terminals (the ends of lines and/or services) also usually
   bear the name of the local community (e.g., " Middle
   Village–Metropolitan Avenue"), especially on maps and signs.

Diamond services

   Normal and diamond 7 bullets.
   Normal and diamond 7 bullets.

   Despite its efforts toward single identifiers for each service, the MTA
   has adopted a variation of a signage practice that began with street
   railways, in which a variant service is identified with a special
   colour or symbol on the route number signs. For example, if a service
   was designated 10, a short-line of the service might have a diagonal
   stroke through the number. This informed boarding riders that the car
   would not travel all the way to its usual destination.

   This has been implemented on the subway by use of diamond services.
   Since a route letter or number is ordinarily presented inside a circle,
   variants of the same service are shown as the same letter or number
   inside a diamond shape.

   Current diamond services are:
     * 6 regular service all local; daytime directional diamond service
       express in the Bronx (with local service in the same direction cut
       back to Parkchester)
     * 7 regular service all local; daytime directional diamond service
       express in Queens

   Until the end of May 2005, 5 rush hour trips to 238th Street Bronx were
   marked with a diamond, with regular service to Dyre Avenue. Both
   services run express in the Bronx between East 180th Street and 3rd
   Avenue/149th Street during rush hours in the peak direction.

   Current rollsigns include several unused options to replace these. To
   replace the green 5 and 6 diamond services are green 8, 10 and 12
   circles, and a purple 11 circle is present for a replacement of the 7
   diamond. The rollsigns also have the regular diamonds, but with the
   word "Express" under the bullet.

   On the other hand, the rush-hour only skip-stop service that
   complements the J is designated Z rather than with diamonds. Similarly
   the 9 ran skip-stop with the 1 until May 2005. Diamond service was also
   introduced on the BMT Brighton Line during the Manhattan Bridge
   closure, with Brooklyn locals being the Circle Q and expresses being
   the Diamond Q. Other services have also used the diamond before and
   during the closure; at least one (the diamond R) dated from a BMT
   special service using the same number (2) as the main service that
   became the R.

Describing directions

Public information

   Directions along a line in Manhattan or the Bronx are usually described
   as uptown and downtown, roughly corresponding to compass north and
   south. Uptown and downtown are not always meaningful on lines in the
   other boroughs or on the crosstown IRT Flushing and BMT Canarsie Lines
   or the downtown-only BMT Nassau Street Line.

   On the BMT system, most in-station signage specified To City and From
   City. Currently signs typically read To Manhattan and To Coney Island,
   To Flushing, or any other outer borough destination. If the train is
   headed to a different borough, it is described as Borough-bound, for
   example, Manhattan-bound or Brooklyn-bound. If its terminus is in the
   same borough, it will be described as Terminus-bound, for example, 8th
   Avenue-bound or Canarsie-bound. An exception is the BMT Fourth Avenue
   Line in Brooklyn, where uptown means toward 95th Street in Bay Ridge,
   which is compass south, and downtown means to Downtown Brooklyn, which
   is compass north.

Internal usage

   In the U.S., most railroads have only two railroad directions. In this
   vein, all New York City subway lines are deemed to run north-south. In
   many cases, this is close to the related compass direction, but this is
   not always possible. Any line that enters Manhattan from the Bronx or
   Queens heads south into Manhattan; any line entering Manhattan from
   Brooklyn goes north into Manhattan. Directions of other lines are
   determined by following the services that run over them; except for the
   BMT Eastern Division services (over the Williamsburg Bridge), which
   change direction at Chambers Street, every service has one north end
   and one south end. On the 42nd Street Shuttle, railroad north is
   compass west, due to the line's former status as part of the main line.

   In fact, very few track connections exist to allow a train to reverse
   railroad direction without running around a loop or literally reversing
   direction by backing up. The IND system (except on the ex- LIRR
   Rockaway Line) has none of these; this philosophy may explain the lack
   of track connections between parallel IND lines at Seventh Avenue and
   Hoyt–Schermerhorn Streets.

   Before unification, all BMT lines ran east-west, west being towards
   Manhattan. After Unification, west became north and east became south.

History

   This nomenclature has been complicated by the differing systems and
   cultures of the former private companies that operated parts of the
   system, by the need for non-ambiguous names in a city where there are
   stations with the same name on different lines in different locations
   and even different Boroughs, and by changing perceptions of the best
   way to communicate information to a diverse public.

   Up until 1940, there were three major operators of New York subway and
   elevated lines, the Brooklyn-Manhattan Transit Corporation (BMT), the
   Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT) and the Independent Subway
   System (ISS or ICOS before 1940, now IND).

   Service labels have always been assigned based on their outer line
   (Brooklyn on the BMT, Bronx on the IRT and IND) and then by the
   Manhattan trunk if necessary to distinguish multiple services on the
   same line.

BMT

   CAPTION: BMT numbers, 1924–1967

                     Line                          Division
   1  Brighton Beach Line                Southern Division (subway)
   2  Fourth Avenue Line
   3  West End Line
   4  Sea Beach Line
   5  Culver Line                        Southern Division (elevated)
   6  Fifth Avenue–Bay Ridge Line
   7  Brighton–Franklin Line
   8  Astoria Line                       Queens Division (elevated)
   9  Flushing Line
   10 Myrtle Avenue–Chambers Street Line Eastern Division (elevated)
   11 Myrtle Avenue Line
   12 Lexington Avenue Line
   13 Fulton Street Line
   14 Broadway–Brooklyn Line
   15 Jamaica Line
   16 14th Street–Canarsie Line          Eastern Division (subway)
   Typical pre-1967 BMT rollsign number
   Enlarge
   Typical pre-1967 BMT rollsign number

   The BMT was the inheritor of subway, elevated and surface rapid transit
   lines that had been built in Brooklyn by a variety of previous
   operators, mainly surface steam railroads to Coney Island and elevated
   railroads in more populated areas. The BMT identified most of its lines
   by the common names given to them, often going well back into the 19th
   century. Services on these lines usually had the same name as the
   branch line they ran on; for example, the line that the current F
   service runs on in Brooklyn was (and is) the Culver Line, and the BMT
   signed these trains Culver Local or Culver Express.

   Partly as a result of its steam railroad history, BMT terminals were
   far more likely to be named after neighborhoods or towns, rather than
   streets, so trains were signed for Coney Island, Canarsie and Jamaica
   rather than Stillwell Avenue, Rockaway Parkway and 168th Street.
   Stations also tended to use local names, but this gradually changed,
   especially as lines were upgraded, so that stations like Bath Junction
   on the Sea Beach Line became New Utrecht Avenue and Manhattan Terrace
   on the Brighton Line became Avenue J.

   The BMT introduced numbers for all its services in 1924 but these were
   mostly for map purposes, since none of equipment displayed line numbers
   until the D-type Triplex cars were introduced in 1927, and these only
   on the front of the trains (but later also on the sides ). In 1931
   these numbers were also used on 16 IND R1 cars when they were tested by
   the City on BMT lines.

IRT

   CAPTION: Early IRT numbers

            Uptown branch             Manhattan trunk line
   1 Broadway-Seventh Avenue Line Broadway–Seventh Avenue Line
   2 White Plains Road Line
   3 Lenox Avenue Line
   4 IRT Jerome Avenue Line       Lexington Avenue Line
   5 White Plains Road Line
   6 Pelham Line
   7 Flushing Line                Queensborough Line
   8 Astoria Line
   9 Dyre Avenue Shuttle (non-Manhattan service)
   Typical pre-1967 IRT rollsign number
   Enlarge
   Typical pre-1967 IRT rollsign number

   The IRT was the contractor with the City of New York to operate the
   first subway lines; by that time it was already leasing all the
   elevated railways in Manhattan. Unlike the BMT, the IRT had multiple
   long mainlines (eventually six of them) from which several branch lines
   extended into the Bronx, Queens and Brooklyn. The IRT therefore named
   their services for these mainlines rather than their branches. The
   branch lines were mentioned on the destination signs instead, to that
   typical signage read Lexington Avenue Express to Woodlawn - Jerome and
   Utica Avenue - Brooklyn, meaning Woodlawn on the Jerome Avenue Line and
   Utica Avenue on the Brooklyn Line. Where a service ended in downtown
   Manhattan, it simply carried the destination name, for example South
   Ferry or Chatham Square.

   The IRT subways used a logical numbering system, but the numbers were
   not used publicly until the R12 cars were introduced in 1948, under
   City management. Due to the lack of new IRT construction, this system
   has largely stayed intact to this day, with the only major changes
   being at the Brooklyn end.

IND

   CAPTION: Early IND letters

          Uptown branch          Manhattan trunk line
   A Washington Heights Line Eighth Avenue Line
   B                         Sixth Avenue Line
   C Concourse Line          Eighth Avenue Line
   D                         Sixth Avenue Line
   E Queens Boulevard Line   Eighth Avenue Line
   F                         Sixth Avenue Line
   G Brooklyn–Queens Crosstown Line (non-Manhattan service)
   H Fulton Street Line (non-Manhattan service)
   S Specials (no consistent usage)
   Typical pre-1967 IND rollsign letter
   Enlarge
   Typical pre-1967 IND rollsign letter

   The IND adopted the IRT system whole but reversed the terminal and line
   name on the destination signs: Queens - 179th St. for 179th Street
   terminal on the Queens Boulevard Line. The IND also adopted a similar
   logical labeling system, but used them publicly on trains and maps.
   Single letters were used to indicate an express service and double
   letters indicates locals. For example, the CC ran local and the C ran
   express on the Concourse and Eighth Avenue Lines.

   Unlike the IRT labels, the IND letters no longer follow the original
   pattern; the uptown branches of the B and C services have been switched
   via a complex process that involved the former AA eventually becoming
   the C and the B moving to the Concourse Line. Again, major changes have
   been made at the Brooklyn end (and in downtown Manhattan), but the
   system was designed for flexibility on that end.

Unification and BMT/IND service integration

   When all three systems came under city ownership in 1940, essentially
   nothing was done to regularize signage for two decades. Stations on the
   IRT and BMT still said INTERBOROUGH or BMT LINES or sometimes older
   designations. Services continued to be signed by their traditional
   methods for each system. IND and post- Second World War ("R-type")
   equipment used BMT numbers when operating on BMT services. With the
   introduction of R12 equipment on the IRT in 1948, IRT subway services
   (except for the 42nd Street Shuttle) began using the route numbers
   still used today, which had been used internally but not on trains or
   maps. Astoria Line trains were only signed as 8 for a year, after which
   the line, which had been shared with the BMT, was converted for BMT
   operation only (and the Flushing Line carried only IRT trains).

   CAPTION: BMT letters and old numbers, 1960 mapping

   Letter Old number Line
   J 15 Jamaica Line (express)
   K 14 Broadway–Brooklyn Line to Canarsie Line or Jamaica Line (local)
   L 16 Canarsie Line via 14th Street
   M 10 Myrtle Avenue Line from Lower Manhattan
   MJ 11 Myrtle Avenue Line from Downtown Brooklyn
   N 4 Sea Beach Line
   Q 1 Brighton Beach Line
   R 2 Fourth Avenue Line
   T 3 West End Line
   SS 5 Culver Line
   S 7 Brighton–Franklin Line

   In 1960, with the delivery of the first R27 class cars for the BMT, the
   New York City Transit Authority (TA), which had become the operator of
   the combined system in 1953, began the introduction of letters for BMT
   services in anticipation of integrating the BMT and IND operationally.
   The last IND letter used was H, and the letter I was skipped as being
   too similar to the number 1. The BMT Eastern Division services got the
   letters J, K, L and M. The BMT Southern Division services were
   designated N, Q, R and T. P was for some reason skipped over, and while
   one theory says this was because it might lend itself to bathroom
   humor, the letter's unusability for this reason would seem to be
   disproven by the fact that the letter was later proposed for an
   emergency line that would replace Long Island Rail Road service to Penn
   station in the event of a strike, and the fact that other cities like
   San Francisco use the letter. A more likely theory suggests that it was
   originally planned for the last segment of Culver service to Manhattan,
   which was cut back to a shuttle permanently, right before the letters
   were introduced. S was still reserved for "Special" and SS began to be
   used for shuttles. Since the BMT was not amenable to the neat IND
   system, the TA had to make some compromises. They tried to follow the
   IND system of single-letter expresses and double-letter locals, but the
   system began to break down under the complex BMT routings. Where on the
   IND a local simply doubled the express letter ( A Eighth Avenue
   Express, AA Eighth Avenue Local), some lines had multiple local
   services with different routings. For instance the two Brighton Local
   services, one via the Manhattan Bridge and the other via the Montague
   Street Tunnel, were designated QB and QT respectively. The TA had no
   specific lettering plan for the two Wall Street special rush-hour
   services, so it just designated these M (Nassau Street Express)
   temporarily, a letter reserved for use on the BMT Myrtle Avenue Line's
   Nassau Street service.

   During this period, the TA did not change sign rolls on BMT equipment
   (the D-types and R16s) that carried numbers, so that on the Brighton
   Line, the R27-operated locals were signed QB or QT but the
   D-type-operated expresses continued to carry the number 1.


                                          1  2  3    4    5  6  7  8
                                          A  AA B    CC   D  E  EE F
                                          GG HH J    JJ   K  KK LL M
                                          MJ N  NX   QB   QJ RR RJ TT
                                          SS 145 St
                                             135 St       SS Dyre Av
                                                             E 180 St
                                          SS Bowling Green
                                             South Ferry  SS Grand Central
                                                             Times Square
                                          SS Prospect Park
                                             Franklin Av  SS 9 Av
                                                             Ditmas Av

                                        Former service colors, 1967-1979
                                       (shuttles all became green in 1968)

   A typical post-1967 side rollsign
   Enlarge
   A typical post-1967 side rollsign

   In anticipation of the 1967 opening of the Chrystie Street Connection,
   which combined two major BMT and IND services as single routes and
   resulted in numerous other changes (especially on the 14 and 15), the
   TA decided to adopt universal systems of signage and nomenclature. The
   rationale was that this would make the system more consistent and more
   understandable for newcomers to the city and tourists, who were
   presumed to be uninterested or even confused in historic or community
   names, or might not be native English speakers.
    1. Branch line names would be eliminated from signage and maps; all
       services that had Manhattan mainlines would be identified by those
       names only.
    2. Services would be identified only by letters or numbers wherever
       possible, even when announcing reroutings.
    3. Terminals would be identified by street names rather than community
       names where that existed. This had actually begun with the
       introduction of R-type equipment, when destinations such as
       Woodlawn and Canarsie were changed to read Woodlawn Road (which is
       no longer the name of a road) and Rockaway Parkway.
    4. All services would be colour-coded for map and rollsign purposes.
       This proved a daunting task, since the TA wanted to ensure that no
       two services with the exact same color would operate over the same
       line. With a lot of imagination and a lot of colour variations,
       this goal was achieved but proved unwieldy. The colors didn't have
       any particular logic and still produced ambiguity; notably the A
       service and the E service shared miles of line between Midtown
       Manhattan and the Rockaway Line in Queens, one as an express, the
       other as a local. But the A was assigned dark blue and the E light
       blue, not always easily distinguishable.

   The 8 designation was brought back for the only remaining IRT elevated
   service, the IRT Third Avenue Line in the Bronx but trains never
   displayed the number. When the Lo-V cars (which did not have front
   signs) were replaced by R12 cars the front roll signs in use did not
   contain the number 8 and instead diplayed the word SHUTTLE. For map and
   sign purposes MJ was assigned to the last old-style elevated line,
   standing for "Myrtle Avenue Line to Jay Street", while the "Myrtle
   Avenue line to Chambers St." subway service would finally receive its M
   designation. The short-lived new Sea Beach Line super-express service
   was made NX. The Q, QT and T disappeared when the Chrystie Street
   Connection opened; thus they never had colors (until after the
   elimination of double letters, when the Q came back; by that time the
   current colour system was in place). By 1968, all shuttles (SS) were
   green. For a short time, the off-hour shuttle between Metropolitan
   Avenue and Myrtle Avenue was added in 1969 when the MJ service to Jay
   St. was discontinued, and that part of the line abandoned. The shuttle
   was soon renamed "M", however, as it only ran when the M to Manhattan
   didn't run.

After Chrystie Street

   The system immediately showed evidence of problems for various reasons:
    1. Different services at common stations shared common destinations by
       different routes. N, B and QJ services arriving at DeKalb Avenue,
       for example, all had Coney Island as a destination, but had no
       mention of the widely separated routes ( Sea Beach Line, West End
       Line, Brighton Line) used to get there.
    2. Service labels are ephemeral. The TA has frequently shifted
       lettered routes from one branch line to another, and introduced,
       changed or deleted letters, making a description like "the D Line"
       meaningless. The D service has been on three completely different
       Brooklyn branch lines since 1954. K was introduced for a service on
       the Broadway-Brooklyn Line but was later used for the IND Eighth
       Avenue Line local which had formerly been AA.
    3. The same lettered or numbered lines may have different destinations
       by time of day, despite a largely successful effort to minimize
       this problem.
    4. Newcomers to New York City have recently shown more interest in
       their neighborhoods and city history, as have long-term residents.
       Some people feel that the emphasis on letters and numbers for
       routes and street names instead of communities is dehumanizing.

Elimination of double letters

   In June 1979 the former color scheme was scrapped, and the TA settled
   on the more coherent policy of assigning the same color to every
   service on each Manhattan mainline, plus different colors for lines not
   entering Manhattan, the colors still used today. Nevertheless, no New
   York subway line is referred to by its colour – e.g., BMT Broadway Line
   services as the "Yellow Line." While this practice tends to be used
   amongst visitors to New York City, it is strongly discouraged, and
   sometimes frowned upon by native New Yorkers. There are simply too many
   such services on too many different lines and destinations for the
   colors to be meaningful as line names, as in other cities.

   The JFK Express, started in 1978 and discontinued in 1990, used a
   turquoise bullet; this stayed through the colour change.


          AA   → K 8 Avenue Local
          CC   → C 8 Avenue Local (rush hour "diamond" service)
         CC/ A → H Rockaway Shuttle
          GG   → G Brooklyn-Queens Crosstown
          LL   → L 14 Street-Canarsie Local
          QB   → Q Broadway Express (had been rush hour "diamond" service)
          RR   → R Broadway Local
          RR   → R Nassau Street Local (rush hour "diamond" service)

                                1986 letter changes

   On May 5, 1986, the last significant change in route identification
   policy was made after the TA had decided in 1981 that the single and
   double letter system of the original IND was no longer meaningful,
   given that there were many services that were express for part of their
   route and local for other parts. In most cases, this was accomplished
   by simply eliminating the second letter in route designations. There is
   no longer a letter designation for specials (formerly S).
   A current sign reading indicating that the train runs express on the
   Eastern Parkway Line.
   Enlarge
   A current sign reading indicating that the train runs express on the
   Eastern Parkway Line.

   In the last decade the TA has moved steadily toward using traditional
   line names on maps and especially on signage. All of the southern
   Brooklyn subway lines now show the traditional line names. On BMT/IND
   equipment branch line names frequently appear on operating trains, in
   addition the route letter. R32 equipment with rollsigns, for example,
   may read:

   A | Washington Heights-8 Avenue-Fulton
   N | Astoria-Broadway-Sea Beach
   Q | Broadway Brighton

   One change which exceeds the pre-Unification practice has to do with
   the use of locality names. Where these were discouraged during the
   1960s where they had been inherited from private operators, virtually
   all terminal stations are described by both a community and a street
   name; i.e., Inwood-207th Street for the northern destination of the A
   service; Wakefield-241st Street for the northern desination of the 2
   service.

Route consistency

   Since the unsuccessful attempts at applying the briefly popular
   schematic theory of diagrammatic maps, line-by-line colour coding, and
   exclusive use of numbers and letters for service and line descriptions,
   the MTA has moved steadily toward a more traditional approach, with
   more geographically correct maps and use of traditional line and
   community names on maps and public signage.

   Concurrently, it has been refining its use of the number and letter
   system to try to achieve consistency across the system. One major push
   has been an attempt to have as many services as possible serve the same
   stations, routes and terminals at all times with the major exception
   for most services being the early morning hours of approximately
   midnight to 5 am (00:00-05:00). To this end, the MTA took advantage of
   the unavoidable service changes forced by the partial Manhattan Bridge
   closures to reroute some services when all bridge tracks reopened in
   2004. Particularly, the Brooklyn branch lines of the B and D services
   were switched, with the B becoming the BMT Brighton Line express
   service and the D becoming the BMT West End Line express. This enabled
   the D, a full time service, to operate continuously on the same route
   and terminals from the Bronx to Coney Island, while the part-time B was
   meshed with the part-time Brighton Express service.

Operator codes

   Train operators have a series of "12-" codes to describe incidents
   while on their run, including:
     * 12-1: Used as the first statement, to gain the attention of the
       dispatcher.
     * 12-2: Fire or smoke on the train or roadbed
     * 12-3: Flood or serious water condition
     * 12-4: Unused to avoid confusion with 10-4
     * 12-5: Stalled train
     * 12-6: Derailment
     * 12-7: Request for police or medical assistance
     * 12-8: Armed passenger
     * 12-9: Passenger under train
     * 12-10: Unauthorized person on track or catwalk
     * 12-11: Serious vandalism
     * 12-12: Disorderly passengers

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   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_Subway_nomenclature"
   This reference article is mainly selected from the English Wikipedia
   with only minor checks and changes (see www.wikipedia.org for details
   of authors and sources) and is available under the GNU Free
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