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@Another Josh:
One more thing. I won't say you're wrong about waiting through several Greens between Yellows. You obviously experience this.

But the gap in Yellow Line trains is not because the first one to start running to Fort Totten takes longer to come back.

In the afternoon, when the last "rush" Yellow Line train ends at Mount Vernon Square, the Yellow Line train that will follow it southbound 12 minutes later is already running southbound on the Green Line.

To prevent a big gap in service, a few Yellow Line trains are dispatched from Greenbelt Yard to cover southbound coverage, while northbound trains cover the additional track between Mount Vernon Square and Fort Totten and back.

It takes a train 11 minutes to get from Mount Vernon Square to Fort Totten. Let's assume it takes about 2 minutes to turn a train at the crossover. It then takes 11 minutes to get back to Mount Vernon Square. If there were no Yellow trains dispatched from Greenbelt, there would be a 24 minute gap in service.

I've observed this happening a good bit, since I transfer at Fort Totten every day. Generally, when the first Yellow Line train of the evening to Fort Totten arrives, you can watch a southbound Yellow Line train arriving (with passengers) on the southbound platform.

by Matt Johnson on Jun 11, 2012 12:03 pm • link • report