Quickest way from Shea to Penn?

Which of these is generally considered a faster way to get from Shea
Stadium to Penn Station:

- stay on the 7 train all the way to Times Square, then take the 1/2/3
to Penn

OR

- stay on the 7 only until Jackson Hts/Roosevelt/Broadway, then transfer
to the E and ride it to Penn

?

I ask this mainly because there isn't any express 7 service *leaving*
Shea after games; in evenings, express only goes to Queens, not from it.

(At Yankee Stadium, OTOH, it's easy; just ride the 4 downtown one stop,
then transfer to the 2 at 149th St. and ride it all the way to Penn)

Why do I need to get to Penn so quickly? It's because I always stay with
relatives in NJ, and I would prefer not to keep them up too late waiting
for me. :)

--
"Drop the One Ring! Drop it NOW!"
- Jack Bauer in 'Lord of the Rings'

Addendum: I did the math, and there are six fewer stations I would have
to stop at, if I transferred to the E at 74/Broadway (vs. staying on the
7 until Times Square).

But what I wonder is, would this be offset by the time I'd spend waiting
for the E at 74/Broadway? And, conversely, would the *increased* travel
time (by staying on the 7 till Times Square, and thus stopping at more
stations) be itself offset by the presumably *less* time it would take
transferring from the 7 to 1/2/3 at Times Square?

(I'm just guessing that, since Times Square is a busier station, thus I
would assume trains run more frequently there, then transferring from
the 7 to 1/2/3 there would not take quite as much time as transferring
from the 7 to the E at 74/Broadway. Is this accurate?)

--
"Drop the One Ring! Drop it NOW!"
- Jack Bauer in 'Lord of the Rings'

furles@mail.croydon.ac.uk wrote:
>
> I don't know exactly where the station is, I've never been there, have
> only been on the LIRR a few times, and have no interest whatsoever in
> sport , so it's unlikely that I would ever go there.

Sport!? Didn't they have only baseball at Shea?

On Aug 8, 4:34 am, Patok <pa...@pataklama.net> wrote:
> fur...@mail.croydon.ac.uk wrote:
>
> > I don't know exactly where the station is,

It's south of the subway. Going to the World's Fair by subway, you
crossed over the train tracks on an immense boardwalk.

> I've never been there, have
> > only been on the LIRR a few times, and have no interest whatsoever in
> > sport , so it's unlikely that I would ever go there.
>
> Sport!? Didn't they have only baseball at Shea?

And rock concerts.

And Billy Graham revivals.

"Sport" is Brit for "sports."

I remember seeing, ca. 1963, what might later be called an infomercial
about how great Shea Stadium was going to be (maybe Robert Moses was
in it!), in which they demonstrated that there would be movable seat
sections so that it could be configured for football _or_ baseball.
The Jets played there for some number of seasons.

On Aug 8, 8:37 am, fur...@mail.croydon.ac.uk wrote:
> On 8 Aug, 12:46, "Peter T. Daniels" <gramma...@> wrote:
>
>
>
> > On Aug 8, 4:34 am, Patok <pa...@pataklama.net> wrote:
>
> > > fur...@mail.croydon.ac.uk wrote:
>
> > > > I don't know exactly where the station is,
>
> > It's south of the subway. Going to the World's Fair by subway, you
> > crossed over the train tracks on an immense boardwalk.
>
> > > I've never been there, have
> > > > only been on the LIRR a few times, and have no interest whatsoever in
> > > > sport , so it's unlikely that I would ever go there.
>
> > > Sport!? Didn't they have only baseball at Shea?
>
> > And rock concerts.
>
> > And Billy Graham revivals.
>
> > "Sport" is Brit for "sports."
>
> > I remember seeing, ca. 1963, what might later be called an infomercial
> > about how great Shea Stadium was going to be (maybe Robert Moses was
> > in it!), in which they demonstrated that there would be movable seat
> > sections so that it could be configured for football _or_ baseball.
> > The Jets played there for some number of seasons.
>
> To be honest, I don't know what they do there, beyond the fact that
> it's some sort of sporting venue. In May there were posters up in
> Subway stations for the 'Final Season', I think that was the phrase
> which was used, at Shea Stadium. What's happening, is it closing
> completely, or are whoever play there moving elsewhere, or what? I
> thought it was a newish venue, built around mid-'60s sometime.

Very few stadiums last as long as 50 years.

The Mets played their first two seasons (1962-63) at the Polo Grounds
in Manhattan, which had been the home of the Giants before they moved
to San Francisco in 1958.

Maybe the football Giants played there too, I don't know anything
about football.

Both Shea Stadium and Yankee Stadium are being replaced -- the new
buildings will open (adjacent to the sites of the old ones) next
season.

> The strange thing is that the timetable for Shea Stadium shows it open
> on game days only, but with trains running for several hours. It
> seems more typical for stations which only serve a sporting venue to
> have just a handful of trains in the hour or so before a game starts,
> and after it finishes, like the Ballpark station on the Staten Island
> Railway, for example.

Willetts Point is not merely a "sporting venue."

> The LIRR also has a timetable for another 'special station, Belmont
> Park I think it was called; is this another sporting venue of some
> sort? Where is it?

Belmont Park is just over the border from Queens in Nassau County.
It's a race track, where the third leg of the Triple Crown -- the
"Belmont Stakes" -- is run each June.

The subway serves Aqueduct Race Track, too, with a station on a siding
just north of Howard Beach that's served on race days.

So is the Shea LIRR station relatively easy to find? It's "south" of the
station, but how far? Is it hidden, or out in the open? (I've been
through the subway station many times and have not seen much of the
surrounding area)

--
"Drop the One Ring! Drop it NOW!"
- Jack Bauer in 'Lord of the Rings'

On Aug 8, 11:37 am, hanco...@bbs.cpcn.com wrote:
> On Aug 8, 7:46 am, "Peter T. Daniels" <gramma...@> wrote:
>
> > I remember seeing, ca. 1963, what might later be called an infomercial
> > about how great Shea Stadium was going to be (maybe Robert Moses was
> > in it!), in which they demonstrated that there would be movable seat
> > sections so that it could be configured for football _or_ baseball.
> > The Jets played there for some number of seasons.
>
> Did they actually install the movable seat sections?
>
> The stadium site was offered to the Brooklyn Dodgers who refused it.
> LA gave them a very generous stadium package, more than NYC could
> prudently afford, so the Dodgers moved to LA. Some of the demands by
> the Dodger owner at the time were really outrageous and unfair to the
> city.

More pro-Moses propaganda from nyct's biggest Moses fan..

Okay...bringing this thread (that I started ;) ) back to its original
topic - getting from Shea to Penn.

Using the LIRR is interesting. I never thought of that before. Have any
of you used this route - riding the LIRR from Shea to Penn? What did you
think of it? How long did it take? Is the Shea Stadium LIRR station easy
to find, if you're just walking around near the station? (I found it on
Google Maps but that isn't exactly everything)

And assuming that I only intend to ride the LIRR in one direction (from
Shea to Penn; I have enough time before the games that I can ride the 7
train *to* Shea. If nothing else, I save money by only buying a one-way
LIRR ticket, right?), I assume I can still buy the return ticket at
Penn, even though I'm *ending* my trip there, not starting it?

--
"Drop the One Ring! Drop it NOW!"
- Jack Bauer in 'Lord of the Rings'

On Mon, 11 Aug 2008 03:45:29 +0000 (UTC), General Kireiko
<douglas@panix.com> wrote:

>You should also know that the MTA DOES run #7 express trains back to
>Times Square after night games. They will not run until 10 minutes or
>so after the final out is made. This train will make fewer stops than
>a regular #7 express.

In particular, it skips Junction Blvd, Hunters Point & Vernon-Jackson.
If you want to change for the E/F/R at 74th-Roosevelt, you must take
the local. You can also change for the E/G from the express at
Courthouse Square, unless you used a single-ride metrocard (you need
to walk a half-block outside the system to the E/V/G station, then you
get a free transfer in - board the 7 at the front of the train if you
are going to do this).

You use a separate set of turnstiles to board the express than the
local. There seems to be no way to go between the express and local
platforms within the paid zone. I'm not sure if that is now the
permanent configuration or they just rearrange the station for the
postgame service (I was there yesterday for the first time this year,
and likely my final visit to Shea), but this configuration also makes
access to the LIRR easier.

--
Peter Schleifer
"Save me from the people who would save me from myself"

On Aug 11, 8:20 am, Peter Schleifer <pschl...@speakeasy.org> wrote:
> On Mon, 11 Aug 2008 03:45:29 +0000 (UTC), General Kireiko
> <doug...@panix.com> wrote:

> >You should also know that the MTA DOES run #7 express trains back to
> >Times Square after night games. They will not run until 10 minutes or
> >so after the final out is made. This train will make fewer stops than
> >a regular #7 express.
>
> In particular, it skips Junction Blvd, Hunters Point & Vernon-Jackson.
> If you want to change for the E/F/R at 74th-Roosevelt, you must take
> the local.

(Not because of anything special about this train, but because it's a
local stop.)

> You can also change for the E/G from the express at
> Courthouse Square, unless you used a single-ride metrocard (you need
> to walk a half-block outside the system to the E/V/G station, then you
> get a free transfer in - board the 7 at the front of the train if you
> are going to do this).

I've always wondered about those outside-the-system free transfers.
Does that then use up your transfer so you can't get on a bus after?

> You use a separate set of turnstiles to board the express than the
> local. There seems to be no way to go between the express and local
> platforms within the paid zone. I'm not sure if that is now the
> permanent configuration or they just rearrange the station for the
> postgame service (I was there yesterday for the first time this year,
> and likely my final visit to Shea), but this configuration also makes
> access to the LIRR easier.