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No. 7 Train is NYC’s Best Subway Line, According to Transit Advocacy Group

Photo: iStock

July 30, 2014 By Michael Florio

The No. 7 train has been crowned New York City’s best subway line by the transit advocacy group Straphangers.

This is the seventh time in 16 years that the No. 7 has received the top ranking since Straphangers began its State of the Subways annual report of the city’s 20 subway lines.

Straphangers said that the No. 7-line comes more frequently than any train, especially during rush hour.

For instance, the report said that during the AM rush, a train comes ever 2:30 minutes, while the average wait time for all trains is 5:29 minutes. As for the PM rush, a 7-train comes just as often as the morning (2:30 minutes), while it takes other trains an average of 6:02 minutes.

The 7-line also travels a much greater distance before suffering delays from mechanical failures than other trains.

It was also deemed to be cleaner than the average subway line, and passengers were more likely to get a seat.

The Q train was named the dirtiest train of those tested, as 17 percent of its cars were deemed to be “moderate to heavily dirty.”

The 2 train was named the worst subway line, for the second time in 16 years. This was due largely to the fact that riders are least likely to get a seat.

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24 Comments

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SuperWittySmitty

Julia, I was making that suggestion to all of the unhappy people, and that does NOT include me. I’m very happy and pleased with how nice Sunnyside is (and safe, especially on the south side.) I like the 7, I like the plaza, the dog run and that whole park, the library, the small merchants, and so forth I like how this neighborhood has changed since I moved here in the mid-nineties (I’d like to take some credit, but I’m too modest.)

My only complaint is that there are too many cars, trucks, and motorcycles racing through the streets and putting the pedestrians in danger. I’ve communicated with the mayor that we need a maximum speed limit of 15 MPH within the business & residential areas, and 25 anywhere else; more bike lanes and more areas closed to vehicular traffic; for foot traffic only. He seemed VERY receptive to my ideas.

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43rd & 43rd

This is insane. A train comes every 2:30 in the morning? What station are they using to measure that? Because at my stop, the most frequent announcement is “The next train will arrive in eight minutes.” And when it does, it doesn’t stop. Or if it stops, it’s too jammed for anyone to get on. I frequently have to wait for 2-4 trains to pass . . . waiting eight minutes in between each one. It adds incredible amounts of time to the commute. Of course the whole time you can watch Queens-bound trains arrive at the opposite platform — now they do come every two minutes. (Maybe that’s what they’re counting?)

The rush hour commute is by far the most stressful, worst thing about Sunnyside.

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aha

90% of the time, the 7 train gets me to work extremely timely. During morning rush, I just wait for the next almost empty train when it’s overly packed. 10% of the time, when it’s delayed, messed up, overcrowded, or hot/smelly/full of drunk baseball fans, it feels like the worst.
But overall I’m grateful.

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Robert

Hey Crane,
Cmon lets upgrade our standards…I have not been on a subway car on any line in 10 years that did not have AC! Thats a problem we had over 20 yrs ago….Im a native. I could care less whether it says what stop we are at….just run more trains frequently! I know where I am going as do most NYers.

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Julia Assange

Major signal problems whenever there is rain. And the “construction” goes on forever. Who is that “sick passenger” that I am always hearing about who keeps the train from moving? As for superwittywmitty, you first!

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Ted

All I can figure is that people voted on the basis of their favorite color and a lot of people like purple cause this is not a good train. Trains are badly crowded except when you’re going the opposite direction during rush hour, and constant weekend construction is a nightmare.

Its sad we have to be grateful for the Mets and US Open, otherwise the 7 would be worse then the G train.

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SuperWittySmitty

I ride the trains a lot and definitely prefer the 7 train to any other line. I wonder if there is a correlation between the people who like the 7 and the people who like the 46th subway plaza? It’s interesting that half the world has complaints and the other half has compliments.

If I was as unhappy as many of the people around here seem to be, I would be thinking of moving away. I think it’s a great idea- things are much better elsewhere, and you should go there; the sooner the better!

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Crane

It sounds like many of you guys don’t really take any other lines on a regular basis. The construction has been going on in order to upgrade the tracks and provide better visibility and information, sure it has been taking forever but I guess you all would prefer to ride on redbirds without A/C and broken doors. R62s are now being retired and all the construction was done so 7 line could get the latest trains, soon you will have signs on each station indicating how far the train is, how long the wait is, etc. Also Sunnyside stretch is one of the quietest elevated tracks, this is a huge plus, the convenience of the El without the noise and eyesore like the guys up in Woodside and rest of the line has.

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Crackerjack

Makes you wonder how bad the other lines must be!

I think the 7 has more “signal problems” than most other lines, and if you include the awful weekend construction that has plagued the line for YEARS. then there is no way the 7 can be considered the best line. But to be honest, when things are working ok I think the 7 comes more frequently, and is less crowded than most of the other lines I take.

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Roxy

Obviously, the voters never use the #7 during weekends or at other off-peak times when disruptive “track maintenance” continues on a seemingly eternal basis.

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Woody Woodpecker

Screw the passengers what do the want for there lousy 35 cents to live forever.

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Robert

Is this a joke? No seats, no service on the weekends and too many delays. Construction has been going on for DECADES!!! I am a 36 yr. old native of Sunnyside. I agree with the above that we need more local trains..

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Andrew

I think compared to years past, the 7 train has been improving. This is already the second new car update (although I have gripes with the new cars like no more green/red to easily distinguish between local and express). It can still get crowded during peak hours, but it’s not too bad depending on what station you get on and off. I do know that Queens bound trains during pm rush hour is still horribly crowded at Grand Central, but most of them get off at hunters pt. The trains do seem to come more frequently, though sometimes you will still get the dreaded wait usually due to some malfunction somewhere on the line. As for the downtime on weekends, well it’s really the MTA that is doing that, not the 7 train itself which if running normally is ok.

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SunnysidePosthatesme16

bwahahahahhahaAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Crane

mandy, I would agree with this, most of the time you don’t have to wait for 7 more than few minutes while you have to wait for F much longer. 7 is not as crowded (unless it is peak rush hours in the morning, evening is not that bad since you can catch both local and express) the main problem is the express in the morning manhattan bound, when it keeps skipping stations like broadway or 46th and stopping in stations like woodside 61st makes it pretty useless unless you take it from flushing. They should have two or three locals for each express because morning commute between 7:45 and 8:45 is really nightmare.

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Cptn Obvious

Hi mandy…. if you click on the link in the article for the “State of the Subways annual report” you can see who surveyed this and their methodology: the Straphangers Campaign, a very noted and trustworthy organization who “represent” NYC subway riders. Given the extensive data they compiled and reviewed we don’t need to rely on our own opinions to judge the subway lines. The answer is in the data that was collected! It’s neat how social science works. Yay for the #7. Yay for empirical data!

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Anon

This is just absurd. The 7 local is awful. Crowded, comes very infrequently and has been down on weekends for the past 2 years. Maybe the express is a little better, but the 7 local may actually be the worst train in NYC! What a joke!

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mandy

Who did this survey? I’ve lived off of almost every subway line in the city, and the 7 is by far the worst.

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