MTA Battles Blizzard With Gigantic Snow Blower Train

photos from NYCTSubwayScoop's twitter

To clear snow from outdoor subway lines during this week's winter storm, the MTA brought out the heavy artillery: A five-car diesel train outfitted with a high-powered snow blower than can launch snow as far as 200 feet from tracks. Using a six-foot cylindrical brush, the train sweeps snow into a metal tube and hurls it out of a chute so it doesn't block the tracks, according to the Daily News. "It's like your household snow blower but a million times bigger," said agency engineer Edward Macina.

During the storm, the diesel snow blower was used to clear the five-mile stretch of the A line between Howard Beach and the Rockaways. Meanwhile, the MTA used 60 work trains to clear the rails and dispense de-icer on the Dyre line in the Bronx and the Sea Beach, Brighton, and Culver lines in Brooklyn, as well as other lines that make up the agency's 220 miles of outdoor subway tracks.

If the agency didn't clear the tracks, snow could have triggered a train's emergency brakes or damaged its engine, while ice on the third rail could have cut power or jammed switches, according to the tabloid. Overnight, MTA NYC Transit parked thousands of subway cars in tunnels to keep them out of the snow, while police dispatched extra officers underground to stop graffiti writers from taking advantage of a moment when parked trains were less secure than usual.

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By Ben Muessig in News on February 12, 2010 2:30 PM

Comments [rss]

Theodore Wirth

Man, I love this thing! But did you really have to out it? Now it will become fodder for politicians and tea-baggers who want to point out "wasteful spending" that is always equivocated with necessary budgeting. If and when this device needs to be upgraded/updated (and it will), there will be cries of: "What happens if it doesn't snow? That budgeted money would be better off invested in a hedge fund where we can get immediate ROI (and enrich Wall Street--"the cornerstone of NYC"--M. Bloomberg). When and if it does snow, we'll worry about it then." "Budgets be damned" is in vogue.

You have to admit that overall it would be WAY cheaper to let the thing rot and then hire a six-pack of Mexicans to hand-shovel the tracks when it does snow.

BTW, I have nothing against Mexicans but I am "Sinick."

Bottomless Chips

Wow. Pick something innocuous and go off on a rant about how the political group you oppose will build a strawman to attack.

You're no better than the conservatives that you rant against.

Theodore Wirth

Yeah, I guess I was a bit excitable at the time. However, I want you to know that the ranting is ideological and has no political agenda. We in Jersey have a Democratic majority and they virtually pioneered screwing around with budgets and crippling useful public services. Are they "liberals?" I don't know or care. However, if this was NJ Transit and somebody brought this this cool tech to their attention there would be outrage. It's very existence would be quickly deemed unnecessary and wasteful and it would be used as ammo for the next budget cut.

TrippinJoJo

Is there video of this in action?

jaycjay

Not that little subway type, but here's a bigger one working in much deeper snow than we had, in Nebraska:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCqEBdjaXpM

Check the related video links; there are plenty of clips of these things.