Sunnyside Yard is a large

coach yard A rail yard, railway yard, railroad yard (US) or simply yard, is a series of tracks in a rail network for storing, sorting, or loading and unloading rail vehicles and locomotives. Yards have many tracks in parallel for keeping rolling stock or ...

, a

railroad yard A rail yard, railway yard, railroad yard (US) or simply yard, is a series of tracks in a rail network for storing, sorting, or loading and unloading rail vehicles and locomotives. Yards have many tracks in parallel for keeping rolling stock or ...

for

passenger car A car, or an automobile, is a motor vehicle with wheels. Most definitions of cars state that they run primarily on roads, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport people rather than cargo. There are around one billio ...

s in the Sunnyside neighborhood of

Queens Queens is the largest by area of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. Located near the western end of Long Island, it is bordered by the ...

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. The yard is owned by

Amtrak The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, Trade name, doing business as Amtrak (; ), is the national Passenger train, passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates intercity rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous United Stat ...

and is also used by

New Jersey Transit New Jersey Transit Corporation, branded as NJ Transit or NJTransit and often shortened to NJT, is a state-owned public transportation system that serves the U.S. state of New Jersey and portions of the states of New York and Pennsylvania. It ...

. The

Pennsylvania Railroad The Pennsylvania Railroad ( reporting mark PRR), legal name as the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, also known as the "Pennsy," was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. At its ...

(PRR) completed construction of the yard in 1910; it was originally the largest coach yard in the world, occupying 192 acres (0.78 km²).

Harold Interlocking Harold Interlocking is a large railroad junction in New York City. The busiest rail junction in the United States, it serves trains on Amtrak's Northeast Corridor and the Long Island Rail Road's Main Line (Long Island Rail Road), Main Line and Po ...

, the United States' busiest

rail junction A junction, in the context of rail transport, is a place at which two or more rail routes converge or diverge. The physical connection between the tracks of the two routes (assuming they are of the same gauge) is provided by Railroad switch, tur ...

, is part of the yard. The shared tracks of the

Long Island Rail Road The Long Island Rail Road , or LIRR, is a Rail transport, railroad in the southeastern part of the U.S. state of New York (state), New York, stretching from Manhattan to the eastern tip of Suffolk County, New York, Suffolk County on Long Islan ...

(LIRR) Main Line and Amtrak's

Northeast Corridor The Northeast Corridor (NEC) is an electrified railroad line in the Northeast megalopolis of the United States. Owned primarily by Amtrak, it runs from Boston in the north to Washington, D.C., in the south, with major stops in Providence, Rhod ...

pass along the southern edge of the yard. Northeast of the yard a balloon track (or reverse loop) is used for "U-turning" Amtrak and NJ Transit trains which terminate at Penn Station. Leading eastward near the south side of the yard, this balloon track switches off and turns left under the LIRR/Amtrak tracks, turns left once again, and merges with the Sunnyside Yard track to turn the train west toward Penn Station.

History

The

(PRR) completed construction of the yard in 1910. At that time, Sunnyside was the largest coach yard in the world, occupying 192 acres (0.78 km²) and containing 25.7 miles (41.4 km) of track. The yard served as the main

train A train (from Old French , from Latin">-4; we might wonder whether there's a point at which it's appropriate to talk of the beginnings of French, that is, when it wa ... , from Latin , "to pull, to draw") is a series of connected vehicles th ...

storage and service point for PRR trains serving New York City. It is connected to

Pennsylvania Station Pennsylvania Station or Penn Station may refer to: Current train stations * Baltimore Penn Station * New York Penn Station ** Pennsylvania Station (1910–1963), the predecessor to the present New York City station * Newark Penn Station Trai ...

Midtown Manhattan Midtown Manhattan is the central portion of the New York City borough of Manhattan, serving as the city's primary central business district. Midtown is home to some of the city's most prominent buildings, including the Empire State Building, the ...

by the

East River Tunnels The East River Tunnels are four single-track railroad passenger service tunnels that extend from the eastern end of Pennsylvania Station under 32nd and 33rd Streets in Manhattan and cross the East River to Long Island City in Queens. The trac ...

. The Sunnyside North Yard initially had 45 tracks with a capacity of 526 cars. The South Yard had 45 tracks with a 552 car capacity. Factories surrounded Sunnyside Yard. On the south side the Degnon Terminal rose, with businesses served by the railroad. It included the

American Chicle company The American Chicle Company was a chewing gum trust founded by Thomas Adams, Jr., with Edward E. Beeman and Jonathan Primle. Thomas Adams Thomas Adams (May 4, 1818 – February 7, 1905) was a 19th-century American scientist and inventor who is ...

factory for chewing gum, the

Eveready Battery Company Eveready Battery Company, Inc. is an American manufacturer of electric battery brands ''Eveready'' and ''Energizer'', owned by Energizer, Energizer Holdings. Its headquarters are located in St. Louis, Missouri. The predecessor company began in 1 ...

factory for batteries, and the Loose-Wiles

Sunshine Biscuits Sunshine Biscuits, formerly known as The Loose-Wiles Biscuit Company, was an independent American baker of cookies, crackers, and cereals. The company, which became a brand on a few products such as Cheez-It, was purchased by Keebler Company ...

factory. The

Swingline Swingline is a division of ACCO Brands Corporation that specializes in manufacturing staplers and hole punches. From its foundation in 1925, the company was located in Long Island City, Queens, New York, United States, until the plant was moved ...

Stapler factory was immediately east of there, at 32-01 Queens Boulevard.

Plans

East Side Access project

As part of the East Side Access project to the new LIRR terminal at

Grand Central Terminal Grand Central Terminal (GCT; also referred to as Grand Central Station or simply as Grand Central) is a commuter rail terminal station, terminal located at 42nd Street (Manhattan), 42nd Street and Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, New York Ci ...

(opened January 25, 2023), some LIRR trains diverge from the main line and travel through a tunnel under the yard. The project would also create a new station at Queens Boulevard, named Sunnyside.

Harold Interlocking

In May 2011, a $294.7 million federal grant was awarded to address congestion at Harold Interlocking, the United States' busiest

, which is part of the yard. The work will allow for dedicated tracks to the

Hell Gate Line The Hell Gate Line is the portion of Amtrak's high-speed Northeast Corridor between Harold Interlocking in Sunnyside, Queens, and Shell Interlocking in New Rochelle, New York, within the New York metropolitan area. The first portion of the li ...

right of way A right of way (also right-of-way) is a specific route that people, animals, vehicles, watercraft, or utility lines travel, or the legal status that gives them the right to do so. Rights-of-way in the physical sense include controlled-access h ...

for Amtrak trains arriving from or bound for

New England New England is a region consisting of six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York (state), New York to the west and by the ...

, thus avoiding NJT and LIRR traffic. Some of the interlocking improvement projects are complete as of early 2023. Other projects are ongoing and will be complete by late 2025.

Housing development

In 2017 it was announced that the city would begin a feasibility study into the construction of 21,000 to 31,000 units of housing on top of the rail yard. The project, which would be similar to the Hudson Yards development over

West Side Yard The West Side Yard (officially the John D. Caemmerer West Side Yard) is a rail yard of 30 tracks owned by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority on the west side of Manhattan in New York City. Used to store commuter rail trains operated by t ...

, has stoked public controversy over the affordability of units, pedestrian and road connections, open space, and a nearby

Superfund Superfund is a United States federal environmental remediation program established by the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 (CERCLA). The program is administered by the United States Environmental Pro ...

site. In September 2019, a public meeting was interrupted by protestors chanting, "We Don't Trust this Process!" In early 2020, Amtrak and the city government published a master plan. The plan called for building a deck over Sunnyside Yard and constructing 12,000 housing units, all of which would be

affordable housing Affordable housing is housing which is deemed affordable to those with a household income at or below the median, as rated by the national government or a local government by a recognized housing affordability index. Most of the literature on ...

, as well as of parks and public plazas.

References

External links

PLAZA Interlocking (The LIRR Today)

- Trainsarefun.com

* ttp://www.discoverpotsdam.com/connolly/sunnyside-yard/ Photosof Sunnyside Yard circa 1925. {{Authority control Pennsylvania Railroad Amtrak facilities Long Island Rail Road NJ Transit Rail Operations Rail yards in New York (state) 1910 establishments in New York City New York Tunnel Extension Sunnyside, Queens