The video was picked up by The LIRR Today, and I felt I needed to comment, but a comment on the blog I felt would be too lengthy and image intensive, so I'm making this post as a long comment.
There are a few things different in this arrival compared to previous years. Many years ago, the circus would play at Madison Square Garden, and the train would stay over at Yard "A" in Sunnyside. The animals and equipment for the show would travel through the Queens-Midtown Tunnel to much fanfare, despite this "parade" happening overnight.
I remember seeing the train pass by while I was attending a school in Glendale which happened to be located near the LIRR's Montauk line.
Flash forward to more recent years. Yard "A" is no longer there thanks to the East Side Access project. A renovation project at Madison Square Garden would keep the circus from making a stop there. The Circus at this point has what seems like a regular routine: Play in New Jersey, play in Long Island, move on to another state.
The routine for Long Island is the same: Norfolk Southern or CSX brings the train onto the Northeast Corridor line near the North Elizabeth station, Amtrak picks it up, takes it to HAROLD Interlocking, and hands it off to the LIRR. Things happen in reverse for the trip off Long Island.
Here's a look at past Circus Train journeys.
March 15, 2010
I caught the Blue Unit train in Garden City, just to the east of GARDEN interlocking and Franklin Avenue, where the Hempstead branch veers south towards the Country Life Press station, and the Garden-Mitchell Secondary continues east.
Franklin Avenue is a busy street. The N40 and N41 cross the line here. I waited for what seems like a long time. I hung out in the waiting room of the nearby Garden City station, where the the police were waiting (they were tasked with guarding the crossings). When the police got word to get to their crossings, I took position at the aforementioned position east of Franklin Avenue.
And here comes the train!
The train took almost 15 minutes to completely cross Franklin Avenue.
Then, of course, there's the protect engine, which usually follows one or two signal blocks behind.
Of course, this being a very busy street, traffic was backed up for a considerable distance (quite obvious when you have 5,400 feet of train traveling at 10 miles per hour or less).
A westbound train was also waiting for the circus train to pass.
After all the commotion, I take an N40 bus (obviously running late by this point) up to Mineola before heading back west.
March 14, 2011
I took perch further west, at a pedestrian bridge over the LIRR main line at 60th Road. This is the Red unit.I don't have a full video of the train's passing due to a low battery issue that cropped up during recording, but I did grab some photos on my iPhone.
Apparently, the train's crew had spent much of their time waiting for the train, and after pulling and shoving it around the GMS all afternoon and into the night, they had to send a sixth MP15 out to bring the others back.
Video by EMD GeepThirtyEight
March 21, 2011
Armed with my camera, my iPhone, and a pair of fully charged batteries, I navigate my way through the morning fog and arrive at the Queens Village station.The train passes on the track usually used by eastbound trains.
The protect engine
I catch a westbound train and we catch up with the train by the Hillside Support Facility, and we get a good view of it passing the Jamaica station on track 9. I had a brief chat with an LIRR engineer where he says he had never seen such a long train on the railroad.
As that westbound from Queens Village was headed to Brooklyn, I changed trains at Jamaica for a Penn Station express. Just east of Forest Hills, we begin to pass the train again. The pass is completed at 63rd Drive.
At Penn Station, I wait for the train again, this time, hauled by Amtrak. Thanks to New Jersey Transit's DepartureVision service, I was able to see westbound departures from Penn for both New Jersey Transit and Amtrak. I figured that the circus train would pass during a long gap in service, and I turned out to be right. I caught the train running through the station on track 12, as seen here looking from the west end concourse, above the stairs to tracks 13 and 14 (Platform G).
The train would continue via other railroads to Youngstown, Ohio.
March 19, 2012
The Blue Unit makes its way eastbound through Jamaica on track 9.
March 27, 2012
I catch the train making a stop at Bellerose to allow an eastbound train to pass before it switches over to the eastbound track.
While I was waiting, a Sperry car caught me by surprise.
The train wouldn't make it to Penn Station before the start of the evening rush hour, so it spent the evening at Hunterspoint Avenue.
Or at least, the front of it did. The back stretched past Queens Boulevard. Both of these shots were taken from a passing 7 train.
March 13, 2013
I returned to Garden City to reprise the 2010 video, this time with my iPhone 5 camera.Following which, I began to walk east, past the old Clinton Road station which is now a fire house, then in front of the train and over to Selfridge Avenue. This is one of two exits to the north from Nassau Community College (The track ends just west of the other one, Endo Boulevard). In the past, I had often see people taking to Twitter to vent their frustration because the train is blocking their crossing of choice, so I went to see what the fuss was about.
Of course, people who chose Selfridge to make their way off the campus were stuck until they split the train to clear the crossing.
This was the first year when the circus would play at the Barclays Center. The route the train would take was unknown at the time, so there's no video of the train's exit.
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