When Metro-North schedules change on Sunday, November 9, for the first time, there will be new half-hourly service between New Haven and New York in the off-peaks and on weekends.  There also will be minor adjustments on all three lines to improve reliability.

Metro-North, in conjunction with the Connecticut Department of Transportation, for the past two years, has been adding trains on weekdays in the off-peak periods and on weekends between New Haven and New York. The last of these planned improvements begin on November 9 when six weekday off peak, 12 Saturday and 10 Sunday trains are added to the schedule.

“We have evaluated all of the new schedules carefully to ensure that track and infrastructure maintenance windows are not negatively impacted by the operation of these new trains,” said Metro-North President Joseph Giulietti. “We expect that the assurance that you never had to wait more than half an hour for a train should make Metro-North an even more attractive transportation option.” 

“Knowing that a train will be available at least every half hour will make it much easier for customers – whether heading to New York for work or pleasure – to plan their travel,” said ConnDOT Commissioner Redeker. “I want to commend our partners at Metro-North for delivering on their commitment to full half-hourly service between New York and New Haven.”

With this initiative, Metro-North will now offer off-peak, half-hourly service on the outer New Haven Line as follows:

•   Weekdays: inbound from after the AM Peak until 6:47 p.m. from New Haven, outbound from Grand Central Terminal from 5:49 a.m. until midnight (except during the PM Peak, when service is more frequent)

•   Saturdays: inbound from 6:46 a.m. until 6:46 a.m. from New Haven, outbound from 10:04 a.m. until 10:34 p.m.

•   Sundays: inbound from 7:46 a.m. until 7:46 p.m. from New Haven, outbound from 11:04 a.m. until 10:34 p.m.

Two new super express trains - with travel times of one hour and 39 minutes - also are being added on weekend mornings.

A new Saturday train will depart New Haven at 9:20 a.m., stopping at Bridgeport only at 9:42 a.m., before going express to Grand Central Terminal.

A new train will depart New Haven at 10:41 AM on Saturdays and Sundays, make a Bridgeport stop at 11:03 a.m., then go express to Grand Central.

Finally, a new train will operate Saturday and Sunday evenings, departing New Haven at 10:46 p.m., closing a two-hour gap before the last train out of New Haven.

Metro-North also is adding a new PM Peak train to relieve overcrowding on to the 6:31 p.m. train to New Haven, which will no longer stop at Stamford. Instead, the new train will depart Grand Central Terminal at 6:35 p.m., making stops at Greenwich, Stamford, Noroton Heights, Darien, Rowayton and South Norwalk.

In conjunction with this change and to shorten the time between outer New Haven Line PM Peak expresses after 6:30, the 6:47 p.m. train to New Haven will depart six minutes later at 6:53 p.m., and the 7:06 p.m. train to New Haven will depart at 6:49 p.m., 17 minutes earlier, and no longer stop at Stamford.

On the Waterbury Branch, in response to recent requests from riders and at CDOT’s request, two new trains are being added on weekends and the schedule will be adjusted so that intervals between departures are consistently three hours throughout the day.

•   A new train will depart Waterbury at 10:10 p.m., which is two hours later than the current last train.

•   A new train will depart Grand Central at 10:04 p.m. and Bridgeport at 11:41 p.m., one hour later than the current last train.

On the Hudson Line, there will be some minor adjustments to the connections to the Haverstraw-Ossining Ferry to provide more reliable service in most weather and river conditions.

To provide sufficient time for the ferry to make the crossing, most ferry riders will see their ferry departures shift by 2 to 5 minutes and most will have shorter trip times as a result. Two trains will add Ossining stops, the 6:38 a.m. from Croton-Harmon and the 7:16 a.m. from Scarborough will now originate at Ossining, departing at 7:12 a.m.

On the Upper Harlem Line, to reduce PM Peak congestion at the Southeast station, the 5:27 p.m. train from Grand Central Terminal will now stop at Southeast, and the 5:29 p.m. train will no longer stop at Southeast.

Because of congestion and to improve reliability in the PM Reverse Peak, it is necessary to add one to two minutes of running time between Harlem-125th Street and Grand Central Terminal to trains arriving between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m.