Originally Posted by
ijgordon
I couple of weeks ago I took the LIRR to the Airtrain to JFK. I was on an 8:09am train from Penn Station and did not get to the JetBlue terminal until an hour later.
The main reason -- a 15 minute wait for the Airtrain, smack in the middle of rush hour.
I just missed one Airtrain (partly because the LIRR was crawling into Jamaica), and various electronic signs indicated that the Airtrain runs every 10-15 minutes (IIRC, one said 10-15 another said 15).
Sure enough it was 15 minutes until the next train. I was hopping

to say the least.
Anyone know if this is normal for certain times of the day (I would expect it for 2am, but not at 8:30am on a weekday)? On the return, about 6:30pm on Sunday, the Jamaica AirTrain was running much more frequently (seemed to be 5-10 minutes).
Any ideas? I think I may complain to the Port Authority. A 15 minute headway on the Airtrain really makes this mode of transport uncompetitive in many cases.
The AT could have had mechanical problems (which is less frequent now than when it first opened). Also, the doors are very "fussy", if they don't close as scheduled (a pax holding them open) they take lots of extra time to close--causing delays.

PS: In DFW their Skylink runs every 2 minutes (during the day).^