Queens Village
Belmont Park is located on the Long Island Railroad’s shortest and only special events branch, the Belmont Park Branch. The station exclusively served horse racing fans – with service provided only on racing days from the stations opening in 1905 until November 2021 – when the new UBS arena opened just beyond the southern end of the Belmont Park Station Platforms. As part of the building of UBS arena a new station opened at Elmont on the Main Line in phases from 2021 until it received full time service in 2023. Hockey Fans attending Islanders games only had special service to and from Belmont Park – only shuttle service to Jamaica – next to the arena for the 2021 to 2022 Hockey Season (shuttle buses were also provided to Queens Village, with eastbound LIRR main line trains also stopping at the partially opened Elmont Station).
Since the 2022 to 2023 Hockey season there is no supplemental (except for regularly scheduled trains making extra stops at Elmont) train service for Islanders Games. Hockey fans needing to take an “electric” shuttle bus (that also services the Emerald Parking lot) or walk the 15 minutes between the Elmont Station to the arena.
The station used to receive (with a brief 2009 to 2010 due to the MTA budget crisis, before Belmont Park decided to subsidize the LIRR service) two round-trip trains (one to Penn Station, one to Jamaica) per Belmont Park race day during the entire racing season. On Belmont Stakes Day, the second Saturday in June, the station is extremely busy with long-line ups for racing fans heading home after the stakes. This is the one day the station is pushed to its limit with frequent service to and from Jamaica, Penn Station (and only on June 10, 2023) Grand Central Madison). In 2023 Elmont station even closed to passengers during the racing hours to avoid overcrowded trains. The last time the station received passenger service was for the 2023 Belmont Stakes. The station probably won’t receive service again until 2026 due to the fully rebuilding of the Belmont Racetrack, with the 2024 and 2025 Belmont Stakes temporarily relocated to Saratoga Springs in Upstate New York (Amtrak doesn’t provide any extra service except for the usual Ethan Allen Express and Adirondack).
This quite short one station branch curves off the main line at a wye with one single track leading eastbound to Points East, and one westbound towards New York. After crossovers between the two tracks, these split out and form 8 tracks with 4 island platforms. Only 6 of these tracks are electrified. These island platforms were all low-level platforms on the Long Island Rail Road left with passengers boarding trains using wooden steps on each platform to head up to each train door until 2015.
After a huge crush people – including racing fans waiting up to 3 hours to board trains home after the 2014 Belmont Stakes – the station underwent a $5 Million renovation that boosted power capacity for the third rail on the branch and added two high level platforms to allow level boarding (and ADA accessible boarding) at the station for the first time. Today the station still has four platforms, that go west to east: Track-High Level platform-Track-Track-Low Level Platform-High Level Platform-Track-Track-Low Level Platform-Track. These platforms are completely bare of any canopies or other amenities. These platforms are directly alongside a 2 island, 3 driveway bus loop. This bus loop is the full time terminus of the Q2 and Q110 bus routes with the bus loops and continuing walkway to Elmont Station via an always open to the public walkway that has a canopy over it.
The main way to access the train platforms is via an open air but fully canopied pedestrian bridge. The former low-level platforms have a canopied staircase down to them. The modern high-level island platforms have 1 or two exposed staircases. This pedestrian bridge has a further two staircases one down to each of the two bus islands. This bridge continues to a circular connection area (with a further wide staircase up to the bridge) before continuing to an upper level entrance into the grandstand of Belmont Park.
The two modern high-level platforms combine with a high-level platform connection beyond the bumper blocks of the middle four tracks (there is no way to access the low-level platform beyond the bumper blocks this high-level platform connection is in between them). These lead to a ramp and staircase down to a small modular ticket office building and a crosswalk beyond the southern ends of the two pedestrian islands for buses to a plaza at the corner of the UBS Arena and entrance to the Belmont Park grandstand beyond.
The station platforms are fully gated off when train service isn’t being provided and the station is closed, barricades also close off the pedestrian bridge (including all staircases up to it from the bus loop).
Photos 1-25: November 25, 2023;
