The Staten Island Railroad Express trains are indicated by red signs on the front and back of train cars. On the R44s these signs are supposed to say (on a 2023 visit they were clearly not being maintained with several cars just missing signs) “St. George Express” or “Tottenville Express.” The new R211S cars undergoing testing are planning to introduce an actual route bullet to the line with a diamond with an SI in the middle of it (just like the diamond-6, F, or 7 subway lines).

Train run roughly every 15 minutes exclusively during rush hours. Tottenville-bound express trains operate 5 trips out of St. George during AM rush hours leaving between 7:01am and 8:01am, and 14 trips between 4:01pm and 7:51pm. These trains operate non-stop from St. George to Great Kills, before running local the rest of the way to Tottenville.

St. George-bound Express trains operate during the AM rush hour only, with 9 trips leaving Tottenville between 6:15am and 8:15am (arriving St. George between 6:51am and 8:51am) Trains begin at Tottenville, make all stops to New Drop (this station along with Bay Terrace, and Oakwood Heights receive express service in the St. George-bound direction only) before running non-stop to St. George.

The Express runs save 6 minutes northbound, and 9 minutes southbound, they don’t pass any local trains since the SIR has only two tracks; but run using a Zoned-based express pattern since they leave St. George for example, just 2 minutes before a local train, arriving at Great Kills 4 minutes after the previous local train has arrived and terminated!

During the PM rush hour, express trains return in local service from Tottenville (local trains that terminate at Great Kills, deadhead back to St. George without passengers before making another local trip).

As a professional transit planner, I would normally prefer that transit systems with just two-tracks and no passing sidings operate just one simple and local frequent service and not run less frequent service to provide the gimmick of some express service, with unequitable time savings (when you factor in the extra time people at local stops have to wait for a few minutes saved by express riders) but in the case of the Staten Island Railway this zoned-based express service pattern makes sense.

The Zoned-based express trains makes the SIR feel more similar to a railroad. The only reason having express trains makes sense for the SIR is because trains are scheduled based on Staten Island Ferry arrival and departure times and the ferry is never more frequent than every 15 minutes, so if the SIR just operated every 7.5 minutes during rush hours half of the trains would be empty since they wouldn’t have connected with a ferry. Express trains might as well operate, saving some riders time and more evenly distributing rush hour riders between two trains instead of all crowding into one train (with the next one without a ferry connection being more empty).