MassDOT Rail: Springfield Hub (East-West, NNERI, Berkshires, CT-Valley-VT-Quebec)

The EGE said:
Central Corridor was a good idea proposed too early. There are a number of corridors that would be useful to have regional rail on - moderate-speeds, cheaply operated, ~10 mile stop spacing, service every hour or two, intended for a mix of trips rather than commute-focused. New London-Brattleboro, New London-Worcester, Providence-Hyannis, parts of the Housatonic, etc. Some similar services like the outer LIRR branches, SLE, and Atlantic City Line already exist (but need improvements). Yes, some of these can be served with buses, but those typically have few stops

But in order for those to work, you need a framework of robust intercity services for those to connect to. We're talking half-hourly Northeast Regionals on the NEC, hourly Inland Route trains, and high frequency on the denser local corridors (Worcester Line, Providence Line, etc). Service on lighter corridors won't work if it's only useful for travel within that corridor - it works when it provides a link to everywhere else on the network. New London and Palmer and Brattleboro aren't big endpoints, but as gateways to the entire NEC and the three biggest cities in Massachusetts?
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Absolutely, wholeheartedly agreed.

Investments should be in:
  1. Northeast Corridor
    • bringing it up to international high-speed rail standards, which would drive demand for other connecting services in New England.
  2. Inland Route
    • with frequent, layered, high-speed service, ideally including a one-seat ride to Toronto and a Boston <> NYC service.
  3. New Haven - Springfield Line & Connecticut River Line & New England Central Railroad north of Northfield
    • with relatively frequent service and ideally a one-seat ride to Montreal.
  4. North-South Rail Link
    • with through-service connecting Portland and Providence, Springfield, and Hartford.
At that point, you have good service providing competitive, market-appropriate, one-seat rides between:
  • Boston <> Providence <> Norwich/New London <> New Haven <> Bridgeport/Stamford <> NYC <> Philadelphia <> Baltimore <> DC
  • Boston <> Worcester <> Springfield <> Chicago/Toronto
  • Montreal <> Springfield <> Hartford <> New Haven <> Bridgeport/Stamford <> NYC <> Philadelphia <> DC
  • Portland <> Boston <> Providence
  • Portland <> Boston <> Springfield <> Hartford
  • Boston <> Worcester <> Springfield <> New Haven <> Bridgeport/Stamford <> NYC
Once that's in place, it makes much more sense to improve some of the more secondary connecting corridors. For example, I'd love to see a one-seat ride between Boston and Montreal, or heck even Providence and Montreal via Boston, but that doesn't make sense without the above network established with appropriately good service. I feel similarly about a one-seat ride between Providence and Worcester, Hartford, and/or Springfield, or the present topic of Norwich/New London connecting with Hartford and/or Springfield.
 
It may be worth creating a separate thread focused on the Central Corridor that can sweep up @The EGE and @bigeman312's points in the posts above. (Or alternatively, to cross-post them and continue the discussion in the Regional New England Rail thread, where @Riverside kicked off some good discussion on the topic with this post about five years ago.)

One angle that's probably fair to keep in this thread is what Palmer should realistically expect to get from all this outreach. They apparently got Brattleboro to express support the other day, so they're definitely making themselves heard, but I still don't see why this Central Corridor angle would convince MassDOT to change its mind about where to put the Palmer station. The Palmer people aren't speaking directly to the core issue, i.e. whether they can propose any solutions for the problems MassDOT identified with trying to put platforms that close to the diamond and other rail yard switches, and they haven't really explained why it would be such a problem for Palmer to have a separate Central Corridor station when there's going to be at least a separate platform regardless. They're asking a lot of players to forego their own preferred design standards to suit a rail proposal that likely wouldn't be anyone's priority for decades to come.

Is there any risk of the whole Compass Rail initiative getting held up if this dispute doesn't get resolved, or would they just defer the Palmer station to a standalone infill project at some point in the future?
 
Given the expected time frame for any passenger rail on the Central Corridor (aka not anytime soon), what's stopping us from just building something at Palmer first so that East-West rail can run normally, and revisiting the question later, potentially moving/rebuilding Palmer station if necessary?

Commuter rail stations can and do get moved or rebuilt. Chelsea, Lynn, the Newton stations, you name it.

Granted, none of them involve rebuilding a modern, ADA-accessible station (and accessibility is the reason for many of these rebuilds in the first place), but it's still not impossible. And I don't see this as a situation where "correcting yesterday's planning mistakes" would cost significantly more, even if it can be called a mistake in the future to begin with.

riptide said:
Is there any risk of the whole Compass Rail initiative getting held up if this dispute doesn't get resolved, or would they just defer the Palmer station to a standalone infill project at some point in the future?
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I fear that deferring Palmer station to the future would just create a repeat of Route 16 for GLX, Battleship Cove for SCR, etc. While they're not perfect comparisons, neither are gaining any momentum today now that the main project has been completed.
 
The Central Corridor is so far off from being anyone's planning priority that the not-yet-built B&A Palmer station will be more than 2 decades old by the time they need to address the disconnect. I mean, that's not much different a timeframe from Middleborough/Lakeville's opening-to-orphaning, and we survived that controversy. They should of course be triaging what the alternatives are when a union station at the old location isn't physically feasible, but that's almost the least of their self-justification worries right now.

I like that the CC advocates are being plucky here, but their service plan is awfully half-baked until it has way better/denser services to connect to at the NEC, B&A, and (maybe especially, since the universe of current proposals only nets +2 more RT's) the Conn River ends. It's simply not going to work as a corridor until you get near-hourlies at each connecting node, and we're just not close to there. If they want to give this initiative oxygen for the 2 decades it's going to take to get there, they should be putting much more emphasis on interim solutions like connecting buses that'll make the rail corridor more viable as a future prospect. Route 32 is the region's largest north-south state highway that doesn't have a co-mingled north-south expressway within 20 miles of it. There's definitely a transit exploit there if they cared to pursue it. But that would mean yielding just a bit on the rail-now bent of the current study, and they don't seem to be willing to do that.
 
Knowing Amanda Kennedy well, I want to translate her statement in the Day article I shared as: "Central Corridor Rail makes no sense we're not advocating for this at all" Even the SLE extensions to Norwich and Westerly aren't endorsed by SECCOG, which was made very clear to me when I tried to connect some advocates of the Westerly extension (ITT) to SECCOG. We can debate chicken and egg of rail service and TOD, but the decision makers involved are very firmly in the camp of the chicken (TOD) needing to come before the egg.
 
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When Palmer station eventually opens, is it anticipated to become a stop on the Lake Shore Limited? Or will it only be a stop for the Inland Route and the future Boston <-> Albany service?
 
www.amtrak.com

Amtrak Advisory | Lake Shore Limited Service Changes

www.amtrak.com www.amtrak.com

Lake Shore Ltd. suspended/bustituted between Boston and Albany until further notice, and Berkshire Flyer's planned season startup beginning Friday is also cancelled due to a large/complex sinkhole that opened up on the Amtrak Post Road Branch between Schodack and Rensselaer, NY. The soil subsidence issue under the tracks is apparently severe enough that they don't expect service to resume before next month.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
www.amtrak.com

Amtrak Advisory | Lake Shore Limited Service Changes

www.amtrak.com www.amtrak.com

Lake Shore Ltd. suspended/bustituted between Boston and Albany until further notice, and Berkshire Flyer's planned season startup beginning Friday is also cancelled due to a large/complex sinkhole that opened up on the Amtrak Post Road Branch between Schodack and Rensselaer, NY. The soil subsidence issue under the tracks is apparently severe enough that they don't expect service to resume before next month.
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Scuttlebutt from an Amtrak employee on RR.net that the LSL Boston section might not resume until October because the soil subsidence on the Post Road Branch is going to be that hard to fix. The Berkshire Flyer's entire 2025 season will be a shuttle bus, which might doom its chances of having another season because the MassDOT funding contract is going by year-to-year extensions and the ridership since its launch has been very poor.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
Scuttlebutt from an Amtrak employee on RR.net that the LSL Boston section might not resume until October because the soil subsidence on the Post Road Branch is going to be that hard to fix. The Berkshire Flyer's entire 2025 season will be a shuttle bus, which might doom its chances of having another season because the MassDOT funding contract is going by year-to-year extensions and the ridership since its launch has been very poor.
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Is there any chance that these resources could be diverted to a higher demand route next year, like a trial of an Inland Route Boston - NYC?
 
bigeman312 said:
Is there any chance that these resources could be diverted to a higher demand route next year, like a trial of an Inland Route Boston - NYC?
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Probably not. Berkshire Flyer lives within its very meager margins because it's just a 1-stop/few-dozen mile extension of a bog-standard NYC-ALB short-turn slot with same crew that already runs with push-pull equipment. There are basically no ops numbers to square with it other than a few hours' pay and fuel. Indeed it's been able to survive with only single-digit to couple dozen passengers to Pittsfield each trip because it's frequently sold completely out NY-ALB on its weekender-oriented time slots. The Inland Route, unless it redirected a Valley Flyer slot eastbound from Springfield (bad idea politically to punish the Valley with frequency loss when they are putting up the ridership), would be an all-new slot with all-new crew and equipment (where Amtrak is having an acute systemwide coach shortage at the moment because the Horizon fleet is still grounded indefinitely). A bit more subsidy involved, so the pittance that gets spent on the Berkshire Flyer wouldn't begin to pay for the operating costs of a new Inland slot. Berkshire Flyer really was an ultra-ultra- low reach for getting it started, whereas the Inland Route is a regular-low reach.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
Probably not. Berkshire Flyer lives within its very meager margins because it's just a 1-stop/few-dozen mile extension of a bog-standard NYC-ALB short-turn slot with same crew that already runs with push-pull equipment. There are basically no ops numbers to square with it other than a few hours' pay and fuel. Indeed it's been able to survive with only single-digit to couple dozen passengers to Pittsfield each trip because it's frequently sold completely out NY-ALB on its weekender-oriented time slots. The Inland Route, unless it redirected a Valley Flyer slot eastbound from Springfield (bad idea politically to punish the Valley with frequency loss when they are putting up the ridership), would be an all-new slot with all-new crew and equipment (where Amtrak is having an acute systemwide coach shortage at the moment because the Horizon fleet is still grounded indefinitely). A bit more subsidy involved, so the pittance that gets spent on the Berkshire Flyer wouldn't begin to pay for the operating costs of a new Inland slot. Berkshire Flyer really was an ultra-ultra- low reach for getting it started, whereas the Inland Route is a regular-low reach.
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That makes sense to me. Thanks for the explanation.
 
wnyt.com

Amtrak: Service to Berkshires suspended due to large hole

The seasonal Berkshire Flyer service, which travels from New York City to Albany to Pittsfield, will be shut down until at least September. Amtrak said the shutdown is because of unstable ground near the tracks running from the Rensselaer station to Schodack.
wnyt.com wnyt.com

Lake Shore Ltd. service suspension extended to an estimated January because of the Post Road soil subsidence. Apparently an entire hillside is sliding away, so it's way more than just a sinkhole.

Now's probably the time for Amtrak to try to pry a cab car loose somewhere from very tight fleet margins to run push-pull, and do a reverse move on the B&A's junction with the Hudson Line to try to get the train running sooner. When the LSL Boston section began service in 1975, the more direct Post Road Branch had been abandoned for several years and they ran with the reverse move for awhile until Amtrak could come up with the money to rebuild and reinstate the branch in-full.
 
That sucks. I was thinking of taking the LSL all the way to Chicago sometime in the fall, but I guess that'll have to wait another year.
 
bigeman312 said:
Is there any chance that these resources could be diverted to a higher demand route next year, like a trial of an Inland Route Boston - NYC?
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They could use the Pittsfield line which was the original plan. The speed might be slow in spots but the tracks are still in use and i'm sure Housatonic Railroad would be happy to host them.
 
Nexis4jersey said:
They could use the Pittsfield line which was the original plan. The speed might be slow in spots but the tracks are still in use and i'm sure Housatonic Railroad would be happy to host them.
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10 MPH-slow, and derailment-prone because Housatonic doesn't maintain for shit. Berkshire Scenic Rail Museum hasn't even been able to return to its home rails on the line yet after 10 years in exile up in North Adams because Housy is going so dog-slow implementing safety improvements funded by MassDOT after they bought the line. Given that the Berkshire Flyer routinely has ridership in the single digits between Albany and Pittsfield, they can ill-afford to throw more money at the service. It's only because those weekender time slots are routinely sold out south of Albany that the train is living within its margins and has a puncher's chance of lasting for another season. Revisiting Gov. Patrick's Berkshire Line folly is complete insanity. It would cost a billion dollars to get the ROW in any kind of shape for halfway tolerable travel times, less than that would net literally no ridership, and the Flyer trial so far hasn't lived up to expectations at finding adequate demand from NY to the Berkshires.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
10 MPH-slow, and derailment-prone because Housatonic doesn't maintain for shit. Berkshire Scenic Rail Museum hasn't even been able to return to its home rails on the line yet after 10 years in exile up in North Adams because Housy is going so dog-slow implementing safety improvements funded by MassDOT after they bought the line. Given that the Berkshire Flyer routinely has ridership in the single digits between Albany and Pittsfield, they can ill-afford to throw more money at the service. It's only because those weekender time slots are routinely sold out south of Albany that the train is living within its margins and has a puncher's chance of lasting for another season. Revisiting Gov. Patrick's Berkshire Line folly is complete insanity. It would cost a billion dollars to get the ROW in any kind of shape for halfway tolerable travel times, less than that would net literally no ridership, and the Flyer trial so far hasn't lived up to expectations at finding adequate demand from NY to the Berkshires.
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The ridership is low due to its wonky routing , and it skips key weekend gateway areas like Western CT. I doubt upgrading the line would cost a billion unless you add in restoring the Maybrook Line to Brewster and throw in Danbury Extension to New Milford. I can easily see a few half full trains running up to Pittsfield per day if you go by how many Mass cars are parked at the Upper Harlem Line stations.
 
Nexis4jersey said:
The ridership is low due to its wonky routing , and it skips key weekend gateway areas like Western CT. I doubt upgrading the line would cost a billion unless you add in restoring the Maybrook Line to Brewster and throw in Danbury Extension to New Milford. I can easily see a few half full trains running up to Pittsfield per day if you go by how many Mass cars are parked at the Upper Harlem Line stations.
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"Wonky" routing or not, at 3:50 (probably 3:30 if the B&A gets uprated from Class 3 to Class 4 for better BOS-ALB service) it's over an hour faster than the Berkshire Line would be on good track.
500px-PCRR_Pittsfield_19710201.png

People drive all the way to the Upper Harlem stops because that in itself is about an hour faster than this train would be, and the roads aren't congested enough up there to ever make that a question. And the stop catchments north of downtown New Milford are absolutely microscopic. There's a reason why Connecticut wanted absolutely nothing to do with Patrick's folly the first time around, and why there's been virtually zero advocacy for it in Berkshire County since he left office.

I've said it before: if we've got a jones to spend an absolutely stupid amount of money on one-seat Berkshire rail projects, spending less than half as much to de-landbank the Pittsfield & North Adams branch to run the same Berkshire Flyer to Adams and North Adams ends up netting more total ridership than touching anything on the Berkshire Line because it would actually go where the bulk of the county's population is. Pittsfield, North Adams, and Adams alone have as much population as the next 36 municipalities in the county. That...and/or spending some MTA money to re-extend the Harlem Line from Wassaic to Millerton so the park-and-ride is that much easier for North Caanan and Great Barrington, the only population pockets of any consequence between New Milford and Pittsfield. The Berkshire Line is objectively bad transit with its corkscrewing-curve river valley ROW going dog-slow at even expensively upgraded track, and avoids actual population like the plague. Get the line up to tolerable-enough condition for Berkshire Scenic to resume operating on it, and look into getting an excursion carrier for New Milford-North Caanan like Housatonic used to operate back in the 80's. But that's about all the passenger value you're ever going to wring out of this corridor: 10 MPH scenic rides by museum operators.
 
So upgrade the line to 80mph , route it via the Harlem Line which is faster, and you could bring that down to 4hrs... CT is currently dumping a half of billion into the Waterbury Branch so I see no reason why they couldn't do a Brewster - New Milford , Danbury - Pittsfield line upgrade for a billion+. Combining the projects would say money and time and you would be able to Justify upgrading all the way to Pittsfield... Isn't the Branch to North Adams gone?
 
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