1. Riding I-95 is going to cost the same or less than riding I-84 will. It's a choice between two new ROWs - not one new ROW or Shore Line.
I'm not sure who agrees that switching Providence and New Haven for Worcester and Hartford (which, when factoring in the Boston-Albany HSR, turns into just Hartford) is a net benefit, especially given the associated cost gain and Hartford's HSR demands not being a direct link to Boston.
If Danbury, Waterbury and Woonsocket aren't lines to nowhere, I'm not sure what your definition of a line to nowhere is exactly. These are all localities that benefit from a mid-speed local connection (Hartford for the first two, Providence for the third), not a super-express trip to New York or DC.
2. Yes, it's in the heart of a major city, but the costs associated with punching right through to the Center City are just too immense for what it gets you. It's far more cost effective to upgrade 30th Street Station, even if you factor in the cost (which will be necessary) of completely replacing the mess that's down there right now. There's not enough good reasons to do it, and way too many good reasons not to.
3. Boston - Worcester - Springfield - Albany - Points West seems like a more ideal station spacing than Boston - MetroWest - Springfield - Albany does. I would have MetroWest and/or Weston/Riverside serve the Park-and-Ride crowd into Boston or west to Worcester/Springfield, where they could transfer onto HSR if so desired.
4. Fair enough, but I'm not happy about keeping Stamford.
I-84 ROW construction is gonna be hella expensive. There's enough median room, but a couple of the hills in Tolland County are too steep to support regulation 1% track grades. The hill between Exit 68/Tunnel Rd. and the Willington rest area in particular...no way that's doable without busting out the tunnel boring machine. A
far better route is building a combo highway/rail line for the I-384 Willimantic extension. They almost had the routing accepted 9 years ago for Fed fast-tracking...a route that minimized land-taking, spread the median wide with a greenway, and had tacit local support. And then the Army Corps decided to play God and politics, jab its preferred routing with dozens more houses of land-taking, and deny the EIS. Fell apart right there...for the umpteenth time. I think if they re-mounted the effort with rail on the median (which, mind you, is nearly 1/4 mile wide because of the greenway setting), that might be enough to put it over the top. It has this going for it:
1) Shotgun marrying it to the highway is some safety in numbers on the EIS. The highway funding, which is more plentiful and which would favor this long-desired route, can clear away a ton of the paper hurdles for the rail line if a bare railbed were graded during the highway construction. They don't have to build the thing until they need it...just grade it and take advantage of the permitting.
2) The Manchester Secondary crosses the highway at Bolton Notch where current I-384 ends, and is active to Manchester Ctr. with only a short abandoned jog through Vernon. Easy one to do without displacing the rail trail because the railbed here runs through a state park. On the other side the active stub of the Willimantic Secondary crosses under the existing Route 6 expressway that 384 would connect to. So there's your entry and exit points for highway+rail. And on the highway grading it would have curvature supporting 150 MPH. You could probably do 150 from East Hartford yard to Manchester if the Manchester Sec. had its last grade crossings eliminated, then a slower zone on the curve through Bolton Notch, then 150 again to Willimantic along 384. You sure as hell ain't going that fast on the NEC Shoreline.
3) It's got immediate utility as a freight route. NECR and P&W, the state's two largest carriers, already exchange double-stack freight in Willimantic. NECR and CSO, the carrier that operates out of Hartford on the Manchester Sec., are owned by the same company, RailAmerica. Both are growing at a good clip, but they have no physical connection to each other. Bringing double stacks to Hartford Yard would be a big freakin' deal for I-84/I-91 traffic. And if P&W got overhead rights (i.e. RailAmerica handles the locals, but P&W can express through) to its Hartford-area holdings on the freight-only line that parallels the Springfield Line on the east side of the river, it won't have to use schedule slots on the NEC to New Haven every day of the week like it currently does.
4) It's got immediate utility as a passenger route. Hartford-Manchester/Vernon commuter rail on the Manchester Secondary is a lot of I-84 relief, and probably third priority for Hartford-area commuter rail after the New Haven-Springfield service and Waterbury-Hartford service. Easy line to adapt for it since it's in relatively good condition and as the former Hartford-Providence mainline is pretty straight, formerly double-track, and relatively grade crossing-free except for an icky cluster near Buckland Hills. Willimantic CR would be the ideal destination for such a line, and then there can be continuing service to New London and the casinos on NECR...before they build any of the HSR links further east. NECR is already proposing running its own Willimantic-New London service to eat into the casino bus market and draw some state money for freight improvements. This would be a well-patronized route. Again, start by just grading the railbed along 384. Then start it off as diesel with freight + commuter rail. And THEN later on they can electrify it and get it up to spec for HSR speeds. Easier steps than plunking billions all at once.
5) It's a way better route for high speeds and grade separation than de-mothballing the old line along Route 6, which is--like most old RR lines in New England--grade-crossing heavy and curvy so it can hit small town centers. It's also got a very nice trail on it right now and some close abutters in these town centers, so not an easy one to reactivate. If they'll swallow the highway, obviously they'll swallow a rail line along the highway. And be happy to keep their nice trail.
6) They have multiple routings they can choose after Willimantic.
-- The ex-NYNH&H Air Line (a.k.a. the Franklin Line) barrels northwest out of Willimantic to Putnam. It's graded as a former high-speed route...some curvature and hills, but can probably waver between 90-125 MPH through the wilderness. The current trail is under state lock-and-key as a linear state park, so there are no NIMBY "Friends of The Trail" organizations to act as a royal P.I.T.A. here and the state DOT has it in the state rail plan that this is a high-profile potential reactivation corridor. From Putnam the P&W mainline is almost arrow-straight northbound to Worcester. Not many grade crossings either...only problem areas are up in Auburn where a slight re-route next to 395/290 might be advisable through town centers. Otherwise that can be upgradeable out to Worcester Union Station. And then the Worcester Line (which we hope will be electrified by then) is tri-trackable all the way to Route 128.
Regional stops on the Worcester flank: Hartford, Buckland Hills park-and-ride (84/384/291 convergence), Willimantic, Putnam/395 (eh...need some station spacing, make it a bare platform), Worcester, Framingham, Boston. Pretty nice. Acelas can of course blast through.
-- East to Providence. Now, the active Willimantic Secondary to Plainfield is one curvy piece of track that can't exactly be high-speed. But if they can get 384 to Willimantic in one piece, the second desired leg of it to 395 and the stub highway to the RI border is a considerably easier build. So second-phase the ROW as more rail-on-highway-median. It crosses the P&W main in Plainfield before it hits 395, so could also be a choose-your-adventure alternative to Worcester if the Air Line isn't palatable. Getting to Providence would require a short slow-speed jog south on P&W to Moosup to meet with the old main to Providence, but it's short. And north you're dealing with much the same straightaway on P&W (albeit not as direct as the Air Line cut-over to Putnam). The route to Providence is landbanked in both CT and RI...no trail in CT, some trail in RI. RIDOT has also studied it as (far, far future) commuter rail from Providence to Coventry, so there's some other stakeholders in play there. And P&W would probably rather go to Willimantic on the grade-separated highway median than continue using the Willimantic Secondary, so there's freight stakeholders (I do not think it realistic to build as passenger-only...freight's a fact of life, and this is not a high-congestion route where that's a problem).
Regional stops on the Providence flank: Hartford, Buckland Hills, Willimantic, Plainfield/395, Coventry (convergence of RI3 / RI117 / RI116 / RI33, not too far from Exit 7 off 95), Providence. Acelas...non-stop. Willimantic as intermediate stop for the transfers in other directions...at most.
There...build in stages. Each segment has its multiple stakeholders who can utilize it if built asynchronously. Multiple routings. And it can be fed from a 100+ MPH-upgraded Springfield Line for starters. I think as Amtrak studies it more the Willimantic routing is going to snap into focus as the best and most cost-manageable option, and the 384 median build is going to look like a smarter way of getting the dang thing (both the road and rail dang things) built.
I do NOT think Woonsocket's a great destination because it misses Worcester. They have such an easier time upgrading the existing P&W track to Worcester and using the Worcester Line that the Putnam-Blackstone restoration makes little sense. The other P&W main to Providence will be hosting commuter rail by 2020-2025 and be available, but it's got a lot of grade crossings so I think >80 MPH is gonna be tough. You also can't get to Boston AND Providence that way without reversing direction at Providence. I don't know where else you can cover Woonsocket and Providence in the same trip...there's no available land.
I do NOT think going straight to Boston via the Franklin Line is a good idea because it misses too many population centers. Really, either go to Worcester on the existing P&W track or go to Providence on the old route east of 395. I can't take these maps seriously if the east-of-395 portions show anything different.
I think it's going to be HARD AS HELL to build the western half at all. Westchester County is a NIMBY minefield. Upgrading the Metro North Harlem Line to HSR or relocating portions of it to the Saw Mill Parkway and I-684 medians are going to bring out the flaming pitchforks. Brewster-Danbury is fine, but the old ROW from Newtown to Waterbury was obliterated by I-84 construction. To do that would require median running on an expressway they are having a devil of a time trying to permit and expand from 4 to 6 lanes because of terrain, EIS, and abutter issues. I think that is BILLIONS down the drain to re-establish that link, and another community minefield because of the density along 84. Waterbury-Bristol is OK...that is the former intercity route. However, downtown Bristol has a hella tight hairpin curve because the RR was built to serve a former downtown factory instead of cutting straight across. The town defeated the Route 72 expressway about 10 times over because of how it would decimate downtown. You aren't cutting across that mile or so without busting out the tunnel boring machine and digging under dozens of residential property lines, the Pequabuck River, and a whole lot of wetlands. That could be another billion to eliminate the 5 minutes of sharp curves, steep hill, and grade crossing hell on the hairpin. Chances: very, very poor. Rest of the line to Hartford is nicely built for it, though.
The chances of that route working are vanishingly small. I think if this is gonna happen it's Springfield Line or bust, then the much more buildable eastern inland half. Which means they still have to contend with Metro North congestion to New Haven. OR, they have to contend with Long Island Railroad congestion halfway across the island and the mythical cross-Sound tunnel. Better wrap brain about figuring out how to de-clog MNRR, because that's probably what they're stuck with. Springfield Line + east leg is still a hell of a lot better than the NEC Shoreline, but I think this plan needs several more revisions to bring it down from the clouds into some sort of realism.
