Crazy Transit Pitches

Matthew said:
Huh? I read his blog as well and I don't recall him saying anything of what you just rambled. Except for the fact that the Amtrak Vision plan is a boondoggle. And it is.
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How is it a boondoggle , I think its a great plan....the Coast is too curvy...
 
Nexis4jersey said:
Idk If I told the forum this , but Alon Levy thinks the Canton Viaduct should be tore down due to it being in bad shape.... Apparently he thinks its in worse shape then any of the bridges with Speed Restrictions in Connecticut , New York , New Jersey or Maryland..... He also thinks using the Providence Bypass would be a stupid idea.... Sigh , hes only used the Northeast Corridor once and seems to think he knows whats best of the NEC. Hes calling the Amtrak Expansion plan a Boondoggle , but has no problems with the botched Cali HSR plan... Hes also against 4 tracking in Mass and Rhode Island even though its need for HSR and Freight operations to co-Exist....
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Yeah, no...that guy doesn't know what the hell he's talking about.

Canton Viaduct was extensively rehabbed in 1995 in prep for the Acela. Completely ripped out the trackbed and strengthened the granite caps with a new concrete deck. And even if it weren't rehabbed and extensively inspected that thing ain't falling over anytime soon. The collaborative of Freemason lodges who engineered and built it in 1835 out of local quarry granite modeled its design after the city walls of ancient Rhodes from 400 B.C. Which are still partially standing, BTW. There's a reason why it's one of the oldest pieces of major infrastructure in the region still in active use and largely unmodified from its original construction. It doesn't need to be. It's probably going to be one of the last structures still standing at the end of some future New England episode of "Life Without People".

And, hey, if Boston were to get sacked by the Vandals that means we can all flee the city on the Providence Line before we're enslaved.
 
It's $151 billion of pipe dreams, like building an entirely new tunnel under Philly. That's not realistic. What Amtrak's already doing by slowly improving the existing infrastructure is much better.

You can relax, F-line, nobody's advocating for removal of the Canton Viaduct. I have no idea what got into Nexis.
 
Matthew said:
It's $151 billion of pipe dreams, like building an entirely new tunnel under Philly. That's not realistic. What Amtrak's already doing by slowly improving the existing infrastructure is much better.

You can relax, F-line, nobody's advocating for removal of the Canton Viaduct. I have no idea what got into Nexis.
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You sound just as bad as those NIMBYs....we need a New NEC....at least to bypass the clogged up sections in CT , PA , NJ , MD.... How is a tunnel under Philly to the core not realistic? 151 Billion is for the Entire Northeastern Network , so not just the NEC , but Keystone , Empire , Vermonter , Downeaster , Downstate , Lackawanna , Lehigh , and Northwest Service upgrading those with the full build out plans comes to 50-70Billion , to Electrifying , replace bridges , Bypass slow spots , bore new tunnels , build new stations. The New NEC will cost 50 billion which is in line with other Int projects of similar size and density and then the rest will be spent on the current NEC and feeder approaches....along with New Yards , Enlarged Stations like New York , Boston , Newark , Baltimore , and DC....
 
What would it take to CBTC the Red Line from South Station to Alewife, order more trains, run trains that loop Alewife to South Station and back to decrease that stretch of the Red Line's headways to ~3 minutes peak, ~4 minutes off peak? Those would be the headways if for every two trains that left Alewife (1 destined for Ashmont and 1 for Braintree) there was a train added that left Alewife destined for South Station.

EDIT: To make this a fully crazy transit pitch. I propose to 4-track the Red Line from Harvard to South Station with turnarounds on either side. Use the outermost tracks for "Harvard Express" trains that run Harvard-Park Street-Downtown Crossing-South Station. At 50mph, Harvard to Park Street would take 4 minutes, compared to 10 minutes currently via the Red Line, and a 15 minute drive in the middle of the night with nobody on the road.
 
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Waiting for a train to Elm Cheer doesn't sound nearly as unpleasant as it really is.
 
My Proposed Improvements to the Waterbury Branch , Trackage upgraded to 80mph , Hourly off peak Bi-Directional Service , High Level Stations , DMU Trains providing Faster acceleration and cheaper to operate , all crossings gated and upgraded. 5 New Passing Sidings constructed...

Waterbury Branch
Torrington North
Torrington
Thomaston
Waterbury
Naugatuck
Beacon Falls
Seymour
Ansonia
Derby (Close it)
Great River
Milford West
Devon (Most Services Terminate here)
Bridgeport (Limited)
Stamford (Limited)

I'm beating the Drums on the Beacon/Maybrook line....if the Central Corridor and Lewiston Commuter Rail can be pushed along , then theres no harm with the Beacon/Maybrook lines. Trackage Replaced and upgraded to 80mph , all Crossings upgraded , Service Hourly , with limited peak service to White Plains from Connecticut and to New Haven , DMU Trains providing Faster acceleration and cheaper to operate , Bi-Directional Service , New Sidings constructed.

Northern Line
Poughkeepsie
New Hamburg
Beacon
Beacon Towne Center
Fishkill
Brinckerhoff
Hopewell JCT
(Connections to Harlem line for White Plains./ Grand Central)
Brewster Hill
Mill Plain
Danbury JCT
North Danbury
Newtown
Stevenson
Shelton
Great River
Milford West
Devon (Most Services Terminate here)
Milford (Rush Hour only)
West Haven (Rush Hour only)
New Haven Union (Rush Hour only)
 
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Im not so sure there's need for the Maybrook line passenger service.

Also, why the heck would you move the Naugatuck station? I'm liking the extension to Thomaston and Torrington though.
 
Scalziand said:
Im not so sure there's need for the Maybrook line passenger service.

Also, why the heck would you move the Naugatuck station? I'm liking the extension to Thomaston and Torrington though.
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I'll keep the current Naugatuck station location , but there should be increased connections to Maple.

Theres an Estimated 8,300 who drive from Newtown-Danbury Area or just west the Harlem line towns to use the Harlem at Southeast , Brewster , or points North , there's enough demand between Danbury and Brewster to reopen that part of the line and there's a growing demand coming from the Hudson line towns as White Plains booms with jobs it currently has 150,000 jobs in its Downtown core. Theres also some demand for Danbury to New Haven Service , commuting patterns are showing this....
 
Speaking as a Bristol native. . .

Torrington's very low-demand. CT 8 is wide open north of Waterbury and one of the state's lowest-volume expressways, and the commute orientation from there swings more E-W than the Naugatuck Valley from Waterbury-south. It's too easy to park-and-ride at Waterbury from points north on 8 to be thinking substantial extension up into that low-density stretch of the valley. And, horrible as 84 is, you unfortunately you can't do Hartford-Torrington without a reverse move at Waterbury or without constructing a wye that totally misses Waterbury...so E-W commuter rail loses a lot of luster too.

I think it's got some long-term potential as a Waterbury Line extension, but frankly I think that service has got more upside getting punted off the Metro North system map entirely (since it doesn't have any GCT thru trains like Danbury) and getting rebranded under the Central CT/CTDOT commuter rail umbrella. With some overlapping mix of Devon/etc.-Waterbury and Hartford-Waterbury short turns and Hartford-Waterbury-Devon/etc. thru trains (more predominant on the off-peak to keep frequencies everywhere constant) taking over the corridor. Torrington gets lost in the shuffle a little with that reorientation. Future consideration for sure, but I'd rank it pretty low on the state's priority pile.



Brewster-Danbury works if the Danbury Line gets electrified to the south and they consolidate the MNRR diesels to a home base out of Southeast. This may be a way to finagle the badly needed New Milford extension while electrifying the existing Danbury Line, since the Berkshire Line will probably have to remain diesel forever to preserve the vertical freight clearances. Run the EMU's to Danbury with greater GCT thru trains like they used to before the wires came down in ('64?). Run the diesel shuttles to Southeast, where the ex-Maybrook line is nice, straight, and direct and can have its former wye at Southeast restored. Then abandon the totally redundant 6 miles of Beacon Line line paralleling the Harlem Line out to Dykemans to consolidate infrastructure.


Not so sure the Maybrook between Danbury and Milford is worth using. That thing corkscrews back and forth on itself several times over for very poor potential speeds, hits a density cavity in Monroe, and is a freight clearance route that wouldn't support high platforms anywhere. DBY-NHV would probably end up faster under wires on the L-shaped route down to Norwalk if the branch got a bump from 60 to 80 MPH (hard, though, with the grade crossings), even with an awkward reverse move at Norwalk. Maybrook Line was never, apart from its earliest days, much of a passenger route...that was always the main route for big slow freights into CT until the 1980's when Conrail divested itself out of most of the state.


I do NOT think the Beacon Line between the Hudson and Harlem Lines has got any potential. It is so damn curvy and hilly you'd be hard-pressed to top 50 MPH anywhere, it's a grade crossing shitshow, it only serves tiny villages esp. east of Hopewell Jct., and the would-be stations sites have very little parking capacity (reason why the studies have all been very meh on its upside). The Hudson Line also doesn't have the capacity to serve a full-on diesel branch schedule easily with all the Amtrak intercity growth, future HSR considerations, and future MNRR considerations for running up to Rhinecliff and/or electrifying it all. I think MNRR gets better bang-for-buck restoring the Harlem Line all the way back to Millerton rather than trying to make something of the Beacon on the Hudson-Harlem segment.
 
Blue Line Extension for Central Square in East boston, Chelsea, Revere and on to Lynn. I am well aware it would never happen. Ever. It is just something I fantasize about when NextBus say the next 116/117 bus is 50 minutes away.
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Tunnel branching off after Maverick under Meridian Street, all the way through Chelsea continuing under Broadway through Revere, then popping out just after the Route 60 traffic circle and on to a bridge over the marsh, then on to Lynn...
 
That was an early proposal to extend the Blue Line since that's where a lot more of the traffic was coming from.
 
Regional Link
Williamantic
Vernon
Manchester
Manchester - Interstate 84 Park & Ride
East Hartford
Hartford Union
West Hartford
Newington
New Britian
East Bristol
Bristol
Waterbury
Naugatuck
Beacon Falls
Seymour
Ansonia
Derby (Close it)
Great River
Milford West
Devon (Most Services Terminate here)
Bridgeport (Limited)
Stamford (Limited)
 
Weird to see a Chelsea transit proposal right around the time I was thinking of some myself. These are entirely on existing or former rail lines, with some minimal crossing only to connect to existing stations:

https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msi...ll=42.380612,-71.014938&spn=0.061246,0.140762

I've labelled this as an extension to the Orange Line, but it certainly could be its own line. Particularly since the East Boston extension I've proposed is basically part of the Urban Ring proposal.

The Revere and Lynn extensions would work best in conjunction with a Blue Line extension, in my opinion. In theory, I suppose this Lynn extension could be a replacement to the Blue line to Lynn, but its very circuitous. The Malden extension that connects back to the existing OL, I figure is just a convenient way to shuttle trains around, or as a backup during congested hours (express trains and the like).

In particular, I like the idea of improve MBTA access to the various industrial facilities near the lines, to make commuting life more tolerable for their employees. Having worked briefly on Eastern Ave in Chelsea, I would've killed for a walkable station to my place of work (hour long commutes when I still lived in Boston itself were maddening).
 
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