Side note, I work at EWB and we had weekend regulars that lived in Rowes Wharf (with a direct water taxi to BOS) and they had their driver bring them to EWB every Friday to fly to MVY.
Fall River/New Bedford Commuter Rail (South Coast Rail)
- Thread starter JoeGallows
- Start date
Side note, I work at EWB and we had weekend regulars that lived in Rowes Wharf (with a direct water taxi to BOS) and they had their driver bring them to EWB every Friday to fly to MVY.
I don't doubt it, but do you think they'd ditch the driver for the Commuter Rail?
Awesome you work at EWB, by the way. I'm still hopeful that they end up with meaningful scheduled service beyond the Islands.
No, I don’t think they would, they were an older couple.
I hope for the same! It was a tease when Elite operated for that month span. I can’t believe how well they did despite announcing the service only weeks ahead.
South Coast Rail Middleboro route through Taunton to be complete by end of 2023, MBTA says
The director of construction said right now in Taunton, encroachments and demolition to prepare the right-of-way are going ahead.
www.tauntongazette.com
Update from the Taunton Gazette.
Construction ramps up for South Coast Rail Project
Construction work for the long-awaited South Coast Rail Project linking southeastern Massachusetts to Boston is ramping up this spring. Under Phase 1 of the South Coast Rail Project, six new commuter rail stations will be built along the Middleborough-Lakeville line, including at Middleborough...
turnto10.com
Another update.
themissinglink
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East Taunton Station Site (8/23/21)
themissinglink
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I wish I knew how to copy You Tube videos to this page but I'm sure someone else knows how to. If you search William Sternitzke's You Tube page you will find a fascinating video of the South Coast route. It starts at Stoughton Station, proceeds to No Easton Station and then shows a back of the train video through the Hockomock Swamp. I think it answers the question that a right of way exists for two tracks through the Swamp. The next shot is Whttenon Jct in Taunton.
Correct and thank you.
Does anyone know where I could find station-by-station ridership projections? The MassDOT documents library is... not super easy to use.
EDIT: Nevermind, found it, slide 13 in this presentation (Capital Programming Committee, South Coast Rail Phase 1 Service Project Briefing, February 6, 2018).
EDIT: Nevermind, found it, slide 13 in this presentation (Capital Programming Committee, South Coast Rail Phase 1 Service Project Briefing, February 6, 2018).
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These numbers aren’t new, but provide an opportunity to once again say, I just can’t fucking believe we are spending such a vast amount of money for such a tiny number of new riders. Billions of dollars could’ve been spent on much, much, much more utilitarian projects that would’ve benefited many more people than this.
HenryAlan
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I keep wondering what would have benefited New Bedford and Fall River more -- this really lame rail connection to Boston vs. a south east coastal light rail system for better local transit. I tend to think the most transit dependent folks there aren't likely to ride commuter rail to Boston very often, but might well benefit from a better RTA option for getting to their actual job.
While I don't necessarily think that LRT is the best choice for these two cities, given that I don't think there's an SRTA route with the ridership to justify it to a funding committee, it would have cost less than SCR. I will say that the SRTA can stand some bus service and route improvements; running on Sundays, for one.
And why are Seekonk, Swansea part of Gatra anyways? Especially now that RIPTA is running a weekday peak only Newport - Fall River - Providence, I think the SRTA can extend it's intercity Express to Providence, and maybe a parallel local on 6 to the state line, especially since that would neatly pass by the new CR station site. Or, work some sort of funding formula via Pilgrim Agreement where payment for RIPTA service into MA, since they have the waivers in place to cross state lines, offsets against RI funding for MBTA CR.
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I can’t remember exactly but somewhere in the threads there’s discussion with usual weigh ins from the transit geeks about light rail — my fantasy was to run a light rail exactly as you envisioned, but among other comments it was shredded in minute detail by F Line. And the critiques were valid, as they usually are.
Thinking about it now, probably the most effective use of money to benefit the south coast cities would be BRT, but real BRT that didn’t add bus lanes to those empty stretches of overly wide 1960s highways only to let the buses get stuck in the same old choke points, but truly build out a BRT network that worked. And since NB and FR aren’t that dense, you could probably execute this pretty handily. Getting to providence might be a later phase since that would be trickier but It doesn’t take a genius to know that most people don’t wanna travel 80 miles to work and providence is way closer than Boston.
From a broader view of what really is equitable on a regional level, I also think it’s both arrogant, unfair, and unrealistic to assume that every low income employee is breaking down the door to get into the Boston markets. Why does Boston have to be the hub for every line? How about we actually build a network of cities and employment hubs that looks at the actual geography of the population and transit needs, and accelerates those patterns with transit? We could accomplish the south coast network and it would build jobs and resiliency and save people a 2 hour expensive train ride, too.
Brattle Loop
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That's an excellent point. I find myself wondering if this'd be a much easier solve if transit to Providence wasn't so much of a jurisdictional minefield compared to transit to Boston. Though I suppose the state doesn't have nearly so many incentives to help people get to jobs in other states as they do to make all roads lead to Boston, unfortunately.
themissinglink
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They really should have just extended the Stoughton line to Taunton as Phase 1 from the start and waited to see if ridership was high enough to justify a later Phase 2 to Fall River/New Bedford, but instead we're left with the ass-backwards Middleborough routing which will only introduce more problems due to the single track Old Colony mainline.
Oh well.
The EGE
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Stoughton to Taunton is the expensive and politically difficult portion. It requires reactivating abandoned ROW, some of which hasn't seen passenger service for over a century, and is the section that the Army Corps put ridiculous requirements on. Stoughton, Raynham, and Easton are the most vocal opponents of the project. Fall River and New Bedford is all existing freight trackage (save for the new connecting track at Cotley Junction), and those cities have been the principal support for the project. Fall River and New Bedford have a combined population just under 200,000, to Taunton's 59,000.
While the project as it's being built is an operational nightmare, I understand the political calculus that led to it.
While the project as it's being built is an operational nightmare, I understand the political calculus that led to it.