Re: Fall River/New Bedford Commuter Rail
SCR is using old routes that go through populated regions. There are sections of track that must be upgraded to passenger standards. And there are sections that are empty rights-of-way that must be reactivated and rebuilt entirely.
The reason why they are not double tracking all of it is due to community opposition from the surrounding populations of the existing right-of-way. In particular, there are about 15 miles worth of single tracking from Easton Village through Weir Junction with only two passing sections*. This section occurs on the trunk of the route, passing through Taunton, where contention will be the worst.
Overall,
I don't remember off-hand how many of those 46 railroad at grade crossings are within Taunton itself, but as you can imagine, the idea of reactivating those crossings with only 38 trips per day is already causing NIMBYs to freak out. Doing more frequent service is an uphill battle -- although I agree with you that double-tracking and creating properly frequent service would be significantly better.
On the other hand, properly frequent service would cause significant traffic problems on the Northeast Corridor. The RAILSIM analysis decided that the Stoughton alternative was acceptable but mainly because it piggy-backs on the existing Stoughton branch. The Attleboro alternative represented adding traffic equivalent to an entirely new branch on the NEC and the projections were absolutely nightmarish. In fact, the analysts reported that the number of conflicts was so high for the Attleboro alternative it caused the RAILSIM software to crash.
*To be completely clear here, there are 10 miles of single tracking and 5.9 miles of double track sections for a total of 15.9 miles between Stoughton station and Weir Junction. Much of the double tracking comes around Stoughton station up until Easton Village. Between Easton Village and Weir Junction there are only two opportunities for passing. In particular, there are no opportunities for passing on the long segment between Easton Village and Raynham Park, in other words, the portion of the line that is contained within Easton.
Everything between Stoughton Station and Weir Junction is currently empty right-of-way and is being built from scratch, essentially. They are creating new at grade crossings, hence the NIMBY freak out.
SCR is using old routes that go through populated regions. There are sections of track that must be upgraded to passenger standards. And there are sections that are empty rights-of-way that must be reactivated and rebuilt entirely.
The reason why they are not double tracking all of it is due to community opposition from the surrounding populations of the existing right-of-way. In particular, there are about 15 miles worth of single tracking from Easton Village through Weir Junction with only two passing sections*. This section occurs on the trunk of the route, passing through Taunton, where contention will be the worst.
Overall,
I don't remember off-hand how many of those 46 railroad at grade crossings are within Taunton itself, but as you can imagine, the idea of reactivating those crossings with only 38 trips per day is already causing NIMBYs to freak out. Doing more frequent service is an uphill battle -- although I agree with you that double-tracking and creating properly frequent service would be significantly better.
On the other hand, properly frequent service would cause significant traffic problems on the Northeast Corridor. The RAILSIM analysis decided that the Stoughton alternative was acceptable but mainly because it piggy-backs on the existing Stoughton branch. The Attleboro alternative represented adding traffic equivalent to an entirely new branch on the NEC and the projections were absolutely nightmarish. In fact, the analysts reported that the number of conflicts was so high for the Attleboro alternative it caused the RAILSIM software to crash.
*To be completely clear here, there are 10 miles of single tracking and 5.9 miles of double track sections for a total of 15.9 miles between Stoughton station and Weir Junction. Much of the double tracking comes around Stoughton station up until Easton Village. Between Easton Village and Weir Junction there are only two opportunities for passing. In particular, there are no opportunities for passing on the long segment between Easton Village and Raynham Park, in other words, the portion of the line that is contained within Easton.
Everything between Stoughton Station and Weir Junction is currently empty right-of-way and is being built from scratch, essentially. They are creating new at grade crossings, hence the NIMBY freak out.
Last edited:
