MBTA Commuter Rail (Operations, Keolis, & Short Term)

Riverside said:
I haven’t read the report in detail yet but wouldn’t it make more sense to discuss the TM report in the Regional Rail thread? At this point, they aren’t proposing primarily operational changes, which I feel like moves it beyond the scope of this thread?
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Absolutely. I realized I should've sent the report in the Regional Rail thread after posting. Perhaps the convo can be moved to its appropriate place by a mod?
 
themissinglink said:
TransitMatters released a report today about modernizing the Framingham/Worcester Line.
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I had never heard of the proposed infill commuter rail station mentioned in here to be located at parsons street in brighton. Looking at maps it makes a lot of sense. They also mention that with a new pedestrian bridge this would be a 5 minute walk from arsenal yards. This is the type of maximization of transit infrastructure utility I love to see. Proposed location marked in red.

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They also mention a proposed infill station at newton corner. This is one that everyone has heard of/thought of before but it seems complicated to make work. They mention instead of putting the station at its historic location under the hotel to put it closer to st james st. I feel like thats an awkward spot and it would probably make more sense on the opposite side of the hotel, but I’m no expert and I’m sure theyve thought about that too. Either way its awesome to hear some proposed infill stations on the CR that we can hopefully look forward to in the future. Proposed location at st james st.

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Java King said:
@F-Line to Dudley estimated 1/3 billion. That seems to be in fantasy territory. The elevated section through Framingham center just seems crazy to me.
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Yeah, for how we're currently funding and managing public transportation, that's a crazy amount of money.

However... there have been periods of time when we have thrown a ton of funding at public transportation. Especially when the feds step in, a lot can get done. The last time this happened, about 1970's and early 80s, whole new systems got built, like in DC, Baltimore, Atlanta, and the BART in San Francisco. In Boston in a few short years then, we got Red Line to Alewife, Red Line to Braintree, and Orange Line to Oak Grove (which included a new tunnel under the Charles).

Maybe (hopefully) we are on a verge of another one of those cycles. The federal infrastructure bill of a couple years ago was a pretty big uptick in spending for public transit. The trend of a few decades now is more people moving back into cities. Even cities in red states are building streetcars.

As for the Framingham Viaduct idea, if/when more federal money flows, a few hundred million dollars looks less crazy. That's cheaper than the nearby project to upgrade one single highway interchange. And it is less crazy especially if a viaduct is what's needed to get Regional Rail style frequencies, like Transit Matters is saying. If we are at the start a new wave of public transportation funding, I'll be glad orgs like TM are including some bigger ideas for what could be done with that money.
 
ritchiew said:
Yeah, for how we're currently funding and managing public transportation, that's a crazy amount of money.

However... there have been periods of time when we have thrown a ton of funding at public transportation. Especially when the feds step in, a lot can get done. The last time this happened, about 1970's and early 80s, whole new systems got built, like in DC, Baltimore, Atlanta, and the BART in San Francisco. In Boston in a few short years then, we got Red Line to Alewife, Red Line to Braintree, and Orange Line to Oak Grove (which included a new tunnel under the Charles).

Maybe (hopefully) we are on a verge of another one of those cycles. The federal infrastructure bill of a couple years ago was a pretty big uptick in spending for public transit. The trend of a few decades now is more people moving back into cities. Even cities in red states are building streetcars.

As for the Framingham Viaduct idea, if/when more federal money flows, a few hundred million dollars looks less crazy. That's cheaper than the nearby project to upgrade one single highway interchange. And it is less crazy especially if a viaduct is what's needed to get Regional Rail style frequencies, like Transit Matters is saying. If we are at the start a new wave of public transportation funding, I'll be glad orgs like TM are including some bigger ideas for what could be done with that money.
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A problem I see is that the next time more federal money comes in, Boston may not have a good number of shovel-ready projects to get funded immediately if they're still in planning. Red-Blue is the only one with tangible progress so far (assuming no one wants to revive SL Phase III).

I recall someone said several cities didn't take full advantage of the 1980s federal funding because of the lack of projects (ironically, some of the ones you listed may have been on that list).
 
stick n move said:
I had never heard of the proposed infill commuter rail station mentioned in here to be located at parsons street in brighton. Looking at maps it makes a lot of sense. They also mention that with a new pedestrian bridge this would be a 5 minute walk from arsenal yards. This is the type of maximization of transit infrastructure utility I love to see. Proposed location marked in red.

View attachment 46932
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I think sliding the station closer to its former location at Brooks St might have more space.
 
ritchiew said:
Maybe (hopefully) we are on a verge of another one of those cycles. The federal infrastructure bill of a couple years ago was a pretty big uptick in spending for public transit. The trend of a few decades now is more people moving back into cities. Even cities in red states are building streetcars.
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I hope you are correct, and I love your optimism! I just feel the Transmit Matters report on the Framingham/Worcester line is so far down the list of important transit needs within the Boston area that it borders on fantasy. Extension of the Orange Line to West Roxbury, conversion of the Needham line to a Green Line extension, Red/Blue Connector, extension of the Blue Line to Lynn, and a host of other projects seem like a higher priority and greater use of limited funding.
 
Teban54 said:
A problem I see is that the next time more federal money comes in, Boston may not have a good number of shovel-ready projects to get funded immediately if they're still in planning. Red-Blue is the only one with tangible progress so far (assuming no one wants to revive SL Phase III).

I recall someone said several cities didn't take full advantage of the 1980s federal funding because of the lack of projects (ironically, some of the ones you listed may have been on that list).
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Push your city/town officials, RTAs, and be pushing your state reps on the bigger projects!

The MPO has seen a declining number of submissions for the annual Transportation Improvement Plan (TIP), and as such is seeking to create a pipeline via a new program to fund design costs through the TIP (formerly it only funded construction and required 25% design already completed, I think 75% a while back).

The MPO is also actively soliciting study proposals right now. Would you like to see, for example, a study on Needham line replacement? How about RLX to Arlington or GLX to porter? Something straight out of crazy transit pitches? Propose it!
 
Java King said:
I hope you are correct, and I love your optimism! I just feel the Transmit Matters report on the Framingham/Worcester line is so far down the list of important transit needs within the Boston area that it borders on fantasy. Extension of the Orange Line to West Roxbury, conversion of the Needham line to a Green Line extension, Red/Blue Connector, extension of the Blue Line to Lynn, and a host of other projects seem like a higher priority and greater use of limited funding.
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Yeah, I totally agree about prioritization. I think if you go through all the TM reports, the big takeaways you get are 1) lots more people could use these lines 2) run more trains, all day, and 3) electrify everything. And that seems like roughly correct priorities for commuter rail. Past that, the reports can come across a pile of other, smaller recommendations without clear prioritization. That could still be fine. I haven't been really sure who the target audience is for these reports.
 
As indicated in the report, the Worcester Line is going to have to bear a lot of the load during the Allston Viaduct reconstruction (and the 495 interchange work) - it's the only real alternative in the entire Metrowest quadrant. That bumps it quite a bit up the priority list, especially considering the tailpipe emissions of traffic jams on the Pike.
 
KCasiglio said:
The MPO is also actively soliciting study proposals right now. Would you like to see, for example, a study on Needham line replacement? How about RLX to Arlington or GLX to porter? Something straight out of crazy transit pitches? Propose it!
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Any chance you have the link?
 
ritchiew said:
As for the Framingham Viaduct idea, if/when more federal money flows, a few hundred million dollars looks less crazy. That's cheaper than the nearby project to upgrade one single highway interchange. And it is less crazy especially if a viaduct is what's needed to get Regional Rail style frequencies, like Transit Matters is saying. If we are at the start a new wave of public transportation funding, I'll be glad orgs like TM are including some bigger ideas for what could be done with that money.
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To qualify for feddy bucks you have to first achieve a clear consensus on what to do. Again...40 grade separation and/or improvement studies, no action, because Framingham always ties itself in knots on any improvements whatsoever to its downtown street grid. Up to and including basic queue-dump management at the crossing gates; yes, they can't even agree on frigging signal timings. Nobody's going to turn on the money spigot for a surefire deadlock. We already have all the evidence in the world for that, given the number of failed attempts to address this problem. There's going to have to be a sea change in the local relative desperation to solve this problem for there to be any movement in a positive direction (even if it's just nip/tuck and optimization stuff and not full separation). For there to be a way there has to first be a will, and this is one of the if not 'The' most notorious municipalities in the state for being unable to muster a clear will. This is a large, large blocker.

Meanwhile, we want to implement Regional Rail on the Worcester Line sooner rather than later. So the all-or-nothingness of demanding a viaduct in the implementation plan is a big, big problem. You probably aren't getting a viaduct here given the complexity and steep odds of achieving consensus, and even if you do it's certainly not going to happen soon. But we still want near-term Regional Rail (and, frankly, there's no constraints on the RR side to implementing that through the crossings...it's strictly a local carpocalypse and local surroundings pain threshold therein, not a Worcester Line traffic congestion problem). So where's the fallback position? What optimizations can you do in the meantime to net a halfway-tolerable traffic situation for Regional Rail? What's a viable installment plan? How much does Regional Rail succeed at removing cars from this problem spot, to buy time for permanent solutions? We don't know any of that because the mandate is presented as straight-up "Viaduct or GTFO", just as it was in Waltham on the Fitchburg Line. Only here, unlike Waltham, we don't even have ballpark cost estimates offered for that all-or-nothing mandate that we're told holds the fortunes of any Worcester Regional Rail in its grip. I'm at a loss to explain how a tact like that is supposed to influence real policy makers to act on this.
 
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Definitely get the impression that local pols really do not care about DT Framingham. That's probably part of it.
 
jklo said:
Definitely get the impression that local pols really do not care about DT Framingham. That's probably part of it.
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It's not just that. The current crossings haven't been touched in so many decades that they are out-of-compliance with current FRA safety regs for their traffic volumes (which are much higher than when the current crossing protection was installed eons ago) and, most importantly, accident rates (Bishop St. being the much nastier one for accidents). So any touch you make to the crossing protection, such as queue-dump signal preemption, ends up triggering other safety improvements that cost $$$. And it's the other safety improvements that the City balks at, so nothing ever gets done and the consensus ends up getting tanked on doing anything ever. One real sticking point has been the number of pedestrian trespassing close calls on the ROW between the crossings, as people just willfully cut through Howard St. rear parking lots to shortcut over to Waverly St. instead of using the designated sidewalks on Concord and Bishop. The T has been trying for years to install security fencing on the whole block to stop that dangerous practice, but that's when the local pols get involved to gum up the works to protect their citizens' god-given right to trespass on the ROW. So it's inability to reach a consensus on any improvements AND tons of micro-distractions like the trespassing "right" that reduce all efforts to better the situation to total spit.

As I said, there's no Worcester Line traffic issue here preventing Regional Rail service levels through these crossings. There's a 25-30 MPH speed restriction through the crossings, but it's on a station approach for every single scheduled train including Amtrak so trains are all at their slowest accel/decel here meaning no tangible schedule penalty to anyone. It's totally negligible for overall train throughput. And there's no quid pro quos written or unwritten with the City of Framingham restricting movements through the crossings (indeed the freight traffic is a miniscule fraction what it was just 15 years ago before Beacon Park closed). So if the state wanted to ram through Regional Rail frequencies with gates-down every 7.5 minutes, there's nothing stopping them from doing so. At most they might have to get that security fencing installed and the crossing protection upgraded to quadrant gates to satiate the FRA, but those are relatively minor in the grand scheme of things. It's totally the City's loss if there's an ensuing carpocalypse, because they had eons to agree to common-sense improvements and couldn't ever un-deadlock themselves. See if the pressure makes them squirm enough to finally un-deadlock themselves. But the crossings shouldn't prevent full Regional Rail, and mandatory elimination of them shouldn't be a binding prerequisite for full Regional Rail.
 
themissinglink said:
TransitMatters released a report today about modernizing the Framingham/Worcester Line.
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Does anyone know of any examples of an elevated concrete viaduct structure that carries freight traffic over land like is suggested in the report? I dont think Ive ever seen this used in the US before. There are elevated viaducts that carry commuter rail trains, and bridges over water that are essentially the same structure, but it seems lines that carry freight are always elevated by using fill.

Freight trains are many times heavier than passenger traffic so I would have to assume an elevated viaduct meant to carry mixed traffic would have to be built stronger and therefore be more expensive than one just for commuter rail. I, as well as I’m sure many others, have thought in their head about what to do with the framingham crossings and have thought why not just do an elevated concrete viaduct? But then I realized Ive never seen this done before and figure it would be too complicated and expensive. Is this a thing that actually gets used anywhere in the US, an elevated concrete viaduct with freight traffic?
 
stick n move said:
Does anyone know of any examples of an elevated concrete viaduct structure that carries freight traffic over land like is suggested in the report? I dont think Ive ever seen this used in the US before. There are elevated viaducts that carry commuter rail trains, and bridges over water that are essentially the same structure, but it seems lines that carry freight are always elevated by using fill.

Freight trains are many times heavier than passenger traffic so I would have to assume an elevated viaduct meant to carry mixed traffic would have to be built stronger and therefore be more expensive than one just for commuter rail. I, as well as I’m sure many others, have thought in their head about what to do with the framingham crossings and have thought why not just do an elevated concrete viaduct? But then I realized Ive never seen this done before and figure it would be too complicated and expensive. Is this a thing that actually gets used anywhere in the US, an elevated concrete viaduct with freight traffic?
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This would support @The EGE's opinion/idea that only the mainline passenger tracks need to be elevated, while freight tracks remain at grade with much less frequent crossings.
 
stick n move said:
Does anyone know of any examples of an elevated concrete viaduct structure that carries freight traffic over land like is suggested in the report? I dont think Ive ever seen this used in the US before. There are elevated viaducts that carry commuter rail trains, and bridges over water that are essentially the same structure, but it seems lines that carry freight are always elevated by using fill.

Freight trains are many times heavier than passenger traffic so I would have to assume an elevated viaduct meant to carry mixed traffic would have to be built stronger and therefore be more expensive than one just for commuter rail. I, as well as I’m sure many others, have thought in their head about what to do with the framingham crossings and have thought why not just do an elevated concrete viaduct? But then I realized Ive never seen this done before and figure it would be too complicated and expensive. Is this a thing that actually gets used anywhere in the US, an elevated concrete viaduct with freight traffic?
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The NY Connecting Railroad has a pretty long viaduct over the BQE that's only used for freight. I don't think it's made from concrete though, for what it's worth. If that's what you're after the one just down the line over Queens Blvd is concrete, although much shorter.
 
Teban54 said:
This would support @The EGE's opinion/idea that only the mainline passenger tracks need to be elevated, while freight tracks remain at grade with much less frequent crossings.
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The Downtown Lynn viaduct on the Eastern Route (then B&M service) was a quad-track combination freight and passenger viaduct when complete in 1914. It carried more than 150 trains per day, probably 50% freight. It remained partial freight service well into the 1960's.
 
stick n move said:
Does anyone know of any examples of an elevated concrete viaduct structure that carries freight traffic over land like is suggested in the report? I dont think Ive ever seen this used in the US before. There are elevated viaducts that carry commuter rail trains, and bridges over water that are essentially the same structure, but it seems lines that carry freight are always elevated by using fill.

Freight trains are many times heavier than passenger traffic so I would have to assume an elevated viaduct meant to carry mixed traffic would have to be built stronger and therefore be more expensive than one just for commuter rail. I, as well as I’m sure many others, have thought in their head about what to do with the framingham crossings and have thought why not just do an elevated concrete viaduct? But then I realized Ive never seen this done before and figure it would be too complicated and expensive. Is this a thing that actually gets used anywhere in the US, an elevated concrete viaduct with freight traffic?
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All new railroad bridges are required to be built weight-rated for freight as a future-proofing thing for 75-100 year structural lifespans, so it really doesn't make a difference. CSX still has freight rights into Boston and on the Grand Junction even though they aren't being used for anything regular right now, and while they contractually sunset their high clearance route into Boston with the closure of Beacon Park there are still considerations where one-off freights can run east of Framingham. It's happening right now with occasional trips to Beacon Park to haul away contaminated dirt (reason why there were some new stub-end tracks recently laid in the remains of the yard). The weight rating of the B&A is 315,000 lbs. per car, a little bit above-and-beyond the 286,000 lb. modern standard. I don't think the weight rating has been contractually sunset like the height/width rating has, since it doesn't really affect ops current or future.

Bottom line: it's a common-carrier mode, so there's no cheaping out. And the state's standards for new RR bridge construction don't cheap out. Everything new/replaced is built to a minimum 286,000 lb. loading standard.


It's not a concrete viaduct (mostly steel with one brick arch section), but the West Philadelphia Elevated is an example of a long freight viaduct. It carries the CSX freight mainline over Downtown Philly and 30th St. Station in/around/over the Northeast Corridor with grade separation. It's 120 years old, and manages to carry crush-load 315,000 lb. traffic every day on the biggest freight artery between the Mid-Atlantic and NY/NJ regions.
 
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