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Wow. Just... wow.
The infills at Sweetser Circle and Wonderland are deeply questionable to me. All those bus connections can be made at Sullivan and Wonderland/Blue, and saying that Sweeter Circle is convenient to Encore strains credulity.
February 2018, Regional Rail for Metropolitan Boston, Page 23:
- FINALLY!...the Peabody Branch is namechecked! It's still nebulously phased-out vs. the infills and they don't describe how it affects the diesel vs. electric fleet shares discrepancy, but it finally gets put to words after being absent entirely in the first-take Implementation Plan. Progress! Tacked-on progress, but some of the whoppers from last time about turning ops at Beverly, tunnel vs. drawbridge capacity, etc. are coalescing towards their most-obvious resolutions.
Alon is not a paid employee of TransitMatters. They are a volunteer.
- These guys employ Mr. "Electronics Before Concrete" Alon Levy, right?
February 2018, Regional Rail for Metropolitan Boston, Page 23:
(Also in plaintext: http://transitmatters.org/rolling-out-regional-rail)
View attachment 11214
- And they're going to lump infills at (1) Sullivan, (2) Sweetser Circle, (3) Revere Center, (4) 'Zombie' Wonderland, and (5) South Salem to no schedule detriment because 70 years of native speeds are so chum-packed with "safety theater"??? Really...these guys found 5 stop dwells' worth of pure, unadulterated performative "safety theater" in there?
Theres a lot of culture that needs to be changed with commuter railroads in response to dwell time.
And Im not just talking about the employees.
On the subway, people move to the door and are stepping off the train the instance the door opens and lets them out.
On commuter rail, the culture seems to be that passengers remain seated and only stand up when the train stops.
Conductors encourage this behavior because they are essentially doing "all aboard" calls at every stop (with a flashlight) and are content to hold the train as long as needed to ensure everyone can take their sweet time to get on and off.
Add doors, add beeping, and start to train people that you have 6 seconds (or whatever) to get on or off and we're moving with or without you*
*Conductors still have the ability to override this and allow longer dwell times for ADA passengers as needed
Also, F-Line (or anyone in the know), I have an engineering question: Are the NSRL construction zones/entry points reserved/purchased yet?
Seriously - do you have the coordinates where there are set asides for all four approach tunnels?I just want to know where I should bring my shovel to start digging. My back ain’t what it used to be but I’d rather dig a tunnel than join a gym.
Seriously - do you have the coordinates where there are set asides for all four approach tunnels?
These are my guesses. Tell me if I win.
Northwest?
Dropped pin
Northeast?42°22'24.8"N 71°04'23.0"W
goo.gl
Dropped pin
No clue on the south.42°22'39.5"N 71°04'35.0"W
goo.gl
I remember when they were looking at alternative locations for the GLX maintenance facility, a couple of options on the north side of the North Point development were ruled out in part because they were on top of the NSRL portal location for the Fitchburg Line. So clearly there's an awareness that they need to keep those places unbuilt-on.
TransitMatters has released their report on the Eastern Route: A Better Newburyport/Rockport Line.
For those who don't know, TransitMatters are probably the most vocal (or at least most visible) advocates of the Regional Rail concept, and this report continues a bit of a tradition they've developed of trying to identify specific actionable improvements, with an eye to the short-term, medium-term, and long-term alike.
TransitMatters members are active on this forum, including one of our moderators, @datadyne007. So, I'm sharing the report here to discuss (and I'll offer my thoughts on it myself later this week), but hope that the conversation can remain productive and constructive.
If there is only budget to electrify as far as Beverly in the near term, then the branch lines will need to be served by short-turning diesel trains at Beverly Depot. It is not possible to run diesel trains as expresses between Beverly and Boston without severely harming reliability for Beverly-Boston local service. Dual-mode multiple units do exist, but they are expensive to purchase and maintain: the cost premium over standard EMUs is high enough that it rivals the cost of simply electrifying the branch lines. Electrifying both branch lines as soon as possible is ultimately the most economical and efficient solution