Lack of Greenbush Line Enthusiasm Question

I'm just curious. Frequently, I go to the Greenbush Line web site...
http://www.cbbgreenbush.com/projectschedule.html just to see what's going on. My daughter works in one of the hospitals in Boston and wants to move to the South Shore. She's looking forward to the Greenbush Line rectivation, which looks like it may actually be sometime in my lifetime, so she can move down to Weymouth and commute to Boston thru the junction in Braintree.

Down here in Jersey the M&E and the state are reactivating a couple of freight lines and the folks on the M&E and NJ Railfan forums are ecstatic (although the NIMBYs are doing a fair amount of whinning as you would expect). How come no one seems pumped up about reactivating the Greenbush Line on the NE Railfan or MBTA Forums? That would seem like a big deal to me.

Probably because its been a long, nasty, fight to get this line approved.

As for myself, I am resting up for the Mother Of All MBTA Commuter Rail Expansion Projects - New Bedford/Fall River.

Dave

And the restoration of service to Plymouth and Kingston sort of broke the ice for the possibilities of South Shore trains.

I last rode the Greenbush line way back in 1959 and I hope that someday I will ride that line again. I live out in the Kansas City area but much of my family is still in the Boston area. So maybe, on one of my trips to Scituate in about 2 years, I'll be able to get on in Greenbush.

The following is an e-mail update from Tom Carrol, Community Outreach Director, for the Greenbush line contractor, Cashman Balfour Beatty about the status of the Greenbush branch as of March 14, 2005. Hope this gives all an idea of what's happening (Cohasset is not mentioned, as no further work can be done in that Town until May 1, due to "environmental" issues)

Paul

-------------

Good Monday morning from Jackson Square, (CBB's HQ in Weymouth)

This June will mark 3 years since began our work here in Jackson Square, and the one question I receive the most is how can we do all the construction we have done and not have people complaining and criticizing the project. The answer is a simple one, people have been very tolerant and understanding of the work that needs to be done. It would be impossible to dig a slurry wall 3 feet from someone's building and not have them notice that you are there. No matter how much you try to minimize the impacts you can only do so much. The same with putting a 74" drain line down the main through street in Hingham Square. For all the people who read this that are impacted by the project, I just want to say thank you. Thank you for your understanding and patience because without that, well I don't want to think about it. On to the update:

Braintree.......

I will be before the Braintree board of Selectman tonight to discuss overnight work this weekend on the Monatiquot River bridge near Commercial Street. Not the one near Vinton Ave. The issue is that the bridge is on the active section of track and the railroad has agreed to not run trains from around 12:00 pm Friday the 18th of March 2005 till 6:00am Monday the 21st of March ..... The issue for us is that in trying to place the sheet pilings in the ground behind the existing abutments we discovered a lot of obstructions ( rock ). So we need to go in and excavate behind the abutments and remove the obstructions then backfill so we can drive our sheets.....crews will be on Quincy Ave this week restriping the center lane. Work also is continuing on the new bridge abutments at Quincy Ave....

Weymouth........

Crews will begin erecting the superstructure on the Green St. bridge this week.... Our crews will also continue installing drainage between Unicorn Ave and East St. This is another example of people being tolerant. This area is full of ledge and we are ho-ramming the ledge away as needed ...we may also be removing stumps on the right of way between Ledgehill Rd. and Webb St.
Hingham......Main St. is still closed for the installation of the slurry walls. We are also placing slurry wall between Central St. and Hersey St. We are also rock drilling the beams into the rock between Central St. and Hersey St. There could be daytime lane reduction on South St. @ North St. for utility relocation....

Scituate.....

We had a great meeting with the Businesses owners of North Scituate last Wednesday my thanks go out to Susan Phippen and Ann Burbine of the Town for putting this together and of course to the people who attended for giving up their time...We are placing silt fence on the right of way between Capt. Pierce and Hollet St. this should complete the areas we can get to now. We expect to be accepting platform sections in the next two weeks for Greenbush Station site. There are 26 pieces totally 864 feet. Most of the other work will be restricted to right of way ........We may also be receiving the Electrical substation sometime in the next couple weeks......

I want to remind everyone to tune to WJDA 1300 AM (Quincy) on the fourth Tuesday of every month from 1100-1200 for the Greenbush update program on Party line.....Also in every Saturday's Patriot Ledger in the local section look for a preview of the weeks up coming work.Last Wednesday we taped our latest Scituate cable access show and will be taping on Thursday our latest Braintree update ....Hope you all have a good week .....

Tom
Tom Carroll
Comm.Outreach Dir.
Cashman Balfour Beatty
1-781-335-5001
CBB/MBTA Hotline 1-781-682-6350
www.cbbgreenbush.com