Commuter Rail To Millis and Milford

There's a fairly good chance such an extension would be built to Hersey tor somewhere near 128 to provide a park-and-ride.

A Needham Green Line branch would still need to cross 128 somewhere near Channel 5.

The "choked" South Station situation will probably be eased in the future when the planned expansion of SS toward Fort Point Channel is completed. It's a long way off but I think it will eventually happen. The North-South tunnel is a longer shot, but either change will completely shuffle the deck for Needham Branch service to Roslindale, West Roxbury and further. Green Line to Needham Heights, OK.

A better choice for extending the OL would be to Hyde Park and Readville with at least a new stop at Clarendon Hills.

On CR, the Franklin line should be extended to Bellingham and Milford.

That doesn't take into account the choked NEC.

wicked wrote:Is the ROW still big enough for two tracks, especially in the Falls? I know it is in Needham.

The most expensive part of the project would be the bridge over 128, right?

I recall reading somewhere on this board that replacement of the bridge over Rt 128 near Highland Ave is part of the project to widen Rt 128.

highgreen215 wrote:
A better choice for extending the OL would be to Hyde Park and Readville with at least a new stop at Clarendon Hills.

Ideally, the LL would split at Forest Hills and service Hyde Park and Rozzie/West Roxbury. But a Hyde Park branch is problematic because Amtrack wants to quad track that area and the ROW starts to run out of room pretty quickly for any rapid transit. It also doesn't help with NEC capacity north of Forest Hills. Using the Needham ROW fixes capacity problems and serves a more densely populated route.

There should be a line to at least millis to take traffic of 109. 109 is bad at rush hour with only one lane each way. If there is a line to millis they could have a terminal station at the now closed factory bay colony used to serve. Tracks are still in place across union st and in the factory's property. It will just need to be upgraded. Track conditions heading towards needham from the factory I have no clue about. It's just my .2 cents.

MBTA3247 wrote:I recall reading somewhere on this board that replacement of the bridge over Rt 128 near Highland Ave is part of the project to widen Rt 128.

That would make sense, and I didn't even think of that aspect. Thanks.

wicked wrote:

MBTA3247 wrote:I recall reading somewhere on this board that replacement of the bridge over Rt 128 near Highland Ave is part of the project to widen Rt 128.

That would make sense, and I didn't even think of that aspect. Thanks.

Yes. Current bridge isn't wide enough on one side of the highway. Replacement RR bridge is being paid for by MassDOT (since it's their project), and will be full two-track width unlike the single-track span there now.

If/when the GL ever comes, that infrastructure will be ready. The Charles River bridge would still need replacement, however.

Track conditions heading towards needham from the factory I have no clue about.

The track condition from Needham to Medfield where it meets the Millis spur are at the same condition. The track would of course, be upgraded among a few short bridges, and street crossings are paved over, those would have to be redone for the new track between Needham through Dover and Medfield Jct

Thanks Robert. I don't know if anyone has mentioned this but, where the Framingham secondary and this track meets is it set up as a diamond crossing or is a reverse move needed to cross the secondary.

mbta fan the diamond and related signals were removed about 20 years ago. freight service to millis ended with the closure of gaf. ( 10 Years ago?) there was an attempt by gaf to establish a rail re-load distribution operation. the rail rates of qbtrr and csxt were not competitive with trucking from new jersey. i had a brief exposure to that proposal and felt csxt was using a bad truck comparison. obviously not cost. a waste of taxpayer money to re-do the charles river bridge. i think the row from medfield to needham will become a rail trail. ken patrick

Thanks ken, I did hear some rail trail proposal a while back. If commuter ever gets extended down to millis and Milford it would make 109 easier to deal with around rush hour.

You're right, MBTA fan, especially in rush hour through Medfield Center at 109 & 27 where it gets real bad in the afternoon, since I go through that intersection to go to sports games, and its bad, like a standstill sometimes, so I think the Millis/West Medway branch ought to be reactivated to relief the congestion along 109 on weekdays

People also forget about village st before tresca brothers heading toward medfield center. It's a shortcut to 115 and is a good way to avoid the 109/27 mess. I've gone that way before during rush hour and it's a good shortcut to Norfolk and Walpole.