Pan Am Southern / Patriot Corridor Discussion

That is correct, take it from someone who grew up in North Adams and still visits family there often, the vast majority of tourist traffic is from the South (New York). I believe service to the Berkshires be it over the B&A to Pittsfield or the B&M to North Adams makes more sense than anything to Boston. Too bad all but 5 miles of the PNA is gone, they could do both with one train.

That said, post-COVID, it's gonna be a hard sell to buy the entire line, even if they had the numbers to show it was worth it, which they don't.

At the end of the day from observing the activities of MassDOT lately I suspect the only thing that's going to happen anytime soon passenger wise in Massachusetts is inland route service from Connecticut via Springfield to Boston. All of the rest of it is likely a long way off if ever. I have no opposition to service from Greenfield to Boston but the most realistic thing up north seems an extension of T commuter service to Gardner which is probably the most cost effective solution. I don't want to lead this too far off topic as there are plenty of passenger threads about these topics but I can't see passenger service between Greenfield and Boston being the priority over service between Hartford/Springfield and Boston. And being someone that is following this very closely I see absolutely no evidence that the northern tier is viewed as the priority within the state - the only thing mentioned by the governor's office as actively being considered has been essentially taking the existing Amtrak Lake Shore service and expanding on that with frequencies - initially between Springfield and Boston (which likely means inland service.) and the recent CRISI grant awarded for improvements around Springfield station seems to hint at that as well.

Since the west-of-Wachusett corridor is less desirable, they might get a bargain, whereas CSX knows they want WOR-SPG or WOR-state line and will hold out for top dollar.

Per the NS intermodal site, 23K is now originating in Mechanicville with Ayer traffic forwarded to meet it. Can anyone confirm this? I presume the intermodal block is riding 11R?

First I've heard of this, where are you seeing this on the NS Corp website?

See here. Entirely possible it’s just some glitch, but they did announce TOP/SPG yesterday.
http://www.nscorp.com/content/nscorp/en ... er-ma.html

FWIW, on the CSX Albany Div, NS Lake Erie Dist, and Southern Tier Railroading FaceBook pages, there are postings that NS ran a round trip of a 26T/27T IM/manifest train between Cleveland and Ayer initially via NS Southern Tier/D&H to PAS at Mechanicville. The first eastbound 26T apparently ran Tuesday night on NS to Binghamton with manifest up front followed by COFC (single stacked presumably) led by a single CSX locomotive!?! Lots of speculation - don't know if this will eventually be routed over CSX/B&A or what....

Update: there's a forest fire of confusing and conflicting info on the interweb re: these 26T/27T trains such as from NS has no such symbol profiles and isn't planning to. And what might have been observed was a Binghamton bound "W16-27" train led by a single CSX unit, apparently the only such power configuration operating on the NS Lake Erie Dist on Tuesday. Others swear they clearly heard "26T" given on the scanner as the train passed. A photo of this mythical train might help - it's currently believed to be at Binghamton.

And I wonder if I'm pouring the proverbial gasoline on the this inferno!

No info as to what of those rumors may or may not be true. But as to the suggestion of that train in the future possibly moving over the B&A, NS trackage rights are limited to one pair of 9000 foot trains of exclusively rax and stacks. No manifest can be moved by NS via this route under the current deal. So if it did continue the manifest would need to drop off at Binghamton

CSX Geometry train SB through Holyoke -

CSX 9969 pulling Hocking Valley and Track Geometry Car TGC3

Looks like they went up to East Northfield, and headed back south.

Info on the Northern Tier Passenger Rail Study for anyone interested:

https://www.mass.gov/northern-tier-passenger-rail-study

Giving this thread a kick: FWIW in the past week, I've seen two 22K trains pass the Elkhart cam that were all double stacked but only a half mile or so in length. On other days, I've seen 22K trains with an Ayer block of 100+ single stacked container positioned between the Taylor doubles (head out to come off with the power at Binghamton) and the Mechanicville doubles. So I'm guessing that an all doubled consist has no Ayer containers meaning Ayer is getting roughly every other day service despite what NS' published IM schedules indicate.

Also note that when the across the board IM train symbol change at NS occurs on 8/22/22), 22K becomes symbol 264, the 206 Chicago to Buffalo IM train symbol changes to 28B, and both 264 and 28B will now come out of the Englewood IM pad (63rd St I think) instead of 22K coming from 47th St and 206 coming from 63rd St. Perhaps an opportunity for further operating economies combining an Ayer-less 264 with a Buffalo bound 28B or perhaps 2 daily frequencies to Buffalo? Who knows?

8/16/22 Update: the 22K passing Elkhart this morning at 0249 had an Ayer block of 150+ single stacked containers. Total train length by my estimation was about 2.5 miles in length.

the most realistic thing up north seems an extension of T commuter service to Gardner which is probably the most cost effective solution.

If this is ever seriously considered (again), I think it needs to be extended to Athol or Orange. That's where the heavy commuter traffic begins and ends. West of Orange it tapers off a lot.

They have the data to show where the density is.

Passenger service west of Greenfield ended in December 1958 and everything west of Fitchburg ended in the spring of 1960. Have any of those towns along the line grown that much in the last 60 years?