VRE News: Track Work Delays and Train Lengths

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From June 6-9, Norfolk Southern officials will be replacing the ties on the track connecting with the CSX line, just south of Alexandria. VRE officials said speed restrictions will be in place and trains will have to operate on a single track along the Manassas line.

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In other rail news, VRE will make train 303 an eight-car set every Friday this summer to accommodate an increase in ridership. Train 307 will be reduced to a six-car train on Fridays. VRE officials said Manassas line train 327 is also crowded but will not be adjusted. If the number of standees rises, VRE officials said they may be able to add a car to 327 at a later date.

I'm guessing thats the HORN Track going OOS during the work?

Davis

You might have noticed their is only 1 8 car set on the Fredericksburg Line and 2 on the Manassas Line. That new 8 car set was added 1 month ago for crowding.

Train #307 has been an 8 car set for many years.
I've riden Train #303 & #305 once before and I can tell you those trains are pretty crowded - standing room by the time they get to Alexandria. Unfortuanetly, VRE does not have enough space at Ivy Yard or enough railcars to make more 8 car trains.

Yes and at this point I really don't see the Ivy City Complex as any kind of long-term viable space. There is the space dubbed "Wedge Yard" by MARC which is in between the NEC and Capital Sub leads and the Acela Car Wash. Its a strip of dirt in a triangle shape. In one of MARC's plans they outlined that as a possible area to do add some space, so i guess they call dibs on it over VRE but really no one has ever ponied up the money to build there (which may be owned by CSX). I'm sure if VRE had the money on hand and MARC didn't they could probably get it. But in the scheme of things its pretty small and just a stopgap when looking at how much VRE's ridership can grow.

In one of the VRE Manager's recent online forums with passengers, someone asked about the L'Enfant Storage track which CSX officially calls "VRE STUB TRACK" according to the guy in the HyRail I talked to, (pretty reliable source IMHO). Anyways the manager's response is sometime this year they want to add a switch to the North end of the stub track (currently its only connection is on the south end). He said after trains finish their runs they would run back down to the stub for midday storage from Union. "Sometime this year" strikes me as I haven't seen any news on preliminary work for this, maybe its too small of a project to get any publicity. Once again this is merely a stopgap, anyone who has seen the storage track can tell you it will only hold 2 mid-sized equipment sets. If they throw a switch on the North end that may compromise the length more. Definitely a good and relatively inexpensive option for the interim time but ridership will continually grow and surpass the capacity provided by the siding.

Just my $0.02 as a railfan, no more, no less,

Davis

As a railfan too, the only long term solution I see will be to run more trains in the opposite direction both in the morning and the afternoons. That will mean paying CSX and NS more money for track upgrades and more slots, and possibly run some midday trains.

electricron wrote:As a railfan too, the only long term solution I see will be to run more trains in the opposite direction both in the morning and the afternoons. That will mean paying CSX and NS more money for track upgrades and more slots, and possibly run some midday trains.

I wonder if it would be possible for NS to let VRE use their storage tracks at Alexandria near AF/VAL. Not quite Potomac Yard, but still doable.

strench707 wrote:In one of MARC's plans they outlined that as a possible area to do add some space, so i guess they call dibs on it over VRE but really no one has ever ponied up the money to build there (which may be owned by CSX). I'm sure if VRE had the money on hand and MARC didn't they could probably get it.

MARC has already spent quite a bit of money for preliminary work on the wedge yard - the holdup for the start of construction was it being used as a staging area for the work going on the 9th Street bridge.

HokieNav wrote:

strench707 wrote:In one of MARC's plans they outlined that as a possible area to do add some space, so i guess they call dibs on it over VRE but really no one has ever ponied up the money to build there (which may be owned by CSX). I'm sure if VRE had the money on hand and MARC didn't they could probably get it.

MARC has already spent quite a bit of money for preliminary work on the wedge yard - the holdup for the start of construction was it being used as a staging area for the work going on the 9th Street bridge.

You mean the T Street Bridge . I haven't heard much about the wedge yard lately, but it would greatly help with things at the Terminal.

No, I mean the 9th street bridge.

T Street doesn't have a bridge:

Oh. That 9th Street. Oops. My geography about NE DC is a bit off atm.

strench707 wrote:I'm guessing thats the HORN Track going OOS during the work?

Davis

Kudos to NS dispatch....Horn track has been OOS for 2 days already and it'll be another 3-4 before it will be back up to 40mph MAS again...no real delays in running us all via the North Pass track....

NS has also been resurfacing 2 track from S. Manassas to CR Tower.....few speed restrictions during the day over the past couple days, but no real disruption in service.

gp40marc69 wrote:Oh. That 9th Street. Oops. My geography about NE DC is a bit off atm.

No problem - the only reason that I was so sure of it is that I had to look it up in the first place!