River LINE/Atlantic City connection considered

Well, imagine if the River LIne wasn't built as light rail. Then, you could have had direct rail service from Trenton to Atlantic City (the connector that the Nellie Bly formerly used would have had to be reinstalled, though), and any questions of transfer stations would have been moot.

Interesting that someone urges imagining Trenton to Atlantic City. Thirteen years ago, as part of the River Line mix, NJ-ARP in fact did just that, in cooperation with (sometimes even in concert with) pro-rail forces in Burlington County and within New Jersey Transit.

But, as per our earlier thread on Pennsauken's location, the difficulties involved in swaying anti-rail forces to a pro-rail point of view ... any pro-rail point of view ... vis a vis the intersection of the Atlantic City Line and the (now) River Line called for alternate plans. That's before one waded into the issues (political and real-world) over service to Camden, and/or Philadelphia--much closer and more imaginable (for many) origin/destination targets than (relatively) far-away Atlantic City.

In other words, and not to be too pointed about it: Reality supervened. With that, NJ-ARP played the game as it happened, and in the arena where the game occurred. We think we did well enough. Those who despise (D)LRT, of course, will continue to disagree.

On the map I saw that they where considering a new line from A.C. for casino employees. Any news, thoughts, ideas? Has it been canned?
http://www.geocities.com/transit383/njt2020.gif

That sounds very vague. Are you claiming that the anti-rail folk find it better to have the freight trains running at night while they're trying to sleep, by some ephemeral extension? Your same anti-railers that caused whatever (unspecified) difficulties have been dealt with at the state government level, otherwise there would have been no kind of passenger rail at all on the former C&A.

It's listed under "Projects to be defined/studied" on that map, so it's way less likely than any of the "candidate projects". Also, nobody knows if it were to be light rail or anything else. (Note that ARC was listed under "candidate projects" on that map, too.)

PullmanCo wrote:That sounds very vague. Are you claiming that the anti-rail folk find it better to have the freight trains running at night while they're trying to sleep, by some ephemeral extension? Your same anti-railers that caused whatever (unspecified) difficulties have been dealt with at the state government level, otherwise there would have been no kind of passenger rail at all on the former C&A.

That always bugged me. The DLR eventually adopted should have created even more opposition. It forced loud freights off the tracks outside overnight hours. The light rail schedule is certainly filled with more trains than if it were a commuter line only. Off-peak service would only mean hourly service during the week, perhaps only 3 per hour during peak hours.

Is there anybody who thinks that conventional heavy railroad FRA compiant sevice would be as frequent as light rail?
There's nothing that really dictates how frequent either one of has to be, but there aren't very many railroad lines in the world with 30 minute or less service 14 hours a day 7 days a week, and very few light rail services whose most frequent rush hour service is every 20 minutes and off peak is hourly or less. It's just a bunch of factors typical, but not universal, of each that tend to influence frequency: train length, crew size, motive power...
And the exceptions that come to my mind have some characteristics typical of the other mode, for example Long Island Railroad: electrified lines, high level platforms, remote contolled "subway" style doors. I doubt that Trenton-Camden or Atlantic City has the passenger potential to rival the Long Island Railroad.

Is there anybody who thinks that conventional heavy railroad FRA comp(l)iant sevice would be as frequent as light rail?

Maybe other things matter more. Notwithstanding, it is possible, since the River Line currently runs four trains per hour per direction at most. (The former PRR "High Line" runs more trains than that, on a two-track railroad, so it's more than just possible—it's common practice.)

the exceptions that come to my mind have some characteristics typical of the other mode, for example Long Island Railroad: electrified lines, high level platforms, remote contolled "subway" style doors. I doubt that Trenton-Camden or Atlantic City has the passenger potential to rival the Long Island Railroad

It currently runs more frequent service than many of the LIRR's electrified branches. (And I don't mean just the West Hempstead Branch, which strangely enough does not run into Manhattan at all.)

We concur with PullmanCo on this: Nothing expressly prohibits Atlantic City Line service (or passenger rail service in general) from matching light rail frequencies. Yes, we're aware of signal and track capacity limitations for this issue, but modes aren't an automatic determining factor for this issue.

Building a transfer actually lets operators move into the realm of potential reality on such a matter. True, such an evolution will take time, even more than it takes money, given NJ Transit's past performance history. Still, incrementalism in one sense is the belief in long-term improvement. We'd love to address the problem of matching service frequencies to better effect, once the issue becomes a real one.

Well it's a reality, $40 million from New Jersey's share of the economic stimulus is going to build a new River Line - ACL transfer station.

http://blog.nj.com/ledgerupdates_impact ... t-list.pdf

Now they need to increase the ACL frequencies, otherwise folks are going to waiting a long time for their connecting train.

I would love to see all frequencies increased, but folks are not going to be waiting any longer for their connecting train at the Pennsauken-Delair bridge station than they are at Lindenwold, where PATCO operates more frequently and longer hours than does the Riverline or the Atlantic City line.
However Lindenwold station has other reasons to exist than just as a transfer between PATCO and the Atlantic City line.. Does anybody have any idea how many non-transferring passengers might use this new connecting station?
And I hope we're getting something more than just a station for $40 million.

what i really want this new station to have is 2 riverline tracks and 2 acl tracks completely ada connected with elevators and ramps... also a small bus transfer station... screw the park n ride

I'd love to see more double tracking as well, and that sounds like something that starts to approach justifying $40 million.

I'm not sure there's much immediate need for bus service here, at least not so much need to serve the Riverline here with bus. Folks from outside of walking distance from this location probably would get better served if they improved bus frequencies on the existing River Road bus route (409?) which already stops at 36th St and Rt 73 Riverline stations.

Are you suggesting the bus service for Atlantic City line passengers?

i am suggesting it would be for bus riders to transfer to the acl for direct connections to phill and ac.. especially for the 409.

It doesn't really make sense to me. Where are these bus passengers coming from? The further south of the Atlantic City line they come from the the more likely they're better off going to Broadway for a connection to Philly or Lindenwold for the Atlantic City line, even if it does mean an extra change of train. The further north they are the more likely they'd be better off taking the Riverline to the proposed Atlantic City line transfer station.

Also at that point the existing River Rd bus route is a not unreasonable 2 block walk from the proposed new station. How many passengers do you envision who would need a direct bus, vs how many existing passengers who might be discouraged from riding if a substantial number of trips make that 2 blocks each way diversion from their current route?

Again I feel if you're going to fool around with the bus service you're better off increasing the existing service which already parallels the River Line, and serves all existing stations Broadway Camden to Riverton, and comes close to the remaining stations up to Burlington than you would be diverting some of the trips off the existing route.