Long/Medium Distance Maine Amtrak Service

Lewiston-Auburn feels pretty strongly that it's "their turn" next.

CarterB wrote:Would service to Bangor be through Lewiston ...or Brunswick?

It can't be expansion on both forks. And if voters think they're owed both or have a realistic shot at both they're in for rude, rude lessons on the political realities of. . .

1. ...sitting at #38 out of 50 states in population density when it comes to competing for federal funding.

2. ...having Cumberland County be the revenue donor that has to float the finances of--*charitably*--11 or 12 of the state's other 15 counties on its back in any economy. A house-of-cards situation when inevitable national or regional recession cycles send a temporary ripple through Portland, because the reverberating effects will hit statewide much harder and be much slower to recover from.

3. ...having a census change map that is stuck in long-term, multi- Census stagnation. With depopulation in the secondary cities and rural areas offset to neutral statewide only by the robust growth of Cumberland Co./Greater Portland. As in #2, a statewide destabilizer when inevitable recession cycles throw an occasional pause Portland's way.

And note where the biggest population declines are on that linked Census update. Outside of Aroostook County's population centers of Presque Isle and Caribou where industrial collapse has taken well-publicized outsized toll, the single-biggest statewide population losers this decade have been cities of Augusta, Bangor, and Lewiston, respectively. Scroll further down that page to the small-town and suburban rankings and the trends are even starker: other than the predictable boom in Cumberland and predictable wipeout in Aroostook, Greater Lewiston-Auburn is taking the heaviest longer-term population losses in the entire state. Across the board...there's little if any growth to be found within several-town radius of there. If you're looking for any statistical nuggets of not-bad news for these transit expansion corridors, some of the Bangor 'burbs have "statistical noise"-level growth that may not be offsetting the city's losses right this second but could--upon next Census snapshot--indicate that Greater Bangor's decline has almost run its course and is starting to level out. Lewiston-Auburn and Augusta, on the other hand, are losing people both inside and outside the cities...and that's not a trend that's going to turn the '15 update's deep red splotches into benign pinkish off-white (let alone green) by the 2020 Census or '25 mid-decade update.



That's not a problem TRNE, NNEPRA, the Legislature, and the towns can sugarcoat from the results of a rah-rah vote about it being "their turn". Demographics are a leading indicator, not trailing indicator, of where scarce resources can feasibly go. Structurally, Maine can't triage a mass economic stimulus program for steep negative-growth Androscoggin & Kennebec Counties on the back of donor county Cumberland when there are no other positive-growth counties to draw from statewide. Certainly not for major transportation funding when negative growth on I-95 due north out of Portland throws cold water on the worsening congestion thesis and weights I-295 northeast out of Portland through a string of positive-growth 'burbs as the corridor of somewhat greater concern in the competition for scarce resources. No matter what glass-half-full vs. glass-half-empty games you play with Downeaster demographics re: in-state travelers, broad Census trends don't change fast enough to turn widespread present-day deep red negative growth designated statistical areas into lush green positive-growth areas within one or two Census snapshots like it's sitting on a cork about to pop.


You can search the Census Bureau for Portland statistics to illustrate just how futile it is to try to parlay an 'intangibles' manifest-destiny project for Lewiston-Auburn on the back of donor Portland's real current revenue growth. Track the start of Portland's population decline in the '60 Census to the massive '70 crash to the '90 gains halting the slide to the meandering '00/'10 and '15 update numbers and see how intractable the trending behavior is. There's nothing there giving any prayer of "explosiveness" of growth hiding in the weeds of steep decline. The crawl back to positive trending in a midsize urban area after a great big crash is very slow...same in Portland as it's been in each and every one of the non- Boston metro areas of CT, MA, RI. Today's "explosive"-seeming growth in Portland/Cumberland isn't historically explosive at all. Merely, it's passed a point of consistent forward momentum where >0%-3% growth and no major setbacks stops being statistical Census noise and starts becoming a broader sustained trend that'll perk up to >2%-5% over the next couple cycles and not be unduly set back by a recession or two. The stuff of bona fide "explosive" >5% decennial growth maintained over multiple cycles is the sort of thing current momentum isn't going to be able to deliver to Greater Portland/Cumberland Co. until 2030 or '40...knock-on-wood. It projects to be a bright mid-century for the city and its immediate 'burbs, but the revenue donor that carries the entire rest of Maine on its back is still very, very low on the positive growth curve. It only seems explosive in Portland given the length of the famine and the scope of the original crash. Only pressure and time is going to build that momentum up...not leaps and bounds. Population statistics just don't turn on a dime from incremental trending to exponential trending in a built-out midsize metro area.

That's the demographic trending in Maine's sole major revenue-donor city/county, backed up by the entire history of Census trending behavior. How exactly does one extrapolate from there the wherewithal to mount a "their turn" manifest-destiny stimulus package to much smaller cities that are actively in the throes of loss-leader population declines statewide? The statistical leading indicators in places like Lewiston-Auburn don't point to an immediate turnaround, because those indicators aren't yet behaving like they've bottomed out. There's no credible claim of demographic 'intangibles' with Lewiston-Auburn that are going to turn deep-red population losses into gains within 1-2 cycles like a cork about to pop, because that would require explaining away why much larger and more advantageous Portland did not respond with any similar cork-popping explosivity when it went through its bottoming-out and began recovery. And given that Portland's recovery is tracking very slowly and wholly-orthodox with how slowly many similar statistical areas have re-grown after a major bottom-out...how exactly is Maine's statewide donor county expected to grow fast enough in the next few Census cycles to pay for all other statistical areas' manifest destiny megaprojects? While also being expected to weather every periodic recession and budget deficit on the whole state's behalf?

Ain't going to happen that way.

Please Maine, do look closely at what problem you are trying to solve. Rail is a solution in search of a problem (particularly on railroad.net), but an approach of "Rail is the answer. What was the question?" is the wrong way to go about this.

F-Line makes a strong case above that congestion would only be a threat to Maine in two very limited areas:
1) on immediate commutes into Portland (for which HOV/Bus is the best value for money)
2) on commutes between Portland and Boston (for which Downeaster speed & capacity is the issue)

Beyond that is not apparent to me that Maine has any problems for which rail service is a good answer.

Arlington, how is Maine any different from Vermont? The Vermonter is much loved and successful. Vermont has no congestion problem. It's just a hellishly long drive to get anywhere, especially in bad weather. So people prefer the train, especially college students. If people in Maine, like those in Vermont, are willing to pay for connectivity to support economic development, that's just fine.

What they need to do is find a way to run those trains all the way into New York, or beyond, as Vermont does.

My kids aren't applying get to college in Maine because there's no easy transportation. If you want to have an economy, you have to bring in lots of smart college students and convince some to stay and start businesses.

VT is very different:
- Burlington (Vermont's largest city) is at/near the end of the run,
- Montreal is a big, close metro. (Bangor or Augusta are not Montreal)
- the route is closely and directly connected to the NEC (and such connections work for Virginia too)
- CT & Mass have improved their part (and co-fund it)
- VT has a tight leisure market connection with car-free places in NY, even if its population is stagnant like Maine.

Maine's trains are needed as far as its largest city, Portland, but no farther.

Jehochman wrote:Arlington, how is Maine any different from Vermont? The Vermonter is much loved and successful. Vermont has no congestion problem. It's just a hellishly long drive to get anywhere, especially in bad weather. So people prefer the train, especially college students. If people in Maine, like those in Vermont, are willing to pay for connectivity to support economic development, that's just fine.

What they need to do is find a way to run those trains all the way into New York, or beyond, as Vermont does.

My kids aren't applying get to college in Maine because there's no easy transportation. If you want to have an economy, you have to bring in lots of smart college students and convince some to stay and start businesses.

There are so many differences between VT and ME passenger service that they aren't comparable at all.

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-- The Vermonter and Ethan Allen Express are each one round trip per day. The Downeaster is 5 round trips per day with a 6th on-tap. That's a massive difference in state subsidies to run those trains.


-- The Vermonter and EAE both bootstrap onto existing Springfield NE Regional and Empire demand. 60% of the Vermonter's route miles and station stops are south of Springfield on the Corridor services overlap. 65% of the EAE's route miles and station stops overlap conventional Empire service to Schenectady, and it's a two-state train with double-up of Adirondack service covering 82% of the route miles and station stops. Both routes are significantly underwritten by farebox recovery from rote-conventional maximal demand WSH-NYP-NHV, WSH-NYP-NHV-SPR, and NYP-ALB slots. The EAE's Adirondack overlap covers New York-paid demand for additional north-of-ALB frequencies to Saratoga Springs and Ft. Edward, and the Vermonter's relocation in MA covers north-of-SPR demand that MassDOT intends to further exploit with extended Springfield Shuttles. The EAE/Western Corridor expansion studies are in fact joint-funded by NYSDOT and VTrans because of additional demand that would be served intra- New York State by additional north-of-ALB service.


-- The Downeaster's 145 route miles @ 5 frequencies per day do not overlap any other intercity services (as nobody in their right mind pays for an AMTK ticket as substitute for an MBTA Zone 2 fare 13 miles to Woburn or Zone 7 fare 33 miles to Haverhill). A little less than 25% of those route miles and only 2 of 11 stations are shared with anyone else's taxpayer-paid passenger infrastructure, as New Hampshire doesn't chuck in a dime for the route. NNEPRA has a much steeper cost recovery target it must meet vs. VTrans on 5x the number of trains because of how much a go-it-alone operation the DE comparatively is. The DE recovers that cost quite well relative to other AMTK routes, but it's a much stiffer initial target than any service VTrans has ever had to subsidize in 45 years of subsidizing AMTK service.


-- Expansion economics are very different. For the Vermonter. . .

** What truncated the Montrealer in '95 was not poor patronage or slowness of schedule, but rather the price-gouging by CN for terminal use of Gare Central. That's no longer an issue with Gare Central having new and more accommodating owners/management, the new preclearance treaty significantly slashing the Customs overhead to outright lower than it was 20 years ago, and passenger-friendlier national and provincial gov'ts in Canada committing upgrade $$$ on their own turf for a change. A reanimated Montrealer on much faster infrastructure (especially on the WSH-NHV and NHV-SPR Regional overlaps) will better-underwrite the relatively modest required increase in VTrans subsidy because the out-of-state catchment will be a lot broader on a faster schedule than it was on the excruciatingly slow '95 train.

** The Northern New England Intercity Rail Initiative study lumps the CT/MA-centric Inland Route, Boston-Montreal round-trip, and additional Vermonter/Montrealer NHV or NYP short-turn frequency into a modular build around Springfield hub that limits the amount of subsidy cash-poor VTrans has to contribute to get +2 more round-trips. The routes and their subsidies are to be constructed like tinker toys around Springfield Union station, in which the traditional Vermonter is timed with a transfer to an Inland running BOS-SPR and the BOS-MTL train is timed with a transfer to an Inland/Shuttle or NE Regional running NHV-SPR such that both NYP/WSH and BOS net two daily Vermont/Montreal round-trips from the cross-platform transfer, and each Vermont frequency gooses its fare recovery with cross-platform transfer to the other half of a conventional Inland. The savings from this is what allows the third VTrans-paid short-turn frequency (also timed with a meet @ SPR) to live inside the margins of much larger conventional Inland patronage. All 3 NNIRI states are constructing it this way so end result is better than sum of its parts and works with the contributions of all 3 states despite the sharp contrast between CT/MA and VT in funding heft.


-- For EAE expansion. . .

** Upgrades to the Rutland-Burlington infrastructure have quietly been going on for over 25 years...ever since the Champaign Flyer ran. The EAE expansion wasn't announced until the state had reached the point of needing closeout grants, not kickstarter grants, for the infrastructure. Slow and plodding doesn't even begin to describe how VTrans has been spending out of its penny jar here. Compare with the zero-to-sixty pace of the DE's Brunswick extension's kickoff and large up-front price tag. VT and ME chose different paths to execute those intrastate extensions. Apples-oranges on pacing, high-impact vs. low-impact on state financing, risk management, and amortization of investment. There's more than one viable way of mounting service expansion in a small state.

** As mentioned above, the lower Western Corridor passenger expansion is a joint study with NYSDOT. New York wants more north-of-ALB service, which the route to Hoosick Jct. can serve up with 1-2 more instate intermediate stops. They have a stake in more Rutland frequencies as well, since that's a largeish border city with significant NY patronage. The Bennington route gives them that second frequency, and Saratoga Springs' demands for better service are informing the final route configuration. The New York side of the study may end up demanding that the Bennington-Rutland route end up absorbing all intra-Vermont service so the EAE can be re-truncated to Rutland and have its service levels increased by NYSDOT for the sake of Saratoga Springs. Two are doing a tango here: one very big state, and one very small state.

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As small states go, the cost burden for VTrans to increase and extend its service and for NNEPRA to increase and extend its service is wildly different. Everything VTrans does is built on a bootstrap of New York and CT/MA service scale-up where they're basically grabbing table scraps and fashioning them into low barrier-of-entry service expansion on short money. With regional/national coattails much broader than their own state when it comes to putting Montreal on the map. The only way Vermont can get anything done is to live parasitically off New York-Empire and CT/MA-Corridor service. You're not going to see voter referendums passed about it being "St. Johnsbury's turn" to get a Vermonter fork on the Upper Conn River out of WRJ; that serves no known demand that can be tied to the NEC megalopolis. You're not going to see the Green Mountain mainline between Rutland and Bellows Falls get movement for a straight-on EAE extension if the Bennington-Rutland train takes over Burlington service; that serves no known demand that can be tied to the NY/Empire megalopolis.

With the DE they are extremely fortunate that the coastal megalopolis runs its way all the way to Portland and is able to robustly sustain BON-POR at a half-dozen trips per day while hitting all its performance targets and projecting robust long-term growth. The demand is good enough to overpower the much tougher road NNEPRA has to haul in capital and operating costs with no other intercity service sharing that corridor and NH being a non-participant in the cost-sharing.


But demographics set the limit on how far Maine can reach to serve majority intrastate demand when it doesn't have any further moves to lower its barrier-of-entry like the NNIRI "tinker toys" route setup @ Springfield nets VTrans +2 cheap additional frequencies, or the cost-lowering Montreal preclearance treaty netting VTrans cheap extra running miles, or the north-of-Albany 'burbs barking loudly for more service that just so happens has to cross the VT border. NNEPRA doesn't have cost-lowering tricks it can pull through bootstraps on other BIG service gravity wells. They're the only game on the whole route, and they float all the cap and ops costs in 2 states on their backs. So if they can't lower their barriers-to-entry by pooling costs...the demographics have to tell a story of cresting demand that'll overpower that escalating cost burden with farebox recovery. Maine voters can 'want' things, but there has to be a path to 'do' the things they want. And that's damn hard for intrastate demand in a small state that doesn't have the options VTrans does to glom cheaply off some bigger neighbor's megalopolis-serving service expansion.

You'd be hard-pressed to find any leading indicators in those demographics suggesting there's pent-up demand north of Portland. Ridership craters @ PTC to greater degree than lack of a layover @ Brunswick these last few years could ever explain away. There's a whole lot of lying-with-statistics that could be done glass-half-empty or glass-half-full with where the cutoff for MA/NH thru patronage is, so that's an ongoing debate. Freeport and Brunswick do have consistently net-positive population growth like all parts of Cumberland down to the NH state line, so there's more yet to be told on that story. But the Census doesn't lie: Lewiston-Auburn and Augusta are bleeding population all around as a long-term trend deep enough that it can't feasibly reverse in less than 2-3 decennial cycles. Greater Bangor is seesawing like it's in a bottom-out that's 1-2 decennial cycles from turning into non-zero growth. Portland, owing to the extremeness of its late- 20th c. population crash, is still very low on the growth curve and 1-2 decennial cycles from turning consistent 5% growth. And statewide the contrast between "donor" Cumberland County and "recipient" all-else is so stark that Maine has unusually severe structural limitations--severe amongst any of the 50 states--for mounting any sort of large-scale stimulus megaproject.


Where are the Mainers going to come from to build these extremely expensive service extensions when those are the intractable demographic trends? Not from wanting things more badly than the next small state. Not from Lewiston-Auburn having such nifty intangibles that the whole history of Census trending is going to be proven wrong for the first time. And not from there being enough 'hidden' Bostonians itching for a Lewiston one-seat that the Downeaster could ever work forking its schedule at Portland without the reduction in frequencies to the endpoints badly hurting thru patronage. Where on that population change map linked in my last post are those numbers coming from on these studied extensions? At least with Vermont's also pretty mediocre mid-decade snapshot you've got net-positive growth in all the counties that line up on the EAE-Burlington extension (which are also the highest-density counties in the state) and no particularly off-scale loss leader wipeouts destabilizing the whole state like Aroostook, Androscoggin, and Kennebec Counties.


Numbers, dollars, bodies, math...where are they, and where are they going to/from? There's nothing real behind Lewiston-Auburn or Augusta advocacy if the advocates can't document the hard demographic evidence. There's two proven avenues for a state as small as them to do this. Either there's a eureeka-moment cost saver that significantly lowers their barrier to expansion like an intercity route bootstrap...but that doesn't exist on this corridor. Or there's a eureeka-moment demographic explosion proving the Census trends dead-wrong...but multi-Census trending is virtually never proven wrong to the degree it needs to be proven wrong here. It can't be Door #3: the wishful thinking of "build it and they will come". Maine isn't structurally set up to do that.

The only way L/A or Bangor is ever going to be worth serving is if rail service would be a significant improvement over well-planned connecting bus service. Right now, that's not the case - the superior speed and lower operating cost of a connecting bus would vastly outweigh the benefits of a one-seat ride. Doubly so, as F-Line shows, because these cities have declining population. Brunswick may not have been a great idea as an extension, but it at least has population trends and the Freeport intermediate on its side, and 295 and 1 do have actual traffic at times. (The loss of connecting excursion service to Rockland, while not a huge ridership driver, was a loss of connectivity.)

L/A, Augusta, and beyond all have uncrowded I-95; except for a small number of snowstorms, buses will always be faster than trains north of Portland. They lack any real tourism potential. There's not a huge ridership draw to Portland or Boston. With current economics, there's just not enough to justify the infrastructure and operating costs of rail service.

The only way I possibly see that changing is if we ever see the introduction of a fully FRA compliant DMU capable of decent speeds on lightly maintained track in all weather. While that would be a godsend, the engineering difficulties and the likely high unit cost of such a vehicle places them in fantasyland right now. The only way it would ever happen would be a deliberate decision by Amtrak to simultaneously pursue connecting services on a number of lighter corridors simultaneously - and only if the economics actually worked out for it to be better than a bus on those corridors. While I would love to see modern DMU connecting/splitting service to Augusta, Cortland, Dover, Toledo, Decatur, Peoria, Muskegon, Saginaw, and so on, that's firmly in foamer fantasy right now. Moreover, such a service ever coming to Maine would only ever happen from a national-level shift at Amtrak - NOT merely from local interest.

The holy grail is a combination of faster trips to Boston for the trunk and especially through trains on the new. I would think Maine should be extremely vocal in its support for a tunnel connecting north and south station so the train to Maine can operate like Virginia trains. Portland becomes a one seat ride to providence, NYC, Philadelphia, baltimore and dc on some trips.
Also, what about seasonal service to Rockland with connecting ferry service to bar harbor? Or would ferry service make more sense to run out of Portland? In either case I would be more likely to take the train to wiscasset or Rockland than Freeport...and the likelihood increases exponentially without the Boston shuffle

F-line to Dudley via Park wrote:The Downeaster's 145 route miles @ 5 frequencies per day do not overlap any other intercity services (as nobody in their right mind pays for an AMTK ticket as substitute for an MBTA Zone 2 fare 13 miles to Woburn or Zone 7 fare 33 miles to Haverhill).

Not true. It is well documented and well reported that a good number of Boston-Haverhill/Haverhill-Boston commuters do in fact use the Downeaster rather than using the commuter rail. In fact, those commuters make up the bulk of Haverhill Amtrak passengers.

Inbound Downeasters don't accept new passengers at Woburn, and outbound Downeasters don't discharge passengers at Woburn, so that isn't a valid comparison.

Suburban Station wrote: I would think Maine should be extremely vocal in its support for a tunnel connecting north and south station so the train to Maine can operate like Virginia trains.

And should we Massachusetts taxpayers also assume that Maine will pick up part of the multi-billion-dollar tab?

In a perfect world the tunnel and the required electrification to support it would of course be a nice thing, but there are more pressing needs for public money right now like properly maintaining Amtrak's NEC infrastructure.

Suburban Station wrote:Also, what about seasonal service to Rockland with connecting ferry service to bar harbor? Or would ferry service make more sense to run out of Portland? In either case I would be more likely to take the train to wiscasset or Rockland than Freeport...and the likelihood increases exponentially without the Boston shuffle

I can't remember which thread I was discussing it in — might've been the Downeaster thread or might've been one of the Rockland Branch threads — but I believe that seasonal service to Rockland could be successful. We've got this beautiful, well-maintained, barely-ever-used fresh CWR line from Brunswick to Rockland — and we, the state of Maine, own it. From Memorial Day to Labor Day, the Downeaster could do one round trip per day on Fridays/Saturdays/Sundays/holidays from Brunswick to Rockland, with a very quick stop in Wiscasset. Hotels in Boothbay Harbor could provide their own shuttle van to Wiscasset. You'd easily get more passengers for those two towns than you'd get for Brunswick and Freeport. You'd only be doing it during the good-weather months. There'd be only minimal freight traffic to deal with. Both stations/stops are smack-dab in the middle of where tourists want to be and are easily walkable. It would be faster than auto or bus. And people from out of state would actually have a reason to go there.

Maine Eastern's finances weren't all that efficient on the Rockland Branch, which is why they lost the contract renewal. Still, it's baffling that MEDOT didn't push harder for a passenger operator on the next contract and were as blase as they were about going freight-only for up-to 10 years. In-season excusion demand's kind of a duh-obvious troubleshooting vector for Brunswick's underperformance. In no way, shape or form does that mean an improbable and ill-advised big leap to "extend Amtrak to Rockland"...just getting another excursion carrier and optimizing what they had under Maine Eastern.

Doesn't make much sense to let that one slip and figure that starting over with a much more daunting service fork with way more pessimistic demographics is somehow going to have a shot. Cover your flanks first.

F-line to Dudley via Park wrote:Maine Eastern's finances weren't all that efficient on the Rockland Branch, which is why they lost the contract renewal.

I think there may be more to why they lost the contract than finances. It begins with P and rhymes with haul some bricks.

F-line to Dudley via Park wrote:In no way, shape or form does that mean an improbable and ill-advised big leap to "extend Amtrak to Rockland"...just getting another excursion carrier and optimizing what they had under Maine Eastern.

Summer weekend/summer holiday service at 1 RT a day is not all that improbable, and personally I don't think it's ill advised. The primary reason that Maine Eastern's excursion service didn't perform better — and it performed pretty well under the circumstances — is because the connection with the Downeaster was difficult or impossible. Vacationers who'd be interested in taking the train to Wiscasset/Boothbay or Rockland want a one-seat ride with a single ticket. Amtrak can do that; a third-party operator can't.

I don't know if you've ever driven US-1 from Brunswick to Rockland on a summer Friday, summer Sunday, or summer holiday weekend, but it's terrible. Horrible. Even (and especially) people from Boston and New York complain about how awful it is. I'd rather throw myself off the Casco Bay Bridge than be stuck inside a cramped stinky bus in that traffic. Rail has a very legitimate advantage between Brunswick and Rockland, and it should be exploited. We already own the damned railroad and it's already been rebuilt to passenger standards. It's nutty not to use it. This could be the one and only thing that actually makes the Portland-Brunswick extension worthwhile. And frankly that is exactly how the Portland-Brunswick extension was sold to a lot of Mainers. For the past 10 years we were told "once we do that, you'll have service from Boston to Rockland and you'll never have to endure the Route 1 parking lot ever again." Mainers and folks from away are still waiting patiently for what we were promised. It's been built. Someone just needs to flip the damned switch.

In the discussion about Auburn/Lewiston demographics, the census figures do not take into account immigration from Africa, primarily Somalia. It is estimated that there are approx. 10,000 Somali immigrants (as of 2013) from nearly zero in 2000. These immigrants hava high birthrate resulting in the Lewiston school district's schools bursting at the seams, which nodes well for future population growth. Whether or not this is a big enough effect to make L/A a sufficiently attractive destination for passenger rail is to be determined but needs to be considered.

However I feel that we should crawl before we walk, and the potential market be tested with improved bus service that would connect to trains at Portland and/or continue to Boston. The proposed Concord Coach service would be a good start. In the meantime focus on beefing up the existing DE service and considering the summer weekend extension to Rockland as discussed above.

Jon

jonnhrr wrote:However I feel that we should crawl before we walk, and the potential market be tested with improved bus service that would connect to trains at Portland and/or continue to Boston. The proposed Concord Coach service would be a good start. In the meantime focus on beefing up the existing DE service and considering the summer weekend extension to Rockland as discussed above.

Agreed 100%.