AMTRAK NEC: Springfield Shuttle/Regional/Valley Flyer/Inland Routing

[Larry]

I do have something, the #2 track moved in the Hartford yard I found out will be used for a customer down south, not sure where exactly. So we lost the #2 track for Springfield Line and we did not gain any track in Hartford yard for CSO or Amtrak.

[NH2060]

I do have something, the #2 track moved in the Hartford yard I found out will be used for a customer down south, not sure where exactly. So we lost the #2 track for Springfield Line and we did not gain any track in Hartford yard for CSO or Amtrak.

But won't that section eventually get double iron in the long term?

[shadyjay]

Yes, the whole line will have its double track reinstalled, except for the Hartford viaduct and the Conn River Bridge in Windsor Locks. IIRC, the plans I saw for the north end of single track in Hartford was parallel to Hartford yard.

Has any double tracking begun in the Meriden-Newington stretch? I'm pretty sure Wallingford's new station construction has begun, and Meriden is beginning to start up work as well. NHHSRAIL.COM only is posting signal cable pics still.

[runningwithscalpels]

I was told they started double tracking a few weeks ago.

[F-line to Dudley via Park]

OK, so the Ayer-Worcester rights are akin to MNRR's acquisition of the Beacon line. Makes sense.

Not totally. The T doesn't own any of the track as it's privately-owned by Pan Am with the T just having perpetual rights. Sort of like a much more permissive trackage rights agreement like the Connecticut end of the Beacon/Maybrook where Housatonic still outright owns and dispatches the track but Metro North has permission to take the non-revenue bypass to Danbury. Only here the T does use it in non-emergency situations (not often, but once every few months) when the equipment that needs to be swapped is already out roaming deep in Worcester County; it wasn't just for last year's Grand Junction outage. The Worcester Branch is used for mission-critical daily freight and is the primary CSX interchange for the PAR (not PAS) half of the Pan Am system for jobs where they don't feel like splitting the proceeds with Norfolk Southern at more heavily-used Rotterdam Jct. CSX also has overhead rights on it to run to Ayer. Throwing a little more complexity to the mix is the downtown Worcester portion of it from Worcester Union Station to Barbers Jct., which is actually owned by P&W and lumped in with their Gardner Branch and gets used by all three carriers (who occasionally butt heads with each other over usage). It's sort of remarkable it's been allowed to fall into that decrepit a condition because Pan Am-being-Pan Am affects a lot more than just Pan Am and the T. CSX has long been unhappy with the track condition when they have to take their power north, but they don't have enough leverage with their overhead rights agreement to force the issue.

So...^that^ too. It's a crowded freight situation with 3 carriers engaging in an on-again/off-again staring contest. The logistics for passenger use don't just have to square the big disconnect with MassDOT's funding interests viz-a-viz Boston in order to get any track upgrades here, but they probably have to involve MassDOT paying a pretty good sum of money for outright ownership of both the Pan Am-owned segment and the small P&W-owned overlap so the state is the alpha dog for mediating the frequent freight disputes. State's got much bigger freight fish to fry right now with upgrades to those three carriers' mainline tracks. So as long as they don't have to slap Pan Am to fix some unacceptably high derailment-risk spots they don't care if it's 10 MPH garbage track for how little they need to use it themselves for non-revenue swaps. The 'fungible' passenger rights at the 100-year level were just a value-added throw-in. Unlike the Beacon Line this track was at less-than-zero risk of freight abandonment, so the state can literally take till end of the century to figure out what--if anything--passenger-wise they'd ever want to run on it. It's not going anywhere. If anything it'll be interesting to see if any freight mergers get one of the parties making a power play for control of it.

[jonnhrr]

F-line, whoever wins Baker or Coakley should appoint you Secretary of Transportation!

Seems to me that Maine service via NHHS and CSX has a lot of side benefits, such as an additional frequency Boston - Springfield which makes this a viable alternative to Peter Pan, as the current Lake Shore schedule is too limited and unreliable. Additional Amtrak Inland route service would make the situation even better, plus if you have Inland Route + Maine service you get 2 frequencies each way Boston - Hartford.

Jon

[The EGE]

So back to the actual thread topic...

They announced today that the official name is.... the Hartford Line.

Literally the most unimaginative name possible.

[TomNelligan]

Given that Hartford is the largest city on the line, and that Connecticut is putting up a pile of money for restoration of double track and increased service, I don't think the name is all that terrible. Ancestrally, the New Haven RR called it the Springfield Line, but most of the riders always came from Connecticut stations.

[NH2060]

I'll admit it's not what I was expecting -wasn't even thinking that they'd actually brand the service- but I quite like it. In a way it's more appropriate than "Springfield" since Hartford is 1) the epicenter of the line 2) the state capitol and 3) the terminus of some of the round trips.

The official logo is also posted on the DOT's CT Rail homepage.
http://www.ct.gov/dot/cwp/view.asp?a=1386&q=305322" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Idk about others here, but I'm already hoping they add some kind of extra stenciling with the new name/logo on the SLE equipment when the time comes. Probably not, but at the very least perhaps an update to the "old" CT Commuter Rail logo could be in order?

[amtrak-wnd]

From what I've seen online and from word of mouth, this line was called the Hartford Line a while ago. I think the Hartford name is fitting since most of the current improvements (double track and new stations) are only extending up to Hartford for now.

[Station Aficionado]

FWIW, FY13 ridership at Hartford was 187,000 vs. 142,000 at Springfield. And, of course, all the other stations on the line are in Connecticut.

[Jehochman]

This is a logo already. See http://www.nhhsrail.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;. The project was funded with federal grants and Connecticut State bonds so naturally it has to have a Connecticut name.

I understand that Massachusetts is considering commuter rail from Springfield to Greenfield to ease traffic while they rebuild the I-91 viaduct. (This sounds like the temporary commuter service called Shoreline East that's still running long after its justification, an I-95 construction project, ended.) If it happens, they can call it the Springfield Line.

[amtrak-wnd]

I went to the Hartford yard this afternoon and the old running track is no longer next to the mainline. It has been cut into sections and shifted over next to the CSO yard.

[shadyjay]

This is a logo already. See http://www.nhhsrail.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;. The project was funded with federal grants and Connecticut State bonds so naturally it has to have a Connecticut name.

I understand that Massachusetts is considering commuter rail from Springfield to Greenfield to ease traffic while they rebuild the I-91 viaduct. (This sounds like the temporary commuter service called Shoreline East that's still running long after its justification, an I-95 construction project, ended.) If it happens, they can call it the Springfield Line.

Naming the service "The Hartford Line" isn't that bad of a name. I'm not sure what else they could've renamed it, outside of the Springfield Line. Years ago, I thought the "Capital Line" would have been a good name, as one of the reasons why the rail line was originally built in the 1830s was because CT alternated capital cities between New Haven and Hartford for a time. At least the new logo looks like it could possibly be a "Genesis" locomotive hauling coaches (a nice touch would've been an N over H logo on the locomotive's nose), but its a lot better than the "stock" photo on the nhhsrail.com web site of some "futuristic" train that most likely is from Europe, China, or elsewhere.

As far as Massachusetts goes, I would hope that they wouldn't choose the "Springfield Line" for any Springfield-North service. I think something on the lines of "PVX - Pioneer Valley Express Commuter Rail" would be good. Calling it the Springfield Line I think would be too much confusion with the line south to New Haven, which Amtrak calls the Springfield Line. It will still be interesting to see what transpires with Amtrak's shuttle service in the post-2016 time frame and whether Amtrak gets the contract for the service, and where we go from there.

Still, I hope this new service will be successful. The Springfield Line for years has been "screaming" for commuter service. If Amtrak didn't rip up the second track along much of the line in the early 90s, the service may have gotten off the ground sooner.

[Jehochman]

Still, I hope this new service will be successful. The Springfield Line for years has been "screaming" for commuter service. If Amtrak didn't rip up the second track along much of the line in the early 90s, the service may have gotten off the ground sooner.

Right on. In the 90's both old tracks were shot, and there was only funding to replace one. Hopefully they'll get a plan together soon for the Hartford I-84 viaduct so the can fix the station and the track which might need to be moved to make room for the highway.