Amtrak Downeaster Discussion Thread

[charlesriverbranch]

Why not leave the Portland station where it is?

For one, there's nowhere on the main line that they could put a station that will be much closer to anything of interest. For another, the current station has lots of parking. And for the bulk of Downeaster passengers who travel between Portland and points south, there is no reverse maneuver and therefore no time wasted.

So, why move it? The current station is co-located with Concord Coach; will they follow Amtrak to a new one? And it's also not in CSX's way.

[markhb]

Why not leave the Portland station where it is?

For one, there's nowhere on the main line that they could put a station that will be much closer to anything of interest. For another, the current station has lots of parking. And for the bulk of Downeaster passengers who travel between Portland and points south, there is no reverse maneuver and therefore no time wasted.

So, why move it? The current station is co-located with Concord Coach; will they follow Amtrak to a new one? And it's also not in CSX's way.

Concord Coach has made it plain that they will not be moving; they own the PTC and from their perspective it is perfectly situated (it practically has its own Interstate cloverleaf).

From the Planning Study, the reasons for changing (which don't include the $50k/year NNEPRA pays CCL in rent) are:

The PTC is in urgent need of a terminal renovation and additional parking capacity, and if NNEPRA remains at the PTC, added train platform capacity. NNEPRA has indicated that the location of the station on the Mountain Division spur was impeding ridership (currently trains need to back into the spur to pick up and discharge passengers, adding significant time and cost to each trip). A mainline location was needed to maximize efficiency of the Downeaster and fully realize its ridership potential for travelers within Maine, as well as between Maine and Boston. Possible sites have been identified on the main line just to the north and south of the Mountain Division junction which would support a station and could arguably benefit from redevelopment that needs further evaluation.

I continue to believe that they should set aside the "walkable destinations" criteria and seriously consider the Deering Junction area by Morrill's Corner, which has tons of available space and room to build as many platforms as they might need.

[CN9634]

A selling point that seems to be missing in all this, unless I've overlooked it somewhere, is also plain and simple that the current Portland station really well... sucks. It's not really much of a station other than a small ticket area and a bunch of awful chairs. A few vending machines?

I've been to quite a few stations in the US, Canada and Europe... Portland is laughable. Good opportunity here to build a nice station, maybe something you could kill some time if you're waiting to pickup a loved one who is on... a late train. You'd think for Portland anyways they'd at least have a few restaurants and watering holes in a decent station with better amenities.

[David Benton]

Or they could try a new development. A station at the center of a walkable/ cyclamen suburb, where the car is not king, and with good transit connections to other suburbs.

[CN9634]

I'm good with that too. Check out some of the stations in Florida, North Carolina and Virginia amongst other places... don't need a mega station either but really could use something way better than what there is today.

[Cowford]

With apologies to Winston Churchill, the Portland station is in the worst location, except for all the rest.

Bottom line, there is no other location in Portland that offers such a balance between proximity to the city center and highway access for suburban users. And NNEPRA needs Concord more than the other way 'round. No restaurant or craft brew place is going to last long in a stand-alone rail station that averages 450 pax per day interspersed over a 20-hr period. (Heck, NNEPRA can't even make money selling comestibles to a captive audience.)

If you want to be stupid with government money, then at least do it intelligently and concentrate investment in reconfiguring the existing site, e.g., move the Thompson's Point access road so it crosses the Mtn Sub ~600-ft (TT) west of present, having it skirt the peninsula. This would open up the area for additional parking while permitting the construction of a larger multimodal station that could be closer to the tracks.

I'm guessing that NNEPRA will be more fanciful than this. Maybe they'll revisit the Commercial Street idea given they paid for the rebuilding of the wye to Yard 8 last time they went down this dead-end path?

[Goddraug]

NNEPRA's goal seems to be getting the station off the Mt. Division, hell or high water.
I personally think they should be utilizing that cash focusing on the Rockland extension, but that's just me.

[markhb]

NNEPRA is actually letting MaineDOT be the lead agency on the relocation project,probably (in my estimation) because that agency has a greater capacity for bonding (caveat voter approval), with the likely intent that MaineDOT will handle any construction that needs to be done and NNEPRA and Amtrak will get use of the station for free.

Commercial Street is out of the question at this point; the originally-proposed site is now home to the container port and the under-construction cold storage building, and I think all the stakeholders are adamant that the mainline is the place to be. According to the MaineDOT report, NNEPRA staff supported the current Ferguson showroom location on St. John St., while MaineDOT favored something in the neighborhood of the former Union Station. It strikes me that NNEPRA could conceivably use an existing storefront at Union Station Plaza, taking over the T-Mobile or even the Chinese restaurant space, and build whatever is needed for platforms, etc. out back.

[markhb]

https://www.pressherald.com/2024/04/25/ ... -portland/


I listened to the meeting. They discussed three potential sites: the long, squiggly parking lot that lies between Congress and Park Ave., behind and across the tracks from Amato's and McDonald's (or, to go old old-Mainer, the old Cumby's across from where Brinks used to be), the Union Station Plaza area, and the area where Ferguson has their showroom near the foot of St. John Street. Those were the same locations identified in the initial MaineDOT report months ago, so what has been going on in the meantime other than compiling pro & con lists, I have no idea.


The analysis as presented definitely leaned in favor of the Ferguson site, partly because they wanted an area they saw as ripe for TOD redevelopment, partly because they also want easy access to the Mountain Branch both to get to the existing maintenance facility by the station, and because they do still see a possibility of using the branch for connectivity to Westbrook (it sounded like Rock Row's plans might still be on the table). They also said the analysis indicates that they need c. 105 parking spaces, and in relation to the Ferguson site several commenters stated that they believe the MMC garage is underutilized and possibly a deal could be made to use that.


One thing to note w/r/t the Ferguson area is that they anticipate that a connection would be made through to the other side of the tracks, accessing Fore River Parkway via the Mercy parking lot. They also anticipate that there would be a shuttle service between whatever new station is built and the PTC. Finally, they also noted that a station on the mainline would actually save 5 minutes between Portland and Boston, just by eliminating an extra mile of slow-speed travel.

The presentation and the meeting recording should be posted on NNEPRA's website soon.

[R36 Combine Coach]

Several remedies come to mind:

1. New Hampshire changes their law.
2. Some sort of federal preemption under either railroad regulations or the Interstate Commerce clause. The former might be tricky since the liquor license is held by the contractor, not Amtrak or NNEPRA.
3. Buy limited quantities of nips, beers etc. in NH for sale specifically while in New Hampshire. Probably far too complicated to keep track of behind the counter, plus, again, they'd have to be stocked in Portland which might fall afoul of Maine law.

The 21st Amendment repealing the 18th gives the states exclusive power over alcohol.

No interstate commerce law is ever going to cancel a Constitution Amendment.

On a side note, Metro-North's bar cars were licensed in New York under the NY State Liquor Authority despite
the bar cars owned and funded under ConnDOT and serving beverages east of the Port Chester/Greenwich line.

That then brings up on Amtrak's intercity and LD trains, is there a liquor license for each state or simply a blanket Federal (interstate) license for all states issued by ATF/U.S. Treasury?

[ExCon90]

The matter of licenses had never occurred to me until now; I know that State regulations were strictly enforced aboard trains -- on the Missouri Pacific the outside back cover of the drink list in dining and lounge cars was devoted to a summary of the laws in all States served by the MP, and very informative reading it made -- but I never saw anything authoritative about licensing. I did hear, but never verified, that the PRR could not serve alcohol while the train was standing in Penn Station because New York City required each individual car to have a license, certainly not worth having for a car that wasn't going to be in town for longer than a few minutes before leaving for St. Louis or someplace.

[markhb]

The presentation and the meeting recording should be posted on NNEPRA's website soon.

The materials I mentioned are both available here, as is an opportunity to comment which I believe is available until early May.

[CPF66]

It could just be me, but it seems like the current station seems to be a good fit. Its right off 295, has plenty of parking, connects with buses, and is on a busy Westbrook-Portland corridor. As for placing it somewhere on Commercial St, I don't see a place where that would be possible to hit those key attributes. For a fraction of the cost, it would make more sense to run shuttles to downtown.

As for relocating the station to Congress St, there is definitely room for a platform of some sort, but not so much parking enough.

Another possible option (by a stretch) would be to redevelop part of the Deering Oaks park off of Forest Ave. It has some benefits, such as being close to downtown and Maine Medical Center, as well as the thoroughfares of Forest Ave and 295, and is close to attractions like the Portland Seadogs stadium.

The downside would be it would result in a good portion of the park being redeveloped. Which I am not sure what condition the park is in, but that may or may not go over like a fart in church. At a minimum it would result in the removal of the sports fields and would also require the traffic pattern to be reworked. And I think CSX still owns the railroad right of way.

[markhb]

It could just be me, but it seems like the current station seems to be a good fit. Its right off 295, has plenty of parking, connects with buses, and is on a busy Westbrook-Portland corridor. As for placing it somewhere on Commercial St, I don't see a place where that would be possible to hit those key attributes. For a fraction of the cost, it would make more sense to run shuttles to downtown.

As for relocating the station to Congress St, there is definitely room for a platform of some sort, but not so much parking enough.

Another possible option (by a stretch) would be to redevelop part of the Deering Oaks park off of Forest Ave. It has some benefits, such as being close to downtown and Maine Medical Center, as well as the thoroughfares of Forest Ave and 295, and is close to attractions like the Portland Seadogs stadium.

The downside would be it would result in a good portion of the park being redeveloped. Which I am not sure what condition the park is in, but that may or may not go over like a fart in church. At a minimum it would result in the removal of the sports fields and would also require the traffic pattern to be reworked. And I think CSX still owns the railroad right of way.

I am very sure that Commercial is very off the table; the original land they anticipated using is now a container port, there are other marine-related businesses surroundig the area, and the old ROW on the north side of the street has a brand new VA clinic in the middle of it.

Regarding the Union Branch, MaineDOT owns it west of Forest Avenue; they sold the eastern portion of the old ROW to the city years ago for construction of the Bayside Trail. They are moving to formally abandon it for a trail at this point. One commenter in this forum years ago suggested using it as an approach to a new station that would utilize the main Post Office at Forest Ave. and Portland St., but that hinged on USPS surplussing that building, which has never happened.

[CPF66]

It appears that there would still be room for some sort of trail (at least it looks like there is a dirt road along the tracks for part of the stretch). Other than that, I don't know where the DOT could put a station with enough parking, and connections close by. But who knows, maybe the town is willing to give up the sports fields if they are relocated, which would allow a new station to be built. But other than that spot, there really isn't anything else close by.