Danbury service suspended due to high water.

Great pictures!

2 more PM and 1 more AM is running from Branchville now. Why can't they serve Redding?

Amtrak7 wrote:2 more PM and 1 more AM is running from Branchville now. Why can't they serve Redding?

If you have to terminate the run short of Bethel, it makes more sense to use Branchville than Redding because a) Branchville has a siding and b) Branchville has much better road access than Redding, so it's a lot easier to make the train-bus transfer.

I was just looking at the MTA website and it looks like they are going to operate the following trains to Branchville for the PM rush hour.

The 5:10 PM train departing Grand Central will operate to Branchville. Customers going to Redding, Bethel and Danbury should transfer at South Norwalk for bus service to these stations.
The 5:50 PM departing Grand Central will operate to Branchville. Customers going to Redding, Bethel and Danbury should transfer at South Norwalk for bus service to these stations.
The 6:22 PM train from Grand Central will operate to Branchville. Customers going to Redding, Bethel and Danbury should transfer at South Norwalk for bus service to these stations.

http://mta.info/mnr/html/danbury.htm

Jeff Smith wrote:Off-Topic: Um, Patrick, time to retire the signature "The M-8 is coming...but will it beat the apocalypse?" The M-8 has indeed won the race!

Now, will the Danbury Branch Study beat the apocolypse????

AFAIK, Dutch was previously qualified on the Beacon. I believe the HRRC pilot is for the stretch of the branch that they own up to the state line. I would imagine they could just toss him/her overboard at that point, but that wouldn't be neighborly now, would it?

I guess we'll have a good idea of the condition of the connection after this....

Correct I was expired so they had a HRRC SLE pilot me on HRRC and a person requalifying me on MNCR portion.
Me and yesterdays engineer are current again for entire move if it happens again in next year or so.
I like to thank HRRC Superintendent Rick A. for his help and understanding, It was great to work with the co-operation of both railroads.
Im sure some day the HRRC may need our track for a Emergency, as nothing ever goes according to timetable or weather gods

Great photos FL9AC. I see you got a picture of my back as it was departing Danbury. Here are a few I got :

through Danbury

IN the Mill Plain, CT area

more photos

in Brewtser

Near the end

Awesome pictures Kurt.

DutchRailnut wrote: Beacon line has some washouts and Maybrook east is still out of service from Botsford to Derby.

I guess the Beacon Line was OK to get the equipment out. Didn't they knock the shoes off a Genesis when they ran it up from Derby years ago? That was a costly mistake at the time.

yup and almost killed a lady in Newtown but we could not go that way as part of Maybrook east is out of service.
Even part between Brewster and Danbury is restricted to 10 mph (ouch ) The shoe issue is normally only east of Danbury, but we did loose some shoes somewhere due to Ice or a boulder.
Ran the 13 car train into GCT and then had to run a mini of that train back to Brewster as a spare...

Once again Don Nelson's investment pays off. He spearheaded the purchasing of the former Maybrook Line from HRR for $40 million in 1994 (or was it 1993?).

He once told me that he didn't want to see the line scrapped and that it may have use in the future. Somehow I doubt this is what he had in mind!!