Maine Eastern Railroad (MERR) Discussion

"If this is truly economical, the ME acquiring a refrigerator car would solve the dilemma of other reefer owners not wanting to transport bait fish in their cars.
It wouldn't be ther first car in dedicated service to one customer."

The only thing worse than having no temperature-controlled equipment is having a few.

Reefers take an inordinate amount of management oversight. Running one or two reefers would be a nightmare. You have to set up servicing agreements at origin and destination, have tracking software installed to ensure the reefer is performing correctly, etc. What happens if one of the reefers craps out in Gila, AZ? Aside from maybe setting off the car, the railroad cannot help you.

What Maine Eastern should be doing is farming this opportunity out to the likes of Cryo-Trans, a rail-oriented, asset-based (meaning they have reefers) temperature-controlled logistics operator. They'd be able to give a good assessment of whether there's any way to make such a move work.

Thanks Watchman318. I think I've got it now!

I recall seeing remnants of a track there before,

You sure did. Google Earth Street View did a superb job of capturing those remnants as viewed from New County Rd. between the crossing and Park St.


God, that area has' changed plenty since the days of my youth.

Thanks Cowford for spelling out some of the issues with reefers. I'm a banker, not a transportation logistics guy.

Don't know if this is worth it's own thread, but there's some interesting history of this line, the Lime Rock, the Georges Valley and the Rockport railroads at http://books.google.com/books?id=vA_6ir ... ad&f=false and http://www.sullboat.com/rockland_history.htm

Has anyone heard anything as to the Amtrak connection at Brunswick? Any hope of schedule coodination?

papabarn wrote:Has anyone heard anything as to the Amtrak connection at Brunswick? Any hope of schedule coodination?

The honest answer from everything I've ever gathered about their position is they're just holding on for the Downeaster. One can certainly assume they will be coordinating schedules. The frequency and scheduling issues as a result of the layover facility construction delays are definitely a negative for them (and for the entire region).

Schedule coordination seems like it'll be a challenge- competing interests between Rockland tourists and inbound/outbound riders. Any ideas on what the schedule would look like?

No idea on the timetable, but they've said they want to run a 3-season service: spring, summer and foliage, coordinated with the DE. I would think they'd unload WB passengers from Rockland, back up and park on the second track at BRK (I haven't been there for a while but I think there were 2 tracks in the station area) to allow the DE to do its thing, and then come back to the platform to reload for the trip to Rockland. Of course, that would change if the Brunswick West facility opens and Amtrak withdraws from the station to the yard to do between-trip restocking, etc., and the MERR train would then be the one in the middle bracketed by the DE arrival and departure.

My gut feeling is that the MERR service to Rockland will still primarily carry tourists rather than Rocklanders transferring to Portland or Boston; I think their anticipation is that said tourists will be arriving in Brunswick from Mass. via the DE for a car-free vacation on the Maine coast. Does anyone know what Rockland has for tourist and resort shuttles other than cabs?

If you're going to back up to switch over to the second track in the station, why not just back up to the Lower Road and sit there? That way, you're out of the way and when the DE clears out, you don't have to make another backing move to get on the station track.

markhb wrote:Does anyone know what Rockland has for tourist and resort shuttles other than cabs?

Well, once upon a time there was the Rockland, Thomaston and Camden Street Railway but it met it's demise on May 31, 1931. From what I saw last summer, and can determine on the web, there's nothing other than a daily Concord Coach bus. About the only "Resort" anywhere near town is the Samoset and to my knowledge they don't have anything regularly connecting to downtown. I'm afraid it's taxi, rent a car from Budget (Knox County Regional Airport out in Owl's Head), Enterprise (out of Thomaston) or the "two foot gauge" equipment most all of us were born with. Hopefully, there will be "forward thinkers" in town that will come up with something soon.

Once this get's going I'll be able to pretty much re-trace the rail journey my mother used to take frequently in her younger days.

One thing I wonder about is if it would pay (maybe with state or employer subsidy) to get one or two RDC's to serve Bath Iron Works (and I guess Bath/Brunswick in general, maybe even a Freeport or Portland connection)? Pleasant St. in Brunswick (Route 1) is frequently anything but, and getting into or through Bath's no picnic at certain times either. Wiscasset is a story of it's own.

kilroy wrote:If you're going to back up to switch over to the second track in the station, why not just back up to the Lower Road and sit there? That way, you're out of the way and when the DE clears out, you don't have to make another backing move to get on the station track.

Very true. I'm not sure enough of the overall layout to know if there's enough room past Rock Junction to idle a consist without blocking a grade crossing, while I was sure about the second station track. But if there is enough clearance on the Lower Road, then that would make more sense. (There's also a possibility of a third train being added to the mix a few years down the road, if MERR goes ahead with their idea of running commuter service to the State House area in Augusta via the Lower Road, so that would require a 3rd parking spot.)

Well, if they do go ahead with their plan to run service up to Augusta, then you can't park the Rockland set on the Lower Road. You could always park it on the Rockland Branch. No grade crossings to block there and it can't block itself from the branch either. Probably the best solution upon further analysis.

As for the post on running RDC's, they've talked about setting up park and rides to bring BIW workers into Bath since they reactivated the Rockland Branch. So far nothing so I'll believe it when I see it.

This is true. I remember various people and groups talking about it as far back as the late '90s and early 2000s when the Downeaster upgrade was just starting to get underway and the Rockland upgrade was more of a "maybe in the future" idea. I think a lot of us assumed that some kind of Bath-Brunswick commuter rail would start up as soon as the Rockland Branch was rebuilt.

papabarn, did you do the color-coded links for Budget and Enterprise, or is that some automatic ad-insertion software playing tricks?