NCS to Broad Street Station ("Newark Light Rail")

Took a quick look strait down from above (car is 10 feet from the portal) at the tunnel portal by St. John's RC Church this morning from the parking lot. Looks ready for tracks to be installed.

Orange Street has been closed this week for the "inbound" track construction. Note that the map posted earlier has an error - Orange Street is north (to the right) of Washington Park & Newark Library. Not sure what the map source was, but it's not quite right.

went by broad st station friday night, some catenary poles are in place.

I'm not certain of this because I haven't been near it, but it looks like from my window that Broad Street southbound is closed (redirected onto University Ave at State St.) and northbound traffic is running on the southbound side. It appears as if they are installing a section of the grade crossing on the northbound side.

Boy, doesn't it seem like they did nothing for a year and are doing everything in the last few months?

I'll take a picture later if anyone's interested. The view from here of the construction is surprisingly good.

Mr. Novosielski:

Please do, and thanks!

In the last few days, the plates covering the track construction ("outbound track") crossing Broad Street (ie. between the Stadium and the DL&W Broad Street Station) were removed, exposing a paved grade crossing.

I've noticed some of the "brackets" (sorry, don't know the technical term) being installed on the new catenary poles in the vicinity of the NJPAC station. These look to be perhaps aluminum metal arms from which the atcual trolley wire will hang.

Work is also well along on the "inbound" track crossing of Broad Street down by Lombardy Street. This is where the inbound cars will make a 90-degree left turn from the (effectively) southbound curb lane of Broad Street to the south side of Lombardy street. This crossing is also being done at night and covered with steel plates during the day.

The crossing at the north end of Washington Street is now open (where it meets Broad and Bridge streets), and judging from the congestion I see in the evenings, the new configuration is not as good (for auto traffic) as the old configuration. There used to be an extended green for north bound Washington to northbound Broad street turns, and this has been eliminated due to the Light Rail.

Electrify the RVL! wrote:Mr. Novosielski:

Please do, and thanks!

I took several photos at night. They are not great, but it's the only time I was down there. I will post them someplace later tonight as my camera is at home (don't have anywhere that jumps out at me right now, but I'll think of something).

gravelyfan wrote: The crossing at the north end of Washington Street is now open (where it meets Broad and Bridge streets), and judging from the congestion I see in the evenings, the new configuration is not as good (for auto traffic) as the old configuration. There used to be an extended green for north bound Washington to northbound Broad street turns, and this has been eliminated due to the Light Rail.

I believe you are incorrect on this one. While the new configuration is not as good since there are not dedicated "ramps" to the respective roads (there was an island separating Broad vs. Bridge traffic), there is a left turn arrow for Washington to Broad traffic, if I am not mistaken. Last time I was through there was about a week or so. Most of the traffic relates to all of the construction related crap still in that area. Not all lanes are yet open, and construction barrels are narrowing lanes yet.

ryanov wrote:

gravelyfan wrote: The crossing at the north end of Washington Street is now open (where it meets Broad and Bridge streets), and judging from the congestion I see in the evenings, the new configuration is not as good (for auto traffic) as the old configuration. There used to be an extended green for north bound Washington to northbound Broad street turns, and this has been eliminated due to the Light Rail.

I believe you are incorrect on this one. While the new configuration is not as good since there are not dedicated "ramps" to the respective roads (there was an island separating Broad vs. Bridge traffic), there is a left turn arrow for Washington to Broad traffic, if I am not mistaken. Last time I was through there was about a week or so. Most of the traffic relates to all of the construction related crap still in that area. Not all lanes are yet open, and construction barrels are narrowing lanes yet.

The difference is that in the past, the northbound Washington to Northbound Broad street had an extended green phase while the westbound Bridge street light was green. Now, the northbound Washington to Northbound Broad phase occurs at the same time as the Northbound Washington to Bridge Street phase, and does NOT extend when the Westbound BRidge street phase goes green. Sorry if this is confusing without a diagram.

Ah, makes sense now. Gotcha.

gravelyfan wrote:Orange Street has been closed this week for the "inbound" track construction.

...and it finally reopened this past week. Two months! wow.

Ridiculous! The street was closed while workers finished up other sections of the trackwork that didn't block streets at all. Most closed roads were only closed for one or two overnights. Did they not realize how badly this was screwing up traffic?

Did they not realize how badly this was screwing up traffic?

You are talking about Newark. They had Mulberry closed for well over a year and now another busy street, Lafayette St, is closed between Mulberry and Broad. Just to make it more fun, they allow Newark City Hall "VIPs" to park and double park on Mulberry, Broad, Green and Franklin St at will at all times. Such is life in Newark.

Well, it's finally 2006, so we should be abvle to ride this new extension soon, right? I see progress on tracks being laid, but what about the overhead power lines?

bonaire wrote:Well, it's finally 2006, so we should be abvle to ride this new extension soon, right? I see progress on tracks being laid, but what about the overhead power lines?

Many (if not all) of the catenary structures seem to be up. There is some sort of wire work evident at the two diamond crossover locations (one between Broad Street and University Avenue and the other on the "Penn Station" side of Lombardy Street). As of last week I hadn't seen any wire strung elsewhere.