by Suburban Station
wagz wrote:well, I presume passenger and freight CAN coexist...amtrak operates over freight territory. it just may not be worth it for SEPTA to install the equipment over such a short stretch and it seems like they'd prefer to have their own track anyway. I thought from the picture it was the track closest to the station, no?R3 Passenger wrote:In a perfect world, high level platforms would be added. However, I am interpreting this to mean that the 3rd track that CSX runs on exclusively between Neshaminy Falls and Woodbourne would be extended to West Trenton. While doing this separates SEPTA and freight operations, it forces Yardley into the same boat Langhorne and Woodbourne are in with regards to high platforms. Segregating the freight and passenger traffic may prevent either freight or passenger to be held up by the other, but the West Trenton Bridge has no room for additional track, and freight traffic would still block one of the West Trenton platforms in addition to possibly still blocking the yard tracks.Have you not read the rest of the thread (or at least the first post)? The third track isn't because they felt like it, but because of the Federal mandate of installing PTC systems on all passenger rail lines. Said PTC system is incompatible with freight operations (unknown how this will affect NS/CSX in NJ where they share trackage with NJT), so trackage for freight and passenger operations must be segregated. In fact SEPTA is losing some capacity in the deal since the Delaware River viaduct can only support two tracks, so SEPTA will single track from some point in PA through West Trenton.
I don't see what benefit this has outside of SEPTA's attempt to transitize the Regional Rail. It is not worth it in my opinion and does not address the biggest problem: yard tracks being blocked by a late freight.
There are many other things that are higher priority than this in my book, such as the aging electrical systems and substations. No electricity, no trains.
Also I'm not sure where you get the idea of freight trains regularly blocking the yard? Except for some extenuating circumstance like a train going in to emergency because a brake line broke, a freight train should not be stopped blocking the interlocking ever.