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Discussion relating to the operations of MTA MetroNorth Railroad including west of Hudson operations and discussion of CtDOT sponsored rail operations such as Shore Line East and the Springfield to New Haven Hartford Line

Moderators: GirlOnTheTrain, nomis, FL9AC, Jeff Smith

 #1564800  by nomis
 
CT: OPINION: Lawmakers suggest new train system for eastern Connecticut
https://www.masstransitmag.com/rail/ne ... onnecticut
New legislation co-sponsored by Democrats from the eastern Connecticut delegation to the General Assembly proposes that the state Department of Transportation study the concept of two new passenger rail systems centered in the region.

The second line would put passenger trains on the existing Providence & Worcester freight line, which runs from Groton to Norwich and up into Massachusetts. Adding train cars could take passengers from Electric Boat and Pfizer in Groton up the Interstate 395 corridor to Worcester, Mass. Right now, freight travels at night and the tracks are unused during the day.
For now, I will keep the SLE extension to RI separate from this P&W centric topic
 #1570938  by Arlington
 
ConstanceR46 wrote: Sat May 08, 2021 11:13 pm Geography?
How? Not economic geography, and crows-flight geography is highly misleading.
Does this service have stated schedule goals?

While in CT itself it may appear to be drawing a more direct line, once you get to the state line, it seems you’re still got a trip from Worcester to Boston

If Worcester were a bigger biotech center, maybe, but biotech is really concentrated near the NEC in places like Longwood Boston or Kendall Cambridge

CT would probably find it far superior to work with RI on extending MBTA service to NLC
Or maybe even an Amtrak overlay BOS - NHV. Ideally something that’d do 100mph+ where possible...for much of the run via PVD

What upstate CT needs really to be proposing is a toll road with rail cutoff straight east west Hartford- Providence

The coast has literally the fastest tracks in the USA between Westerly an RTE 128 and it makes more sense to me that they figure out how to run a fast train on it
 #1570939  by Arlington
 
I get that if you’re Groton you’d like commuter rail, and redeployment of the SLE diesels to bring people from Plainfield might be attractive (though competing with uncongested 395 seems tough).
 #1570999  by Ridgefielder
 
Arlington wrote: Sun May 09, 2021 12:46 pm I get that if you’re Groton you’d like commuter rail, and redeployment of the SLE diesels to bring people from Plainfield might be attractive (though competing with uncongested 395 seems tough).
This proposal puzzles me somewhat for just that reason. This is the least-densely-populated part of the state of Connecticut. Seems to me that there are other parts of the state that have a better case for getting service. Waterbury-New Britain-Hartford springs to mind, as do various Danbury-centric proposals.

WOR-NLC trains running as a feeder to the NEC is one thing. But a commuter train from Putnam to Norwich?
 #1571121  by ElectricTraction
 
I hate to be a naysayer, but I just don't see the case for this service. Once you get to Groton, you end up getting dumped in a location where you'd have to take a bus to actually get anywhere. It's just not a terribly dense route. There is trackage to Pfizer and EB, but it's a highly circuitous route that wouldn't work well for passenger service, it remains in use once a year for the "special" load. There are many far more worthy projects to improve the existing commuter rail operations in the state, including multiple missing stations on each service, electrification, parking, equipment, service extensions, etc. The one new service to the north that I think could be potentially useful would be running up to Mohegan Sun, which could probably be done with a single RDC if anyone could find one, and making the other side of the platform in New London actually a platform. The biggest expense would be that Mohegan Sun would have to build a station, and Foxwoods might want in on it too with a bus shuttle from just south of Mohegan, so I'm not sure how that would work out between the two of them, maybe Mohegan would allow Foxwood in on it if they paid half the cost of the station and track improvements. That's NECR though.

This sounds like a kind of political proposal for Eastern CT, even though it doesn't really make much sense. The low-density South Coast and Cape Cod services on the T make a lot more sense, as they are anchored at one end by Boston itself, which is a huge driver of traffic.