CSX Boston and Albany Line

Speaking of auto racks, a rather lengthy train of auto racks headed westbound in Westborough passing the former Auto yard (now tranflo yard) at approximately 1600 on March 11th. I wonder if they were cleaning out the racks that were in storage at the CP yard in Framingham.

Looks like someone forget to tell this morning's 111 car, 9900' WB rack train that they were supposed to pick up 425 at Springfield.

They pulled 80 out of storage at Framingham yesterday.

B740? went by the Palmer webcam EB this morning with 23 racks on the back.

The auto racks on Q424 are coming from a factory down south, and are newer traffic. The eastbound loads for this traffic are being handled in the manifest trains, Q4XX trains up the river line to Selkirk then humped for Q424. The Palmer local out of West Springfield then brings them to the site in East Brookfield.

All the empties for both go west on the unit auto rack train Q205, which usually sets out and picks up racks in Selkirk. Q264, unit rack train from the west, still runs and is how most of the loaded racks get to E.B.

johnpbarlow wrote: ↑Wed Mar 10, 2021 8:02 am Taracer, thanks very much for the detailed answers! It will be interesting to see what ops changes occur on the B&A once CSX acquires Pan Am and NS begins running its 22K/23K IM trains on the line.

It's definitely going to mean more trains, but nothing that the B&A can't handle. There were twice as many trains out here 15 years ago.

Taracer, Thanks for the info. I've been trying to wrap my head around present day operations and train counts and the autorack ops. I used to own and built a log home next to MP 143 (Hinsdale/Dalton town line) back in the late 70's and the train count was somewhere 18-20 a day. They can definitely handle 22/23k w/o a problem and probably more if the opportunity ever arises.

J.D. Lang wrote: ↑Tue Mar 16, 2021 2:07 pm Taracer, Thanks for the info. I've been trying to wrap my head around present day operations and train counts and the autorack ops. I used to own and built a log home next to MP 143 (Hinsdale/Dalton town line) back in the late 70's and the train count was somewhere 18-20 a day. They can definitely handle 22/23k w/o a problem and probably more if the opportunity ever arises.

Yes capacity is not an issue. What most don't see is that outlying yards and even the mainline are parking lots due to PSR. 15 years ago the new auto traffic from the south would have run as a unit train both ways for example, no matter 10 or 100 cars. It would be its own service.

Between the addition of the NS intermodal trains, growth in traffic to/from the former PAR (including potential Intermodal service) as well as increased C&D and especially MSW shipments, I would expect the line to be handling an additional 3-4 train pairs a day within a couple years.

Not an issue, that will be about what it was 15 years ago.

Agreed. The only thing I was thinking though is that they are running much longer, heavier trains these days so it may be a bit more difficult in terms of timing with meets.

2 MT or a few passing sidings strategically placed solves the meet problem.

It was almost a quarter of a century ago that CSXT got the Boston Line, which was received in excellent shape -- CWR and 315K on the main. In the intervening years, little reformatting has been done to accommodate what wasn't even a fever-dream back at the time of the sale -- PSR and trains up to 9K'.
On this, the feast day of the patron saint of Ireland, I perhaps should be a tad less cynical, but I have trouble avoiding the thought that CSXT will offer the track to the Commonwealth for expanded passenger service so the Commonwealth will float bonds for restoring full double-track west of Worcester with strategically-placed crossovers every few miles. And yeah, that'll be kinda like the highway Big Dig in that it just might delay future bond funding for yet another Big Dig -- dropping the floor of the Hoosac. Sly folks to the South!

Ah, but the leprechauns bearing a pot of gold might just take CSX and B&A freight traffic to the end of the Pan Am Southern rainbow.

~$500 million or more in capital cost savings for the politically-powerful MA E-W passenger rail project, upwards of $100's of millions of value in CSX assets that could be sold for the project and transit-oriented development, and potential tax benefits for those willing to do a deal makes for plenty of possibility to move B&A traffic over to PAS during this next decade. "Ni bheadh a fhios agat!"

QB 52.32-
Thanks for your beam of optimism on a cloudy morning.
Sadly, I can't quite rid my pessimistic mind of another Gaelicism involving not a pot, but an upturned hat and a less desirable commodity as the outcome of this version of Let's Make a Deal.