Weighing the Advantages of improving CP216 at New Rochelle

DutchRailnut wrote: With MTA and Amtrak both in financial Decline, the improvements do not have a chance of being finished soon.

I was reading one of the Amtrak Timetable books and in David Gunn's statement he stated that a number of major interlockings were going to be upgraded along the NEC to keep it in a state of good repair. I assume CP216 is one of them. Based on Gunn's rhetoric I would assume this is one area he'd consider.

I'm not surprised that the flyover idea was dropped due to lack of realestate. Simple re-alignment does seem more feasible and quite doable judging from the photos. If the curve north of the junction was straightened out a bit more and the junction took on more of a wye shaped formation, I could see both railroads having equal 30-45 MPH speeds through the junction.

How about this as a flyover alternative: In the 4 track Shell interlocking, dedicate three tracks to MN and 1 to Amtrak and remove all crossovers. Have the 3 MN tracks become 4 at the New Rochelle station with 2 platform and 2 express. Have the single Amtrak line platform at New Rochelle share the current island platform with the eb MN track. Then merge the Amtrak track into MN's 2 local / 2 express tracks east of New Rochelle station where train speeds can be higher. I would think removing the crossovers on the curve at Shell would permit all 4 tracks (3 MN and the diverging Amtrak track) to be super-elevated to enable much higher speeds through the Shell area. Poor man's approach.

There doesn't have to be a flyover but the interlocking has to be fixed up for the speed for Amtrak trains to be raised by 67 percent.

johnpbarlow, your plan sounds similar to my inital one.

After seeing the photos and reading some of the posts however I realized that a flyover my not be as necessary as I previously thought, in which case I think njt/mnrrbuff makes a good point as well.

If anyone is familiar with the Hudson River Line jucntion with the 4 track main of the Harlem and New Haven Lines, operated by Metro-North, Hudson line trains take the diverging route at pretty high speeds for the curvature that exists there. I believe there are 2 - 3 tracks that diverge to the West there, but the transition is allot smoother.

CP216 should be re-aligned in that fashion. The only difference between the two is that the Junction described (not CP216) has (I lack the appropriate vocabulary so forgive me if I'm wrong) has one "drastic" diverging route while the other is a straight-away.

I'm not sure if CP216 can have trains operate the same way if both routes diverged the way the Hudson Line does but I would think it's possible.

Here is difference , at MO jct the Harlem line tracks are straight and Hudson line tracks diverge.
At CP216 both tracks are curved so a flat interlocking is needed(slow speed due to no rail banking. to make the speed higher the rail needs to be banked, but with both routes curving its impossible as the interlocking would be very prone to derailments with frogs on high rail side.

I was viewing Amtrak's 5 year plan and it looks like re-aligning CP216 is on the agenda. I don't see anything about the design though.

I'm thinkin if Metro-North could take the diverging route while the hellgate line maintained the straight-away a little longer, it might work. There might have to be some buildings that have to be demolished and that will definately hinder progress of this project.

At CP216 both tracks are curved so a flat interlocking is needed(slow speed due to no rail banking. to make the speed higher the rail needs to be banked, but with both routes curving its impossible as the interlocking would be very prone to derailments with frogs on high rail side.

Maybe they'll have to include "banking" of the Amtrak trackage at CP216 split so that Amtrak trains can do at least 70 (wishful thinking). But as you said the routes curve so I'm afraid that any faster speeds through CP216 will have to be a bit slower.

As for the Amtrak stretch past CP216 towards NYP, the speeds go up to at least 70-75 mph, based on my observations when I took recent rides through there.

70?

50, if they're lucky. It's a tighter turn than it looks, for whatever reason.

I'll have to go with 50 mph the, I didn't pay close attention to the curve there. Looks can be deceiving then...........

Still at 50 mph thru CP216, things will still be improved for Amtrak Service in terms of speed and on-time performance.

Mr. Weaver, I run the Acela both directions 3 days a week and do 100mph between cp216 and Pelham Bay all 3 days. actually I got it passed 100 quite often. Dont believe me? come for a ride

THANKS BUT NO THANKS!!!!
Noel Weaver

The Shell at grade project is a funded project that is reconfiguring CP217, CP216 and building a new interlocking CP215 and Manor on the Hell Gate.

The catenary bases have been installed and the switches at CP215 and CP217. Basic design is tracks 1 & 3 become straight track at CP216. CP216 becomes a total of I believe 3 switches going to the Hellgate.

The project is ongoing and will have a postive effect for both Railroads that are involved.

Noel, Have been on the Acela express and they make the 100 with no problem other than it is not sustained, due to the short distance they get to do it in.

Thanks for the update regarding track improvements about CP216, Mr. MTASUPT.

That sounds like a good thing. At lease progress is being made. I thought work may have been halted at one point.

Everytime I travel through Shell, I look to see what progress is being made but the work must be spread out significantly. Out of the many trips I've made through the area, I can recall may once or twice when I saw people out there working on something. One would think it was maintenence but before my knowledge grew about CP216, I assumed they had to be working on re-alignment of the area because for something like the NEC that markets based on high speeds, a section like that where a train has to crawl through at 15 MPH is unthinkable.

Is this addressed in the NEC commission’s improvement plan for the NEC, and is a flyover being proposed infrastructure funding?


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