cjvrr wrote:Bringing large corporations to Scranton is great. It allows people that live in the area to work in the area and not clog roads to jobs in NJ or NYC. I just don't see how moving a handful of large corporations to Scranton would increase ridership on Scranton to NYC service. Just because the area is boring doesn't mean a person is going to take a 2-1/2 hour train ride to NYC for some fun and another 2-1/2 hour ride to get home.
Are these corporations centrally located near a possible train station. If they are you might have some type of need for local commuter service. My guess is that they are spaced all up and down the valley and you need to drive to get to them from any rail hub. Then it may just be easier to take you car door to door, (one seat ride) instead of taking 3 different seats to get there.
This should be in the other forum but the Highlands Act does impact development near the Cutoff project too;
Scranton is being billed as the "Wall Street Backup." What that basically means is that a lot of financial corporations are implementing a secondary base of operations in Scanton PA in order to ensure redundancy should the unthinkable happen. In that case, a rail link between NYC and Scranton is justified. Scranton can get very busy in an extremely short period of time.
While it's attractive to move to Scranton, the bottom line is the area does not have enough qualified individuals to effectively run these backup centers. To get qualified people, a better transportation infrastructure must be put into place. Since the expertise is in the NYC metropolitan area and the majority of people will most likely not relocate, a connection such as the one proposed is viable.
1. As far as the Highland Act. How many applications for Highlands Applicability Determination have you filled out? I have done four now in the last year. I am by no means an expert at it. You need to file for an "exemption" and pay a fee even to repave a roadway. If you are in the Preservation area and you bought your residential property after 2005 you can not cover more than 6% of the lot with impervious area. You can not disturb more than a 1/4 acre of property. You can not have a septic system installed on a new lot of less than 85 acres without obtaining Highlands approval. If the addition to your home is valued at over $100,000 you need to get Highland's approval. Construction of new structures on new lots is severely restricted. All of the restrictions have not been put in place yet. The Highlands Council members are fighting over how severe the restrictions will be. The 300' restriction from any waterway would further limit development, some members want it to be 1,000'. So it does not apply only to Virgin properties as most people, including yourself, assume.
Regulations exist no matter what you do. You are right that some regulations of the Highlands Act effect re-development. However, there are ways around the act. They're developing new homes right at the end of my street. How did they get around the Highlands act? They asked Vernon to honor regulations from 1983 that did not prohibit development.
BTW. I do not think I put the notion forward of assuming. It's significantly easier to develop on land that is already developed versus land that is untouched.
2. The center of Vernon and the ski areas are in the Highlands Planning Area and the Town can either "opt in" or out of placing the same requirements on developers that the Persevation Area has. The redevelopment area for most towns had been set when the act was adopted. Local building codes still limit the amount and type of development that can occur. You aren't going to get a massive population explosion in Vernon, there just isn't enough viable land left for that.
You are wrong. Look at the most recent census statistics and you will already see that the population has increased. Home values continue to skyrocket here as well, despite a weakening real estate market.
3. What time would you have to leave Vernon to make it to a train in Vernon that will get to your place of employment on time? The train will easily take an hour between Vernon and Stockholm. Even if it takes 1/2 hour to drive between those points you still win by taking the car. While I agree that the new operators are expanding Mountain Creek (the old Vernon Valley ski area) still hasn't reached a point to warrant dedicated ski train service. The roadway between those points will be improved at some point regardless of train service.
Stockholm for the time being seems like the best terminus for normal passenger service. However, you are wrong regarding ski service. If the conventional passenger service is there, wouldnt it make sense to offer ski service as a value add? Not specifically talking about Mountain Creek, but what about the many resorts in PA? I read in an article once that a PA ski resort is going to shell out money to build a station on the cutoff line. To me, a commercial business would not be doing that if they didnt feel that it would be economically viable.
