Potential MBTA Southern NH Service

Does New Hampshire get federal highway money? I've noticed that it hasn't renumbered the exits by mile marker, so whatever leverage the feds used to make MA, VT, RI, CT and NY do so clearly doesn't apply to it.

Lil' Snu said that they weren't renumbering because people liked the numbers they were used to or remembered from their childhood or something like that.

Only Interstate highways are required to have exit numbers match mile markers. There is no such requirement for other highways. If I recall correctly, there were only two reasons NC would renumber exits:

• (Re)designating a highway as an Interstate highway (even if not numbered as such in public signage)
• Building a new exit between two existing exits that would force a renumbering

There may be more recent legal or regulatory changes that are triggering other exit renumbering projects, but if so I am not aware of them.

From what I have read/heard, there is no set time limit on when the feds will require states to convert to mile-based exits. Right now the states with sequential exits include NJ (turnpike only), CT, NY, VT, and NH. CT and NY have started converting a handful of highways but the bulk will take several more years. VT has done a "soft conversion" (adding placards saying "Milepoint Exit #" but retaining the sequential numbers (for now). NH hasn't even started, and a bill was introduced to convert but was shot down. Hmmm.... odd... where have we seen this before in NH? (cough... commuter rail...cough). Eventually the feds will crack down and say you have until 20## to convert, or you'll miss out on the 80/20 funding.

Still it seems weird to see MA and ME converted, while the 16-mile stretch of I-95 along NH's seacoast retains sequential exits. And Sununu's argument about "I was an Exit ## kid" I just don't buy. But, again, it's NH, so live free or die, I guess.

mbrproductions wrote: ↑Fri Dec 23, 2022 7:24 am https://indepthnh.org/2022/12/21/counci ... christmas/

mbrproductions wrote: ↑Thu Dec 22, 2022 8:02 pm NEWS: "Commuter rail study goes off the tracks"
https://sports.yahoo.com/commuter-rail- ... 00725.html

Kevin Landrigan, The New Hampshire Union Leader, Manchester
Thu, December 22, 2022 at 4:12 AM EST·3 min read

Refresh my memory, was the report due in December 2022 or January 2023? I would LOVE to read the "72% complete" report, hope it at least 50% complete. AECOM Technical Services has had two? or three? years to complete this report. And they were having trouble talking with city officials that were pro-commuter rail? I'm calling BS. I wish Massachusetts had the balls to pull the plug on contractors who don't complete projects on time or on budget. Meanwhile, you buried the most important paragraph of the article:

Transportation Commissioner Bill Cass said part of the reason the vendor needed more time was the potential sale of the former Sears store at the Pheasant Lane Mall in Nashua.

The store abuts the site where Nashua city officials want to locate a train station for the project.

Emphasis added. I interpret this that the site of the South Nashua train station was not next to, but was to INCLUDE some or all of the Sears parking lot and access road(s). While NHDOT has been playing footsie with their consultant, NHDOT or the City of Nashua could have bought the Sears site at bankruptcy / fire sale pricing. Now it will cost millions extra or perhaps be impossible to build South Nashua station. In the three years we have been waiting for this report, the price of construction has at least doubled and interest rates have tripled and we are now in a recession.

You do realize that Sears was in a mall owned by someone else? Also consultants don't just work on your project they have multiple projects and may only be putting in say 5 minutes today 30 tomorrow and so on.

According to this page on the Federal Permitting Dashboard's website, the project is still planned to go on until March:
https://www.permits.performance.gov/per ... project-ea

Red Wing wrote: ↑Thu Jan 05, 2023 1:57 pm You do realize that Sears was in a mall owned by someone else? Also consultants don't just work on your project they have multiple projects and may only be putting in say 5 minutes today 30 tomorrow and so on.

No, I don't know whether Sears owned the real estate or had a long-term lease or had sold it to Transformco. What I do know is if you wait for a developer to buy a property, with plans to to redevelop it, you will end up paying much, much more for it than if you had bought it before the owner sold it.

https://manchesterinklink.com/bill-prop ... uter-rail/
"Bill proposes freeze on state-funded commuter rail"

The bill, HB 110, comes on the heels of an Executive Council decision late last year not to extend a contract studying the expanding Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority’s Lowell Line to four stations along the Merrimack River in Nashua, Bedford and Manchester as part of the Capital Corridor Project

To those who tout "the vast majority of NH does not want Commuter Rail"

Online testimony submission was approximately 10-to-1 in opposition to the bill

Looks like they are still afraid that something good might be developed in their state for once.

NEW ARTICLE; STUDY COMPLETED: "Boston to Manchester rail study: $782 million to build, $17 million a year to run"

Restoring commuter rail service from Boston through Manchester would cost $782 million to build and $17 million a year to operate, according to a new draft study done for the Department of Transportation.

Claiming fares could cover 82% of that operating budget, the 80-page consultant's report concludes the annual state taxpayer subsidy could be as low as $200,000 and as high as $3.5 million depending on how many use the service.

Thoughts on this?

Build it, and they will come, is a poor way to sell such a wide gap in a subsidy they have no clear picture on the actual amount of.

Do you have a link to the report?

Unfortunately, I do not know of where I can find the project report, though I would like to know if anybody else can find it.

Thoughts on this?

For the one guy who said relying on 19th century technology is dumb, I wonder who's going to break the bad news to him about when roads were invented.

Here's the report
https://www.nh.gov/dot/projects/nashuam ... t-2023.pdf

This link to a set of "Informational Sheets" goes with the report
https://www.nh.gov/dot/projects/nashuam ... r-2023.pdf

Further information can be found here
https://www.nh.gov/dot/projects/nashuam ... /index.htm