Central Connecticut Rail Study Hartford-Waterbury (Busway)

And if it's anything like the Q Bridge/I-95 East Haven-Branford widening project it'll be about 20 years after the commuter rail is up and running that it'll be all done! By then who knows how many folks will have switched to the train for good.

In the meantime it'll be interesting to see how many riders this thing actually attracts.

I can speak as a proud Bristol native and expat, and venture that it's going to exceed expectations handsomely if the frequencies are meaningfully decent. East-west is the overwhelming majority of the commute patterns for just about the entirety of the the area bookended by CT 372 in western New Britain and CT 8 in Thomaston longitudinally, and Waterbury/Cheshire and Avon/Canton latitudinally. Including Waterbury-proper and the small villages north on CT 8 where east-west is the prevailing commute by a *modest* margin over the north-south the Waterbury Line serves. Some of the far north of this 'box' uses US 44 instead of I-84, but that's its own exercise in masochism east of CT 177 at the Canton/Avon town line all the way up and down Talcott Mountain into West Hartford.

So you have this great funneling of traffic into I-84 that builds and builds and builds until it slams into a wall of critical mass in Farmington:
-- I-84 east all the way, Exits 17-28: Waterbury, Cheshire (Cheshire has *some* diversionary options to take I-691 to Meriden station on NHHS), southern part of Wolcott at bottom of mountain. More dilution in north-south/CT 8 commutes the further west you go, but this is still 50% or greater Hartford orientation and with the 84 traffic levels to prove it. Including significant minorities of E-W commutes outside-the-'box' in Naugutuck, Middlebury, etc.
-- CT 10 north-south to I-84, Exits 29-33: all of Southington and Plainville, southern third of Farmington (note: Farmington is a large landmass with hollow middle and distinct population + traffic density pockets concentrated far NW, far south, and far east).
-- CT 72 east to I-84, Exits 33-34 in Plainville: southern two-thirds of Bristol, all parts of Plainville not directly on CT 10 (i.e. CT 177), densest part of Plymouth, northern part of Wolcott up on the mountain, southernmost Farmington on CT 177.
-- Western New Britain traced by CT 372, Corbin Ave., Exits 35-36 in Plainville/New Britain. As noted, a lot of the CT Transit coverage here doesn't hit the busway.
-- US 6 east to I-84, Exits 37-38 in Farmington: northern parts of Bristol, most of southern and eastern Farmington, Plymouth west of downtown, Thomaston and Harwinton (some dilution in north-south commutes on CT 8, but all the new housing developments going up out here tend to be east-west oriented folks).
-- CT 4 to Exit 39 in Farmington: Burlington, NW Farmington, Avon/Canton via CT 167 and CT 177. Some Harwinton and Torrington.
-- CT 9 to Exit 39A, Farmington: anyone who shortcutted through downtown New Britain from points west. Potential busway diversions for the people on the *extreme* east of the 'box' where a short-hop on the highway + park-and-ride is a time-saver vs. tackling Farmington. But it will not save time for anyone who's already fought their road-rage battles getting to Exit 33 from points W/N/NW.


These are the 2010 populations of those towns in the 'box' with a majority Hartford orientation:

Waterbury: 110,366
New Britain: 73,206
Bristol: 60,477
Southington: 43,069
Cheshire: 29,261
Farmington: 25,340
Avon: 18,098
Plainville: 17,716
Wolcott: 16,680
Plymouth: 12,243
Canton: 10,292
Thomaston: 7,938
Harwinton: 5,571
Burlington: 9,301

That's the area of impact. Note that not all of these are going to be direct users of Hartford-Waterbury commuter rail. But they are in that 'box' of hellish commute. The 'box' exists because the CT 72 expressway from Plainville to CT 8 in Thomaston was never built and the NW quadrant of the I-291 beltway was never built. These east-west commutes have been crippled since the last segment of I-84 opened in 1969 because all these load-spreading routes were never built. The towns started suffering right then and there. Add the Viaduct project terrorscape to their mobility woes for 15 years and it's basically the killshot. At a time when a LOT of cheap housing and office parks are going up in these 'burbs for people and businesses priced out of any town with a tolerable commute. Which only makes it worse on all those 2-lane feeder roads. These places are also maddeningly inaccessible to Bradley Airport. It's nearby as the crow flies, but 291's cancellation makes downtown 84/91 the only physical means of doing it. And that's torture at all times except late at night and on weekends. You almost can't be in a 'road warrior' type job and be based out here. There's so much cheap real estate out here for office parks and so much trouble attracting white-collar businesses because the airport accessibility is so wretched. ESPN spends an enormous fortune every single day of the year on towncar and limo service to get its guests and remote employees onto campus in Bristol from Bradley, because it's too impractical to force the out-of-towners to rent a car or get there themselves.

One of the many follies of the busway is that it adds absolute zilch to the mobility here in this region most affected by the highway cancellations. The busway pretty much serves population that already has easy access to NHHS via Berlin or West Hartford if the buses only looped there instead, the immediate downtown New Britain, and commuters who have it easy on CT 9 but haven't fought half their car battles reaching Route 9 in the first place. New Britain did have its highways completed save for the I-291 alignment to Rocky Hill that the 1988-infill Route 9 more or less replicates. So for the towns in the 'box' messed up forever by the unfinished highway network, you can't do the 84 Viaduct without having BOTH transit modes cranking beforehand.


The places who are going to use the on-line commuter rail stations are the bolded ones in the above list: New Britain (at direct cannibalization of busway riders), Plainville (incl. west swath of New Britain with easier contra-flow commute to Plainville station vs. downtown NB), Southington (via Plainville), Bristol, Wolcott, Plymouth, and Waterbury. Note that if the spacer stop between Plainville and Bristol in the dense Bristol village of Forestville gets added that's going to increase the ridership share further from Farmington and Southington. Don't know how to empirically crunch those numbers, but if you assume that slightly 50% or somewhat more of the total commuter rail demand in Waterbury is for Hartford, then you can extrapolate some ridership from how a well-performing and frequent-schedule Waterbury Branch would perform from there. Then the population numbers around these stops (taking into account Southington and the Farmington + Plymouth density skews along the Bristol border) allow you to build it up from there in comparison to the much much smaller Waterbury Branch intermediates and their catchment area.

Bristol is obviously a slam-dunk. You can see how well its population slugs vs. Waterbury and NB (it's held steady at 60K for pretty much my whole life while Waterbury has declined and NB has collapsed). Both the downtown stop and the potential Forestville infill have excellent walk-up accessibility. Note that Forestville would be the one that employee shuttle buses from the gigantic ESPN campus would use; it's a 2-mile trip down Birch St. + Pine St. + Lincoln Ave. + East Main from their security gate to the station kiss-and-ride on streets relatively uncongested now that the Route 72 bypass has opened. In fact, I think ESPN arm-twisting probably makes that station AND makes a train schedule that pokes some runs past Hartford to Bradley-terminating both default requirements.

Plainville has excellent walk-up density and room for a parking sink, which is there the Southington and Farmington catchments come into play. It'll probably make CT 10 and CT 177 traffic worse than the bad it already is, but it'll be last-mile type traffic for the commuter rail users instead of only the beginning of their daily waterboarding experience on state highways. Plymouth's obviously a small spacer (though if they pick the east portal of the tunnel on the Bristol line it's got better walkability), but a lot of the farmland on the outskirts of town and in Harwinton, Thomaston (as well as Burlington where CT 69 to downtown Bristol station is the easiest commute) are getting new housing developments for the yuppies who can't afford closer to Hartford. And that's locking up Route 6 solid the whole length east of Route 8. So while the ridership there be sparse it'll draw from every corner intra-town if there's a *decent*-size parking lot. That in turn ends up helping the parts of Bristol that have to fight more traffic on Route 6 to get to the downtown and/or Forestville stops.

I'd say if you're slotting it in total demand it's probably got starter potential > Waterbury Branch, < Danbury Branch. And would be faster-than-usual to catch on as a starter line if it were timed as a Viaduct-geddon project prerequisite. Growth ceiling at probably the Danbury/New Milford level if the schedule it scales up; if Bradley-terminating trains are a meaningful permanent portion of the schedule and Devon or Bridgeport run-thrus on a smaller portion of the schedule open up some transfer options on the Shoreline; if they get ESPN's full-throated support for running an employee shuttle; and if the CT Transit connections (especially up-down CT 10 and CT 69 to Plainville and Bristol to capture a wider walk-up swath of Southington, Farmington, the outer hills of Bristol, and Wolcott). I wouldn't put great money on CDOT's follow-through on the connecting services because it's CDOT, so that'll probably blunt the edge quite a bit. But ESPN is a definite wag-the-dog on putting the extra running miles to Bradley in-play because they are the singularly largest and deepest-pocket employer, pretty much are the de facto government in Bristol as far as getting their way, and have the most to gain from this line of any one organization. For one because they'd save millions of operating expenses per year on car service (that gets stuck in traffic) to/from Bradley.

You mean nobody has done a survey yet?

Oh yes, the Busway survey day done, what 15 years ago?

There was a minor "fact-finding" series of meetings last year concerning the Waterbury-Hartford rail line.

Let's be reasonable, any Waterbury-Hartford rail service is at least 5 years out. A serious survey will take up to 2 years to complete, the RFP is another year. Getting funding - ha! You need to pass legislation for the bonding - at least 1 legislative session (Feb-June or so), then the Bonding Commission has to approve. THEN CDOT has to get its ass in gear with their painfully small Rail Ops Department in Newington (the larger portion located in New Haven only deals with - you guessed it - Metro North/Shoreline East) to marshall the project.

Purchasing the line from PAS has to come into play.

Construction - that's easy, less than a year to upgrade the tracks (once wooden ties are available from the current shortage), a little more to install new crossing gates/flashers, a little more to build parking lots and a little more to get equipment - 3-4 trainsets? And a little more to construct the maintenance facilities for the same. Stamford - full up. New Haven - no room. East Bridgeport - maybe. Hartford - got room somewhere, but no facilities except for Rail America. Waterbury - no place for construction unless land is acquired south of Bank St or in the Lower Waterbuiry Yard.

This whole project is going to take a lot of work and dedication by public officials, private enterprise (like ESPN), and the Governator.

It seems like bringing service on the Housatonic to Pittsfield is trivial by comparison. You have the Republican Party happy to spend state funds to acquire the Housy track, millions for building stations & facilities, more millions to upgrade the track & crossings, the same problem with acquiring trainsets for the service. But since the representatives will be happy to saddle the Democrats with more debt (see - I told you so, the Dems spend money), it would seem that this proposal has a better chance of happening.

Tone down the sarcasm a notch, m'kay. And the political party non-sequiturs.

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The formal study has been underway for 3 years. We're well beyond "minor 'fact-finding'"; this was a requirement of the busway funding bill to satiate the Legislative opposition from the Bristol-Waterbury bloc. Draft Final Report is scheduled to be published in April with ridership forecast, then out for public comment. Wait 2 months, open the PDF, then toss it in the trash if you don't like what you see. Given that 84mageddon is going to take the whole rest of this decade to scrape together enough funding for design-only and probably has no hope of starting before 2027 or some absurdly long delay from now, they are not exactly under dire time crunch to rally the troops for the commuter rail option. This IS a 15-year timetable for thumbs-up/thumbs-down + design + build + initiation of service. Probably the only reason this does look like semi-proactive planning is purely coincidental: those opposing Legislators had to be bought off with something to drop their threats against the busway, so CDOT gets a study it never otherwise would've thought to commence until the 84mageddon traffic modeling gave them their "Oh, @#$%!" moment. Blind squirrels and nuts...yada yada.

Pan Am offered up a valuation close to a decade ago for the assets at about $10M. That was before the Pan Am Southern partnership, but given that PAS sold the Conn River Line to MassDOT for only $17M in 2014 that sets a pretty firm ceiling for the Highland. Probably not a penny north of $10M (if that) with CDOT taking the Canal Industrial, Waterbury Industrial, Watertown Industrial, and Waterbury Yard (CDOT has indeed eyeballed that for this and the Waterbury Branch layover site) ownership in the package with the same ironclad freight slot protections PAS got guaranteed in the legalese of its Conn River sale. These are the last off-main properties PAS hasn't yet dished off to the states since its formation; Norfolk Southern has pushed to get everything outside of the Patriot Corridor profit center shoved off the books and put on trackage rights.


If you seriously think that Housy passenger service is going to happen for less than $1.5B you might want to check if someone slipped something in your morning coffee. CDOT's own 2010 State Rail Plain itemizes $165M just for bringing the CT portion of HRCC up to Class 1 freight state-of-repair and business stability. $157M for only basic rail, tie, crossing, and drainage/culvert state-of-repair to keep the railroad safe to operate, and $8M for yards and business developments to keep it from folding. That's $30M more than the total in-state itemization for P&W, PAS, and NECR combined. I would venture that the $300M originally proposed but never to be spent in MA on the "passenger proposal" needs an equal $150M just to keep the as-is line from getting swallowed into middle earth, let alone "upgrade" them to anything more than what they are. PAS submitted a $48M wishlist to CDOT; $17M of that was for replacing all existing stick rail with CWR and $13.8M for crosstie replacement so they could bump the track class to Class 2. Those are actual above-and-beyond line upgrades, not pulling them out of a bottomless pit of safety violations.

Here's the report on the November 20th meeting:
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If it does indeed have a 2025-2030 startup date (vs. somewhat earlier) I wouldn't be surprised if that's also be because of uncertainty on equipment options. There will be at this point just enough Geeps, P40s, and Mafersas for SLE and the Hartford Line. If WTBY-HFD is brought into the mix then you're talking 3-4 more train sets needed (as mentioned in the report above) and even if MNRR is the operator they may not have enough BL20GHs and Shoreliners to run an additional 30 or so miles to Berlin and Hartford. Timing it to 2025-2030 works perfectly for this because -as those of use keeping tabs on these things know- :

1) MNRR will be in the process of replacing all of their Shoreliners and dual modes with new (presumably bilevel) coaches and next gen dual modes (the latter could possibly be a variant of the Siemens Charger or another in-production diesel) allowing for CDOT to piggyback their own coach order and possibly order a diesel only version of MNRR's new dual modes.

2) The current SLE/NHHS fleet will likely be up for replacement (if not then or before then then in due time) so there will be new diesels + coaches needed for SLE (unless they do go electric), NHHS, and WTBY-HFD + the New Milford extension and Hartford-Manchester if that comes close enough to reality (the latter could even be incorporated into BPT-WTBY-HFD operations as it is only 10 miles or less).

3) Amtrak's replacement of their Gennies, F59s, Dash 8s, etc. will likely be underway if not near completion, creating an opportunity for a variant "commuter" loco to be manufactured/piggybacked, etc.

4) If they do go the DMU route SMART, UP Express, and the MBTA will have had their vehicles in service for 5-10 years or so allowing the technology to be seen as either a success or in need of improvement (though I don't see them having a separate DMU fleet)

In short, if the results of the study show a thumbs up and the state goes ahead with it, everything lines up well enough for the state to order everything needed for current and near future operations (including the Highland) in one piece and have as streamlined a fleet as possible.

CannaScrews wrote:It seems like bringing service on the Housatonic to Pittsfield is trivial by comparison. You have the Republican Party happy to spend state funds to acquire the Housy track, millions for building stations & facilities, more millions to upgrade the track & crossings, the same problem with acquiring trainsets for the service. But since the representatives will be happy to saddle the Democrats with more debt (see - I told you so, the Dems spend money), it would seem that this proposal has a better chance of happening.

There's no Republicans vs. Democrats thing here. The proposal for passenger service to Pittsfield was proposed by the Housy, not lawmakers. Now some lawmakers/legislators representing the areas that would be served by a Danbury Branch extension to New Milford are throwing their support behind that for sure, but support for Canaan or Pittsfield seems pretty much limited to "it would be nice and would attract tourism". Which it would/could. But it's not feasible enough to begin with unless Rte. 7 traffic starts backing up further up through Litchfield County.

Equipment shouldn't be a problem. If the MTA's cap budget ever gets approved by NYS it's got the aggressive Shoreliner purge for MLV coaches in its vehicle procurement section. All ~200 of them retired by 2025, but the first of those retirements starting 2020. And not because of the condition or un-rebuildability of all Shoreliner classes but because the only way to serve the ridership projections for the Upper Harlem and Upper Hudson is to go taller instead of longer to fit them on the same limited-length GCT platforms. As well as needing to stay in-sync with NJT on the west-of-Hudson coach fleet, with NJT doing the exact same purge on exact same timeline of every single-level left in its fleet. It's quite likely CDOT's going to pick up the ownership on a lot of those displaced Shoreliners via intra-agency transaction and send them out for rebuild. Plenty fine for a rebuild being about as vanilla as coaches get, and CDOT doesn't have the MLV needs that the MTA does on both sides of the Hudson. In fact, I bet the Mafersas get junked in favor of rebuilt Shoreliners because they don't fit in GCT while Shoreliners obviously do, and CDOT at least wants the option of running stuff off the Hartford Line into GCT. Apparently also this service too from what the study docs say, although that's a big and very impractical reach I can't see demand for much less cooperation from Metro North to ever allow. But I guess if it's all part of the same equipment pool you might as well strive for standardization and scalability. This is probably not a timeline consideration for Hartford-Waterbury, but rather how they expect to hit the 32 trains per day on NHHS and possibly supply a pool fleet with MassDOT for Hartford Line service poking north of Springfield. If an additional service comes on line, that probably delays the Mafersa displacement a few years rather than requiring a wait for all the Shoreliners to be retired. There's no way in hell CDOT needs every MTA unit. They can probably just take the IV's for rebuild. That's 60 cars. Enough to retire all 33 Mafersas and have 27 more to play with. I can't imagine any of their intrastate lines current (incl. shuttles) or next 20 years needing more than a fleet of 5 dozen to operate comfortably with spares. If there's any conceivable need for more than that, NJT's 97 to-be-purged Comet IV's are near-exact copies of that make.


As for locos, the used market is going to be flooded with them in 5 years. In fact, with the dwindling number of Geeps still in passenger use use you can sort of question the wisdom of rebuilding those units. It's now just them, NJT's pared-back fleet, and the 10-15 GP40MC's with the funky computer controls the MBTA is retaining after its current loco order as passenger operators of those locos. The end is approaching for parts/maintenance viability of the non-freight Geeps (whereas other old stuff like F40PH's are still living on in rebuild immortality). There will be MANY more P40DC's available; NJT still has its 3 units it really would prefer to get rid of, Amtrak has 15 in storage, and once the first of the state-sponsored Charger orders gets tapped to start replacements they'll be quick to yank their stimulus-upgrade P40DC's, which they aren't too fond of because of the mechanical brakes different from the P42's. CDOT would honestly be better off rebuilding their P40's to same spec as the Amtrak stimulus rebuilds, then pouncing on the relatively fresh and low-mileage stimulus rebuilds in 5 years when they become available for a song. I mean...everyone else kicking around for Amtrak dispersals made available by the Charger options is going to be looking at the P42's first. CDOT's the only operator with enough of a P40 installed base to have any efficiencies to gain looking at those units instead of the 42's.


Really don't think rolling stock is going to be a concern with what's going to be available by decade's end in time for the 32-trains-per-day NHHS scale-up. Maybe not something you can bake into a study now because the Amtrak options haven't been tapped and the MTA budget hasn't been approved...but the tentative aftermarket discounts are cost you practically slice off the top of any service expansion (including just plain old schedule expansion on Danbury, Waterbury, and NHHS).

And also, for this reason, I suspect push-pull is going to be the best available option. Yeah, DMU's are nice...but NHHS, this potential line, and Waterbury have wide enough stop spacing that the performance advantage isn't very large vs. the types of applications DMU's are being purchased for. And I have near-zero confidence that the MBTA is actually going to act on its RFP with the crisis that's hit the system on basic state-of-repair. They have their own need to budget replacements of their 200 remaining single-level coaches with bi-levels for FY2020 when those singles all hit end-of-life at once, and to keep up with seating demand (i.e. DMU's were all for additional service layers, NOT for displacing a single piece of conventional equipment). This winter changed everything, the Olympics bid is going down in flames, and I honestly think the pols fear a voter revolt too much to divert any more money from bread-and-butter procurements. They'll collect that RFP, then quietly file it away and that'll be the end of that little vaporware flirtation.

If the time period is indeed 2025-2030, as opposed to earlier, at that point Amtrak's long-term plan of an inland route starts coming into view (assuming that progresses in the timeframe they want). Considering part of the route they want is Waterbury to Hartford, at that time period the Amtrak's ambitions and the CR would probably be mutually beneficial; you'd want to start upgrading the extant RoWs way before any construction of new RoW. The fact that the line between Waterbury and Hartford is viable on its own as a project would also help the inland route fend off similar criticism the Cali HSR gets for not being "useful" until it's all built.

In addition, all the problems PAS is facing now dealing with PAR's continued incompetence definitely is in favor for pressuring ownership of the Highland into different hands... the news has continually been worse and worse about PAS operations. The winter certainly helped to compound these issues, but there's going to be a point where that really comes to a head, for better or for worse, and regardless of the outcome; there's no way PAS' status-quo (or PAR's, as a whole,) can keep going the way it is, and the Highland will inevitably be involved in that.

The current Waterbury-Hartford alignment is very curvy - the only section of tangent track off the Springfield Line is the Pequabuck Tunnel! Any HSR route between the two would be all-new ROW.

F-line to Dudley via Park wrote:As well as needing to stay in-sync with NJT on the west-of-Hudson coach fleet, with NJT doing the exact same purge on exact same timeline of every single-level left in its fleet.

Including the relatively new Comet V coaches (of which NJT has 200 and MNR 65)? I would think that those would be hanging around for a long time even if just on the Pascack Valley and Port Jervis lines.

It's quite likely CDOT's going to pick up the ownership on a lot of those displaced Shoreliners via intra-agency transaction and send them out for rebuild. Plenty fine for a rebuild being about as vanilla as coaches get, and CDOT doesn't have the MLV needs that the MTA does on both sides of the Hudson. In fact, I bet the Mafersas get junked in favor of rebuilt Shoreliners because they don't fit in GCT while Shoreliners obviously do, and CDOT at least wants the option of running stuff off the Hartford Line into GCT. Apparently also this service too from what the study docs say, although that's a big and very impractical reach I can't see demand for much less cooperation from Metro North to ever allow. But I guess if it's all part of the same equipment pool you might as well strive for standardization and scalability.

Since part of the plan was/is for some through service to/from Bridgeport, extending select NHL trains to/from the Hartford Line would satisfy that in spades. Passenger loads are a bit lighter east of there so in theory there would be seats available for north of New Haven passengers. And would allow more MUs to be freed up. But for that they'd of course need the dual modes which would require an expanded joint order with MNR come 2030-ish.

Considering the oldest SLs were built in 1985 or so you're talking at most 40 years of use BEFORE another rebuild which could take them another 20 years down the line. Or would those get flat out retired and only the '90s-00s built "centerdoor" cars retained for rebuild? The older cars have more seating capacity and I doubt the Hartford Line will need the extra set of doors in their coaches for faster boarding/detraining in the near future.

This is probably not a timeline consideration for Hartford-Waterbury, but rather how they expect to hit the 32 trains per day on NHHS and possibly supply a pool fleet with MassDOT for Hartford Line service poking north of Springfield.

Touche. We both know the T's single levels will be sticking around for some time to come. Unless another RFP is issued for more bilevels to replace all of them. 'Course with the T's troubles being what they are who's to say commuter rail on the Conn River won't be held off unless CDOT literally supplies ALL the equipment and MA does a simple RIDOT-style reimbursement agreement that wouldn't attract scrutiny. It's not SCR and not the T's bag, but it's still a "commuter rail expansion" which at this point is something that isn't happening for quite awhile.

If an additional service comes on line, that probably delays the Mafersa displacement a few years rather than requiring a wait for all the Shoreliners to be retired. There's no way in hell CDOT needs every MTA unit. They can probably just take the IV's for rebuild. That's 60 cars. Enough to retire all 33 Mafersas and have 27 more to play with. I can't imagine any of their intrastate lines current (incl. shuttles) or next 20 years needing more than a fleet of 5 dozen to operate comfortably with spares. If there's any conceivable need for more than that, NJT's 97 to-be-purged Comet IV's are near-exact copies of that make.

And give them the same Mafersa treatment: big red-orange "NH" logos I do believe that 60 cars won't cut it if expanded New London and Westerly service comes into play along with WTBY-HFD, Manchester, and north of SPG service.

There will be MANY more P40DC's available; NJT still has its 3 units it really would prefer to get rid of, Amtrak has 15 in storage, and once the first of the state-sponsored Charger orders gets tapped to start replacements they'll be quick to yank their stimulus-upgrade P40DC's, which they aren't too fond of because of the mechanical brakes different from the P42's. CDOT would honestly be better off rebuilding their P40's to same spec as the Amtrak stimulus rebuilds, then pouncing on the relatively fresh and low-mileage stimulus rebuilds in 5 years when they become available for a song.

Which altogether would give them.. what.. 24-26 P40s? And is that 15 units in storage in addition to the 15 units that were rebuilt?

YamaOfParadise wrote:If the time period is indeed 2025-2030, as opposed to earlier, at that point Amtrak's long-term plan of an inland route starts coming into view (assuming that progresses in the timeframe they want). Considering part of the route they want is Waterbury to Hartford, at that time period the Amtrak's ambitions and the CR would probably be mutually beneficial; you'd want to start upgrading the extant RoWs way before any construction of new RoW. The fact that the line between Waterbury and Hartford is viable on its own as a project would also help the inland route fend off similar criticism the Cali HSR gets for not being "useful" until it's all built.

I think it would be more beneficial for the commuter rail to have seamless as possible connections with Amtrak in Waterbury and Hartford than the other way around. Amtrak's primary objective is going to be to serve New York and Boston with HSR; Danbury, Waterbury, and Hartford (and any in-fill stop in Eastern CT if one would ever be put in as a spacer stop) will be right behind it. IMO Amtrak would do just fine on it's own even without the Danbury and Waterbury stops/any connections to Metro North though having them will no doubt be of great benefit to both cities as well as the traveling public, which in turn will indeed help boost ridership.

If there were adequate and frequent bus shuttles/connections between the MNR and Amtrak stations @ Danbury and Waterbury that would bode well for commuter rail operations. They don't even have to be timed with any particular train(s)if they run every 5-10 mins. or so in a loop while serving other nearby stops that get a lot of traffic one could in theory justify the expense of having a frequent shuttle service.

In addition, all the problems PAS is facing now dealing with PAR's continued incompetence definitely is in favor for pressuring ownership of the Highland into different hands... the news has continually been worse and worse about PAS operations. The winter certainly helped to compound these issues, but there's going to be a point where that really comes to a head, for better or for worse, and regardless of the outcome; there's no way PAS' status-quo (or PAR's, as a whole,) can keep going the way it is, and the Highland will inevitably be involved in that.

Well from what I see the state would need to purchase the ROW for commuter rail to become a reality anyway. It'll require a complete top to bottom rebuild for the entire length and all those items will be CDOT's own doing. And as F-line pointed out the sale price of the Conn River in MA puts the Highland in a similar price range so it wouldn't require that much funding to just secure the line under state ownership.

NH2060 wrote:

F-line to Dudley via Park wrote:As well as needing to stay in-sync with NJT on the west-of-Hudson coach fleet, with NJT doing the exact same purge on exact same timeline of every single-level left in its fleet.

Including the relatively new Comet V coaches (of which NJT has 200 and MNR 65)? I would think that those would be hanging around for a long time even if just on the Pascack Valley and Port Jervis lines.

Oh yes. Their new fleet plan calls for total retirement of all Comet classes 2020-2025 and replacement of the Arrows with new EMU's in an MLV carbody. And calls for a systemwide redistribution of the passenger rolling stock to somewhat higher % of EMU's--because these will be frequency-agile and not have to be supplemented by ALP-46 consists on the North Jersey Coast Line--and somewhat lower % coaches. And for keeping the total number of cars in fleet static with the capacity gains banked in the added fleet-wide seating capacity. Their internal numbers said biting the bullet on a full-fleet conversion all at once was better than doing rolling replacements on regular cycles, and that's why their 250-something Comet V's (which really aren't as good as the prior gens) are only going to last about a 12-14 years. Certainly the sheer size of the Arrow-replacement order is the reason for the one-time uniqueness of this kind of mass recalibration. And also a third-gen order of MLV coaches is going to be cheaper than the first two since it'll be timed with Metro North's order and probably soon follow SEPTA's almost-certain order; the plant will basically never have been idle. So it's kind of a perfect once-in-an-eon confluence of events they couldn't pass up.

So, yeah...CDOT could also intra-agency transact for the MNRR's 64 west-of-Hudson Comet V units and then take some NJT dispersals to pad its numbers. Now...I suspect MNRR is going to hold onto its fleet until the very end of its procurements and that if anything gets shorted in the budgeting the Comets stay while the Shoreliners go. And likewise NJT's going to take its sweet time on the back end of that coach procurement and probably hold onto theirs for awhile, since it's the IIM's and IV's that are hitting rebuild-or-retire expiration date before decade's end. So for CDOT's purposes they may still want to transact for dispersal Shoreliners because Comet V availability is going to be more in the 2025-27 range. They just wouldn't need to treat those Shoreliners with any respect because they can be taken in more or less disposable form then junked whenever the glut of prematurely-retired Comets comes available for pennies on the dollar and much better rebuildability potential. And given that NO ONE ELSE on the continent is acquiring single-level coaches (not even the couple roads out west that took some Comet IB's because the used bi-levels market has now caught up), NJT's going to be almost literally giving them away. Some upstart commuter rail service in Mexico or somewhere is going to be running a medium-odometer fleet of Cometa Cinco coaches; that's how O-V-E-R the single-level commuter rail market is going to be for a reusable dispersal fleet that bloated in number come 2025.

Since part of the plan was/is for some through service to/from Bridgeport, extending select NHL trains to/from the Hartford Line would satisfy that in spades. Passenger loads are a bit lighter east of there so in theory there would be seats available for north of New Haven passengers. And would allow more MUs to be freed up. But for that they'd of course need the dual modes which would require an expanded joint order with MNR come 2030-ish.

Considering the oldest SLs were built in 1985 or so you're talking at most 40 years of use BEFORE another rebuild which could take them another 20 years down the line. Or would those get flat out retired and only the '90s-00s built "centerdoor" cars retained for rebuild? The older cars have more seating capacity and I doubt the Hartford Line will need the extra set of doors in their coaches for faster boarding/detraining in the near future.

The oldest ones are basically rolling toilets. And given how much Waterbury riders hate them I seriously doubt they have any interest in something older than the III's and the 9 of 11 IV's that the MTA currently owns. There really aren't that many I's and II's left anyway...72 active units vs. 106 III's. CDOT just unfortunately gets stuck with disproportionate % of those rolling urinals. If the MTA budget gets approved it's probably a this-decade retirement for the I's and II's to expedite relief for the Upper Hudson/Harlem seating crunch, and definitely some redistribution of the III's and IV's since CDOT's old units will be cut off from parts supply when the MTA's units are done. But that MLV order will be spread out, with the first batch is pretty acute and will definitely be the first new rolling stock to hit GCT with a few years' lead time on the M9A's or any new locomotives. They need seating relief now. and they have to be able to get seating relief without needing to add cars and compete for the longer platforms at GCT. That's a dilemma they sweat every day right now as those Poughkeepsie trains roll in bursting at the seams with pressed human flesh.

Touche. We both know the T's single levels will be sticking around for some time to come. Unless another RFP is issued for more bilevels to replace all of them. 'Course with the T's troubles being what they are who's to say commuter rail on the Conn River won't be held off unless CDOT literally supplies ALL the equipment and MA does a simple RIDOT-style reimbursement agreement that wouldn't attract scrutiny. It's not SCR and not the T's bag, but it's still a "commuter rail expansion" which at this point is something that isn't happening for quite awhile.

The T can't wait. Its 144 Bombardier singles are exactly the same age as the Shoreliner II's (same plant, back-to-back batches in 1987-88, functionally identical in every way save for the agency-specific door configurations). But unlike the SII's that got an overhaul 6 years ago these are now at 27 years and counting in original service. Outstanding cars, outstanding reliability in their lifetimes. But they're just not going to make it another 5 years. Oddly enough it's the T's 57 Pullman 1978-vintage cars that are in the best condition of any of their singles with the most potential of lingering into the 2020's. But they got a full-on remanufacture 18 years ago to like-new condition and are generic blind trailers only--no cab cars, no restroom cars. Which means they're an incomplete fleet for starting an all-new service (though I guess a few BBD rebuilds or secondhandeds from elsewhere can fill those gaps).

Which altogether would give them.. what.. 24-26 P40s? And is that 15 units in storage in addition to the 15 units that were rebuilt?

Yes. The 15 Amtrak P40's in service and all 3 of NJT's got their prime movers readjusted to match the power output of the P42's. Still have the old mechanical air brakes and other subtle things that were only in the first-gen Genesis, but identical hauling power now to the 42's. But because the stored 15 are un-updated--and also don't have the most up-to-date ACSES and cab signal units--they're really not going to be wanted by anyone when the 15 in-service are going to be tough sells as-is. The P42's are the ones every commuter operator looking for cheap power is going to be buying en masse, and and buying Tier IV upgrade kits and AC traction motors to rebuild. The GE guts in the MBTA's new HSP-46 are basically what's going to be inside all those P42 rebuild/re-powerings. GE offered Amtrak upgrade kits when a P42 rebuild was still in consideration as one of the alternatives to the Charger order. That's now going to be a commuter rail product offering for all the agencies scrambling to snap up those 190-something units. And, yes...the prime mover upgrade kits would be an option for CDOT on the 40's in a midlife rebuild. That part is functionally identical to the 42's. But for their purposes if they've got a whole fleet with mechanical air brakes they might as well stay with it instead of mixing up with the electronic air brakes of the 42's. Which is why they're the only operator in the country who'd have any interest in more P40's.

Well from what I see the state would need to purchase the ROW for commuter rail to become a reality anyway. It'll require a complete top to bottom rebuild for the entire length and all those items will be CDOT's own doing. And as F-line pointed out the sale price of the Conn River in MA puts the Highland in a similar price range so it wouldn't require that much funding to just secure the line under state ownership.

Note that PAS's valuation of the line is being supplied to the state as part of their participation in the study. It's not going to be released as public knowledge and isn't necessarily prelude to a sale, but appraisal is usually S.O.P. for comprehensive studies like this. It's not like haggling at a car dealership...you can appraise the real estate and quantify the costs vs. revenue in a regulated transportation industry with relative impartiality. PAR, back in the bad old days when they couldn't be arsed to care, quoted $10M to the busway-opposing/pro-rail Legislative bloc. Now, that was an off-the-cuff remark made at the time they were giddy at the prospect of just getting a blank check to cash out of everything CT except the Springfield Line. But it's probably close to the accurate valuation. Because if the state buys the Highland it's going to be taking the Canal Industrial Track, Terryville Loop (i.e. the first half of the New Departure Branch before City of Bristol ownership takes over), Waterbury Industrial Track, Watertown Industrial Track, and Waterbury Yard properties with it. Pretty much all except maybe Plainville Yard which has other private tenants. So when the spurs and the very spacious piece of Waterbury real estate coveted for layover space are compared to the $17M Conn River sale--which was mainline-only, no throw-ins--yeah, $10M sounds right about spot-on. And anything less than that a downright steal.

Instead of starting a new thread, and since the two subjects are inextricably linked, I've converted the existing busway v. rail thread in NE Railfan into a thread concerning this study, and moved it to the CtDOT forum. No one knows who would operate this service; in that manner, it's just like NHHS. And it's commuter rail, and it's in CT, so it's just as inextricably linked to this forum.

http://centralctrailstudy.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://centralctrailstudy.com/docs/2015 ... _FINAL.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I'm frankly surprised to see this still moving forward at this point after the busway. Good.

I hope they also consider service southward, towards New Haven, as an extension of "Hartford Line" service. Although the southern leg is disconnected as part of Hartford Line construction, there is a wye at Berlin station heading in that direction.

Some of the Q&A from the attached PDF from a meeting late last year are quite interesting. So like a horror movie line "it's alive......".

DOT to consider shutting down I-84 through Hartford:

The work is still years away, but engineers are floating an unusual idea for handling the complex I-84 viaduct replacement: Simply shut down that part of the highway.

The multibillion-dollar construction job will take years using traditional methods, so a design team is studying whether the work could be drastically accelerated by closing I-84 for months or more as it passes through Hartford.

http://www.courant.com/news/connecticut ... story.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Time to get crackin' on the "Highland Line"?

All together now: "Highland, Highland, Highland...."

This is NOT a bad idea. There have been other total highway shutdowns. The most infamous was Mianus/I-95. That's not a good example, because it was decades ago. But their have been other bridge collapses; NYS Thruway over Central Avenue after a truck fire, etc. And although it would seriously affect alternates, would shorten the pain. You've got 691 over to 91 is the closest; 95 would be a nightmare. There's also the NYS Thruway up to I-90. But it sure would promote freight, eh?

But they've got to have everything in place, ready to go, as much preconstructed material as possible. Similar to the bridge replacements they're doing on the NEC.

Isn't there a precedent for a passenger/commuter rail operation being started up as relief for a highway closure? And in the not-too-distant past?

Ridgefielder wrote:Isn't there a precedent for a passenger/commuter rail operation being started up as relief for a highway closure? And in the not-too-distant past?

There certainly is, and one that turned out to be popular so it stayed around...

But anyways, it's a little more complicated than with SLE; the State is already getting ready to launch another new commuter service in the same timeframe, so launching another one would be a big step up on the car and engine requirements. I don't know how much the Governor will try and minimize harm to himself on the busway, either. It's already going to blow up in his face just by the fact that it has to operate over the selfsame stretch of I-84 as we're talking about, but it's a way higher level of harm to him when the costs involved to convert the busway back into something rail-usable start coming around.

And something else I thought about, unrelated to this article: would it be beneficial to try and run trains over the Connecticut River onto the CSO Manchester Subdivision? There's certainly a commuter market in the immediate vicinity of the rails in East Hartford, Manchester, and even in Vernon (if you were to reclaim a bit of the RoW for rail-use again). There isn't enough mileage and population to have it be its own service, but it could be as attached to another service. Plus, it'd give more options for storing trains for layover. If the New London<->Hartford service F-Line has talked about became a thing, too, it'd probably make more operational sense to run trains New London<->Waterbury than having two services stub-end in a not-stub-end station.