Ridgefielder wrote:Wonder if this could lead to one of the two routes along the Thames between Norwich and New London being abandoned. Way back in the day there was an interchange track between the New Haven and Central Vermont in downtown Norwich, but I think that was wiped out in the floods of '55, if not before.No way. P&W only has one on-line customer south of downtown Norwich, but it's a MASSIVE one: Dow Chemical in Ledyard. P&W's also got the wye track in Groton for the short eastbound jaunt they have to make to serve the sizable Tilcon quarry next to Groton-New London Airport, whereas that would take a convoluted backup move through New London station to do via NECR (which would drive Amtrak crazy). I can easily New Haven loads to/from Canada and to/from Worcester being split and combined in Willimantic and run more often via NECR instead dragging everything to Worcester to be sent back out to NHV. Would be more convenient as relief for Worcester's problematic yard space crunch, as Willimantic is under-capacity and has derelict tracks buried in the trees that could be replaced to re-expand the yard for sorting. Using NECR also avoids the Thames River lift bridge on the NEC and skips the New London platforms. But whether and how often the New Haven service patterns go via NECR is entirely dependent on Tilcon-Groton, and whether they're sending stone westbound that day. I don't know what division of labor is between the mid-afternoon daily and the overnight stone train re: that Tilcon location when the stone train is in season. Could be that both routes are a mix/match for New Haven depending on what the day's customer itinerary is.
Overall, though, NECR becomes the more important route south of Plainfield/Willimantic because it has more customers and Port of New London, while other than Dow and the customers between Norwich and Plainfield P&W is diminished because there's nothing NEC-bound that technically can't run via NECR. Probably means CDOT's list of priority freight projects changes significantly: bringing NECR from 17' to 19'6" south of Willimantic is now the only clearance project that matters; the same is no longer necessary south of Plainfield. And since south-of-Plainfield is already 286K there's very little else other than state-of-repair that needs to be spent on it. Makes CDOT's grant applications much easier to prioritize.
I suppose IF Dow closed and nothing replaced it, IF the tracks into Port of New London had an eastbound connection to the NEC inclined up to hook in next to the bridge, and IF multiple parties had so much money burning hole in pockets to re-create the old Thames River crossing in Norwich...then I could possibly see a scenario where Norwich-Groton is ruled expendable. In which case a "back to the future" re-creation of the original 19th century Norwich line split and singular west-side mainline offers zero loss of mobility to any destination and 100% butt-covering at the century level for preserving New London-Worcester passenger considerations. South of Norwich the east side of the river is barren while the density pockets hug the west side, and the sub base doesn't even have a siding anymore it's been so many years since they were served. But that's a lot of IF's and a lot of bridge construction $$$ to ever make Norwich-Groton expendable. It's not likely to happen, and both sides of the river south of Norwich will continue to get daily use even if NECR now is the more strategic of the two flanks.
