Salem Station on the Eastern Route Discussion

[F-line to Dudley via Park]

But what do you do with the platform for the Danvers/Peabody Branch? Eliminate the parking area on the inside of the curve and put it there? Seems to be the only way that fits. But then trains/gates will block the entrance road to get into the area and to the garage.

It fits a 450 ft. (5 cars) platform for the Peabody branch. That's the minimum standard length they've adopted for new and renovated construction. Some of the Reading and Rockport Line lows constrained by grade crossings already fit to that length, and other small constrained ones would be rounded up to that length if ADA'd for ops consistency. The 800 footers are the standard length for full unconstrained stops (regardless of traffic levels). Peabody at rush hour isn't going to need any more than 4 or 5 cars, especially considering that this is going to be a majority bi-level fleet in due time. They may also need that track before there's ever a passenger branch if the town agitates for some riverfront ped access behind the station and prefers that Pan Am's access gets swapped back to the other (more operationally convenient) side. You never know.


What I want to know is if the 800 footer at Salem is designed to permit a second 800 footer installation to double-track the station with a switch at the portal. The initial artsy renderings showed that single platform running right up to the portal blocking the space for a switch, but they were stylized drawings for the presentation and not engineering documents. This one looks a little bit better, but has anyone been able to confirm if this project provisions for a second platform to be added later? It would be a huge congestion mitigator to have a 2-platform station and be able to stage meets at the portal instead of way back at Beverly. Especially if they ever build that South Salem station at the other portal.

[Red Wing]

Thanks for the answer guys. I've been wondering about the Peabody bound track for a while now.

[Tracer]

Has anyone looked at any of the construction work going on in salem station parking lot? It looks like they have some of the old turntable foundation exposed.

[The EGE]

Tyler (TrainManTy) has some pictures on his blog: http://iridethet.wordpress.com/2012/12/ ... turntable/

[Badandy]

Wow. Go see this. Everything is in tact, the roundhouse foundation, you can see where the engine stalls were,
the ash pits, the turntable. It won't be there for long. Andy

[The EGE]

Contract has been awarded: http://www.salemnews.com/local/x5205581 ... TA-project

The MBTA offered a contract to a Milford-based company this week to oversee the construction of Salem’s new train station and parking garage.

Consigli Construction Company will be paid up to $32.5 million and will be in charge of subcontracting with builders to complete the project.

This was the final go-ahead on a project that’s been decades in the making.

[diburning]

Or, according to the MBTA, "awared"

http://www.mbta.com/about_the_mbta/news ... nth=&year=

[NH2060]

Groundbreaking ceremony held yesterday. Let's see if they can indeed finish it by Oct. next year (quite a rather tight schedule there )
http://www.salemnews.com/local/x3354678 ... pot-garage" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[R36 Combine Coach]

MBTA news

The $44.5 million station project will include a new five-level parking facility holding approximately 700 vehicles and facilitate future Transit-Oriented Development opportunities on nearby MBTA and City of Salem sites. The MBTA has made a commitment to the City to open the new garage by October 1, 2014.

The project will provide a fully accessible intermodal Commuter Rail Station along with a new garage with accessible parking on all five levels and electric car parking, Zip Car parking, motorcycle parking, and bicycle parking.

The new station and parking facility will support higher-frequency MBTA Commuter Rail service. The Salem Station is currently the second busiest on the Commuter Rail system with 2,400 boardings per day. The project design promotes future Transit-Oriented Development opportunities by providing for future development on the nearby City of Salem site and over the bus and vehicle driveways to the riverfront.

[F-line to Dudley via Park]

Except it doesn't increase schedule capacity much at all beyond the modestly easier level boarding dwell times because they shot their whole wad on that white elephant parking garage instead of adding a second outbound platform outside the portal and making train meets stageable at both ends of the tunnel instead of way the hell back at Beverly. That's going to bite them in the butt in a few years.


But yeah...lots more cars clogging downtown and oh-la-la! expensive platform heaters for the $45M (+ 20% future cost bloat). So, uh...it has got that going for it.

[sery2831]

Not sure why you think trains hold at Beverly for inbounds. They hold at the interlocking(Danvers Branch goes off here as well) just east of the platform at the end of the double track.

[The EGE]

Salem was something like 5th in the 2010 Blue Book, with 2,010 daily boardings. 2400 daily is three straight years of 5% growth.

[Elcamo]

Traffic between Peabody/Danvers and Salem is just going to get that much worse with the inclusion of a new garage, the T better be fully prepared to do CR out there in the next 10-15 years, or that end of 114 is going to become a parking lot during rush hour.

[BostonUrbEx]

Traffic between Peabody/Danvers and Salem is just going to get that much worse with the inclusion of a new garage, the T better be fully prepared to do CR out there in the next 10-15 years, or that end of 114 is going to become a parking lot during rush hour.

Bus service would be a must. The last fare-scare consolidated two bus lines and cut some service. The thing is, all the buses up there revolve around the North Shore and Liberty Tree malls. If they actually had some buses which got people between their homes and the station, coordinated with MBCR schedules, then things would be relieved. Too late now, though. The garage is really going to screw things up. They should have gone with TOD, and improving the flow of buses and improving traffic patterns.

Bizarre that the new development doesn't even connect to the station, nor will it connect to the new one! Seriously, Salem is getting screwed.

[NH2060]

Except it doesn't increase schedule capacity much at all beyond the modestly easier level boarding dwell times because they shot their whole wad on that white elephant parking garage instead of adding a second outbound platform outside the portal and making train meets stageable at both ends of the tunnel instead of way the hell back at Beverly. That's going to bite them in the butt in a few years.

Wasn't/isn't there still an option to add a second track at a later date if the T decided to?/Is there enough room to excavate space for another track and platform without affecting the condo complex parking lot? From looking at Google Maps it doesn't appear so unless the existing track were to get shifted a bit more to the west.

One other thing that irks me about this project is the size of the parking garage. Having seen the renderings for the new Beverly garage I was quite impressed with its design and the relative lack of height; anything taller and it would look hideous. When looking at the Salem renderings I can't help but think that it's going to stick out like a sore thumb in comparison to the surrounding architecture (just go onto Google Street View) to see why. Now granted Salem -like Beverly- is not exactly your average "suburb" making it more of a "city" so it's not to say a parking garage would look necessarily out of place there. But at the same time it might just be too tall and too "functional" looking for it's own good. Even the exterior renderings of the Beverly garage make it look a bit like a gutted/refurbished mill/warehouse

I completely agree with you though considering that the North Station-Beverly segment of the Eastern Route is to my knowledge the single most heavily travelled and used part of the commuter rail anything to expand beyond the current timetable would have been money better spent.