Danbury Branch - History, Electrification, Studies

[DutchRailnut]

Now is it smart to tag a bike along on your ride or would it be smarter to have two bikes.
one at Danbury and one at home station.
look at how much energy is wasted lugging the bike back and forth.
Now back to useklessness of Merrit shuttle train.
Merrit 7 office park use to have a RDC shuttle just to merrit 7, it was discontinoud doe to 1841 running in it time slot. and 1810 is just a few minutes later.
It would be much more beneficial to take the Norwalk bus from merrit 7 and not have to pay for entire train and crew for maybe 7 people.

[andre]

i might be venturing on borderline insanity saying this...

but perhaps extending a couple of the stamford locals on a routing lets say
local from GCT to stamford as is currently then run nonstop to south norwalk and then make a final stop at merrit7 then turn back around head back to stamford for the southbound trip to GCT

this way your not dedicating an entire set on two stations and not having to pay a crew on a two station run to serve maybe 50 people if your lucky
with the extension of a stamford local to merrit you already have a train and a crew just with an extra 15-20mins of running time (im sure the timetable could be modified to allow such)

[DutchRailnut]

again for what ? the 7 or 12 passengers heading for Merrit 7 ??
The traffic is just not there, even the Norwalk buses have hardly anyone getting to merrit 7.
The biggest group of people heading to merrit 7 are on train 1841 for about 25 people per day.
and they come from Danbury.

[RearOfSignal]

Ever stop to think that maybe those eastbound Stamford locals already turn for other trains westbound? MNR doesn't just have tons of spare equipment laying around.

[andre]

ok so then turn around at merrit then, i was merely suggesting such for the sake of the topic within the given scenario


do i think merrit can ever justify the ridership no... i have never seen anybody board or get off at merrit

does the danbury branch as a whole need more service? yes!

(i regularly ride from GCT to Danbury weekly)

[DutchRailnut]

as coveniece yes, as a need, no there simply is no demand, but thats a total other topic.

[IrideNHline]

The shuttle for the NTD runs all morning and afternoon. I am glad I take an earlier shuttle as the ones right around prime rush can take 40 minutes to get to the station in South Norwalk.

I would think as a devil's advocate towards the # of people you see riding the shuttles or trains could potentially be related to the length of time and transferring involved means people simply drive in. In order to get to the 7 connector you need to get through downtown Norwalk first. I'm no engineer but even expanding the 7 connector to reach closer to the station would help alleviate traffic and some congestion I would figure.

Merrit 7 I know is not a HUGE office area like downtown Stamford, but I think the fact that I sit at my desk and stare at barren train tracks for most of the day makes me feel that the line is highly underutilized. People aren't going to take a train that gets them to the office a half hour or hour after they would typically be in if taking other means of transportation, therefore you wouldn't see loads of people lined up to take the current routes available.

[Otto Vondrak]

I dare you to count the number of people using Merritt 7 who need the service you are describing... If your numbers come back with some huge demand for this shuttle service, then I suggest you go out and start a bus shuttle line of your own and start reaping in the money that is sure to follow.

[Jeff Smith]

The numbers you desire are probably in the branch study at www.danburybranchstudy.com

[fredmcain]

Can anyone on the forum tell us where things stand today on the subject of electrification (or, re-electrification, really) of the Danbury Line? I know this has been discussed over and over through the years but it never seems to get off the ground. Any hope of this happening?

Also, what about new signals on the Danbury Line and an extension to New Milford. Is anything happeing with these issues?

-Fred M. Cain

[MNCRR9000]

They are currently in the process of installing the new signal system which will be complete in 2012. Currently they have slowed on the work since it is winter.

The following is a pretty good site that provides a lot of good information. I think they are still discussing the possibility of electrification but if it is actually going to happen is anyone's guess.
http://www.danburybranchstudy.com/

Check out this thread:
http://www.railroad.net/forums/viewtopi ... 67&t=74899
http://www.railroad.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=64685

[brettj22]

The latest issue of mileposts (not yet on the mta's website) had a summary of the work they had done. One thing that caught my eye was something along the lines of installing cantenary supports. However, it was something on the order of "8 of 30" so I didn't read that as having anything to do with electrification of the branch... Anyone know what that was referring to?

[fredmcain]

Well, this is only a wild guess, but I remember that the old New Haven Railroad left some catenary supports in place on the Danbury Branch at South Norwalk in case they would ever need to back a train off onto the branch in an emergency. Penn Central and later Metro North kept those supports in place. It might just be that they've decided to keep that wire and replace the supports. Does anybody know?

I don't know how many there are but 30 would sound to me like an awful lot.


Fred M. Cain

[Ridgefielder]

Actually, the catenary itself on the first half-mile or so of the branch-- I think as far as the I-95 overpass, though plenty of people on this forum know exactly-- is still in place & energized. MNR uses it to turn some of the GCT-South Norwalk mainline trains w/out fouling the main, I believe. Since the catenary supports date from the 1920's electrification I would assume that these are the ones being replaced.

FWIW the actual supports are intact along the *entire* branch with one or two exceptions where they were removed to accomodate the new high-level platforms in the '90s.

[fredmcain]

Interesting. While I'd always believed that the Danbury Branch supports were left at South Norwalk for emergency use only, I never knew that they were actually *STILL* in use!

I agree those are probably the ones being replaced but I doubt that 30 are involved. However, here is an intriguing bit of speculation: Could it be that they are actually extending the supports further up the branch to expand turning capacity with the idea in mind that it will one day be extended all the way to Danbury anyways? Could just be.

I was also aware that the old New Haven steel catenary supports extend all the way to Danbury. However, a M-N locomotive engineer on another forum once told me they are in rather bad shape. A few of them have even fallen over through the years. if the branch ever does get re-electrified, they will probably have to be replaced.

Regards,
Fred M. Cain