Siding Resuscitation in Woburn?

On Holton Street in Woburn, right on the Woburn/Winchester line, there's a warehouse with a long abandoned siding. Recently, this siding has been completely cleared out of years worth of brush. There's a million reasons they could have done this, but the one I like best is that they're getting service back. Anyone have any insight on this?
I know this unused siding has a name, but I don't recall what it is. But it's the siding that starts at the South end of "Montvale Yard".

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They'd have to remove this garden mulch box one of the industrial park businesses plopped over the tracks in order to reactivate it, but other than that the spur looks completely intact from end-to-end. Reinstate the removed switch at the Montvale Yard lead and the existing spur tracks can probably be dug out and re-tamped with minimal fuss. It's a good site to go fishing for more customers now that Tighe @ Montvale is such a biggie. Another rail tenant there would be able to get pretty good rates and delivery flexibility by virtue of being served concurrent with PAR's nightly Tighe set-off.

Bunch of the bigger warehouses in that park are hosting low-rent indoor trampoline places and portable moving box rentals. Same types of tenants you typically see taking up empty space at rock-bottom lease prices in industrial parks that have been in a prolonged economic slump with too many vacancies. All it takes is the slightest bump in light industrial real estate to flip those transient tenants back to real warehousing. Further up the road by Anderson RTC in the Woburn-Wilmington industrial stretch you're starting to see exactly that kind of modest uptick in industrial real estate value as points any closer to Boston become completely unaffordable for shippers to set up shop. It's still pretty uneven industrial park-to-industrial park whether they're permanently moribund or starting to show sustainable signs of perking up, but Montvale has good location fundamentals going for it with the easy access to I-93 and pre-existing anchor rail customer. Unless the notorious Winchester NIMBY's are laying in wait to pelt any real estate agents with raw eggs, by all logic this should be a pretty tasty site for roping in another customer of consequence.

The Nimby's outta love that one like they did Tighe.

F-line to Dudley via Park wrote:They'd have to remove this garden mulch box one of the industrial park businesses plopped over the tracks in order to reactivate it, but other than that the spur looks completely intact from end-to-end. Reinstate the removed switch at the Montvale Yard lead and the existing spur tracks can probably be dug out and re-tamped with minimal fuss. It's a good site to go fishing for more customers now that Tighe @ Montvale is such a biggie. Another rail tenant there would be able to get pretty good rates and delivery flexibility by virtue of being served concurrent with PAR's nightly Tighe set-off.

Bunch of the bigger warehouses in that park are hosting low-rent indoor trampoline places and portable moving box rentals. Same types of tenants you typically see taking up empty space at rock-bottom lease prices in industrial parks that have been in a prolonged economic slump with too many vacancies. All it takes is the slightest bump in light industrial real estate to flip those transient tenants back to real warehousing. Further up the road by Anderson RTC in the Woburn-Wilmington industrial stretch you're starting to see exactly that kind of modest uptick in industrial real estate value as points any closer to Boston become completely unaffordable for shippers to set up shop. It's still pretty uneven industrial park-to-industrial park whether they're permanently moribund or starting to show sustainable signs of perking up, but Montvale has good location fundamentals going for it with the easy access to I-93 and pre-existing anchor rail customer. Unless the notorious Winchester NIMBY's are laying in wait to pelt any real estate agents with raw eggs, by all logic this should be a pretty tasty site for roping in another customer of consequence.

There are I believe 4 large warehouses on that side of the street, all with old sidings. No clue what the condition of them are. But that would be a really cool spot to have trains back.
Also the warehouse in question, looks like it's been abandoned. So I wonder if they might have cleared it out so they could use "rail potential" as a selling/leasing point.
And as far as nimby'ism, you couldn't be more out of the way as far as winchester and woburn are concerned. I can't imagine they'd be many complaints. Plus they're too busy arguing against high voltage lines to wakefield.

l008com wrote:And as far as nimby'ism, you couldn't be more out of the way as far as winchester and woburn are concerned. I can't imagine they'd be many complaints.

Do you not know/remember the NIMBYism from Tighe Montvale's reactivation? It was absolutely absurd! The amount of crying and hysteria Winchester put up was nothing short of disgusting and foolish. This site isn't all that much more protected from neighbors than Tighe is. Baldwin St residents will likely shout and scream until they die of a heart attack if anything happens here.

BostonUrbEx wrote:

l008com wrote:And as far as nimby'ism, you couldn't be more out of the way as far as winchester and woburn are concerned. I can't imagine they'd be many complaints.

Do you not know/remember the NIMBYism from Tighe Montvale's reactivation? It was absolutely absurd! The amount of crying and hysteria Winchester put up was nothing short of disgusting and foolish. This site isn't all that much more protected from neighbors than Tighe is. Baldwin St residents will likely shout and scream until they die of a heart attack if anything happens here.

I know nothing of this. And was was there even to complain about? All they did was activate two parallel tracks.
Also how would they even have a chance to complain? It's not like you need a town meeting for this do you? Can't they just install a new switch and start using their old tracks?
And I know I'm preaching to the choir here but regarding Baldwin st, don't buy a house next to train tracks if you don't like trains. None of the houses on Baldwin St even abut the tracks!

Well the whole thing went to the STB too, so they did raise a real stink about it.

D

GP40MC1118 wrote:Well the whole thing went to the STB too, so they did raise a real stink about it.

D

Do we know why Tighe went from years of no service, to suddenly needing lots of rail service?

Business expansion...they needed Montvale to supplement the place in Woburn and the
one in Mansfield.

D

80 Holton Street, the bright blue building, hosts an industrial crane company, supplying the sort of overhead cranes one would find in a factory. It is not inconceivable that such a business would want to recieve heavy steel beams by rail.

I would assume Woburn would have a different dynamic than Winchester?

SemperFidelis wrote:80 Holton Street, the bright blue building, hosts an industrial crane company, supplying the sort of overhead cranes one would find in a factory. It is not inconceivable that such a business would want to recieve heavy steel beams by rail.

The former tenant, NAI Inc (crane manufacturer) was acquired by Dearborn Overhead Crane of Indiana and moved all manufacturing there last year. The building was being considered (fall 2015) as a new headquarters for Jack Young Inc, an auto parts distributor. And as you guessed it, NIMBY's have already come out about truck traffic from the proposed new tenant.
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Move in might be imminent hence the clearing is under way.

Reading that article is so frustrating. They don't want to fix any of the problems, they want the trucks that drive into a long established industrial area to just magically go away. I live right near there and yes the street is terribly narrow. So make it wider. What's the alternative, you want to just have an abounded warehouse forever? People need to use their brains.

Same thing as up in Billerica. They put up a sh%tstorm when the old Boston Globe building went from being vacant to being used by Waste Management for recycling. Boo hoo we live near an industrial zoned area and don't want trucks.

I know people in Burlington who mildly complain of hearing train horns at night. People who live over a mile from the tracks. People are going to complain about everything, making a mountain out of a mole hill.