Southcoast Rail

24 is bad already. It's stop-and-go every day on the 10 miles from Brockton to I-93, and on most of the 4-lane portion from the Route 140 expressway in Taunton to south of I-495 in Raynham. I used to have to make that commute some days about 7 years ago (rest of the time I did CR at Middleboro-Lakeville), and it was bad on a daily basis then. The backups to I-93 are longer now and I'm betting it won't be more than 10 years before the population explosion fills in the 12-mile gap of relatively smooth sailing that currently exists between the I-93 and 140 traffic jams.

There's already construction going on to correct the troublesome 140 interchange, and tentative plans to widen to 6-lanes from 495 to 140. The 25-year Regional Transportation Plan for the South Coast also calls for converting 24 from I-93 to I-195 into a full Interstate, I-695 (with the fed funding that goes along with Interstate designation) and going 8 lanes from 495 to 93. $300 mil price tag to finish the Interstate upgrade job...not yet funded but approved last year by 2 regional planning authorities so with local approval it's a go to try and seek funding for it within the next decade.

Route 3 is in the same boat...MassHighway wants to go 8 lanes from I-93 to Route 18 in South Weymouth and 6 lanes to 3A in Kingston for $120 mil, and they're already re-doing a ton of ramps. After that all they need to do is widen another 5 miles to Plymouth to 6 lanes and the whole road is elegible for Interstate funds, which would re-christen it into I-93 to Plymouth and change the short 93/128 to 95/128 segment into I-595 so the 93 designation can continue south.


All of this could easily happen within 20 years because of the amount that's already funded and recommended. That just gives you a sense of how extreme the increase in highway congestion is going to get to the South Coast and how much the state is scrambling to cut it off at the pass. And there is simply not capacity at Middleboro/Lakeville or Kingston/Plymouth to absorb all the park-and-riders. When I commuted via Middleboro/Lakeville station 7 years ago the parking lot was full most days before the 7:10. It's got to be much worse now even with expanded parking. Those two lines just cannot handle the load. They can run nothing but double-deckers to reduce train crowding but there's just not enough available land to keep expanding parking at existing stations into infinity like is needed. It only takes a matter of months (in Middleboro's case, weeks) for the expanded lots to fill up again.

This is why NB/FR is getting priority from the Patrick administration over other rail projects. The thing has to be rolling in no more than 15-20 years or the South Coast commute is S-C-R-E-W-E-D. It will literally be the new South Shore for Boston-bound commuters...the regional separation that's existed until now will be no more. And they have to build this line with time for the inevitable construction delays, the hard job of securing funding, and the NIMBY's to placate. So the process must start today. And Patrick knows as well as anyone that the South Coast is the biggest swing region in the state for re-election, since Boston metro's never going to vote Republican and Western MA doesn't have the pop density to do it.

As irked as I am that rapid-transit is once again being neglected and punished in favor of the suburbs, this is the one MBCR expansion that's going to prove so necessary in the tangible future that it would be a disaster to put it off. So I don't mind they're starting early...it's going to be a big job pulling it all together.

If the parking lots are filling up, why not build garages? They are a more efficient use of land, anyway.

Well, obviously, the worse the traffic gets the more people will want CR. Your post actually has brought up
a good point that the people touting CR will need to
bring up to move it forward; namely, they should build
that instead of widening the highways. Once you start
comparing the costs of CR versus highway widening, (and I, might add, begin accessing some of the funding
sources) then it starts becoming competitive. I have no doubts that it will happen eventually; however, I still believe that it will probably have to wait until things get
as bad as they are on the south shore before it will happen.

trainhq wrote:Well, obviously, the worse the traffic gets the more people will want CR. Your post actually has brought up
a good point that the people touting CR will need to
bring up to move it forward; namely, they should build
that instead of widening the highways. Once you start
comparing the costs of CR versus highway widening, (and I, might add, begin accessing some of the funding
sources) then it starts becoming competitive. I have no doubts that it will happen eventually; however, I still believe that it will probably have to wait until things get
as bad as they are on the south shore before it will happen.

Unfortunately with the numbers they're expecting for South Coast they're going to have to BOTH build the rail and widen the highways to alleviate demand.

There is a little bit of correlation between Interstate highway and rail upgrades from a federal funding perspective. The upside of the state upgrading 24 and 3 to full Interstate standards is that the second those roads receive I-695 and I-93 designation the state receives a big windfall of federal funds which can pay off a portion of its own investment and be used for future maintenance and upgrades...a big deal, which is why states and pork-barrel Congressmen will scheme ludicrously to get as many miles of asphalt as they can designated Interstates. Mass was spectacularly successful at that in the decades where its congressional delegation was in the majority party...24 and 3 are the last long-ish and heavy-trafficked full expressways in the state that haven't gone "I", and Route 1 was of course supposed to be I-95 before the highway moratorium got slapped down in '70.

Well, the feds are also friendlier to funding interurban rail projects that park-and-ride and terminate at Interstate highways and primarily serve commuter ridership along those Interstate highways. Proof is in the pudding:

Franklin/Forge Park - terminates at I-495
Middleborough - terminates at I-495
Needham - terminates at I-95/128
Providence/Attleboro - terminates at I-95/I-195 or I-95/I-295
Worcester - terminates at I-290
Lowell - terminates near I-495 (via Lowell Connector)
Haverhill - terminates near I-495
Newburyport - terminates near I-95
Fitchburg - 2nd-to-last stop (North Leominster) at I-190

...with a few more potentials:
Stoughton - terminates near Route 24, which could become I-695.
Plymouth - terminates near Route 3 (2nd-to-last station at Route 3), which could become I-93
FR/NB - would terminate at I-195 and serve multiple points on the 24/potential I-695 corridor
Lowell line extension to Manchester, NH - I-93/I-293

So, really, pretty much every existing or proposed line has a symbiotic relationship with an Interstate or potential Interstate with the exceptions of Rockport and Greenbush due to their peninsular locations by the bay. And that isn't an accident...it's an effective way to get funding attention from the feds while they're still highway-mad and rail-ignorant. They are more willing to fund rail that directly throttles the growth of traffic along Interstates they'll be on the hook for maintenance or upgrade costs deep into the future. Carrot and stick. If it's pretty much inevitable that 24 and 3 are going "I" in the next couple decades then they'll think more seriously about chucking in money up-front for FR/NB to curb the road upgrade costs further down the line.

FYI...as an aside, Rhode Island CR expansion may be buoyed by Interstate construction in that state, too. Rhode Island is reviving 30-year-old plans with studies to extend the US 6 expressway to the Connecticut border, hooking into a short stub expressway at the border that connects to I-395...and Connecticut is extending I-384 (nearly funded) from Bolton to Willimantic about 22 miles shy of the Rhode Island border. This was originally going to be the routing of I-84 thru to Providence before it was cancelled, but if Rhode Island builds its last segment and Connecticut fills in the last gap to that I-395 connector then that expressway becomes I-82 with a terminus at I-95 literally right next to the Providence CR station. Certainly the willingness of RI to do the TF Green extension and CR stop has something to do with the Eastern CT passengers and Mohegan Sun casino access they could link with the expressway since that's a closer airport to them than Bradley Int'l., and they will no doubt be much more aggressive about further expansions and park-and-rides if they're linked only 1 hour by expressway to Hartford.

Again, the fastest route to fed funding is by Interstate asphalt, and that's as true for the piggybacking rail lines as it is for the auto traffic.

F-line to Dudley via Park wrote:

trainhq wrote:Well, obviously, the worse the traffic gets the more people will want CR. Your post actually has brought up
a good point that the people touting CR will need to
bring up to move it forward; namely, they should build
that instead of widening the highways. Once you start
comparing the costs of CR versus highway widening, (and I, might add, begin accessing some of the funding
sources) then it starts becoming competitive. I have no doubts that it will happen eventually; however, I still believe that it will probably have to wait until things get
as bad as they are on the south shore before it will happen.

Unfortunately with the numbers they're expecting for South Coast they're going to have to BOTH build the rail and widen the highways to alleviate demand.

There is a little bit of correlation between Interstate highway and rail upgrades from a federal funding perspective. The upside of the state upgrading 24 and 3 to full Interstate standards is that the second those roads receive I-695 and I-93 designation the state receives a big windfall of federal funds which can pay off a portion of its own investment and be used for future maintenance and upgrades...a big deal, which is why states and pork-barrel Congressmen will scheme ludicrously to get as many miles of asphalt as they can designated Interstates. Mass was spectacularly successful at that in the decades where its congressional delegation was in the majority party...24 and 3 are the last long-ish and heavy-trafficked full expressways in the state that haven't gone "I", and Route 1 was of course supposed to be I-95 before the highway moratorium got slapped down in '70.

Well, the feds are also friendlier to funding interurban rail projects that park-and-ride and terminate at Interstate highways and primarily serve commuter ridership along those Interstate highways. Proof is in the pudding:

Franklin/Forge Park - terminates at I-495
Middleborough - terminates at I-495
Needham - terminates at I-95/128
Providence/Attleboro - terminates at I-95/I-195 or I-95/I-295
Worcester - terminates at I-290
Lowell - terminates near I-495 (via Lowell Connector)
Haverhill - terminates near I-495
Newburyport - terminates near I-95
Fitchburg - 2nd-to-last stop (North Leominster) at I-190

...with a few more potentials:
Stoughton - terminates near Route 24, which could become I-695.
Plymouth - terminates near Route 3 (2nd-to-last station at Route 3), which could become I-93
FR/NB - would terminate at I-195 and serve multiple points on the 24/potential I-695 corridor
Lowell line extension to Manchester, NH - I-93/I-293

So, really, pretty much every existing or proposed line has a symbiotic relationship with an Interstate or potential Interstate with the exceptions of Rockport and Greenbush due to their peninsular locations by the bay. And that isn't an accident...it's an effective way to get funding attention from the feds while they're still highway-mad and rail-ignorant. They are more willing to fund rail that directly throttles the growth of traffic along Interstates they'll be on the hook for maintenance or upgrade costs deep into the future. Carrot and stick. If it's pretty much inevitable that 24 and 3 are going "I" in the next couple decades then they'll think more seriously about chucking in money up-front for FR/NB to curb the road upgrade costs further down the line.

Kingston as well (Rt. 3)

http://www.bostonnow.com/news/local/200 ... t-the-road

Not even commuter rail is safe from the dreaded bus... another oddity in the article is the proposal for a monorail from New Bedford to Braintree- I wonder where that idea came from.

I heard the monorail suggestion recently too, perhaps it was in the televised South Coast Rail meeting, and wondered why anyone would even consider it in an area with snow and ice.

There are many serious problems in the way of restoring NB/FR service, including the enormous tax subsidy per rider that would be required. But I think the most serious hurdle is that for much of the route during most of the day the projected ridership by train will not provide a more fuel efficient solution than the same number of people driving to Boston in their own cars. This is particularly true with the projected ridership out of New Bedford.

The "dedicated busway along the proposed rail route" option has also been floated recently, a possible precursor to paving the rail right of way for buses.

I continue to be frustrated by the ridership issues when it comes to
NB/FR. A lot of folks had egg on their face when the Old Colony
opened up and history will repeat itself here.

Big ridership counts exist at Raynham & Taunton. Not to mention
Easton, who is in denial. Stations south of Taunton will come into
their own eventually as sprawl continues to head south to the
Southcoast region.

There is a lot of blame to go around when it comes to "marketing"
this project. I do blame NB & FR for not partnering with Taunton
much sooner and surrounding towns. And then there's the whole
issue of state or federal agencies continuing to cowtow to study
after study and option after option. Go ahead with the busses
and I'll see them stuck in the same traffic on RT24. And what
will the monorail do at the end of RT24 at RT128?

Dave

I hear you Dave. I watch this situation with interest trying to compare with what NJ Transit and Metro North are presently experiencing on attempts to add service in non-attainment areas. The service south of Taunton is a real problem, because for the schedule pattern that is proposed there is no way that most of the train movements can meet the fuel efficiency standards that are being applied now, those that are going to be in place by the time this project is under construction will probably be much more severe. Actually the only thing advanced so far that might even come close (and it was a very long time ago) was Alternative #5 of the original study, which called for service from Westport to Boston via the north end of New Bedford. This proposal cut the equipment and crew requirements about in half by servicing both major cities by one line. It also would have increased the per train ridership south of Taunton significantly through the combined service. It called for the Dartmouth Industrial Secondary (better known as the Watuppa Branch) to be rebuilt as a high speed CR line between Westport (near the narrows) and New Bedford. The NB station would have been at or near the Building #19 site. But at that time the suggested standard for CR on these lines was 80 MPH running rather than the 70 MPH that was adopted for Old Colony. For the line to be at all viable for the Fall River patrons you would need the 80 MPH track to get the running time from Westport to New Bedford down around 15 minutes.

I suspect the alternative was dropped because it did not meet the demands of the mayors of either New Bedford or Fall River, both of whom want the stations right in the middle of downtown.

I was never much for the Watuppa version since it excludes the
whole north end of Fall River/Freetown area. Plus it would kill the
dream of extending the line towards Aquidneck Island (Newport).
Of course, removal of the Sakonnet drawbridge and the bike trail
folks between Tiverton & the Mass/Fall River line has complicated
things.

I got charts of the Watuppa option in the attic somewhere.
No passing siding was projected. Hixville Road stays as
a short siding for freight I presume.

Can't imagine how'd they get through the swamp west of
Mid-City scrap, deal with the sharp curve of the north leg
of the wye at Nash Road. Maybe I could retire as the Faunce
Corner Road crossing tender?!!!!!!

D

No Dave, you don't want that job, it's too dangerous!

I hear that trucks run into locomotives at that location trying to beat the train or, they "just don't see the engines" !! LOL

Paul

Yeah, and those trains are just crawling along. Imagine a 1025 or 1050 class and a string of bilevels emerging from the hole through the trees and crossing Faunce Corner Road at the 80 MPH speed recommendation of the first study.

Given the 80 MPH operating speed of the first study, and the sixty minutes between midday trains, they probably did not need a passing siding on the branch because the total dwell time on the branch even with twenty minutes in the Westport station would still allow you to clear the line in time for the next train.

Unfortunately no easy answers to the NB/FR issue.

"Buses can be more attractive to consumers," Giglio said, because they can run more frequently than trains at peak hours. A bus that bypasses traffic in a dedicated lane, with added amenities like wireless Internet, will attract as many riders as a train, he said.

His first point about frequency is valid, but if it costs too much money to build a train, where is the money to build dedicated bus lanes from FR/NB to Boston going to come from? I know I'm preaching to the choir, but there's still the speed issue. A bus won't be as fast as a train at rush hour and the chances of a dedicated bus lane getting built are lower than the chances of building the train.

"Buses can be more attractive to consumers," Giglio said, because they can run more frequently than trains at peak hours. A bus that bypasses traffic in a dedicated lane, with added amenities like wireless Internet, will attract as many riders as a train, he said.

His first point about frequency is valid, but if it costs too much money to build a train, where is the money to build dedicated bus lanes from FR/NB to Boston going to come from? I know I'm preaching to the choir, but there's still the speed issue. A bus won't be as fast as a train at rush hour and the chances of a dedicated bus lane getting built are lower than the chances of building the train.