125MPH on New Haven Line?

DutchRailnut wrote:upgrading to 80 mph would gain you 2 minutes ?? hardly worth the cost.

It's called a small-large lateness penalty. Being able to make up 2 extra minutes means a train that gets dinged for a small delay won't later miss its slot down the line and cause larger delays. Furthermore by your argument dropping speeds or 60 would save money at the cost of only a few extra minutes. As I see it CT is paying for Class 4 track, but not enjoying full Class 4 speeds.

Well Mikey let me explain this from railroad worker to book smart person who never worked for a railroad.
Class of track does NOT determine track speed, it determines maximum track speed based on track structure, minus any and all other restrictions like curves, hills signal distance , bridges, catenary restrictions etc.

metroduff wrote:Operational capacity (the number of trains you can fit through a segment), not speed, is the name of the game for the New Haven Line, as the vast majority of passengers carried are commuters, not intercity travelers.

Who cares about operational capacity, most of the day it is 2-4 tph per direction. Fixing rush hour capacity should mean have 14 cars (or longer) EMUs, not subway service frequency of 20 tph per direction or even higher. The capacity on NHL has to exist, even today. There is no freight on NHL, and all 4 tracks of NHL merge into harlem's 4 tracks, and eventually GCT's 4 tracks. Park Ave Tunnel does not have 12 tracks in it, therefore NHL runs under capacity between New Rochelle and New Haven.

patcat88 wrote:

metroduff wrote:Operational capacity (the number of trains you can fit through a segment), not speed, is the name of the game for the New Haven Line, as the vast majority of passengers carried are commuters, not intercity travelers.

Who cares about operational capacity, most of the day it is 2-4 tph per direction. Fixing rush hour capacity should mean have 14 cars (or longer) EMUs, not subway service frequency of 20 tph per direction or even higher. The capacity on NHL has to exist, even today. There is no freight on NHL, and all 4 tracks of NHL merge into harlem's 4 tracks, and eventually GCT's 4 tracks. Park Ave Tunnel does not have 12 tracks in it, therefore NHL runs under capacity between New Rochelle and New Haven.

I don't think you know what you're talking about. There is plenty of capacity if you want to run the trains at 25 MPH but certainly that is not the case here. These commuter railroads have to be built and equipped to handle the heaviest traffic of the 24 hour period and clearly that is the rush hour periods, both AM and PM. I doubt if you ever worked for the railroad either, maybe you should take a few rides on this line and see for yourself the extreme dense traffic that is handled. The freight might be gone but there is way, way more passenger service here today than there ever was years ago when the freight trains were still on the road.
Noel Weaver

There's still a streach being rewired with new catenary,there are plenty of curves to deal with,old movable bridges
that need replacing/repair,and ongoing track maintance/inspection,P+W freights run to Danbury and Fremont,and the
Welded rail plant at Cedar Hill sends out welded rail trains for Amtrak from time to time.
The best the locals may do is around 40-60 mph between stops,it does get real crowded at times
between New Haven and CP Shell.
The amount of traffic between CP Shell and Stamford might be equal to the traffic between
Hudson-Union on the NEC there.

patcat88 wrote:

metroduff wrote:Operational capacity (the number of trains you can fit through a segment), not speed, is the name of the game for the New Haven Line, as the vast majority of passengers carried are commuters, not intercity travelers.

Who cares about operational capacity, most of the day it is 2-4 tph per direction. Fixing rush hour capacity should mean have 14 cars (or longer) EMUs, not subway service frequency of 20 tph per direction or even higher. The capacity on NHL has to exist, even today. There is no freight on NHL, and all 4 tracks of NHL merge into harlem's 4 tracks, and eventually GCT's 4 tracks. Park Ave Tunnel does not have 12 tracks in it, therefore NHL runs under capacity between New Rochelle and New Haven.

There are no active station-stops in the Park Ave tunnel, and traffic goes 25 MPH or less close to GCT. You're neglecting a lot of things that affect capacity. Just because the 4 tracks in the tunnel can handle the whole railroad's traffic, doesn't mean the 4 tracks on the NHL are operating way under capacity with respect to how commuter railroads are meant to be run.

And don't forget the scheduled Amtrak trains between New Rochelle and New Haven which the stretch from New Rochelle to GCT doesn't have to find room for. Two questions occur to me:
1. Referring to Backshophoss's comment, MN has been trying to make up for the deterioration that set in during World War II and continued until the establishment of MN. How many years has it been since MN had full use of all tracks from Woodlawn to New Haven at the same time?
2. How many stations can be economically lengthened to accommodate 14-car trains of EMUs? For that matter, is there a significant number of platforms at GCT that can't hold 14 EMUs?

Clean Cab wrote above:
[[ There will be no speed upgrades until the PTC system is fully implemented. ]]

If anything, PTC is going to slow things down even more than they are now.

When the cab signals were cut in between Stamford and New Haven back in the 80's, it -increased- running times, it did not decrease them.

Aside: does the implementation of PTC on Metro North require "forced stops" (a la Amtrak's Shore line) and the use of a "Stop Bypass" switch?
If so, can you imagine what this is going to be like on the lower Hudson line, or Harlem line between Mott Haven and Woodlawn?
The enginemen and dispatchers are going to be tearing at their hair!

the ACES systems on Brookville's and M-8's do have forced stop issue and stop bypass button so I assume it will be part of system.
gone be fun coming into Stamford station when other local is leaving yard

Noel Weaver wrote: I don't think you know what you're talking about. There is plenty of capacity if you want to run the trains at 25 MPH but certainly that is not the case here. These commuter railroads have to be built and equipped to handle the heaviest traffic of the 24 hour period and clearly that is the rush hour periods, both AM and PM. I doubt if you ever worked for the railroad either, maybe you should take a few rides on this line and see for yourself the extreme dense traffic that is handled.

I ride this line a couple times a month. In the mornings I will be sitting on the floor unless I take a local. You havent explained why the Harlem line with 4 tracks doesnt run at 25 mph during rush hour after the NHL merges into them (although with the track work on Harlem line this and last year which left only 3 tracks at all times, it was ~30 mph from Woodlawn to Mott Haven). The only non-GCT NHL service is 2 a day SLE, Danbury and Waterbury shuttles, and 2 an hour amtrak (New Canaan has its own 5th track near Stamford). At Woodlawn Junction the entire NHL becomes 3 tracks, and the 4th track is abandoned/not used from Stratford to NHV. Why is Houstatonic bridge (bridge itself is 40) to NHV station 75 and not 90? Why the only 90 section on the most congested (Stamford,New Cannon, NHV and Danbury originated to GCT) section from New Rochelle to Mamaroneck/Harrison? That blows away all the "operational conditions" arguments without engineering facts and shows it is tradition, not engineering that limits speeds on NHL. Why is track 1 through Stamford that the Acelas take 50 and not 75?

Having trains that arrive at GCT before 7AM be off peak and creating a off peak Monthly. 14 car M8 consists would be a start of capacity over frequency on NHL during rush hour. All the M cars were designed and test at 14 cars, so it is a political not technical problem (and for substation capacity problem, tune the acceleration curve in the NTT cars software). For comparison, in 2014 Mumbai introduced 15 car EMUs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEyHSrJTuKY" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; .

Honestly I will say the catenary upgrades and open deck bridge replacement that CDOT has been paying for have been a waste of money. AFAIK not 1 of those improvements are for raising speed from the typical 60/75, just wasting money. Only the NY State NHL catenary replacement was worth something since that got heat restrictions to 70 mph from 90. Most of the open deck bridge replacements didn't remove the clearance/truck hit problem either, such as Darien's route 1 bridge.

I'll let the other members tear the rest of your argument apart, but I'll call you out on calling the catenary and bridge replacements as wastes of money. Those might not have the headline-grabbing pizzaz of a speed upgrade, or capacity upgrade, but they're critical for reliability. How would you like it if your train scheduled into GCT at say 8:32 was never earlier than 8:40 and sometimes as late as 9:00 because of catenary or bridge problems?

no one ever claimed that speed would be upgraded on New Haven line, the bridge and Catenary project was always sold as rectifying decades of neglected maintenance.

as for your claim about 14 car trains, there are only 4 tracks in GCT that could handle such trains and they would be nightmares when a breakdown occurs.
on part of Harlem there are 12 car platforms, but only two such trains are in service with very limited use between rush hours.

And even the parts not occupied by I-95... are limited on where you could actually have a 5th track. Sure, between Larchmont and Harrison some of the way is relatively preserved so far as the extra space, but Mamaroneck becomes an issue with the station layout, on top of trying to fit an extra track past the site of the Marval freight lead.

Travelsonic wrote:And even the parts not occupied by I-95... are limited on where you could actually have a 5th track. Sure, between Larchmont and Harrison some of the way is relatively preserved so far as the extra space, but Mamaroneck becomes an issue with the station layout, on top of trying to fit an extra track past the site of the Marval freight lead.

I don't want to wade into an argument with the gentleman who rides the train "a couple times a month" so I figured I'd reply to you clarifying what I said a few comments back about the wider ROW in ex-NYW&B territory. What I mean when I say "it would be easier/cheaper to add a 5th track Larchmont-Port Chester" is "it would be easier/cheaper than the alternatives." And, by the alternatives, I mean things like wiring the LIRR Main Line, upgrading the track for 150mph operation and tunneling under The Race to Westerly, RI, or a new build up I-684 and across Connecticut on a Danbury-Waterbury-Hartford alignment (the "NY&NE TGV" )-- all of which have been floated as actual possibilities in various studies.

Replicating the Boston Westchester trackage would require rebuilding every station, bridge and interlocking between Larchmont and Port Chester, and would probably cost $2-3 billion. It's just that any other alternative would cost $20-30 billion, or more, and be tied up in environmental permitting, litigation, etc. for decades.

Catenary replacement and bridge repairs are a waste of money?

Tell that to people stranded on trains when old wires get ripped down and WALK bridge is stuck open for the umpteenth time. These things cripple the New Haven Line far more than slow orders do!