Fewer Stops on Commuter Rail Lines?

Something I have noticed about some of the Commuter Rail lines is that they have a greater amount of stops per certain distance than other lines, which naturally causes the stops to be closer together.
Here is an example: Boston to Bridgewater on the Middleborough Line is 27 Miles, Boston to Southborough on the Worcester Line is also 27 Miles, but between Boston and Bridgewater there are only 7 stops, while between Boston and Southborough there are 13 stops. Because of this, the journey time from Boston to Bridgewater is about 50 minutes, while the journey time from Boston to Southborough for trains that make all stops is about 1 hour and 4 minutes. While this is no big difference in my opinion, I am not sure about what others would think. This has made me consider whether or not cutting out stops that are either low in ridership or are close to other stops could be a solution to speeding trains up and making them more time competitive with driving.
The Worcester Line stops a total of 3 times in Newton and then another 3 times in Wellesley, why? With the advent of park and ride stations, there is usually no longer a need to stop more than 2 times in one city/town as there was a century ago, as people can now just drive to the station and get on from there or take a suburban bus operated by a local agency. Of those stations, two in each town with the lowest ridership counts could be closed, riders who drive could be encouraged to use the other stations, and bus routes timed with train arrivals could be formed to run from the former stations to the ones that remain open for those who did not drive to the stations to use, and trains can start to run faster.

That’s not why Newton is underserved by CR. It’s because the platforms currently only exist on one side of the tracks, leading to a need to express thru in order to maintain the schedule.

Newton on the north side of the Pike is more densely populated than many people realize. There will be a lot of induced demand if/when the stations are rebuilt so we can take advantage of more of the trains that bypass us currently. I would love to be able to walk down and catch a ride inbound to Landsdowne for a game in the afternoon/evening for example, or if I had more options to leave work besides 4:25, 5:35, and 6:35 from south station.

If anything, I think Newton (and Watertown) would benefit from an additional infill station at Newton Corner, but we do need to get to electrification of the line first for that to be remotely practical.

The Newton stops are not park and ride except for a small lot at Auburndale. The Newton passengers are almost all walkers. On the line to Middleboro, the first ten miles are paralled by a rapid transit line. There used to be five railroad stops in Quincy; Atlantic, Norfolk Downs, Wollaston, Quincy and Quincy Adams. Some of these were wiped out or renamed when the Braintree Red Line opened. Prior to the Ashmont Extension of the Boston Elevated Ry. alongside the Middleboro Mainline there were city stops at Savin Hill, Crescent Ave., Harrison Square, South Boston, maybe a few more. Closer to Brockton there was a station at Avon and south of there Matfield, Westdale, Flagg Street, South Bridgewater, maybe a few more.

Yesterday morning while I was out for a walk I found myself at Wellesley Farms station, standing on the Glen Road bridge as an outbound train stopped before moving on toward Wellesley Hills. I could see the electronic sign at the Wellesley Hills station from the bridge. Those two stations have been there since at least the 1890s; there are classic stone B&A stations at both sites. The one at Wellesley Farms has been gutted, alas.

They could lose the Greenwood and Cedar Park stops on the Haverhill Line, AFAIC. Not wild about and Highlands, Wyoming either.

Wyoming Hill, Melrose/Cedar Park, and Melrose Highlands are the three stations in Melrose served by trains, so one of them should have to stay open to keep Melrose with train service. In theory, Melrose/Cedar Park should be kept open as it is the closest location to the center of Melrose, however strangely enough, despite its good location, Cedar Park actually has much lower ridership than Highlands (99 compared to 306), so in practice the best thing to do would be to either simple close Cedar Park and Wyoming and keep Highlands open, or rebuild Cedar Park to make it accessible and an overall nicer station than the others, and encourage riders to use it before shutting down the other two stops and providing bus service from their locations to Cedar Park. Greenwood on the other hand can go as Wakefield already has Wakefield Station which is in a better location and has much higher ridership, plus there is already a bus that takes you between the two stops, the 137.

The only time I've ever seen a commuter stop closed was in the 1960s when Chicago closed most of the close-in commuter rail stops because CTA was expanding into those areas. Closing those stops gave guaranteed traffic to the new line.



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The current schedules are indeed a joke. Every train should not be stopping at every single stop. The misuse of F Stops and L stops is a joke as well, not used as much as they should be. Some of the thought process that goes into these schedules is mind boggling, and made or had input by some people with little to no knowledge of ridership or railroad operations.

Gas was $5 a gallon and the highways were/are still jammed with people not riding the commuter rail. The every hour running, every stop doesn't make it appealing to riders. The upcoming Foxboro pilot program will most likely fail as well with little to no ridership

The Newton stops, as well as stops like Waltham and Roberts would get a lot more usage if their fares weren't THREE TIMES the "rapid-transit" fares, yet the rapid-transit Charlie Card allows free transfers to other lines and 1 free transfer to a bus. Note that Zone 2 Auburndale (Newton) - BOS is shorter than Riverside-Lechmere. Oh, and the Riverside Branch serves areas that are higher income and higher real estate values than the Newton or Waltham Commuter Rail stations, and part of this discrepancy is that frequent, highly subsidized rapid-transit service increases property values and attracts people commuting to high paying downtown and medical area jobs. So "economic justice" would require lowering Zone 1A and Zone 2 fares to Zone 1, permanently, and accept Charlie Cards as payment.

Zone 1 is higher than zone 1A. Commuter rail should not be priced the same as rapid transit because they're very different services (I despise 1A for this reason). Going from North Station to Porter Square, for example, should cost more for the 10 minute direct ride in suburban seats than the subway ride with a transfer and 7 station stops in between. I would not be opposed to a zone fare structure returning to the Highland branch, but Commuter Rail should NOT be as cheap as light rail (nor light rail as expensive as Commuter Rail).

The every hour running, every stop doesn't make it appealing to riders.

Yup, this is why the Commuter Rail should start running every 30 minutes on lines where possible and close down low ridership stations and stations that are very close to other stations with higher ridership, or, like you said, make better use of Flag stops and Early Departure stops.
The MBTA should also try to get as much double tracking done as possible, I was on a Haverhill Train the other day and we were sitting for about 10 minutes just waiting for Boston bound Downeaster to pass, these kinds of things add lots of time to the schedule and make Commuter Rail even less appealing to potential riders.

mbrproductions wrote: ↑Wed Sep 07, 2022 11:17 amA one-way ride on a Middleborough or Kingston Train from Boston to Braintree will cost you $7, while the same one-way trip on the Red Line which only takes 5 minutes more time according to the MBTA's website costs you only $2.40.
What's the deal with that?

Why are you taking up a seat meant for regional travel when you're remaining within a transit district and your route is paralleled by that district's service?

1.) Red Line and Commuter Rail are not comparable grades of service and should not cost the same to use.

2.) Particularly during rush-hour when trains run at or beyond capacity (normal world), people should be discouraged from filling longer distance trains while a local alternative is available. I wish Amtrak took this concept more seriously, too. I was in New York one night and had missed the last evening train home, so No. 66 was it, but it was sold out. Luckily there was room in business so I sprung for that rather than wait for morning service. To my surprise the train was pretty empty, and it remained such until Providence where it became packed with commuters who reserved an Amtrak seat rather than take purple train already berthed on our arrival. If I were Amtrak, I wouldn't be happy with "sold out" trains running empty until the very last station (available for boarding). Likewise, the T shouldn't be running excess capacity to Middleboro because the trains overflow with subway fares for the first few miles of the trip.

Yes, As you can see above, I actually removed that part of my response from my previous post because when I was finished with it, I read your last post which basically answered my question and agreed I with you.

To my surprise the train was pretty empty, and it remained such until Providence where it became packed with commuters who reserved an Amtrak seat rather than take purple train already berthed on our arrival.

it is because of things like these that I am surprised Amtrak hasn't barred the ability to buy tickets between Providence and Boston ever since the "Purple Train" was re-extended from Attleboro to be able to take you between the two.

I'm of a mind that everything inside 128 could be subway? lines and everything outside commuter rail.

I would gladly pay $5 each way for subway-like service. That’s what I used to pay (not counting my monthly pass discount) for the Express Bus when it came as frequently as a subway to Newton Corner and the Nonantum area, before Baker got his wish and was able to cut service on the 500’s.

I’d pay probably $15, because that’s still cheaper than the $30 it costs to park downtown.