Lowell Line - Winchester, Woburn, Wilmington Spottings

Schnitzer send out loads as well? I thought the shredded output, from the inbound scrap, was shipped out by barge/ship?

I've seen both. Were they company gons by any chance instead? Could just be scrap they've been picking up along the ROW.

So New England Transrail is still alive:

WILMINGTON TOWN CRIER — At the Select Board meeting on Monday night, Sena­tor Barry Finegold and Representative David Robertson provided up­dates for the board on a variety of important is­sues. Select Board Chair Judy O’Connell introduced Finegold as Wil­mington’s newest senator.

Finegold formally in­troduced himself also, as­suring residents that he’d listen and support any needs and issues no matter how small. He asked the board to tell himself and Robertson how they could help with the board’s initiatives.

O’Connell explained that she invited Finegold and Robertson that night to provide the board a chance to ask them questions. She first asked for an update on the Olin Su­perfund Site.

Robertson answered that the remediation entered the next step of hydrology. He mentioned that there had been a public comment period, during which they sent a letter to the Environmental Protec­tion Agency and the De­partment of Environmen­tal Protection asking them to hold the companies to blame to the highest standard.

O’Connell then asked about the plans for redevelopment on the site. Town Manager Jeff Hull replied saying that New England Transrail, or Wilmington Woburn In­ter­modal, is looking to re­develop the property for warehousing.

“My understanding is that once an agreement is reached, the proposed development would look to proceed,” he said.

The New Boston Road bridge construction is coming along. Its a very big project. AND, the buildling at the end of the southern New Boston Road, NE Resins I believe... is totally gone! Is that part of the bridge construction or an unrelated project. How does THAT affect N.E.T.? They were originally going to connect via their siding. Are they putting something else in place of that warehouse? I was surprised at the scope of the construction, I thought they were just rebuilding a bridge! No wonder it took 18 years to get construction started.

The plans show the track is to be retained:

https://www.bostonmpo.org/data/calendar ... andout.pdf

Anyone know what was up with the train at Wilmington last night, around 930?

I could hear it idling from a few blocks away. When I got to the station, it was still there. I hung around for a while, and it was still there. Finally I gave up and left, and still it was parked right at the station. It was also blocking the wildcat so no freight or amtrak would be able to get by. There were passengers around too. What was going on? Probably around 20 minutes or so later, I did see another northbound pass by between mishawum and anderson.

News report of a train vs person incident in Billerica (and Whitman too):

Two people were hit and killed by trains in separate incidents in Whitman and Billerica Tuesday night, officials said.

https://whdh.com/news/emergency-crews-r ... billerica/

I see. So does that mean wilmington was the end of the line at that point? And everyone hanging around the train was probably waiting for a shuttle bus to come?

So what's going on with Tighe these days? For a few years there, they had all sorts of traffic at their spot on the woburn/wilmington line but it seems like theres never anything there any more. I used to catch the night time delivery regularly. Now nothing. When they put that mini yard back into service, I thought we were seeing a change in tides, not just one last gasp for breath!

Nothing in ages - possibly 2 years now. I think the complaints from the Winchester neighborhood got too vocal.
In other changes I'm seeing more freight during the daytime, and perhaps a bit less at night. LA-2 isn't as reliable a visitor as it was. I wonder if there are shift changes at Lawrence Yard. I believe there are also still occasional Lowell interchanges too.
Wildcat is about to get a lot busier - an extra 30 MBTA trains a day thanks to the Western route diversions from 9/9

So if Woburn/Wilmington traffic seems to be drying up again, then that makes me wonder...

Looks like theres still plenty of activity in Everett. How does that traffic get there? Does it come down the Lowell Line and if so, when? Or does it come in some other route?

I’m not sure I would characterize Everett traffic as ‘plenty’. I think what was LA-2 is gone, possibly replaced by running LA-3 down during the day a couple of days a week. I saw the 2 Lawrence GE’s bringing 8 cars down for Schnitzer and Ciment Quebec on Monday mid morning and the 2 returned light mid afternoon. Nighttime only brings DOBO now. Given the value of that land where the last 2 customers are, I will be surprised if CSX is still running there in 5 years

I am far more bullish on the prospects of rail service continuing to Everett for the foreseeable future. The "peninsula" that CQ and Shnitzer sit contains far more industrial businesses than just those two. It is a LOT of acreage that has been used for that purpose for hundreds of years. The prospects of selling the land en masse by the 20 or so industries there in the name of development is not as likely as others such as Beacon Park and East Cambridge yards.

"plenty" compared to what I see in woburn these days.

But ALAS, I did see at least one box car at Tighe in Woburn today. Lots of overgrown brush so I couldn't see much detail.

33 MTs just went north through West Medford behind a single GE. At 3:50 (the clock on this site is messed up)