New Switch at Division St Ansonia

Drove over the newly resurfaced crossing at Division St in Ansonia the other day and noticed a new switch just south of the crossing. Anyone know what it's for?

I have a friend who works in the track department who said something to me last week about beginning to build a passing siding "near Division Street" in Ansonia - perhaps it's for that?

Automatic switch? Do they have the cabling for that reaching that deep into dark territory?

Will the Waterbury branch be getting signals or will it remain dark like Greenport on the LIRR?

There are plans to signalize the Waterbury.

as part of requirement for PTC any passenger line having more than one train at anytime, is required to install PTC.
CDOT wants to increase service and at any time now there could be multiple trains on the Waterbury branch, be it P&W or Panam.

The new switch you saw was the beginning phase of building a new passing siding, which was done when they had the branch out for nine days earlier in May. I was told the siding on the south end will start just north of Derby station.

DutchRailnut wrote:as part of requirement for PTC any passenger line having more than one train at anytime, is required to install PTC.
CDOT wants to increase service and at any time now there could be multiple trains on the Waterbury branch, be it P&W or Panam.

MNR never got its temporal separation MTEA request approved for the Waterbury?

Amtrak7 wrote:

DutchRailnut wrote:as part of requirement for PTC any passenger line having more than one train at anytime, is required to install PTC.
CDOT wants to increase service and at any time now there could be multiple trains on the Waterbury branch, be it P&W or Panam.

MNR never got its temporal separation MTEA request approved for the Waterbury?

It can't. Freights gotta service customers who need their deliveries during business hours. P&W and PAS would never ever voluntarily waive their rights to run during the daytime, and voluntary is what it what it would have to be because interstate commerce law protects them.


The only commuter rail lines that are exempt from the PTC mandate are 1) the NJT Princeton Dinky, which is de facto temporal separation since no other train other than whatever Arrow is assigned on a given shift will ever occupy any track on the branch; and 2) the LIRR Greenport Scoot, which only has 6 passenger movements per day in dark territory...under the minimum for qualifying for the mandate. Those are the only ones. Everybody else has to do it.

Waterbury is bound to the mandate; it has enough of a schedule to be. Which means a cab signal installation + ACSES is non-optional, since there's no way Metro North has any interest in hell in running some sort of kooky wireless PTC implementation overlaid on dark territory that's different from the whole rest of the system and different from every CR system Washington to Boston...and on that backwater branch of all places. It has to be a repeat of the Danbury signalization; that's the only non-convoluted way to get compliant. They'll need a deadline extension (which they'll get when the 2020 extension ever gets through Congress), but it's just a matter of come up with the money, roll up sleeves, and get it done already.

Eons ago (it may have been at one of those infamous "lets make the Waterbury branch better" meetings) I thought I had seen that there was supposed to be some sort of preliminary work pertaining to the eventual signalization of the branch commencing this summer...now that would be a step in the right direction!

the Waterbury has several spots were multiple trains end up being on branch, from P&W stone deliveries on south end .
Panam moves on North end and the CDOT wish for more service, so no there will not be any PTC waivers for Waterbury branch.

F-line to Dudley via Park wrote: The only commuter rail lines that are exempt from the PTC mandate are [...] the LIRR Greenport Scoot, which only has 6 passenger movements per day in dark territory...under the minimum for qualifying for the mandate. Those are the only ones. Everybody else has to do it.

4 trains a day is the minimum for dark territory...

49 CFR 236.1019 (c)

(2) Passenger service is operated on a segment of track of a freight railroad that is not a Class I railroad on which less than 15 million gross tons of freight traffic is transported annually and on which one of the following conditions applies:

• (i) If the segment is unsignaled and no more than four regularly scheduled passenger trains are operated during a calendar day, or
  (ii) If the segment is signaled (e.g., equipped with a traffic control system, automatic block signal system, or cab signal system) and no more than 12 regularly scheduled passenger trains are operated during a calendar day.

(3) Not more than four passenger trains per day are operated on a segment of track of a Class I freight railroad on which less than 15 million gross tons of freight traffic is transported annually.

F-line to Dudley via Park wrote:The only commuter rail lines that are exempt from the PTC mandate are 1) the NJT Princeton Dinky, which is de facto temporal separation since no other train other than whatever Arrow is assigned on a given shift will ever occupy any track on the branch; and 2) the LIRR Greenport Scoot, which only has 6 passenger movements per day in dark territory...under the minimum for qualifying for the mandate. Those are the only ones. Everybody else has to do it.

Waterbury is bound to the mandate; it has enough of a schedule to be. Which means a cab signal installation + ACSES is non-optional, since there's no way Metro North has any interest in hell in running some sort of kooky wireless PTC implementation overlaid on dark territory that's different from the whole rest of the system and different from every CR system Washington to Boston...and on that backwater branch of all places. It has to be a repeat of the Danbury signalization; that's the only non-convoluted way to get compliant. They'll need a deadline extension (which they'll get when the 2020 extension ever gets through Congress), but it's just a matter of come up with the money, roll up sleeves, and get it done already.

I believe the LIRR to Greenport has more than one train on the line at a time although I don't have a current timetable handy. Friday evenings there is more service than on other days. I think it will have it sooner or later.
Waterbury needs much more than what they have today. More midday service, at least one or two through trains to New York and probably a facility to lay up trains overnight at Waterbury as well. Of course this won't happen but it wouldn't be terribly difficult to put a second track in all the way from Devon to Waterbury as the line was double track up until very early 1950. Outside of the bridges it still has room for a second track. Today's traffic will not justify a second track and probably future traffic will not either but it would not be impossible.
Noel Weaver

Both FRA and white house have said no extensions and no waivers for PTC requirement for end of 2015.
so a lot of railroads better step up effort or they face big fines or shutdown by feds.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/06/ ... BR20150604" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Politics being what it is, I doubt if any railroads will be hit with "big" fines, whatever they are hit with will be watered down. Excuses, excuses and more excuses.
Noel Weaver