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  • Cape May rail trail

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Pertaining to all railroading subjects, past and present, in New Jersey

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 #1596832  by Bracdude181
 
NJT says the line must stay where it is. Why not put the trail next to the line? Like what Catskill Mountain Railroad does?
 #1596882  by JohnFromJersey
 
Anytime an in-tact railroad that's OOS or abandoned becomes a trail, that's it - it will most likely never be a railroad again. the Henry Hudson Trail in northern Monmouth county is a good example - it would be far better utilized if it was converted back into rail for MOM, but the wealthy constituents, better known as NIMBYs, along the trail do a damn good job making sure that never happens
Bracdude181 wrote: Sun May 01, 2022 12:04 pm NJT says the line must stay where it is. Why not put the trail next to the line? Like what Catskill Mountain Railroad does?
That's good. Why is NJT preserving this line though? Do they want to run trains back down to Cape May? Would probably be a lucrative business in the summers, but in the fall and winter, it would probably be pointless.

As for the Catskill Mountain Railroad and the rail trail next to that, that was NOT their own doing. The Ulster county government did some shady maneuvers a few years ago to seize nearly 12 miles of old Ulster & Delaware RR, which stopped the CMRR from preserving said rail and using it for excursions. Almost all that rail was turned into a rail-trail very quickly, ending the possibility of that rail being preserved and being used for anything train-related. The Ulster County government also forced a rail-trail near the ROW of the CMRR.

A Facebook page by the name of "MetroTrails" has more information on it, the guy who owns it protested what the county government was doing and he was blocked by them on social media and barred from attending their meetings. Very shady stuff indeed.
 #1596908  by Ken W2KB
 
Bracdude181 wrote: Sun May 01, 2022 12:04 pm NJT says the line must stay where it is. Why not put the trail next to the line? Like what Catskill Mountain Railroad does?

That could work, with a short diversion to the road bridge sidewalk relatively near and parallel to the out of service railroad canal bridge to avoid the very costly need to build a new pedestrian bridge which be very costly.
 #1596909  by Bracdude181
 
@Ken W2KB That, and there’s already a trail which runs from north of Cape May Court House to just south of Cold Spring Village. Once over the bridge, just connect it to that. Problem solved. Cape May gets their rail trail and Seashore Lines keeps the tracks.

TBH you don’t even need it to stay close to the tracks for the southernmost end. Just have it run parallel to Elmira Street, turn onto Park Blvd, then when the road ends have the trail run on the dirt road up until the bridge. Keeps it away from the tracks while also ending at the Welcome Center like they want it to.

Edit: CR 626 already has bike lanes too! Just connect it to that!