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Feds to fund $33-million design of South Station expansion
By adamg on Mon, 10/25/2010 - 4:32pm
The new South Station: Rendering from MassDOT (compare to 1904 South Station).
The Federal Railroad Administration today awarded the money to the state to begin planning seven new tracks at South Station to support new commuter-rail and Acela service to and from Boston. The new tracks would terminate at what is now the post office on Fort Point Channel; federal and state officials continue to work on moving that facility nearby.
State transportation officials say a $120 million grant to Connecticut will upgrade the tracks between New Haven and Springfield, which will eventually allow for more service between Boston and New York inland, rather than along the coast. Amtrak recently said it would use this route to dramatically cut travel time between the two cities - over the next 40 years.
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Comments
cool! Hopefully they're also
cool!
Hopefully they're also including plans to reopen Dorchester Ave, which has cut off Southie from downtown since the facility commandeered it.
Also constructing and continuing the harbor walk on that side of the channel would really spruce up and compliment the efforts Gillette put into it on the other side.
I walk to work every day, and going around the channel adds 10 min onto the trip. Reopen the public road, and then it's faster walking then catching the T! (Usually is anyways with the red line issues)
I assume the new proposed
I assume the new proposed shed isn't being extended over the current station platforms because of the proposed and delayed tower over the existing tracks.
I got excited at first, but
I got excited at first, but then I realized they are only funding the design. Meh, the rendering doesn't even look that great -- looks more like two train stations next to each other.
Youve got to start
Youve got to start somewhere.
Usually the design and environmental phase takes longer than the actual construction. Look at the green line extension. Countless years of planning and 3 years of actual construction.
Pretty, yes,
but where will the bums sleep?
I hope they'll leave room for
I hope they'll leave room for people in the future to eventually put in an underground platform for the North-South Rail Link. (Better still, a rail link and a new subway line) We may not be able to get the funding and will together for it, but hopefully someone will someday.
There was an underground
There was an underground platform that was never really used (I think Ron Newman can back me up on this one), but the addition of the Silver Line uses that space...
There was an underground loop
which I believe was used only once, ever, shortly after the opening of the railroad station. It proved to be unusable because of all the smoke from the steam engines.
what was left of the
what was left of the abandoned underground loop was destroyed in the 1980s when the station was rebuilt and foundations for the bus terminal were built, that was even before the Silver Line tunnel was built. The Silver Line tunnel is under Atlantic Avenue while the abandoned loop was under the platforms and tracks.
You'll get your north-south
You'll get your north-south rail link around the same time we all get jet packs.
I think we missed the connection on that one.
That should have been built when the Big Dig was.
Can't see it happening anytime soon now.
Before they spend obscene
Before they spend obscene amounts of money expanding the station, they should take a Southwest Airlines approach and see if they can get more capacity by turning trains faster.
The trains turn pretty
The trains turn pretty quickly already. Spend some time watching operations from 4:00 to 6:00 PM, and you'll see most of them dwell less than 10 minutes, and at least 5 of that is for passenger boarding/deboarding. You can't get it to be much faster than that. The issue is that the station is near capacity now, and there is significant expansion planned/needed for commuter rail, Indigo line type shuttles, and expanded inter-city high speed passenger service. With a larger track capacity, South Station could service much more frequent trains for the various inside 128 line segments, providing something close to rapid transit level service.