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As Amtrak struggles with downed wire at 128, feds consider $290-billion plan for new route to New York via Long Island Sound
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Because using existing track
Because using existing track and right of way along the Connecticut River valley too common sense ? Is Channel 12 even aware Long Island Sound does not extend as far up the coast as Boston ? Is Amtrak aware ? This is the most nonsensical thing I've heard in a while.
Deep breaths, I'm sure Amtrak is aware.
They'll probably cut across to Bridgeport and then up to Boston.
Metro North owns the tracks
between New Haven and New Rochelle, NY, which effectively prohibits any high-speed rail between those two locations. A rerouting of trains starting at New Haven would allow Amtrak to avoid heavy traffic on Metro North tracks. From the lack of details in the story, I'm not sure if the line would share trackage with LIRR once on Long Island.
Mid sound Rail Tunnel
Use of the LIRR Port Jefferson Branch suggests tunnel landfall near Bridgeport CT.
Yup
The Port Jeff branch hits the approach to Penn Station pretty close to where the current Amtrak spur comes down over the Hellgate Bridge right now, so the train would end up in the same place anyway.
So Barney said to Moe....
"Hey wouldn't it be a good idea to build a train line under the water all the way to Boston."
No one is seriously considering this.
It Shows The New Right-Of-Way Bypassing Providence
( apparently, there'll be a new tunnel straight from New Haven to Boston )
That
is a massive sum to drop, and totally unnecessary. I assume some NY politician is responsible?
It's a little more involved than that
The tunnel under the Sound is the most extreme of three plans put forth by Amtrak:
http://ctmirror.org/2016/07/28/amtrak-favors-one-rail-overhaul-plan-old-...
The least expensive plan is already being shot down as well. It may be that Amtrak secretly wanted the middle option (described at the above link as Alternative 2) all along, and proposed it along with an unworkable "cheap" option and a ridiculous plus super-expensive option to make the middle choice look more practical and reasonably priced.
Not to get off track...
Couple of things: http://www.woonsocketcall.com/news/commuter-rail-will-start-with-woonsoc...
Looks like they are trying to do passenger from Worcester to Providence but will start in Woonsocket for now. They claim they're doing it for $3 million. P&W runs leaf-peeper tours already, so I guess the line is sorta up to snuff to carry passengers, although I think they only run from Woonsocket to Worcester.
Looking at the Amtrak plans, it seems they might be using a lot of existing right of way of the P&W. I guess.
http://www.pwrr.com/home/system-map/
That alternative 3, Hartford to Worcester, is that where they're talking 'real fast trains?' I have no idea what the existing row is now, but if it's from the 1840's how straight can it be? Lines on a map are nice, but if you want Shinkansen or Euro speeds, you need a pretty straight row. Good luck with that.
A Long Island Sound Tunnel
A Long Island Sound Tunnel strikes me as completely impractical.
I don't see how it would add much capacity or speed to the service. If there's some sort of bottleneck between Bridgeport and New Rochelle, this would bypass or relieve that, yes - but it would eventually rejoin the existing line at Sunnyside Yard and the East River tunnels before Penn Station. The East River tunnels probably aren't at the same impending-crisis degree of maxed out and needing repairs as the Hudson tunnels, but I doubt there's a lot of spare capacity. It might negatively impact LIRR service on the Port Jeff and connected branches.
I doubt it would be any increase in speed.
They'd have to come up with some sort of tunnel portal on the CT side. How do they tie-in to the Bridgeport station? Do they bypass the city, move the station from downtown (and the ferry connection), or put a tunnel portal right on the waterfront? How much property do they have to take/destroy?
Will they put the ferry out of business?
Will it be a rail-only tunnel, or will they put car/truck lanes?
Will they share the line with freight traffic? (background - many NY people hate the long history of Port Authority failures/inaction to get freight rail connection from east side of harbor (the great natural deep-water slips in Brooklyn) to most of the rest of the USA, Would heading east to Port Jeff be a better path north and eventually west than going through Hell Gate?)
Throw some bike lanes and the
Throw some bike lanes and the nu yuppies will be all over it :)
$290B!!! No thanks! I'll take
$290B!!! No thanks! I'll take the Chinatown express and gladly wait in traffic.
Comical waste of money
I'll still opt for the $30 bus trip instead of the $200 train. Tired of the tax sink hole that is Amtrak
And that is exactly why...
...train service is so awful in the US, because of short sighted naysayers.
Here's the reality folks - 290B is a nutso sum of money. However, at least putting forth these ideas gets the ball rolling. Most of us alive now aren't going to see price benefits of any sort of rail work until another 20 years at least. Even if every high speed rail project around the country started today, we're talking about transforming US travel by pieces, which will involve lots of construction and disruption.
Honestly, I whish they would spend the billions, and just bury the whole rail system in a 'deep tube' like mode that the London underground uses. Forget about the mish-mash of Boston / NYC utilities and existing tunnels and just go 500 feet deeper. If we could decide to improve that technology, it would ease a lot of issues. Build a huge rail system, and make it at least four track, so you can have regular and express service. Seriously, if you could have an underground bullet train and take you from BOS->NYC in 75 mins, I'd pay $200 for that.
Also, places in Europe do this whole family rate - so for a family of four, we went to Venice to Rome for something like $250 total US one way, plus espresso and cookies and nice clean trains. If you can set up a train trip for a family of four like that, it will encourage people to leave the car behind when going from one city to another. NYC and Bos are already so expensive, why pay hundreds for a train, and a couple hundred to Park and then layer another $400 per night hotel expense.
If you just want to wait for the Hyperloop, you can do that too.(
do the math.
$290 billion = 132,420 round trip $30 bus tickets per day for 100 years.
The two-track LIRR main line
The two-track LIRR main line isn't exactly a ghost town with tons of spare capacity.
Why doesn't Amtrak start by adding cars to run longer trains? After that, they can look into signal upgrades that would allow for more frequent service. The busiest rail line in the country should run more often than every 2 hours.