Amtrak's Future HSR: A New NEC

[Guest ___]

It is interesting to see that Amtrak's future plans for the NEC includes an all new NEC line alignment from NYC to Boston, while the existing WDC to NYC will remain the same.  Looks like the current shore line is out due to connection from commuter rail in favor of a new line entirely.

 

http://www.amtrak.com/servlet/BlobServer?blobcol=urldata&blobtable=MungoBlobs&blobkey=id&blobwhere=1249217394430&blobheader=application%2Fpdf&blobheadername1=Content-disposition&blobheadervalue1=attachment;filename=Amtrak_NECHSRReport92810RLR.pdf

[Mudkip Orange]

The PHL-DC line is basically fine geometrically, it just needs to be widened - take out some crappy 50's brick split-levels with the arc/bay window and fake shutters, add more tracks. Also, new tunnel under Baltimore.

 

The NYC-Boston route, by contrast, has 3-degree and tighter curves all over the place.

[Jcarlton]

Very interesting plan.  Makes a lot of sense to get the HSR off the shoreline and especially the old New Haven west end with it's 100 year old track layout and electrification, overcrowded commuter trains and high real estate values that prohibit most possible attempts at realignment.  On the other hand a three hour NYC Boston time could probably be had for a more modest set of improvements.  The best thing thing Amtrak could do in the near future would be to take advantage of the fact that East Bridgeport CT is currently undeveloped to tunnel under the city and eliminate Jenkins curve.  Add some improvements in Eastern CT on the Shoreline and you could increase the average speeds on the West end to over 100 MPH and for much of the Shoreline to 150 or better.

[KenS]

That interior route looks a lot like the old Air Line route from the 1800's, at least east of Hartford.  That was a "high speed rail" route back in the 1890's, when passengers on the coastal route had to take ferrys across several major rivers. The New Haven, owner of the coastal route, eventually forced the owners into bankruptcy, bought them, and shut it down to eliminate competition.

 

But despite the line on Amtrak's map, you can't just build a straight line there.  Not unless they're planning a Japan-scale amount of tunneling. Eastern Conn. and Northern RI are a bit hilly. I can see why straightening the twisty coastal route would be impractical, and as someone who's ridden the Acela Boston to Washington and back (7 hours each way) many times, I'm all in favor of it. But that's a construction project that would make Boston's Big Dig seem small in comparison.  I can't see it actually happening. And bypassing Providence seems politically naive.

 

Much of the current Mass. and RI route of the Acela is already used at 150 mph (ironically, part of that is an alignment from the 1830s Boston & Providence Railroad), and is grade-separated and rather straight and could probably support higher speeds if someone were willing to pay the maintenance costs. It's only the stretch through Conn. (admittedly, that's nearly half the route) that is really twisty.

[Guest ___]

The PHL-DC line is basically fine geometrically, it just needs to be widened - take out some crappy 50's brick split-levels with the arc/bay window and fake shutters, add more tracks. Also, new tunnel under Baltimore.

 

The NYC-Boston route, by contrast, has 3-degree and tighter curves all over the place.

 

Any new tunnel under Baltimore will be an EXTREMELY hard sell. Between the Howard Street Tunnel fire a few years ago, and the b-monthly derailments, one of which recently was a hazmat train, is not going to make for an easy sell to Maryland MTA or the city. The current tunnel is only a few feet below street level and is already an area of concern for the city. Problems are increased when it comes down to the fact that any time there is road work there are fears of caving it in. And while most of the issue have been the CSX tunnel, the phobia surround the rail tunnels regardless of whose they are is touchy.

[Mudkip Orange]

Fires? Derailments? The possibility of cave-ins on a shallow, 150-year-old tunnel? All great arguments for a new one. Maybe two - one for HSR, one for double-stack container trains.

 

Of course if your political class is atrophied and unwilling to spend money on infrastructure, and if your educated classes delight in being "realistic" about what can't be done, well, it's not going to go anywhere. But that's not a problem with the general public...

[Guest ___]

Mudkip, the problem is that the public sees freight and rail infrastructure especially in Baltimore as a non-essential priority when fire/rescue/ems is consonantly on the front lines when it comes to budget cuts, public education, welfare, unemployment, and social services are hit as hard as the civil protections. As for hazmats, the general reception is "not in my backyard" so no one is going to want any new alignment. And while I do think both the Charles street and the NEC tunnels need replaced, people's priorities are going to be looked upon, especially by the lower classes who any such infrastructure will be impacted the most directly by, sees little CBA to cargo or long distance non-localized transport over immediate needs of the social and civil services.

[Mudkip Orange]

Which makes sense. If I was the Mayor of Baltimore, rail improvements would not be my first (or third) priority. Not enough benefit for my city.

 

But the NEC isn't a Bmore thing, it's really a New York and DC thing. Which are still chugging along, last I looked (actually DC seems to be pretty recession-proof, at least in a macro sense). There's really no reason why such a tunnel shouldn't be an 80 or 90% federal match. As for the remaining portion, as far as I'm concerned Maryland's leadership is more than capable of coming up with the remaining funds, ROW, and political approval. See:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryland_Route_200

 

Pushing a toll road through mostly green belts on an alignment with 40+ years of well-organized community opposition takes *moxie*. This is an area where even sprawlbelt cities have folded. And it was the right thing to do. The kind of east-west, suburb-to-suburb trips that currently cram onto the Beltway would never have been adequately served by some sort of "enhanced transit service" option - Montgomery and Prince George's needed a new highway and two successive governors spent political capital to make that happen.

 

They should do the same for trains.

 

The Baltimore situation is also unique in that it's not just about some namby-pamby socialist high speed rail plot, it's also about freight trains. The backbone of American commerce. Double-stack container trains loaded with goods from faraway lands where jobs were outsourced. Trains bound for real, true American places, like Virginia and South Carolina - not just northern elite cities like New York or the District. In other words, I don't see why it shouldn't be possible to mosey up support from outside the usual cadre of rail advocates. Get some real, solid, honest-to-goodness American Family Values-type politicians on board. People who aren't afraid to defend this country by blowing up arabs and institutionalizing homophobia. Yeah, those people. Even they should be upvoting a tunnel.