The Big Bridge Opening

[Jcarlton]

The South Norwalk RR bridge near where I live on Metro North's New Haven Line is the only four track swing bridge in the world.  It's also over 100 years old and the victim of decades of deferred maintenance and neglect.  As the New Haven Line is one of the busiest commuter and passenger lines in the world having the bridge working incorrectly is a big deal.   Having the bridge stuck open is a VERY big deal as it shuts the railroad down. Unfortunately the bridge has to open to allow commercial as well as private boat traffic so just closing the bridge is not normally an option.  Which brings us to the last couple of weeks when  the bridge had two openings that could not be closed and locked causing significant delays. See the news article:
 http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2014/06/09/gov-dannel-malloy-mta-to-review-bridge-that-failed-twice-in-2-weeks-delaying-metro-north-commuters/

The decision has been made to close the bridge for the summer until the bridge can be repaired.  Before that final closing It was arranged that there would be an opening last Saturday morning to allow some private sailing craft to be sent down river from the marina upriver.  I went down to capture the BIG OPENING on video: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3qMz7vQqIU

I've been wanting a chance to shoot the bridge opening, but missed it.  I finally got it, along with about five times the usual track crew to make sure that they could get it closed.

 

[cteno4]

Hopefully they get it back in fighting shape!

 

Jeff

[miyakoji]

Pretty interesting. When it's in the closed position, is the catenary actually connected and energized (other than from the pantograph that's against it), or does it just keep the pantograph in place for when it comes off the other end?

[westfalen]

The Japanese would just raise the bridge and its approaches above shipping height and fix it for good.  Is there much commercial shipping on the river or is the bridge kept operating mainly for the benefit of pleasure craft, if so they must have a bit of political clout.

[miyakoji]

The level of the track looks fairly low relative to the water. To gain a fair bit of clearance while keeping the grade reasonable, the approaches would have to be pretty long. The structure would be substantial, I doubt there's any money or support for that.

[Guest ___]

Dear lord, deferred maintenance of a New York area transportation facility, say it ain't so!? Excuse the snarkcasm, but NYC's deterioration of its transportation is ardly anything new. If anything, only two failures in a week of something as large as that bridge is more of a surprise than anything else.

[Mudkip Orange]

Somebody needs to give Alon Levy a billion dollars, he'd fix this.

[miyakoji]

For a billion dollars, I could fix it :)

[Mudkip Orange]

Alon would fix the whole on NYC regional commuter rail for a billion.

[Guest ___]

One billon in public/private funds to fix a one millon dollar problem with the rest going to kick backs or to be squandered on "project releated expenses"  such as Lincoln Towncars for project managers, and $400 steak dinners for "work crews" right?

[Jcarlton]

The proposal for replacement is 600 million or so.  Raising the bridge is not an option because South Norwalk Station is about 800(1/2 mile or so) meters or so on the west side of with the  Danbury branch junction and another bridge in the middle and East Norwalk Station is about the same distance on the other side of the river.      To say nothing of the aquarium and other buildings which are adjacent to the tracks.  The aquarium actually wraps under the bridge with it's historic main building on one side and the Imax theatre on the other.   There's also an apartment house and retail building right across the street from the theatre. A shoofly is out of the question for the same reason.  If there an attempt to bring the main line to realistic standards a billion dollars would a low number considering local real estate values.  This has been the problem with trying to increase the speeds on the New Haven Line and the rest of the NEC all along.  There just is not the will to spend the kinds of money and political muscle that the upgrades require.  I don't know how JR gets towns to move out of the way, but that's almost impossible here.

[Guest ___]

Typically the JR answer is if you can't go up, you go down.

[Jcarlton]

Here's how my state PREFERS to spend for transit:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CTfastrak

Rather than replacing infrastructure that has needed replacement for at least 30 years they spend on boondoggles like this.
 

[kvp]

Typically the JR answer is if you can't go up, you go down.

Since the track can't go down, because that would mean they have to move several stations under the waterline, it would be easier to move the ships down. I mean they could just lock the old bridge in the closed position and construct a lock under it. Ships would enter from each direction, the water would be pumped out to lower them, theb they would move under the bridge to the other side, then the water could be let in and the ship could continue. Smaller ships could use the other side or go across the open locks. To build this, they would need two concrete walls, one next to the central pier of the old swingspan bridge and the other at the river bank, two lock doors (held closed with water pressure) and a single electric pump in the middle. The length of this structure on each side of the bridge has to be equal to the length of the longest ship.

 

A simple alternative would be to just move that small marina upstream from the bridge to the downstream side, since the river is only navigable above the railroad bridge to the next (fixed concrete) road bridge.a few hundred meters away. Above that, you can only use rowboats that would fit under the railroad bridge anyway.

[westfalen]

A half mile of elevated viaduct in either direction including new stations on that viaduct would mean nothing to the Japanese, they do it all the time, but as I observed it's a lot of messing around for a few privately owned pleasure boats.  They must have a lot of political muscle.

[marknewton]

Here's how my state PREFERS to spend for transit:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CTfastrak

Rather than replacing infrastructure that has needed replacement for at least 30 years they spend on boondoggles like this.

 

 

"The 9.4-mile line is projected to cost $569 million..."

 

FMD. That's over $60 million a mile. What are they going to build it out of - gold?

 

I wouldn't call it a boondoggle, I'd call it daylight robbery.

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[westfalen]

"The 9.4-mile line is projected to cost $569 million..."

 

FMD. That's over $60 million a mile. What are they going to build it out of - gold?

 

I wouldn't call it a boondoggle, I'd call it daylight robbery.

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

Going by their website it's only an ordinary two lane road. But that's the way it goes I suppose, a rail project asking for that much would be thrown out before it even started.

[marknewton]

...a rail project asking for that much would be thrown out before it even started.

 

You're not wrong. I can't even begin to imagine why a road should be so expensive to build - it's ridiculous.

 

"The CTfastrak dedicated roadway transit project was selected as the most cost-effective means to relieve congestion on I-84 between Hartford, West Hartford, Newington and New Britain."

 

In that case, I'd hate to see what was considered less cost effective - individual palanquins for each commuter perhaps?

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[Mudkip Orange]

60 million a mile is cheap by US LRT standards. The LRT extension by my house is $74 million a mile, and that's for 100% at-grade running (basically express streetcar).

 

We just suck at mass transit cost control. BRT is supposed to get around that because you can bid it as a roadway, and if neccessary put the transit-specific stuff in a separate bid. Hence LA got the Orange Line built for $18 million/mile. I'm not sure what Hartford is doing to get their BRT into low-end LRT ranges :/

[miyakoji]

Mudkip, is it clear where that money is going?

[kvp]

Actually it looks like a larger bus network with the bus lanes as a backbone. I don't know if the costs contain the new bus terminals or the new articulated low floor buses. Existing services (if any) will be tied into the network to provide transferless connections to a few targets (examples: downtown loop, school loop) and single transfer to feeder lines. Congestion prevention mean they plan to remove the old bus lanes if present or at least move all interurban buses to the separate two lane road.

[Mudkip Orange]

Dope-ass low floor articulateds (e.g. NABI 60, Van Hool AG330, Civis) are in the range of 750k-950k USD. So even if you assume a fleet-to-infrastructure ratio of several times what a sealed busway would run, that's still only a few million per mile. It might bump you from 18 to 22 but it's not going to get you to 50.

 

Without having seen any cost estimates, if I had to guess where the fat is I'd look in the following areas:

 

---"Architecturally significant" station designs, too many single-source suppliers for arch/engr spec fixtures and components/no competetive bid. Also the further you stray from standard construction the more fudge factor contractors insert into their bids.

 

---Attempting to fit a bike trail into the same narrow ROW forces continuous curb and gutter instead of swale/ditch drainage. Architectural metal railing chosen over K-rail (possibly sole source again).

 

---Busway is fully grade separated at intersections which were at-grade under former rail usage. Ex: 600ft viaduct at Allen/East in New Britain, could be replaced by a roundabout and two signals.

 

---Reconstruction/rehab of existing overpasses is folded into the project cost even though there is sufficient space under them now.

 

Basically, it's a lardy project like so many other lardy US transit projects. People get excited about community redevelopment and everyone draws up a wishlist of what they want, new overpass here, redo this overpass there, pretty station design that "reflects community values," blahblah, all of a sudden the poor second-year engineer totaling it all up in Excel has a bid tab of 60mm for a f***ing busway. But that's how it goes.

[miyakoji]

The AG330 is pretty cool.  I like the back window.  That is, that it has one.  But where's the engine?

 

http://norcalbusfans.jalbum.net/NorCal%20Bus%20Fans%20Photo%20Archives/Northern%20California/AC%20Transit/VanHool%20AG330/slides/ACT2001July2003.html

[Mudkip Orange]

My favorite as well.

 

It's actually mounted under the seats in the main/35' section, a bit like the first gen Toyota Previa. Supposedly you get better handling this way, since the U-joint between sections is under tension instead of compression.

[kvp]

That's called tractor-trailer configuration and it means that the articulation can be passive, instead of the hydraulically actuated pusher versions and if you look closely, the trailer has passively steered wheels, that are linked to the articulation. This gives the bus the turning radius of a normal unarticulated one. This design was invented in Hungary many years ago and proved to be a very simple and elegant solution. Essentially you add a simple 2 axle trailer to the normal bus and connect them. It also enables multiple articulated designs without sacrificing turning radius or complicating it. Usually the middle axle, that is powered has four wheels on it, giving the bus a 1-B-1 configuration.