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Determined state officials say $2.3-billion New Bedford commuter-rail plan still on track
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Stupid
If you live in New Bedford you probably can't afford a $400 month pass.
$400 a month all for the
$400 a month all for the privileged of sitting on a slow train for an hour plus ride into town. And that's assuming it's running at peak efficiency. Which it won't be.
I'm a supporter of the idea that the South Coast deserves it's share of pie, but this is like gifting them a shinny new water torture device.
The cost of public
The cost of public transportation is a problem. It shouldn't be so expensive as to be burdensome. Did you see the news story that the Seattle Washington Metro has begun giving reduced fares to riders who meet certain income guidelines. The discount is about 50% of the usual fare.
That's not really a fair
That's not really a fair comparison, the kings country metro is basically just a bus system. There is way now overhead and cost to running (extremely old) heavy and light rail systems (in addition to buses). Does Chicago, Philly, NYC, or DC do these kinds of fair reductions based on income?
Unbelievable or perhaps too believable
"But...but...we've already spent X $ on design and consultant work and blah blah blah. And it's going to be an economic boom for this part of the state and blah blah blah. And who cares about those sad little people who have had to deal with the failing infrastructure and lack of investment and refusal to deal with the debt load on the system for the past 2 decades. You know those people. The ones that actually rely on it. Who cares? Let's get the Olympics and everything will magically fix itself. The End."
Talk about a disconnect in priorities. In some country in the world there'd be a revolution and the guilty parties would be forced to acknowledge their wrong doings.
Meanwhile, The Red-Blue Connector Is Abandoned
Much money has already been spent on design and consultant work for the Blue Line connector to the Red Line at Charles/MGH Station. The construction costs for that project are estimated at $750 million.
If the need wasn't already apparent enough, the recent horrendous traffic conditions around Mass General Hospital are further evidence of how useful this missing link in the core transit system would be. It would also take some of the strain off of the already overcrowded Red, Green and Orange Lines in the heart of the city.
Conversely, spending many times that amount to extend Commuter Rail to New Bedford, gives ammunition to those who decry expansion of the Ⓣ and blame it for the Ⓣ's troubles.
The problem isn't expansion, it's ill-conceived expansion and failure to invest in the core transit system.
This....
...is one of those projects that NEEDS to happen. It would reduce the burden on park & DTX as transfer points and make commuting from East Boston & Beyond to the Cambridge area or points south on the red line a much easier commute.
Enough of this crap
I feel like "sunk costs" is part of economics 101. Who cares if the State has already wasted money on this project, that's no reason to continue to waste money. The similarly priced GLX is expected to bring in about 38,000 daily linked trips, SCR maybe gets 8,000 - and will dump those riders into a system already defined by over-capacity transfer points in the city itself. Stupid. I'm all for restoration to FR/NB, but now is not the time - nor frankly, do I think that a somewhat-but-not-really quick service to Boston will help FR or NB arrest decades-long economic decline - that will probably only happen once Providence turns itself around in a significant way.
Just we have perspective here: $2.3 billion for SCR. $1.3bil (+ $1 bil from Federal Gov't) for GLX. Projected cost of Red-Blue Connector ~$750 million, projected cost of BLX Lynn $737 mil to 1$ bil, not to mention the refusal to extend the GL to Medford HIllside/Rt. 16 over "cost" concerns.
Correction
Advocates project the GLX to increase system use by only 5,000-6,000 riders. The majority of the trips you claim, already use one of the many buses in Somerville an/or other subway stations. A similar thing happened to Big Dig users - some simply migrated from other routes rather than new drivers hitting the road.
Our primary goal should be to provide basic transportation where none exists. Future GLX riders already have bus service, so, "rapid" transit is just frosting over basic transit. Hyannis already has private bus service, so trains are not necessary. Likewise, New Bedford and Fall River have buses, but proposed stops along the train path likely not - probably because there isn't enough ridership to support even a bus stop.
A red-blue connector again is an enhancement, not additional service to people.
Public transit preachers want more than just to serve transportation needs, they want public transit to displace other modes by making it more attractive than driving, a tough challenge. Faster with rail and by making roads slower with lane reductions and "traffic calming", cheaper with giant subsidies plus higher gas taxes and RMV fees, and with internet service for those who don't want distractions like driving cutting into their hand held device time. When cars got 15 mpg, public transit was more energy efficient than driving. Now that cars have gotten more efficient and little change in public transit energy efficiency, Cars (and motorcycles) are often better for both the planet and transportation finances!
http://www.planningforreality.org/emissions-facts/
Have you ever tried to take
Have you ever tried to take the bus to Somerville?
It's a patchwork of dozens of random bus routes, none of which run very frequently, and none of which stick to major roads. It's a huge mess, and I frequently end up waiting for 30+ minutes for them because the MBTA's live tracking is not very accurate (mainly due to traffic, etc.) and they're so infrequent I want to make sure I don't miss one.
I frequently decide NOT to go visit my friends in Somerville just because I don't want to have to deal with the buses. The GLX would change that completely. It'd make it so easy to go there.
There is such a tremendous difference between the bus network Somerville has today, and the GLX, in terms of transit accessibility and usefulness, that I can't imagine how you could possibly think that the buses they currently have are good enough.
EDIT: And upon seeing the paragraph you edited in right as I was replying, and then looking at your name, I see that any further discussion is futile.
Then fix the bus routes
Much less costly than $2.2+ Billion.
I'd like to see better rail
I'd like to see better rail transit in the dense neighborhoods that deserve it. But I fear the GLX will only fragment things even more in Somerville.
How often will it run? Frequency is the *most important* factor in useable transit. I'm concerned that they're going to reduce service on a bunch of parallel bus lines that don't exactly run frequently today, because there's going to be a trolley every 10 to 15 minutes which holds an equivalent number of people.
And what percentage of residences will be within walking distance of the widely-spaced stations?
You are not in reality
Back in the 70s there was buses to Alewife. But they extended the Red Line to Alewife anyway. And look what happened -- a tremendous amount of development along that corridor. To not have the Red Line go to Alewife today would be unthinkable. The train gets to nearly standing room only by Davis Sq during rush hour. Once in a while they need to revert to busses and everyone can see how in no way could a bus route been seen as a long term substitution.
The GLX is the same thing. In 20 years you're going to see 2-4 times the number of people living along the route. Property values (and taxes revenue) is already going up and will keep going up. More startups will form along the route. The only serious opposition to the GLX is from people who don't want the increase in population and property values, not nutcases like you who think that public transportation is only for the social detritus too cheap to own a car.
Any place subways are extended turns to gold. Not overnight but in the long term it's one of the best indicators of future economic growth.
You got my opinion wrong
I believe people should be free to choose what mode of transit to use and government to support those choice(s). I am against government choosing what mode people will use and promote that over what people want. I'm also for people paying for what they get (gas tax, tolls, fares etc.).
So, what the GLX is most missing is a way for the city of Somerville and landholders reaping big property value increases to reimburse the MBTA for the investment benefiting them. Cambridge, Quincy, and Braintree also owe the MBTA from previous red line extensions. At least fix the city/town MBTA assessments to be more fair based on services received. If communities paid based on what they get, they would help the MBTA by urging the cutting the least used bus routes rather than always resisting those efforts by the MBTA.
This is how the MBTA should get the extra money it needs, along with less subsidy of fares (congestion pricing, distance pricing on bus/subway).
OK, How
By that logic there would be no public transportation as there would be no "demand" for something that doesn't exist. Conversely, this would give the impression far more people prefer to use NYC's subway system when the reality is that many of those subway riders would prefer to drive but they lack the ability to have a car so they take the train instead.
Your viewpoint is what created the highway system of LA. They figured everyone would want to drive so build out a massive system. Well, now there is nonstop traffic 24/7. They simply can't build highways big enough as the larger the road results in only more traffic. LA is a place where public transit has seen huge improvements in the last 20 years. If people followed your advice they would only build bigger and bigger highways which would create that much more traffic.
Buses are public transit too
Except to subway snobs. Yup, public transit (buses) even benefit from roads! As I understand it, trains were things invented sometime after the horse and wagon and boat, but before bikes, motorbikes, cars, planes, and buses which are all less constrained than trains on paths they may travel.
Giving people (customers) what they want is a capitalistic and democratic notion foreign to communists believing in central planning over freedom of choice.
All this stuff they keep
All this stuff they keep repeating about spending money on 4 new rail bridges being about "SOUTH COAST RAIL IS UNDERWAY!" is pure baloney. They're 4 weight-restricted bridges they had to repair anyway because it hampers freight. That $100M that MassDOT paid CSX a few years ago to buy the Worcester Line, the Grand Junction Branch in Cambridge, the Southie port track that goes in front of the Convention Center, the Fall River/New Bedford lines, and get CSX formally relocated out of Beacon Park...that came with stipulations that they repair these bridges. CSX agreed in that megadeal to turn over freight service on the Fall River and New Bedford branches to Mass Coastal, the small freight shortline in the area. On the understanding that they'd work to develop more freight business down there than CSX had time or energy to devote. And that the combination of CSX saving money not having to run those lines and additional revenue pocketed from Mass Coastal delivering more goods to them at their interchange would end up making CSX a bigger overall profit margin than when they were running the show.
Well...CSX doesn't get more business unless Mass Coastal gets the weight restrictions lifted on these 4 bridges. It is money that would've been still been obligated and spent today even if SCR had been killed off 5 years ago. That was the price of doing business with CSX for complete control of the Worcester Line and being able to move forward on all that Beacon Park redevelopment...two buys that will end up well worth their asking price.
One of the many tragicomedies around SCR is how much the Task Force's design for this boondoggle is going to wreck that very freight revenue we obligated ourselves to help develop down there. Massport's got grand (if overoptimistic) plans to dredge the harbors at Fall River and New Bedford to get bigger ships to the docks, and get more rail transload business at the docks. Well...those palatial stations on the branches are going to have high platforms with no provision for freight passing tracks. Which means that oversize railcars can no longer use either line. Or get exchanged to CSX to drag back on its wide clearance route to Worcester so they can pocket those increased profits. Or take advantage of the kinds of rail transloads that shippers at those expensively dredged harbors would have any interest in. And, because of the electrification the overhead clearances underneath bridges are going to get sharply reduced too. Meaning they won't be able to take anything taller than the minimum from the ports either. No shipping cubes, no big racks of construction materials, nothing of any capacity that actually helps the shippers at the ports or CSX when they get it back to Worcester.
Oops. Well, there's some revenue that's not ever going to go into the South Coast economy or state's coffers.
All of that could've been avoided if this were diesel and the SCR Task Force designed those branchline stations with single car mini-high platforms with retractable edges for ADA compliance like you see all over the Lowell Line or the newer outer stops on the Worcester Line. It's impossible to rig up an 800 ft. long full-high platform with a safely retractable edge, so only certain types of smaller-capacity freight cars can use the lines with full-highs. The mini-high is the default fallback in the T's commuter rail accessibility design guidelines when a station doesn't have enough space for a passing track but there's either pre-existing wide freight (protected by interstate commerce law) or above-average revenue potential for encouraging it.
But no...SCR Task Force wouldn't settle for anything less than the best, and is only in the business of letting its cronies help themselves to gobs of cash from the project slush fund. Freights can screw off. Real--as counted in dollars--revenue and economic development pumped into the South Coast can screw off. Their whole purpose in life is "I got mine". Everyone else: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ .
If they're spending $2.3
If they're spending $2.3 billion, can't they include freight bypass tracks at stations?
"“What is needed from the
"“What is needed from the Baker administration is essentially to keep the pressure on its own people in MassDOT to keep pushing the design work,” Straus said."
What is needed from the Baker administration is to accept the sunk costs and kill the project entirely, before they design another bridge.
Fairmont Line
The MBTA spent eighty million on the Fairmont Line or about one million per daily passenger.
So?
The Fairmount Line is very much a work in progress - its ridership always sucked because the service sucked and the money spent on trackwork and new stations is more of an investment in a future served by more frequent trains.
Once they acquire the DMUs
Once they acquire the DMUs for the line it will be revolutionary for the corridor if they can keep decent headways. Would have been nicer if they electrified the line during the upgrade though and used EMUs instead.
I don't see the Fairmount
I don't see the Fairmount line ever taking off. It doesn't serve a busy corridor or major population centers. It leaves you at South Station where you'll probably have to transfer (i.e. wait, and pay extra for the privilege if you're not using a monthly pass) to get where you're really going. And even with DMUs, there's no way the T's commuter rail will ever have the type of frequency needed to be considered a real transit line.
ARGHHHHHHHHHHHH
ARGHHHHHHHHHHHH DFJFVWWCRHVSUOVSEZBYWVJGDBHDCH.
Do it
There is a lot of misplaced hate for expanding public transportation. People need to think long term (20 years). The T clearly needs to improve maintenance but to cancel expansion is simply shortsighted and wrong.
Perhaps no one in New Bedford needs the train NOW but they will in 15 years. Proximity the public transportation rises property values and tax rates in the long run because people like (and need) to live where they have options even if they don't use them daily. In the 70s there was opposition to the expanding the Red Line beyond Harvard; now it would seem unthinkable.
Rail ridership is increasing in the long term. Car ownership is decreasing. Housing prices in dense urban areas are becoming unaffordable to a majority of the population. While fuel prices have had a rapid fall they will rise again.
An investment in expanding public transportation (coupled with an increase in maintenance) is critical for the long term economic and social health of New England. To stop it now is just as short sighted as putting off maintenance of the current system. It's time for the politicians to think in 20 year terms, not just to the end of the next budget cycle. These are 20-50 year investments.
All true, but...
The SCR is one of the last pieces in building out a more efficient transit network in Boston. The one saving grace is that it will be electrified, but beyond that this is an extremely poor allocation of funds especially considering the dire state of truly critical transfer stations, rolling stock, and signal infrastructure. I think the money dedicated to SCR should be re-administered to more worthy projects; I do not think that's shortsighted, I think it's the most prudent decision available. Even if SCR is a necessary spoke (I believe it is), there are far more meaningful projects that the MBTA refuses/cannot undertake because of funding limitations - which the SCR is partially to blame for. As you say, in 15 years maybe NB will enjoy this train. There are people in Rozzie and Lynn that would enjoy rapid-transit access yesterday.
Expansion isn't the problem
Expansion isn't the problem here - the specific plans are.
Some of the more ridiculous plans:
-giant palatial station buildings in Fall River and New Bedford, rather than a simple platform and waiting room
-electrification, even though the individual branches would basically only see a train each way every 2 hours under the established service plan, and the T won't even run electrics on the Providence line which is 99% electrified already.
-the service plan doesn't provide useful service to anyone, and, in the interest of speeding up service to FR/NB, actually REMOVES existing service at existing Providence/Stoughton line stations (SCR would be an extension of the Stoughton line, and would skip stations that Stoughton trains stop at today.
So many of us opposed to SCR aren't opposed to expansion by principle, just the ridiculousness of this implementation. It could, and should eventually, be done for under 1 billion.
Good points
The point about the stations and possibility the *electrification* is well taken. But the bulk of the work -- getting the tracks ready for passenger trains and basic stations -- should not be scrapped now on account of poor maintenance on the rest of the system.
EDIT: Hopefully I won't be electrocuted for my previous typo.
I Didn't Know About The Electrocution - It's Shocking!
EDIT: "Electrification" is still quite a jolt!
The stop-skipping is worse
The stop-skipping is worse than just the Stoughton stations.
-- Peak trains to Fall River skip Easton Village, Raynham, downtown Taunton, and Taunton Depot (i.e. the Routes 24/140 park-and-ride). You cannot reverse-commute from Taunton to Fall River...and that is an actual commute market. Those people will always be taking the same bus they do today.
-- Peak trains to New Bedford skip Canton Junction, Canton Center, and Stoughton. There's the transit loss to Stoughton Line riders.
-- NO trains--at any point during the day--will stop at Ruggles, Hyde Park, or Route 128. That's right...you can't live in any of the inner 'burbs with access to 128 and park-and-ride for a weekend trip to the outlet malls, be a commuting student to UMass-Dartmouth, or ever do a reverse-commute to a job on the South Coast or Route 24 corridor. And if increased Providence Line service and Westwood Landing someday gaining its footing nets some future office park shuttles running out of that station you'll never be able to commute from the South Coast to any of the big companies based around the south half of 128.
Schedules?
-- Peak schedule to/from Fall River is 1:15 peak, peak schedule to/from New Bedford 1:17 peak. That's actually pretty good for total travel time.
-- BUT... the off-peak schedule, which makes all stops Canton Jct.-south, is 1:17 to Fall River, 1:16 to New Bedford. Wait...how is it possible that making 4 more stops on a Fall River off-peak train only takes 2 minutes longer than peak, and 3 more stops on a New Bedford off-peak is one minute faster? Well...see, there's some other limitations with all that single-track they're not telling you about. Like the fact that there are going to be train meets to weave around and not enough track capacity to do it the way it's done on every other line that has portions of single-track. Since most of the passing tracks are at station platforms, these "express" peak trains are going to pause at the stops they do make. And wait, and wait, and wait while the next train behind them skipping that stop catches up and does an overtake. And then when that train that just blew ahead makes its next stop, it'll pause--and wait, and wait, and wait--for the train it just passed to re-overtake it. Sitting for 10 minutes at a time is not a bug, it's a "feature" built into your train's schedule every single morning and every single evening. The off-peaks, having an empty line, make equal time and all stops because they don't have to wait for freaking ever to stage a meet.
-- Of course, if anything--anything whatsoever--runs late and blows its passing slot...everything going both directions runs late in a cascading delay and has to pause even longer for a schedule correction. So...yeah, those 10-minute waits that are a baked-in "feature" will be 20-30 minute waits every X commutes when @#$% happens. And on a bona fide disaster commute when everything is hosed and a train is broken down away from a passing point you won't move off the platform in Easton or whatever for an hour.
-- By the way, if this were diesel instead of that billion dollars extra for electrification...the difference in travel time would only be 5 minutes longer. 1:20-1:22 instead of 1:15-1:17. Why, other than phoney-baloney "environmental" reasons, does the DEIR insist on electrification? Because 5 minutes is the margin of error before none of those baked-in train meet pause "features" work any longer. So they had to come up with a fake excuse to get on the other side of the divide where theoretically the schedule would work vs. not working at all and needing to be slashed back even further. Hence, the expensive-ass wires.
-- At 80 scheduled trains per week, a 95% on-time performance (which is about the absolute ceiling any commuter rail line can ever be expected to rack up over the span of a month) is still going to mean 4 trains get a 'disaster commute' every single week. Because 5 minutes is the sum total of their margin for error to make a train meet. In reality, there is no feasible way to attain a 'superlative' on-time rate. Each disaster commute causes an immediate delay cascade that makes every other train on the line have a disaster commute...so 4 late trains per week--where it's the train's own fault it's late--ends up taking down 2-3x the number of trains in the fallout. And with only 5 minutes of cushion, the delays don't even have to be for reasons of "T BAD!". Unusually crowded platforms because of some special event, handicapped customer needing extra boarding assistance, holding the train for a minute because a bus just arrived and people are sprinting to the platform, taking an extra minute per stop because of an icy platform where they don't want people sprinting to the train. In other words, "good" customer service reasons the train crews are supposed to be accommodating and which most lines have schedule padding specifically so they can accommodate...can't be accommodated here because 5 minutes is the difference between schedule life and death and they have to close those doors to get moving ASAP or it's all gonna go splat.
-- Oh, yeah. There will only be 10 total trains per day south of Taunton Depot. 4 inbounds at A.M. peak half-hourly, 4 outbounds at P.M. peak half-hourly...then THREE-HOUR headways off-peak and in the reverse-commute direction during peak. Taunton Depot, the last stop before the branches split, will get 90-minute off-peak and contraflow-direction peak headways. That's sparser service than that shrine to pointless waste, Greenbush.
It's not just half-baked. It's all defective by design. At least if they built out to Taunton Depot as Phase I with diesels and single-tracking they would be able to maintain schedules equivalent to the Stoughton Line, making all stops, with Route 128 as a stop. And get those bus transfers from Fall River and New Bedford that already go to Taunton (remember, Fall River-Taunton commuters have to ride the buses forevermore because the train won't even stop between Easton and Freetown). And save $1.5 billion in the process. Then when that doesn't end up being the end of the world for the swamp (which, BTW, gets a bazillion times the pollution from Route 24 runoff), they can double-track the whole thing and THEN build out the branches years later. And run them on a meaningful schedule.
What does building it as a monolith do? No service, no convenient destinations = not a penny more ever sunk into increasing the capacity or encouraging more ridership. A write-off...like Plymouth/Cordage Park on a grand scale. The first lines to get their weekend service suspended in a budget crisis. The quickest hook on the system for weekday cancellations due to bad weather or equipment shortages. The last one to get repaired when something breaks or has a speed restriction slapped on it.
Defective...by...design. This isn't service. This isn't economic development. This is a giant scam.
There presently is no bus
There presently is no bus service between Taunton and Fall River, only between Taunton-Galleria Mall and New Bedford.
Car ownership decreasing? NOT
I just read that Boston resident parking permits are up 22% since 2008. That sure doesn't sound like a decrease in car ownership, especially where MBTA service is most concentrated!
With the economic recovery, driving is again increasing, as are all modes of transit, not decreasing. Jobs to go to, money to spend etc..
The big plan is this:
The big plan is this:
Rail lines to New Bedford get upgraded, not for commuter trains, for trains pushing LNG. In 5 years they will come up with federal money to open an LNG port in New Bedford. Port gets built. No need to have an LNG plant in Boston. Opens up all of Massport property to expansion. Look at how much Massport controls. A new Boston is coming. If you own a condo with views of the harbor, sell soon.
That's good. An increase in
That's good. An increase in sea and rail freight is good for the environment and the economy.