OT: - High Speed Rail Through Storrs? | Page 4 | The Boneyard

OT: High Speed Rail Through Storrs?

Chin Diesel said:
You can make 44 or 6 a better, more direct link to Providence without killing most of the small town charm and scenery. You get more than a mile away from that road in any direction and you won't notice any difference. You'd probably have one or two towns that end up with an extra gas station and fast food joint and that's about it.

Unfortunately in CT and RI this is enough to derail a project that would be of great benefit to the overall region.
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Hell, 384 ends just 9 miles from UConn's campus currently. They could build the 9 miles and a massive parking garage at the depot campus and be done with the project in 6 months.

The locals would fight to the death over that 9 miles like it was sacred ground.
 
Zero chance. This is the Patriots are coming to Hartford all over again.

Question, is there an existing rail line on this supposed route? No?

Do you think they will be able to acquire a virtual straight line right of way to build this? No?

Do you think that this eye of a needle golden path is free of obstructions that will happily step aside or be thrilled at the idea of being right next to a high speed train? No?

Do you think this path is essentially flat or that the number of bridges and tunnels will be less than 100? No?

High speed rail in the Northeast if it happens at all will start with GCT to NH, then it would continue along the coast to PVD and BOS. The Casinos might...might, get a spur line if they pay for most of it.

You are barely getting a frontier level rail link between NH, HFD, and SPG. You actually think a virgin ground bullet train is going to be pushed through cow country with nary a stop where people actually live?

This is a joke and a poor one.

Edit: I just remembered why the abbreviation for Hartford gets changed to Voldemort.

Talk about the need for an infrastructure upgrade. Lol.
 
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Mr. Wonderful said:
Hell, 384 ends just 9 miles from UConn's campus currently. They could build the 9 miles and a massive parking garage at the depot campus and be done with the project in 6 months.

The locals would fight to the death over that 9 miles like it was sacred ground.
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Yeah, that's low lying fruit but good luck with the Bolton and Coventry residents along that route.
 
Lots of interesting ideas. In a perfect world we would have high speed service from Boston -Hartford-NYC with spurs off that. Europe and Asia have done this for decades. Unfortunately, we can't seem to execute well. Taxpayers paid millions for busway from NB to Hartford and ridership is very low....even before Pandemic
I would love to see better transportation between Hartford and surrounding cities. It would bring more life to our region
 
Hoophound said:
It’s an easy drive. The first time seems lengthy, after that it’s nothing. I went to Bryant for undergrad and headed to UConn often to visit friends. I also had season tickets. Easy trip at 60-65mph. Never got a speeding ticket.

However, one day I left Bryant to visit a friend in Newport for the day, got a ticket just outside the entrance to the Bryant campus. That night I left Newport and got a ticket on the Newport Bridge. Rough day.
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RI police are maniacal about tickets (revenue). Unfortunately for me, the road that runs by my street connects Woonsocket to 495, so is about 1/3 RI cars. They all go 2 MPH (or worse) under the speed limit. It's annoying as hell. Almost nobody drives the speed limit in MA.
 
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They love to post up right outside the borders in Putnam and killingly and act like it’s illegal to have a CT license plate. Similar in MA
 
HuskyHawk said:
There is already Acela. Anything they do would mirror that route. Seems they are upgrading the trains. I haven't taken it but the time from Boston to DC is roughly the same as driving, and slower than flying. Its not nearly as fast as it should be.

The brand new Amtrak Acela fleet is coming; Here's a first look inside the new trains (thepointsguy.com)
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The problem with the Acela is probably going to be the same problem with any other high-speed train passing through that corridor: there are too many densely-populated areas along the route, during which the train cannot travel at or near its top speed. That means you save little time but pay twice as much. I have only taken it once, when a client was paying.
 
8893 said:
The problem with the Acela is probably going to be the same problem with any other high-speed train passing through that corridor: there are too many densely-populated areas along the route, during which the train cannot travel at or near its top speed. That means you save little time but pay twice as much. I have only taken it once, when a client was paying.
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Yeah, the article I linked said it was how old the rails were plus the sharing of those lines with freight and slower passenger trains. But I'm sure density is an issue too.

I'm not sure it's a wise investment really, as the current trend with WFH seems to be spreading people out. Commuting from NY to DC or Boston to NY for a meeting is likely to remain a Zoom event for many.
 
Acela is great....often sold out....very popular for people in NYC area to get around the corridor. There are only two types of people on Acela; 90% business folk and 10% college/trust fund kids moving about.

The amazing thing is that the Acela service with its high costs actually makes $ for Amtrak. Imagine that, a government run transportation service that delivers positive cash flow and that people like rather than resent. New Acela trains are set to be delivered in the coming years replacing the current fleet.

The problem with Acela is not just the density along the lines reducing max speed, its the fact that its a shared line - shared with regular Amtrak and every local metro commuter rail service in the respective cities it passes through. The sharing means the tracks are crowded and thus Acela must navigate with caution.

The existing corridor, particularly from NYC to DC could be reworked. The challenge would be for society to go w/o rail for like 3-4 years while the system is rebuilt.

The NYC to Boston connection is challenged by hills, rivers, marshes, deltas, beaches, cute towns, etc etc. Reworking the line through CT at the moment seems politically impossible. The inland route means miles after miles after miles of arguments about ruining towns via a bisecting rail line. The shore route means environmental challenges up the wahzoo, and it means expensive upgrades that wont achieve meaningful time improvement. The cost to upgrade the New England track is dramatically higher than the NYC-DC stretch. Which Gov and Sen is going to be the face of literally railroading their way through CT? No one. But in the mean time the drawings and press releases are fun.

Look for the NYC-DC line to eventually get that dramatic upgrade. That is possible.
 
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ClifSpliffy said:
farming in Connecticut is on an explosive growth curve in the past few years.
here, have a brand new 'harvest' industry, just getting started:
The Day - CT Sea Grant awarded major federal grant to help fledgling domestic kelp industry - News from southeastern Connecticut
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businesslawyer said:
The Fairfield train station opened in the 1890s. At that time, the time it took to get from Fairfield to Grand Central was about ten minutes LESS than it is 130 years later.

My point — I’ll believe you can get from New York to Boston by train in two hours when I see it. And I’m not going to lose sleep waiting for it.
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No idea on Farming.

As far as the fairfield train. SMH. What is wrong with out city planners. The new haven line is a joke with its speed.

I will say the NB/Hartford busway is an excellent service. I don't know why people hate it, probably because they wont use it. My biggest beef is lack of parking at some of the stations.
 
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UConnDad said:
Haven’t tried Acela but I’ve used Amtrak 3 times in the past year. Bridgeport to DC. Way better than driving.
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Yeah, having one daughter living in Baltimore and another in DC, we've used Amtrak's regular service literally dozens of times the past few years. No issues, except the pricing varies wildly based on demand, which means last-minute changes can be costly or impossible during peak times.
 
8893 said:
Yeah, having one daughter living in Baltimore and another in DC, we've used Amtrak's regular service literally dozens of times the past few years. No issues, except the pricing varies wildly based on demand, which means last-minute changes can be costly or impossible during peak times.
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Same here. Daughter lives in Arlington. For the first trip didn’t realize booking way in advance was much cheaper. Thought it was always the same like Metronorth.
 
JohnFSilver said:
I will say the NB/Hartford busway is an excellent service. I don't know why people hate it, probably because they wont use it. My biggest beef is lack of parking at some of the stations.
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I just read about development and apartments being built near the busway. So it's working.
 
8893 said:
Yeah, having one daughter living in Baltimore and another in DC, we've used Amtrak's regular service literally dozens of times the past few years. No issues, except the pricing varies wildly based on demand, which means last-minute changes can be costly or impossible during peak times.
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I've taken Amtrak from Stamford to Philly several times and the ride is much more enjoyable than staring at brake lights as far as the eye can see driving through lower Fairfield and Westchester Counties. Acela costs a bit more depending on how far in advance you get a ticket because it's faster/nicer but knowing that I won't have to battle traffic on the GWB and other various areas is worth it alone. I can also get some work done and/or catch up on TV shows on the ride as well.
 
RI pretty much killed Route 84. The most prominent reason given was due to environmental concerns because it would go near the Scituate Reservoir which supplies 60% of the state's drinking water. There was also not much demand in RI for a quick route to Hartford. Route 84 was far more supported in CT with much of it tied to a far faster and direct route for Hartford metro residents to their vacation homes on Cape Cod.
 
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