It has been a while since we have had a top-five list on here, and I am bored to tears right now . . .
Assuming that this recession does not take years to recover from and “this too shall pass,” what do you think the five most needed/most likely to see capacity improvement projects are?
I am sure this is terribly amaturish, but mine are in order of most needed to least:
(1) CREATE;
(2) BNSF Transcon;
(3) UP’s Sunset;
(4) NEC;
(5) NS’ Decatur, IL to Lafayette IN ex-Wabash main.
Gabe
#1: No doubt!!
#2 & #3: these are the same thing, pretty much, Right? competing for the same business,
#4. Interesting possibility, perhaps a good platform for a WPA like project to stimulate the economy.
#5 why do you specify between Decatur AND LAFAYETTE? (curious)
To my knowledge, that is the busiest part of the line. Sometimes it staggers me to sit and watch trains on the Wabash line between Decatur and Saint Louis, and to realize that east of Decatur, the traffic from Decatur - Kansas City is included and it is still only single track.
Gabe
OK, this looks like it’ll be fun (I’m sharing your pain/ boredom, too !), so here’s a partial response and submission:
(1) CREATE - Agree !
(2) BNSF Transcon - well underway, almost done, only 3 short segments to go, so we need to find something else;
(3) UP’s Sunset - essentially ditto;
(4) NEC - Agree ! If this doesn’t already include a new set of tunnels under the Hudson (North) River, then it should, because they are absolutley at capacity (19 to 22 trains per peak hour, I believe), although this could be a separate project all by itself. See also (A) below;
(5) NS - don’t know enough about it to say, but it seems awful local = I haven’t heard about this before.
Here’s some other contenders, IMHO, in no particular order:
(A) New or upgraded freight main(s) parallel to and just inside (west) of the NEC, from Harrisburg, PA south to Miami, or at least as far as Jacksonville (FEC can take it from there). NS has been working on its Shenandoah Valley line, so that’s a start, but it needs to continue further south. The CSX lines are near or at capacity from Washington, D.C. on south - just look at the Amtrak delays;
(B) New or upgraded high-speed passenger main - including electrification - to extend the NEC from Richmond south to Miami/ Jacksonville, including to the North Carolina system. Again, CSX is at capacity - look at the Amtrak delays, and TGV-class trains shouldn’t be on the same tracks with freight anyway;
(C) Upgrade the ex-NYC “Water Level Route” all the way from NYC to Chicago for high-speed passenger main - including electrification, to connect those 2 hubs and the many cities along the way. Six to 8 hours ought to be the goal - roughly competitive with the airlines if travel to airports and check-in
I’d like to play, but what is CREATE? If its Chicago I think all in RRing would agree on it being #1
John
I am not sure if any capacity project $$$ coming from Federal Government is going to the state of Illinois (CREATE), particularly with the past couple of days considered.
If it is flowing to Illinois, might I suggest the Olney, Il to Newton, Il segment of the former Illinois Central branchline? There really isnt any traffic to move on the line, but it sure would be nice to walk the rails on a Sunday afternoon like we did 30 years ago. Hey, I had to ask…
ed
Hmm. Since we already had a thread on resurrecting rail lines, I’ll assume you meant upgrade already existing lines. That eliminates two of my choices.
Triple-track the ex CNW from Proviso to Rochelle. UP needs a bigger parking lot[8D]
Triple-track the EJ&E through the western suburbs and let any and everyone use it for run-through trains.[:-,]
Finish the SF transcon two-track project.
Upgrade the I-5 corridor on the Left Coast. Not sure which line would be the best bang for the buck, but something needs to be done in that area.
Assuming we’re still making automobiles in MI, I would two track the NS from Fort Wayne to Decatur even though NS does’t like to think about it until a line gets over 50 trains a day. Once auto and parts traffic picks back up, this line will hum.
How about the KCS line through Texas to Mexico? Trains Magazine did a story some years back about KCS running on UP trackage rights, and how slow it was.
Move some of the traffic OUT of Chicago. Build up the capacity through St Louis and Kansas City. They have good east west lines throught those cities. Double or triple track them and speed train movements by braking the Chicago bottleneck…
That’s reasonable. I was just wondering because there really isn’t much divergence at Lafayette, is there?
I’d think that all the way to Logansport would be better, since the segment along IN route 25 frequently seems bound up.
This is predicated upon the auto traffic rebounding, which I seriously wonder about.
I recall reading that as well. very interesting story…
Aren’t they in progress on some of that?
Gabe,
Have you been asleep at the switch? The UP has been double-tracking the Sunset Route for the past year. Double track is now complete as far west as Tucson, Arizona, and they are working on the line between Tucson and Yuma, Arizona now. A lot of work is also being performed in California to upgrade to double track mainline all the way between Colton, California and the east coast.
There are also proposals to build a new, 6 mile long, automated hump yard at Red Rock, Arizona and a new refueling and service facility in New Mexico just outside El Paso, Texas to relieve the congestion in El Paso’s yard.
Words can’t do CREATE justice, so…
Definitely number one on any list. And Illinois’ problems notwithstanding, this program is just what the doctor ordered for infrastructure improvements, both railroad and highway.
Parallel to CREATE, but for some reason not tied to it, is the Metra plan for increasing capacity on the UP West Line. It’s meant to improve Metra frequency, but the added crossovers and replacement of other interlockings will help UP traffic as well, and other Metra lines, too (the relocation of the Western Avenue crossing is what I’m thinking of here–not to mention that the whole idea of expanding the West Line was because BNSF was already at capacity).
Someone mentioned three-tracking Proviso to Rochelle. Amen to that–and UP may have plans for expansion of the third track beyond Metra territory. But why stop there? You could also use a third track as far west as Nelson, at least, and then a second track down the Peoria Sub to Edelstein.
There are other places between Nelson and Gibbon Junction where a third track would come in handy. Another track over most, if not all, of the Blair line from Mo. Valley to Fremont would be useful. If there is still any good old Double Track between Fremont and Gibbon, make it CTC–and quickly! Closer to home for me, it would be nice to see third track added at some of the places where traffic often becomes congested–from Clinton west to Cedar Rapids is rough (and I’m sure Jeff and Larry could tell us some tales about other places in Iowa!). If the new crew-change point at Low Moor will include fueling pads, there should be enough trackage to accommodate t
The NS west of Porter is the busiest segment with up to 100/day, but as far as I can tell, it runs pretty smoothely. I’ve heard that Amtrak has big delay’s between here and Chicago, but I’ve never really seen much congestion myself, except that westbound freight trains are often held outside of the junction for very long times waiting for the Amtraks. And Porter - Elkhart has as many trains as Elkhart - Butler.
I’m not a dispatcher so I really don’t know, but this line is very fluid from what I can tell, even with around 80 trains per day in places like Goshen where the Marion branch joins the main. I’m not exactly sure how NS can keep trains moving so well compared to UP’s and CSX’s double track east/west main lines into Chicago, even with more trains and more higher priority trains.
It seems to me RR’s have made it clear they don’t want out of Chicago. Recently, much of NS and UP’s run through domestic intermodal business has been shifted from Memphis and St. Louis to Chicago. BTW, anybody know how much business this translates to?
A few (er dozen) flyovers in Chi-land would be most help me thinks.
Carl has hit on some good needs. While my trip on Amtrak between Chicago and DC last week was on the advertised, that was due in a large part to the obvious reduction of traffic on the west end of NS’s Chicago line. My two trips earlier in the year had us snaking around trains coming and going in that area and I have seen it identified as one of the most congested pieces of mainline in the country.
A couple of things that I picked up in recent months. When I was in Sacramento, I caught a presentation by the UP that covered the latest on the Donner Pass route. It was shortly after the UP turned down $75 million from California to go toward the re-double tracking of that route. In exchange for the grant, Calfornia wanted the rights to run passenger trains on the route and while the UP does handle Amtrak’s CZ on the route, they decided that the additional potential obligations for running passenger was not worth the grant offer. Double tracking is out, but they are going forward of clearing tunnels for double stacks. When done they will swing a number of trains off the Feather River route. It was pretty clear that they see the two routes providing ample capacity for their needs for the foreseeable future. Obviously, the completion of the Donner Pass double track remains a prospect for some time in the future.
The other is in regards to CREATE. From an authoritive source, work continues on that project for those pieces that can be accomplished with the limited funding-primarily work of immediate benefit to the frieght railroad operations. A good part of the projected costs for CREATE were for over/under passes at spots where major streets now cross rail lines at grade. Flyovers are another category of projects on hold. As I recall, those were designed to provide significant improvements for passenger services. Those two types of projects were shown as justifie
Capacity is added when railways want to increase volume, speed, or reliability. A rule of thumb is that in a given lane, capacity is installed incrementally in inverse proportion to its cost. Sidings in open country are the first to be extended, and typically engineered and shoved here and there to avoid having to double-track major bridges, tunnels, road crossings, high fills, and deep cuts. Eventually all the inexpensive siding extensions are accomplished, and then to create additional capacity the railway has to start dealing with the bridges, tunnels, cuts, wetlands, etc., all of which are much more expensive to attack.
Most of the easy, cheap, simple, capacity has been added already. Now we are taking on some of the expensive increases such as mountainous territory, sidehill construction with significant embankments and cuts, medium-length spans in the 50-100’ range, and urban areas where there is not room to jam another main track under all the highway overpasses, there are lineside buildings that have to be purchased and demolished, and a zillion grade crossings that have to be separated. I am reviewing tonight a cost estimate on a single 20-mile installation of a third main track in a corridor that will cost $1.5 to $2.0 billion.
Twenty years from now we will have to start dealing with large bridges, long tunnels, and urban areas where land acquisitions are required, and then the pricetag will truly be breathtaking.
RWM
Call me a curmudgeon but, IIRC, didn’t the Pennsy build the tunnels with a capacity of 72 trains per hour? As Trains “Professional Iconoclast” once said in reply to doubts about that number, “They may have had them stacked up halfway to Montauk, but I saw it”.
I pretty much remember that quote from John G. Kneliling, Jr. - certainly the justifiably assertive, self-confident attitude - but not that specific number. I believe the quote had to do with the Pennsy successfully handling World War II passenger traffic, probably at Christmas or New Year’s, and why Amtrak (or Penn Central or the PRR, whichever it was at the time) couldn’t do as well as the PRR of old back then when John was writing for Trains, or now (your point), a view that I too share often enough.
Nevertheless, I doubt that number was for the Hudson (a/k/a North) River tunnels, which are only a pair of single-track tubes. Perhaps tha figure should apply instead to the tunnels under the East River, where there are 4 Amtrak (ex-PRR) and LIRR tracks, and which is the set of tunnels closest to Montauk, and so would make more sense in that context. [Edit - add:] Additionally, if 3 tracks were assigned to one direction - westbound, in this instance - leaving 1 for any traffic in the other direction (eastbound), then 72 trains per hour over 3 tracks = 24 trains per hour per track, which is entirely consistent with the following:
Further, consider the following quote from an article in Railway Age, J
Trust me, as someone who tries to get my trains over the NS from Porter to Curtis/Rock Island Junction, the NS is anything but smooth.
At the Risk of more East Coast parochialism (I am a New Englander) build (or actually complete as the slurry walls were installed as part of the infamous Big Dig) the Boston North South Rail link tunnel to connect North and South stations…
I also think NS’s new partnership with Pan Am railways would benefit from a project to increase clearances in the Hoosac Tunnel to accomadate full height domestic doublestacks…