Regional Passenger Rail Projects Await Green Light - On The Other| David Scribner's column from the Berkshire Other

Regional Passenger Rail Projects Await Green Light

By David Scribner

Late on a summer's day in the Berkshires of Western Massachusetts, Jack Fitzpatrick, former state senator and owner of the Red Lion Inn, likes to pace the platform of the Stockbridge rail station he bought 10 years ago for $150,000. Every few paces he turns to peer down the rails, as if expecting to catch a glimpse of the headlight of the evening train from Grand Central Station. It's been 35 years since such an intercity passenger train — then operated by the New Haven Railroad — pulled into the handsome, Sanford White-designed stone station, but Fitzpatrick is convinced it will happen again. He may not have long to wait.

Driven by high prices for gasoline, highway congestion, renewed public calls for energy conservation and by a growing population needing access to New York City, proposals to restore and upgrade passenger rail service in upstate New York and adjacent western New England are receiving renewed attention — even going so far as to suggest reintroducing passenger trains to lines that haven't seen such service in more than half a century.

The rail projects are in vastly different stages. In New York, state Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno has enthusiastically endorsed plans put forward by the New York State Senate High Speed Rail Task Force. These include commuter rail service from Saratoga Springs to Albany and the creation of a high speed rail corridor from New York City to Buffalo. The 10-year project's total cost is pegged at $1.8 billion.

In Vermont, rail revival proponents are clamoring for the state to conclude a deal with Amtrak, the national interstate carrier, to begin service from New York City, through Albany, to Manchester, Vt., to serve the popular recreation facilities in the Green Mountains. The route last saw passenger trains in 1953.

And among the routes being discussed is the rail route, owned by the Housatonic Railroad Company of Canaan, Conn., running from Pittsfield, Mass., south through the heart of the Berkshires to Danbury, Conn. where, after a 10-mile jog west to Brewster, N.Y., it would connect with Metro North to reach the city. Currently, one daily freight each way crawl up and down the route, with speeds along most of the line limited to 15 to 25 miles per hour due to track conditions. For the past seven years during summer and fall, the Berkshire Scenic Railway also operates tourist trains between Lenox and Stockbridge, thanks to $3.6 million state grant to upgrade track and roadbed.

"What's old is new, and against all odds, a viable though fragmented rail transportation network is still here," explains Housatonic Railroad president John Hanlon, during an interview in his Main Street office in Canaan. "I believe we're going to develop passenger rail service the way Europe has developed rail service because, sooner rather than later, we're going to be paying what Europe pays for fuel. Just remember that our daily freight trains represent 200 trucks that are not on Route 7 each day. Rail makes sense fuel-wise, labor-wise, pollution-wise and traffic-wise." His remarks were interrupted by the whistle and rumble of a 25-car northbound freight.

Hanlon also believes that passenger service can "break even."

"It's not that hard to do," he said. "There are 21 to 27 million people living with a 100-mile radius of New York City. I'd like to start a homegrown demonstration project with my railroad that would show it could be done."

Hanlon's plan relies upon what he calls the "political awareness and will" to reform transportation priorities so that an under-utilized right-of-ways would be refurbished to permit a 4-hour schedule from the central Berkshires to New York. That roadbed upgrade does not come cheaply. He estimates it would cost $1 million a mile (it's 96 miles from Pittsfield to Brewster), far less than highway construction but still significant. That price includes station and platform reconstruction, as well as signaling.

Whether that political consensus will coalesce any time soon is open to question.

"There's a huge backlog of transportation projects in Massachusetts, each with a feasibility study, because the Romney administration would not authorize new projects," cautioned Sara Burch, press secretary to U.S. Rep. John Olver (D-Amherst), chairman of the House transportation subcommittee and speaking on behalf of the congressman. "This proposal in the Berkshires is new to us. However, the priority is now being given to programs that are environmentally sensitive."

Still, Hanlon is confident enough in passenger rail's future that he has already purchased 11 double-decker, bi-directional commuter cars from Chicago's METRA system and parked them on a siding in Housatonic.

"I'd like to see a necklace of commuter services restored," he reflected, "not only daily into the Berkshires Express' but also south to Norwalk, Conn. This would be a nice conclusion to my career. Railroads are a living, breathing entity, a marvelous thing."

Surveying his Stockbridge train station, with its old-fashioned ticket booth and polished wooden benches, Fitzpatrick is banking on Hanlon's gamble paying off.

"My fantasy is to at least have weekend service during the summer - a Tanglewood Express - where tourists can get off here and walk up to the inn, or take a shuttle to Tanglewood, Jacob's Pillow, the Berkshire Theatre Festival, or Shakespeare & Company," he said.

Development pressure

For some Berkshire officials, however, the prospect of having Stockbridge, Great Barrington or Pittsfield listed on the train board at Grand Central Station introduces a threat to the Berkshire environment for the very reason that it makes this region more convenient to reach.

"The idea of getting to Pittsfield by train from New York has a lot of romantic appeal," mused Berkshire Natural Resources Council President (BNRC) Tad Ames, "but it would definitely have development implications. It would put more pressure on the Berkshires to become more of a bedroom community of the New York metropolitan region than it's already becoming. People are saying there are enough people here. It's a problem of growth management."

He also cited the issue of intra-regional transportation. "Once people get here," he wondered, "won't they need cars? I've often thought an efficient trolley system - as we had years ago - would be the answer."

Just the same, he admits that "it would be great for people living in the Berkshires to get to New York. Maybe we've got to have the best of both worlds: the democracy of public transportation with the elitism of a private fleet."

Former BNRC President George Wislocki agrees. "I long for rail travel," he commented. "Driving to the city is horrendous, and taking the bus is worse. Pittsfield was once the heart of tourism in the Berkshires. There were ski trains. North Street was lined with hotels because the middle class used to visit here."

Green Mountain ghost train

In southwestern Vermont, efforts to restore passenger rail service between the popular tourist attractions and New York City via Albany experienced challenges the reverse of those in the Berkshires: the rail line between New York state and Manchester, Vt., was upgraded with an $18 million investment and agreements were secured with private railroads to operate passenger trains, but the trains themselves never appeared - at least not yet.

Ten years ago, former three-term state representative Bob Stannard of Manchester joined forces with fellow North Bennington representative Richard Pembroke, then chairman of the Vermont House transportation committee, to obtain a state commitment for funds to restore passenger rail service the former Rutland Railroad line, now the state-owned Vermont Railway, paralleling U.S. Route 7. The route hadn't had passenger trains on it since 1953.

Within three years, Stannard had persuaded 60 to 70 Bennington County businesses to invest $100,000 in Railhead Ltd., the entity spearheading the rail proposal, and had managed to secure state and federal money totaling $18 million — including $4 million in federal funds earmarked by Vermont's two U.S. senators, Patrick Leahy and James Jeffords.

"We had the state buy the five miles of track between North Bennington and Hoosick Junction in Hoosick Falls, N.Y., that Guilford Transportation was going to abandon, and then we put in new ties, crossings and brand-spanking new welded rail all the way to Manchester," recalls Stannard, who is now executive director of the Better Bennington Corporation, a nonprofit downtown development organization.

Railhead Ltd. estimated that 40,000 passengers per year would use the service the daily trains, and be a boon to development and tourism in economically distressed Bennington County. Others did not see it that way.

"This was a project that had to be jammed through the Legislature, because nobody wanted this to happen except those of us in Bennington County," he said.

Railhead Ltd. and the state had planned to have Amtrak, the national passenger rail carrier, operate the service, and Railhead had managed to negotiate contracts with the notoriously difficult Guilford Transportation and also Canadian Pacific Railroad, which owned the tracks connecting Vermont to the Amtrak line to New York City.

"Everyone was waiting for the trains to start rolling when the whole process broke down because we were prevented from negotiating the contract with Amtrak," Stannard contends. "Amtrak offered to run the service for $4.1 million a year. That was ridiculous. They operated two other trains in Vermont for less. But the state didn't bargain with them. The state pulled out because it was too expensive."

In retrospect, Stannard still relishes the campaign, though he has no wish to return to it.

"It's the coolest thing I've ever done," he said. "I built a railroad, and I'm not that much of a train buff."

Now retired from the Legislature, Richard Pembroke is still seeking to revive the project.

"It's getting to be more and more understood that rail is going to play a greater part in our transportation planning," he observes. "We need to get the momentum going again."

He points to the proposal published in The Burlington Free Press in early January from Vermont Rail Council chairman Richard Moulton who argued for the purchase self-propelled diesel multiple units (DMU's) in order to extend Amtrak's passenger from Rutland to St. Albans. In response, Pembroke declared the state should live up to its commitment to what he termed the "Forgotten Kingdom," southwestern Vermont.

For now, the only train using the refurbished tracks in Bennington County is the tri-weekly freight bringing road salt to William F. Dailey Construction in Shaftsbury, and grain shipments to Whitman's Blue Seal Feeds in North Bennington. Snow covers the welded rails to the west.

New York's High Speed Rail Project

With a boost from Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno, the introduction of a commuter rail service between Saratoga Springs, one of the fastest growing communities in the Empire State, through Schenectady to a transportation hub in Albany/Rennselaer, is being given serious study. It is part of a larger plan, the New York State Senate High Speed Rail Project, to upgrade the state's passenger rail corridors.

"We certainly believe a trial run is justified, given the growth of Saratoga County," said Bruce Becker, president of the Empire State Rail Passengers Association. "We give our full support to this demonstration project, and clearly the route through Schenectady is the best."

Although the Capital Region commuter service was initially seen as using the same DMU's being considered by Vermont rail proponents — the units, manufactured by Colorado Rail, are being tested in Florida — there are some concerns that the clearances on the route may not be able to accommodate the self-propelled double-decker units. Colorado Rail, however, does manufacture a single level DMU train set that is in trials in California.

Beyond Saratoga Springs commuter service, the New York High Speed Rail Project calls for two-hour travel times between Albany and New York City, and dramatically faster schedules between Albany and Buffalo. This portion of the project would require additional tracks along the busy CSX mainline where Amtrak passenger trains have to compete with congested freight traffic, which averages 60 trains a day.

The future of passenger rail improvements, both in New York and in western New England, Becker believes, depends upon long-term stable funding for rail projects from the state and federal government.

"We're cautiously optimistic," Becker said. "There's a new interest in rail from the governor's office, and a bipartisan effort in the Senate, sponsored by Senators Lautenberg and Lott, to allow states to use federal transportation funds for passenger rail projects."

This article appeared in the January 2007 Hill Country Observer as its cover story.