SEPTA’s Chestnut Hill East Regional Line Shut Down This Summer for Maintenance
Written by Jennifer McLawhorn, Managing Editor
SEPTA
PHILADELPHIA - SEPTA will shut down service on the Chestnut Hill East Regional Rail Line from June 15th to September 2nd to allow for five bridges to be repaired.
According to the report, SEPTA will work on five “poorly rated bridges” are around a century old and are located at Wayne Avenue, Logan Street, Chew Avenue, Mt. Pleasant Avenue and Cresheim Valley Drive. SEPTA’s Chief Engineer of Engineering, Maintenance, and Construction Kate O’Connor said this $23 million maintenance project “does not mean that they’re unsafe. But what it does mean is that we want to be proactive and get out ahead of it.”
Crews will conduct masonry work and repair the structural steel. Additionally, crews will work on ADA improvements at the Chestnut Hill East Station, work on the overhead wires, and perform vegetation management.
O’Connor continued, “The idea is that by shutting down the entire line, we can knock out five bridges, do rehabilitation on all five bridges, bring them to a state of good repair within that one summer. . . While 11 weeks might sound like a lot of time, it isn’t a lot of time considering the scope of work that has to be done. . . It might feel like an inconvenience to have this summer outage where people who are used to relying on the Chestnut East Hill Line have to go to the Chestnut Hill West Line. . . But in the long run, this is going to help things and make less of an impact on riders daily.”
