Tulsans who love to hear
the eardrum-piercing sound of a train blowing its horn as it slowly snakes
through downtown will be glad to know the city still has a ways to go before it
can designate part of downtown a "quiet zone," according to the Tulsa, Okla., World.
Further repair work will
be performed at 168th and 181st Street Stations along the MTA New York City
Transit 1 Line the weekend of August 29-30. The work requires suspension of
train service between 137th Street and Dyckman Street from 12:01 a.m. Saturday,
August 29th until 5 a.m., Monday, August 31st. During this period, it will be
necessary, once again, for customers to either use A Line service, if possible,
or a temporary bus shuttle between Dyckman Street and 137th Street.
Track maintenance on the
Red, Orange and Green lines in the Washington, D.C., area over the weekend of
August 29-30 will cause inbound and outbound trains to take turns sharing one
track. Customers should add at least 30 minutes of time to their trips.
Red
Line Track Maintenance
Metrorail customers traveling between the
Grosvenor-Strathmore and Friendship Heights Metrorail stations should add at
least 30 minutes of travel time to their trips because Metro will make tunnel
repairs and replace rail and rail fasteners that stabilize the tracks.
The launch of the new
Canada Line transit system in Vancouver will mean a key change in customer trip
planning. Because one of the new Canada Line stations is located on Broadway,
concerns have been raised by police, ambulance and fire dispatchers of
potential confusion between Broadway/City Hall and Broadway/Commercial SkyTrain
station.
With the money already in
place to build what likely will be two overpasses and one underpass at three
major rail crossings in Galesburg, Ill., there is more good news, The Register-Mail
reports. The state has applied for about $550 million of federal stimulus
money, $52 million for what Illinois is calling its "Galesburg congestion
relief project."
The Dakota Minnesota
& Eastern dropped its condemnation lawsuit against several Wyoming
landowners in northeast Wyoming, the Casper Star-Tribune reports.
In
addition, the DM&E said current regulatory and economic conditions for its
proposed rail expansion into the Powder River Basin coal-mining district are
not good.
Sound Transit opened bids
for work that will get under way next year to bore light rail tunnels
connecting Capitol Hill and the existing Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel. The
apparent low bid was submitted by JCM U-Link Joint Venture, formed by Jay Dee
Contractors of Livonia, Mich.; Frank Collucio Construction Company of Seattle;
and Michaels Corporation of Brownsville, Wis. Its bid of $153,556,000 came in
12 percent, or $20.7 million, below the Sound Transit engineer’s estimate of
$174,304,700.
BNSF is pushing Congress to
scale back a requirement for carriers to install automatic-braking systems on
most of their tracks, reports Bloomberg News. "Heavy-handed" legislation
enacted last year would cost Fort Worth, Texas-based BNSF almost $2 billion,
Chief Executive Officer Matt Rose said.
Community leaders joined
with the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority to break ground for a new
$8.5-million Rapid Transit station on East 55th Street and the east
end of I-490.The new station
will continue to serve both light rail (RTA’s Green and Blue lines) and heavy rail (RTA’s Red Line). The station is also served by bus routes #2 and #16. The estimated completion is fall 2011.
Union Pacific is investing
nearly $11 million in track improvements to its Hiawatha-to-Upland, Kan., line.
When the project is complete, crews will have removed and installed more than
72,000 ties, spread more than 30,000 tons of rock ballast, renewed road
surfaces at 123 crossings and replaced rail in various curves on the line. Work
began on the project August 26 and is scheduled to be completed by the end of
September.
Traffic back-ups on
Arlington Boulevard and on Howell and 14th streets in Greenville, N.C., should
decrease when it becomes easier for trains to pass through those areas later
this year, the Greenville Daily Reflector reports. Construction on a new
connector railroad track near the intersection of 14th and Beatty streets
should begin at the end of September, according to Greenville Public Works
Director Wes Anderson.
Rail service between the
Blue Line’s Western/Milwaukee and Washington stations temporarily will be
suspended from 10 p.m. Friday, August 28 until 4 a.m. Monday, August 31 as work
continues in the Dearborn subway to reduce slow zones. In addition, a single
track will be in effect between the UIC-Halsted and LaSalle stations from
midnight until 2 a.m. on Monday, August 31. Eastbound customers at the UIC-Halsted, Clinton and LaSalle
stations must board and exit trains from the westbound side of the platform.
The Federal Transit
Administration released $64.5 million in federal stimulus funds to Miami-Dade
Transit for Metrorail and Metromover facility upgrades, the purchase of hybrid
buses and other significant infrastructure projects for the transit system.
The Environmental
Protection Agency has ordered BNSF to begin removing contaminated sediments in
the upper reach of the Whitefish River by Sept. 25, the Whitefish Pilot
reports. The order follows a finding that the company is responsible for the
river contamination under the Oil Pollution Act, said David Romero, an on-scene
coordinator from the EPA’s Region 8 office in Denver. Romero said he informed
BNSF of the finding in March.
ConnectUs, Inc., said
that it and its coalition of business, labor and environmental groups had sent
letters of support and endorsement to U.S. Transportation Secretary LaHood in
support of Florida’s application seeking $30 million for the Preliminary
Engineering and NEPA Environmental studies for the Orlando-Miami corridor.
Transportation Secretary
Ray LaHood announced that 13 grants totaling $189.8 million in Recovery Act
funds will go to improve state and local transit systems in the United States
while supporting the creation of jobs and providing much needed transportation
options for millions.
Members of Amalgamated
Transit Union Local 1555 voted to approve the four-year tentative agreement
that their leaders and BART negotiators reached on August 16.
New Jersey has applied for
federal funding to replace the 100-year-old, two-track bridge that carries
Northeast Corridor trains over the Hackensack River in the Meadowlands, the Philadelphia
Inquirer reports. Nearly 500 Amtrak and NJ Transit trains now use the swing
span, known as the Portal Bridge.
U.S. Transportation
Secretary Ray LaHood and U.S. Senator Arlen Specter broke ground on a $9.3-million
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act project to renovate the Elizabethtown,
Pa., Amtrak station.
A group of local grain
producers is playing a live game of monopoly, local newspapers report. However,
it is taking the "Chance card" from the game by taking matters into its own
hands. The members of the group will be the first Alberta independent co-op
owners after coming up with the winning bid to purchase a rail line from
Camrose to Alliance.
