“Transit holds the key to a successful and prosperous region,” said Minnesota’s Metropolitan Council Chair Susan Haigh, while delivering her first State of the Region speech. Several hundred people attended the State of the Region event at Target Field in Minneapolis, where Haigh highlighted the role of transit in economic development and job creation.
In his 2012 State of the State speech, California Governor Edmund Brown Jr. spoke of plans for a high-speed rail system, which would connect the Northern and Southern parts of the state.
In his speech he stated:
“As governor the last time, I signed legislation to study the concept. Now 30 years later, we are within weeks of a revised business plan that will enable us to begin initial construction before the year is out.
“President Obama strongly supports the project and has provided the majority of funds for this first phase. It is now your decision to evaluate the plan and decide what action to take. Without any hesitation, I urge your approval.
“If you believe that California will continue to grow, as I do, and that millions more people will be living in our state, this is a wise investment. Building new runways and expanding our airports and highways is the only alternative. That is not cheaper and will face even more political opposition.
“Critics of the high-speed rail project abound as they often do when something of this magnitude is proposed. During the 1930s, The Central Valley Water Project was called a “fantastic dream” that “will not work.” The Master Plan for the Interstate Highway System in 1939 was derided as “new Deal jitterbug economics.” In 1966, then Mayor Johnson of Berkeley called BART a “billion dollar potential fiasco.” Similarly, the Panama Canal was for years thought to be impractical and Benjamin Disraeli himself said of the Suez Canal: “totally impossible to be carried out.” The critics were wrong then and they’re wrong now.”
U.S. Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) called on CSX, Amtrak, the New York Department of Transportation and Federal Railway Administration to quickly complete a plan for the construction of the high-speed rail line from Buffalo to Albany, N.Y., that is set to begin in Genesee County. Schumer helped secure $58 million in federal funds to construct the first part of the high-speed rail line in Western New York, but the money cannot begin flowing to the project until the parties complete service, construction and maintenance agreements.
Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton released his bonding proposal for the 2012 legislative session, building on his jobs plan to get Minnesotans back to work. The bonding proposal is focused on making the kind of long-term investments to create jobs. The bill would put up to 21,700 Minnesotans back to work and includes $25 million for the Southwest Corridor Light Rail.
A statement by the Governor’s office said, “Investing in strong, reliable infrastructure is a critical part of building an environment where businesses can thrive. Repairing our roads, bridges and rail lines for the future with smart investments can not only give Minnesota the assets to attract businesses, but can also put hundreds of Minnesotans back to work in the construction industries that are suffering from high unemployment.”
“This bill is our chance to put thousands of Minnesotans back to work by investing in important projects throughout our state. My bonding proposal makes reasonable, focused investments on projects that are ready for immediate action. I hope that the legislature will join me in growing Minnesota’s economy now by passing a bonding bill in the first month of the session. Doing so will enable many of the projects and their jobs, to become realities this year,” Governor Dayton said.
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel officially re-opened the Grand Avenue Red Line Station, which has undergone a complete rehabilitation over the past several years. Additionally, Mayor Emanuel announced that the city will construct a new Green Line station at Cermak, build a new station at Washington and Wabash and conduct a complete rehabilitation at the station at Clark and Division.
Rockford, Ill., received a $3 million investment to develop a new multi-modal station just south of the downtown area. The Illinois Jobs Now! capital plan funding to design and engineer the new facility is in addition to the $60 million allocated to construct the Chicago-Rockford-Dubuque rail corridor. The two projects together are expected to support nearly 700 jobs and bring rail access back to a part of the state that has not seen service in 30 years.
The Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority carried more than 46 million riders throughout 2011, a nearly four percent increase since 2010.
In just December of 2011, GCRTA had an increase of 12.5 percent more riders this year than the same month in 2010. On the Red Line specifically, more than half a million riders used this heavy rail service, making it the highest December Red Line usage since 1988.
For four consecutive weeknights hundreds of New York Metropolitan Transit Authority workers labored through the late night and early morning hours cleaning, inspecting, repairing and replacing subway infrastructure on a nearly seven-mile segment of the Lexington Avenue Line.
The White House Council on Environmental Quality and the U.S. Department of Transportation revealed a pilot program to expedite environmental review of Northeast Corridor high-speed passenger rail projects. The statement below is from Amtrak President and CEO Joe Boardman:
Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority, in joint partnership with the Buckhead Community Improvement District, Georgia Department of Transportation, State Road and Toll Authority, Federal Transit Administration and the city of Atlanta, is preparing to begin construction in the spring on a pedestrian bridge to reconnect the east and west sides of the Buckhead community.
After re-evaluating route options for the Central Valley to Los Angeles Basin segment of California’s high-speed rail system, the California High-Speed Rail Authority’s Board decided to continue to move forward with a proposed route through Palmdale.
A continuation of upgrade and modernization work to the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority Flushing Line and its stations will necessitate suspension of 7 train service between Queensboro Plaza and Times Square for eleven weekends beginning January 21, as well as the full closure of the Court Square Station on the 7 line until April 2, 2012.
The South Florida Regional Transportation Authority’s total ridership, including weekends and holidays, reached 3,948,100 in 2011, up from 3,644,978 in 2010, showing an increase of 8.3 percent.
When Hurricane and then Tropical Storm Irene rode along the East Coast of the United States in late August 2011, reactions to the damage ranged from shocking in the southeast to bullet dodging in New York City. By the time the storm blasted into Vermont on Aug. 28-29, 2011, winds had died down, but the amount of rain that fell unleashed some of the worst flooding the state had experienced in decades. For Vermont Rail System and New England Central Railroad, the storm left the shortlines with track sections hanging in mid air, compromised bridges and shut down both railroads for close to three weeks.
While it’s not unusual for hurricanes and tropical storms to affect the New England Central, according to Charles Hunter assistant vice president of government affairs for RailAmerica, which owns and operates the NECR, the south end of the system located in Connecticut and Massachusetts has been the focus of storms over the past 10 years. In order to prepare for Irene’s impact, Hunter says NECR halted both freight and Amtrak passenger operations prior to Irene’s arrival.
Over on Vermont Rail System, employees were on standby the day of Irene’s arrival. Charlie Lemieux, VRS superintendent of maintenance-of-way, described the preparation as a bit of a waiting game to see what the storm would do. VRS ran patrols in front of trains until waters became overwhelming, operations stopped and employees were pulled off the line for safety.
“As far as any other prep work, there wasn’t much to do until the storm left and we saw what we were dealing with,” said Lemieux.
Both railroads were left to deal with extensive damage. Between the two railroads, there were close to 150 washouts, six compromised bridges and nearly 35 miles of track that had been destroyed.
“NECR had washed out road bed with the rails and ties suspended in mid air, we had bank slides as deep as 50 feet below where the track use to be, mud slides and trees came down over the right-of-way and, while we did not lose any bridges, we had some bridges where the head walls and the piers were affected,” said Hunter.
Lemieux said the Green Mountain Railroad (GMRC), part of VRS, received the worst damage between Rutland, Vt., and Bellows Falls, Vt., where a few bridges were off their abutments and more bridges were lost between Rutland and Hoosick Junction, N.Y.
“We had approximately six miles of track that was totally undermined and washed out and we had at least 15 miles of track that was underwater that we could not access until the water subsided,” said Lemieux.
Once the water receded, Lemieux said only seven miles of track out of the 15 were a total loss and the rest of the damage consisted of superficial washes.
For NECR, the damage was especially painful to discover as the shortline was in the middle of a large improvement project for Amtrak’s Vermonter line. The high-speed rail improvements had just been completed about a month before Irene’s arrival and included installation of continuously welded rail, new crossties, highway-rail grade crossing safety improvements and other track improvements.
“The low point was assessing all the damage, that was pretty depressing,” said Rick Boucher, assistant general manager for NECR, “Especially after a large project where everything had looked so good and then basically, overnight was destroyed.”
“We had brand new cwr hanging in mid air,” said Hunter, “The good news is that because we had installed the rail and installed new ties or re-spiked the ties we were keeping, most of the elements stayed intact even though they were hanging in mid air.”
Post storm, both railroads were shutdown to thru traffic. VRS required an assessment by helicopter after the storm and determined priority to be opening the Green Mountain Gateway between Rutland and Bellows Falls. NECR divided the repair effort into four zones, a plan developed by RailAmerica’s director of structures Bill Riehl and director of engineering Ron Marshall after they completed an on-site assessment of the damage. The worst, zone 3, located in the Roxbury and Braintree Vt., area also dubbed the Red Zone. Work began in zones 1 and 4 and progressed toward the Red Zone.
“We worked toward the Red Zone because we knew access to it would be difficult,” said Boucher. “The plan was to attack [the damage] from each end with the anticipation that by the time we got to the Red Zone, some of the roads would be opened up enough that we could begin to truck some material in and we could bring material in by rail as well, if we had zones 1, 2 and 4 done.”
Access problems due to many roads in Vermont having been washed out by the storm were an issue for both NECR and VRS.
“With anything of this magnitude, there will always be little quirks that will happen along the line that we try to overcome,” said Lemieux. “The biggest one was trying to get the aggregate material to the different locations. A lot of locations were not road accessible and the roads were washed out. It was difficult to get the material to the job sites where it needed to be.”
“We had to actually construct roads to reach our right-of-way to conduct repairs,” said Hunter. “We worked with the local farmers and land owners to get their permission to build roads into those areas and everyone was great to work with. Vermont Agency of Transportation issued a 30-day suspension of environmental permitting for railroad repairs and road repairs, so we were able to get in to do the necessary repairs without the permitting process.”
Once access issues were resolved, the real repair work began and on VRS, bridge repair was a focus.
“On the GMRC there was no traffic because we had a bridge in Proctorsville, Vt., that was off it’s abutment and one in Arlington, Vt., and there were no trains running until we got all bridges safe to run over,” said Lemieux. “One particular contractor that was outstanding was Engineers Construction, Inc., they did a wonderful job for us. We had them concentrating on bridges. Some of the abutments were gone and one bridge, 114, was at a tilt of about 30 some odd degrees.”
Lemieux said that in order to repair the bridge, which was recently completed, the contractors drove pilings down and made a new bridge seat. Heavy-duty cranes were brought in to move the bridge onto temporary pilings so traffic could travel over it before final repairs could be made and the structure was placed on new bridge seats.
NECR had to deal with a lot of holes left by washouts. Dealing with larger holes threatened the shortline’s aggressive recovery schedule.
“At one point, we thought we were falling behind, but once we got through a few critical areas, we made up time,” said Boucher. “We had one area with three large holes, basically a whole curve was just gone with one section of track left in the middle, but the track itself was over a bank and there was just subgrade left. Three large holes had nothing, no subgrade everything was gone. We had to start from the bottom. Some of those holes were 25-30 feet deep and they ranged from five to 800 feet long.”
Boucher also notes the NECR’s bridge contractors, Osmose Railroad Service, Inc., and Engineers Construction, Inc., were responsible for keeping to the repair schedule.
“Initially, we thought it would be Sept. 23 before the bridge work would be completed. Those contractors did a heck of a job to beat their own initial estimates also,” said Boucher.
The shortlines were not alone in their recovery effort. Aid came from the region’s other shortlines, contractors and the American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association. ASLRRA put out an All Points Bulletin for dump cars and both the NECR and VRS said they received a good response from neighboring railroads.
“Railroads are an interesting industry in that not only do we compete with each other but we also cooperate with each other for certain freight movements,” said Hunter. “Generally speaking, the railroads in New England are very response-oriented. When somebody has a problem, the other railroads will help you out.”
It took three weeks for both shortlines to transition between storm-ravaged to back in business. VRS dumped 60,000 tons of rip rap and on the NECR, 15,000 tons of ballast was dumped, 12,500 feet of damaged right-of-way was repaired and all but a small section of new cwr was able to be placed back into service.
Lemieux and the rest of the VRS team were happy with the accomplishment of a quick and thorough recovery effort.
“We had many meetings on it and we came up with a date that we wanted to hit, it could have been a long shot, but that’s what we wanted, we are very proud that we were able to do that,” said Lemieux. “We dealt with a lot of little issues, but the main motivator was that our customers were not receiving their commodities. We were very much customer-oriented to get us up and going because once we’re going, we can help Vermont get up on its feet.”
The engineering department at NECR originally aimed for the railroad to be back in service on Sept. 23. The first train was run on the entire line on Sept. 20, three days ahead of the goal.
“It was a collective effort by everyone, good planning, a lot of support and cooperation from the contractors,” said Boucher. “As we got into that Red Zone, things started going faster than anticipated. We thought we were really going to struggle with accessibility and the repairs actually went a lot quicker than we thought.”
For their efforts to recover from Irene, both railroads were awarded the Herb Ogden Award for Rail Advocacy from the Vermont Rail Action Network.
The last piece of the puzzle is to figure out how to cover the multi-million dollar price tag associated with Irene’s damage. Because Vermont owns the line VRS operates on, the repair effort is eligible for FEMA funds. However, NECR, as a privately owned entity is not eligible, leaving only the Federal Railroad Administration’s Disaster Relief Fund for financial aid.
“There is no money in that fund,” said Hunter. “We’re trying to get that funded, which would not only help our railroad but other railroads in the northeast that sustained damage.”
Waiting around for monetary relief is not something either railroad is doing, as they are both still involved in Vermont’s continued recovery. The state’s highways did not recover as fast as the rail lines. Both shortlines are involved in the running of aggregate to help repair the state’s road network.
Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority General Manager and CEO Richard Sarles recommended operating and capital budgets for the next fiscal year that continue the authority’s path of improvement on safety and reliability, as well as provide more and enhanced service for rail and bus riders.
With demand for intercity passenger rail service on the rise, Amtrak is moving forward with an aggressive agenda for 2012 and building for the future while strengthening current services.
California’s Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority was notified by the Federal Transit Administration that VTA’s $900 million grant request for the Bay Area Rapid Transit Silicon Valley Berryessa Extension Project has received all of the administrative approvals. VTA is now 60 days away from being awarded the anticipated funds through a full funding grant agreement.
Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) urged California Governor Jerry Brown to act swiftly to improve the viability of high-speed rail in California by strongly supporting a plan to move the California High Speed Rail Authority into a transportation agency under the governor’s direction.
Hawaii’s Honolulu Rail Transit Authority awarded a $38.8 million contract to AECOM Technical Services, Inc., to design the project’s airport section of the elevated rail guideway.
For four straight weeknights beginning Monday, January 9, a small army of Metropolitan Transportation Authority New York City Transit workers will perform more than 300 maintenance tasks in stations and tunnels along a segment of the Lexington Avenue 4, 5 and 6 Line stretching between Grand Central-42nd Street and Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn. Service will be suspended in both directions between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m.