Cos Cob Bridge Replacement
The Northeast Corridor has eight movable bridges in Connecticut; other than one that was replaced in the 1990s, all are considered by Amtrak and Connecticut DOT to be both critical priorities for replacement and also major undertakings. The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law funded two, on the Connecticut and the Norwalk Rivers. The costs are enormous, beyond any justification: the Walk Bridge replacement is funded at $1 billion for a four-track bridge of 200 meters, and the replacement will still be a movable bridge rather than a fixed span with enough clearance below for boat traffic. The cost can be compared with an order of magnitude of tens of millions of dollars for comparable or longer bridges, for examples $50 million for one of the Rhone bridges on the LGV Méditerranée and $32 million for an 800 m viaduct on the Erfurt-Nuremberg line.
The goal of this post is to focus on the Cos Cob Bridge on the Mianus River. Among the eight bridges, it is the one with the least advanced plans for rehabilitation, such that no cost figure is given, but rumors put it in the mid-single digit billions for a viaduct of about 1 km, crossing about 250 m of water. Among the bridges west of New Haven, it is also the one with the most constrained alignment making replacement more necessary to fix the right-of-way geometry: the bridge itself is straight but flanked by two short, sharp curves, and replacement should be bundled with a wider curve.
The NEC Webtool outlines one alignment, with a wide curve, 2,400 meters in radius. The snag is the vertical alignment. The bridge needs to be high enough to clear boat traffic below; I-95 slightly upriver has a clearance below of 14.9 meters (Wikipedia says 21 meters but that’s the top of the deck, not the bottom), and with a typical deck thickness of 1.5 meters it means top of rail needs to be about 16.5 meters above sea level – but the Riverside station 450 meters east of the midpoint of the river has top of rail 10 meters above sea level and the Cos Cob station under the I-95 overpass 450 meters west of the midpoint is 8 meters above sea level. To build it as a high span thus requires rising 8.5 meters over 450 meters.
The current Northeast Corridor plans hew to a much lower ruling grade. The Walk Bridge is being replaced with another movable bridge and not a high fixed span because the standards call for a 1% grade. This is, frankly, dumb. The passenger trains are electric, either commuter rail EMUs or powerful intercity trains capable of climbing 4% grades over a short section, even the medium-speed Northeast Regionals. The freight trains are long enough that what matters isn’t so much the maximum grade as the maximum grade averaged over the length of a train, in which case peaking at 4% over a length of 450 meters is not at all problematic.
With a 4% standard, the question is not about the grade, but about the vertical curve radius. Standards for those are tighter than for horizontal curves. Vertical and horizontal curve radii both follow the formula ar = v^2, but the acceleration limit a is much tighter since there is no tilting or superelevation, and on a crest a high speed also reduces the effective weight acceleration and thus reduces train stability. In Germany, a is limited to 0.482 on a crest and 0.594 on a hallow, both requiring special permission; in Sweden, the German crest value is the minimum limit, with no special dispensation on a hallow. The upshot is that at 250 km/h, the exceptional vertical curve radius is 10,000 m and thus it takes 400 meters just to get to 4%; over a length of 450 meters, the maximum average gradient is 1.125% if the higher acceleration rate on a hallow isn’t used or 1.25% if is and the tracks can only rise respectively 5 or 5.5 meters. To make it 8.5, the speed limit needs to be reduced: at 200 km/h, the vertical curve radius is 6,400 meters and then over 225 meters the trains can get up to 3.5% and, if it’s symmetric, over 450 they can climb 7.9 meters, and if it’s asymmetric then they can climb more than the required 8.5%. It’s dirty but it does work.
The issue is then how this affects construction. I don’t know why the Connecticut bridge replacements are so expensive, beyond the observation that everything in Connecticut is exceptionally expensive, usually even by the standards of other Northeastern American rail projects (for example, infill stations), let alone European ones. The local press articles talk about staging construction to avoid disturbing the running track, and if this is the main difficulty, then building a new bridge 50 meters upriver should be much easier, since then the only part of the project interfacing with the existing track is the track connections on firma.
Whatever it is, a multi-billion dollar pricetag is not believable given the required scope. More difficult construction has been done for two orders of magnitude less on this side of the Pond. On a different mode but in the same region, the 10-lane 1.4 km long Q Bridge cost $554 million, around $790 million today, which, relative to the size of the bridge, is still around an order of magnitude cheaper than Walk and more than an order of magnitude cheaper than what Cos Cob is rumored to be.
Pedestrian Observations 
“and if it’s asymmetric then they can climb more than the required 8.5%.”
m, not %
Armchair guess: do CT projects have an embedded requirement that workers live in CT, at CT housing prices? Perhaps due to state-specific work permits (“in CT, every rivet-catcher has to know about endangered nematodes”) maybe topped by some administrative cockup on the level of “the CT Nematode Protection Board cannot handle a mailing address different from the residential address, and/or is forbidden to talk to nonresidents”?
None of that applies. Its Unionized but perhaps not as heavily as Mass or NY.
Your maths all seems to be focused on fast trains flying through at top speed. Your problem is going to be trains calling at the station either side which will stall trying to get up that gradient from a standing start. Tag that on to risks around train performance in braking as they come to a stop, how the layout is signalled etc this is oversimplified and likely to be challenged in a risk sense.
1% as your limiting gradient is a sensible new build number but agree it should be challenged. What I can’t get is why you’ve jumped straight to 4% which seems way steeper than you need to deal with the grade change you’re talking about?
Should replacement of this bridge cost billions, absolutely not, but be careful with your comparison pieces. I’m not familiar with the examples you flag but these seem to be greenfield sites with totally different constraints. Disruption and staging is expensive and a luxury that Europe has often avoided by adopting new build lines, when they haven’t been able to do this is often where the numbers sit outside the norm. Do I think a staged solution should still come out in the billions, no, but it’s still not gonna cost the same as a greenfield site.
Throwing in “just move it 50m north” is another massive oversimplification. On the riverside end your into massive land purchase of what I imagine is very expensive property and then your issues propagate down the railway trying to ensure you can tie the alignment back in and you’ll just end up rebuilding more and more infrastructure. Throw this in to the objections that will mean it never gets built and there’s seems to be very little win in this.
Building this cheaper is gonna come down to creating a framework and mindset (amongst all parties including users) that allows you to sever the NEC for an extended period. If you can do that, you’ll get the cheaper and no doubt better solution. Is that every gonna be acceptable on a piece of highly used critical infrastructure though?
Also to be fair the NEC is extremely built up. More so that most other corridors.
The underground track in the Zürich main station are deep underground, they run below the Sihl river, and on the east side, get up to ground level pretty quickly.
I could not find data for the underground part of the ramp, but the outside part can be measured on the Swiss topographic maps, the ramp is 9.3 meters over 278 meters, so more than 3%.
https://s.geo.admin.ch/tdeyr4r1trv0
3.7% on the eastern side climbing from Löwenstrasse (newest underground platforms at Zürich HB) up to grade (actually the grade goes as steep as 4.1%, but only for 25m, and 3.8% for 50m as shown by driver information lineside grade markers in the many cab ride videos on Youtube), then 2.6% climb up the Kohlendreieck rail-over-rail viaduct, 3.0% down, then 2.7% up and 4.0% down (for 545m) on the Letzigrabenbrücke viaduct. The Letzigrabenbrücke flyover is normally only for outbound traffic and so the 4.0% is a descending grade, but of course it is signalled bidirectionally and is occasionally used in the opposite direction.
Locomotive hauled trains are restricted from Löwenstrasse because of these grades.
The other direction, connecting to Oerlikon through the Weinberg tunnel is a long sustained 2.5%, with a brief dive-under of -3.5% then +2.5% on the outbound track directly before the station platforms.
There’s a sketch of the vertical alignment on page 4 of https://www.bfbahnen.de/attachments/article/58/ETR_Spezial_Tunnel_Weigand_Feurer_FA.pdf#page=4 also showing maximum grades along the newer DML.
If you have to move Cos Cob station anyway (per the webtool), couldn’t you move it another 50m or so west to where Loughlin Ave meets Station Drive?
Have you actually looked at the land use around this location? There’s a power plant, there’s HT overhead cables and pylons owned by the power company, looks there is an AMTRAK substation at the W end of the bridge, there’s very expensive housing hemming in the alignment at the East side towards Riverside station. Changing the alignment here would require significant expansion of the RoW, which is gong to be expensive. The river is also navigable so permitting a new bridge and a new alignment, that requires new RoW and easements, across a navigable river is going to be a royal pain in the ass. You will need a Joint Permit from the US Army Corps’ who manage all navigable waterways in the US. Those permits take time to obtain.
The costs of the physical bridge works is only one part, all that other stuff is going to add significant costs as well as replacing all the 1930’s OCS systems, signals etc. etc. and all the other utilities that piggy back across the bridge corridor.
For 5 billion Spain would just find a spot 10km on either side of the river to split off the current tracks and build all new elevated tracks including new stations over the existing ones with elevators for those making a transfer. They would have a ton of money left over.
Yes going over all the stuff there it more expensive than green field but it shouldn’t be too bad.
Getting Army Core permits should and have been easy and cheap 6 months ago, when Biden can order them to make it so. With Trump it might be more or less – does he see the permits as more government programs to eliminate or more gridlock to eliminate?
Last time we had to apply for an Army Corps permit it took 18 months….. and Biden had no ability to influence that. Get rid of the permits and then you don’t need a moveable bridge or a high level bridge, just weld the existing bridge shut and cut off the river and the marina from the sea. Easy, no need to upgrade or worry about spending any money.
As for building an elevated track, maybe that could happen in Spain, but the NIMBY objections would kill that as you’d have to go over I-95…. so folk would now have a damn noisy high speed train at roof level……. but again if the EIS is junked by the clownshow, then sure its a solution and screw the locals…..
This is what I don’t understand. Why should Cos Cob or some of the other bridges have to be moveable in the first place? Removing the drawbridge component would substantially reduce cost and complexity. Yes, I know the Coast Guard has certain requirements but a good project planner would work closely with them and the boating community to find a fixed link bridge solution. Cos Cob has no commercial boats, just a less than mile navigable stretch to a marina. How many times per year does this bridge open? Could the state pay any boat owner that does not fit under the new bridge to go elsewhere? Walk Bridge has a bit of commercial barges but Housatonic does not nor does Saugatuck.
This is such an incredible amount of ridiculous arguments to try and justify the unjustifiable.
Army Corps of Engineers permit? The replacement bridge budgeted at $4-6(?) billion will need a permit too, so building it differently does not change this fact, plus a permit even if it takes 18 mo to get does not increase the cost of construction at all.
Expensive housing? There are 6,873 people is Cos Cob, which means about 2,714 housing units at Greenwich average. Median home price in Cos Cob is $1.15M, so the total cost of all houses in Cos Cob combined should be around $3 billion. You could buy every home in the neighborhood, depopulate it, build a bridge for a few hundred million (no neighbors, no complaints, no mitigation, no ROW constraints, etc.) and still spend less that what is supposedly being planned. But of course any solution would involve taking dozens of properties not thousands, so even at several million per home it is not that expensive compared to what is proposed.
OCS, signals, etc.? Station to station (Cos Cob to Riverdale, so the bridge plus approaches either side) is 1.15km. HSR has been built internationally for $25-30M per km in the last decade. Even if you have to redo 2 km, and you rebuilt everything with cost a little higher due to inflation, all of those “extras” on top of the bridge should only add a few tens of millions, not billions (remember that $25-30M/km includes the cost of new build earthworks, track, etc., not just OCS and signals, so really just redoing those items should be even less).
Disruption and staging? It’s not “expensive”. Every construction site has to deal with disruption and staging to some degree (if you are out in the wilderness you have plenty of room and don’t have to deal with neighbors, but you also have to haul everything in and don’t have any infrastructure like a parking lot around the corner you can rent and use). Sure, some projects are more difficult than others (build a skyscraper in Manhattan and you need to stage deliveries somewhere in Queens probably, and pay to double ship everything) but really it shouldn’t even be a concern for something that has a full sized soccer field sitting 50m from the bridge site, let alone all of the parking lots at Cos Cob station.
HSR has been built internationally for $30m/km through green fields. Where it has gone through a city it has been a lot more expensive. Perhaps $150m/km like HS1 in Britain is a reasonable example of good practice.
Where did I justify the expense? Nowhere. I’m just tired of seeing, oh well in place x they build stuff for $3 a km why cant the US do it, and why cant they just move stuff 50m north or use skyhooks to build everything, the usual BS wished in place engineering that occurs. All I was pointing out, if you bothered to read my post properly is that there’s a ton of other stuff that you have to do to build a new bridge in this location which will add on to the cost of the concrete and steel for the new bridge.
And maybe other places do this stuff cheaper, I’m sure they do, because they are absolutely wonderful people, but have you ever dealt with the knuckle draggers at AMTRAK????
@Matthew Hutton
HS1 cost 62.75 million pounds per km, or about $102M/km, not $150M/km. It included at least 29.9 km of tunnel and bridge (Medway Viaduct) that at 1.2km was bridge alone longer than this whole project. It, along with other British projects, was the most expensive in the world outside of the US, so not a good benchmark for what can be done.
Using costs for “going through a city” is also a terrible benchmark here. Cos Cob is not a major urbanized area, it is a suburban town. There is an extant four track right of way to work with. There is no need to purchase a whole new route or dig a tunnel underneath a high rise district too expensive to tear down. Even if you want to ease the curves you are talking about taking a few dozen homes – on the east side of the river only. On the west side the rail line passes through Cos Cob park so it can’t even be considered to be any sort of built up area. It’s mostly trees dirt and grass.
@Tunnelvision, if they can do it at a certain cost in other countries with equal wealth and development as the US, why isn’t it reasonable to expect the US to do the same. There is not “a ton of other stuff that you have to do to build a new bridge in this location” compared to other bridges elsewhere. All comparable foreign costs are for projects that are functional rail bridges or viaducts with track and signals not just “concrete and steel”. Even if you do work on the curves at each end, grading a berm and installing track on dry land is something done hundreds of kilometers at a time all over the world at one hundredth the cost per km as what is supposedly proposed here. Even in the US: Brightline built a greenfield route to Orlando.
The cost is unjustified. Period. There are no special conditions or unique considerations to bring up or discuss.
Alon’s $50 million example was a viaduct on the relatively temperamental Rhone river during the late 90’s construction of the 251 km LGV Mediterranee. At the time, this Euro 4.5 billion LGV was the most expensive ever built by SNCF. Green field or not, spending as much to replace a small structure like in Cos Cob appears unjustified.
In 2008, as a preamble to the construction of the SEA LGV, a 476 m long four-track bridge was built across the Garonne in Bordeaux. It cost Euro 55 million, 74 million in todays Euros. The adjacent old bridge is preserved as historical artifact because it was Gustave Eiffel’s first project.
In a semi-urban environment, the 100 years old “Pont des Allemands” was replaced by a more modern and quieter structure in 2017 in Vise, Belgium. This was a twin track 500 meter segment of viaduct, including 230 m across the Meuse river. The existing piers were strengthened and reused which explain the modest Euro 14 million bill.
Onux, I agree that a new bridge that is ~1km long shouldn’t cost several billion dollars. But then even something like https://www.hs2.org.uk/building-hs2/viaducts-and-bridges/thame-valley-viaduct/ on HS2 isn’t anywhere near that expensive.
I do think that some care is needed the other way too, there is no way that a project on the NEC in America which is built up pretty much the whole way is going to be done for the same price as a French project in green fields. That is honestly why HS1 is a good example of good practice as at least that is a project in a crowded area that includes full urban approaches to a big city.
OK so it looks like the ultra complex 3.4km Colne Valley Viaduct is £1.6 billion – or $2250m PPP. And HS2 is very expensive as a project.
https://www.timeout.com/uk/news/this-massive-new-uk-bridge-will-cost-a-huge-1-6-billion-022324
https://www.hs2.org.uk/building-hs2/viaducts-and-bridges/colne-valley-viaduct/
@Matthew Hutton
No care needed in the other direction. The NEC is not really “built up the whole way” in the sense that every km of track is inside Manhattan. In Cos Cob it is not built up at all, the tracks are surrounded by trees, a soccer field, parking lots, some bare dirt at the power station, a dead end road, etc. Look it up on Google maps. Across the river in Riverside the tracks are bordered by single family homes on what look to be 1/3 acre lots, so a not very dense suburb.
The bridge proper at Cos Cob is ~332m, so extrapolating from the Coine Valley Viaduct would be ~$220M – and as you note that is a complex example on a project with high costs to begin with.
@Onux, I do also think that by French (or even British) standards that Cos Cob is pretty built up. There are houses right next to the railway.
I do think even so that the cost for the bridge should be under $500m/km though which is a lot less than the figures the US government has produced above.
I do also think that by French (or even British) standards that Cos Cob is pretty built up. There are houses right next to the railway.
You need to think again. On the Cos Cob side the nearest building north of the tracks (except for the station) is 40m from the closest track centerline (there are some I-95 overpass columns in there somewhere closer too). To the south the closest structure is a high voltage tower 14m away, the closest building is ~20m from nearest centerline. On the Riverside side there is one house and two garages/sheds within 13m of centerline to the south, and to the north nothing within 28m. There is nothing “right next to” the line here. Total ROW for the four tracks through there is on the order of 17-18m, when you can fit another 2-8(!!!) tracks between your existing tracks and any building on each side of the ROW you are not “pretty built up”.
Type “Mianus River Railroad Bridge” into Google maps and have a look around.
The closest house to the LGV Sud Est is probably 4km away, certainly a lot lot more than 40m anyway.
Even HS2 goes through much more rural terrain than that.
The closest house to the LGV Sud Est is probably 4km away,
Are you truly so daft as to think there is an 8km wide swath of empty land a third of the way across France?!?!?! East of Le Creusot, on Rte de la Beujarde, between Av de Varennes and Chem. de la Beaujarde, there are buildings approximately 24m off of the LGV Sud-Est tracks. That’s just the first thing I found by randomly zooming in on a random rural area in the center of the line. I’m sure if I looked at the stretch between Macon and Lyon Part-Dieu.
Even if it Cos Cob suburbia is slightly more built up than a French farm field, it is still irrelevant. If you need 9m to put two whole extra tracks to the side of your right of way, then it doesn’t matter if you have a home 14, 40, or 4000m away. You still have enough room. Nothing about Cos Cob is built up enough to impose higher costs on reworking the tracks there, least of all the cost of replacing a bridge which is over water and so can have no houses next to it!
HS2: Cromwell Lane in Burton Green has houses by the track exactly as in Riverside across the bridge from Cos Cob. Again, just a random spot in the middle.
Fun fact, the progress of HS2 right now is such that if you zoom Google Maps to between 5-10km on the scale bar, the entire route from the Chilterns to Birmingham Airport is visible as the clear thin line across the countryside.
*”I’m sure if I looked at the stretch between Macon and Lyon Part-Dieu I would find many more examples or closer examples.”
You can just compare the project to the Durchmesserlinie project in Zürich: 9 kilometres, 2 bridges, one underground station, a tunnel under a river, under built up areas, in one of the most expensive cities in the world. Total cost: 2 B CH₣.
So that Swiss project is $225m/km PPP
Probably $300m/km adjusted for inflation
Late reply, sorry. The answer is that yes, I did; the land use that such a bridge would interfere with comprises a few townhouses just north of the tracks west of the river and maybe one or two houses east of it. The power plant is south of the tracks, where construction does not need to take place if the two short, sharp curves are replaced with a long, wide curve.
The navigable river is why I’m assuming a high bridge has to provide the same clearance as I-95, which is 15 meters below; this is doable with 4% grades, just not with the 1% grades that the agencies favor for bad reasons.
Thank you for this. I’m a CT resident, recent subscriber (although longtime follower of passenger rail and transit issues) and I have recently begun to attend legislative town halls. The next time my representation holds one, I’ll bring this up.
My first time both attending a town hall and speaking was a couple of weeks ago. I used your & the Marron Institute’s research to critique CT Rail’s acquisition in late 2023 of 60 unpowered coaches at exorbitant cost. I also used my time to make the point that I was not against rolling stock replacement, but not at this price; and offered that electrification would deliver more benefits, including to NEC intercity trains. Some of the audience members and the legislators appeared receptive, although no one knew anything about the topic. I encouraged them to use their legislative oversight to help control transit costs.
I would love a post at some point about how ordinary citizens like myself can use your research to effect change.
Thanks again.
Bravo for your engagement! Compare the news in a recent article in Railway Gazette International article, “DB seeks to order standardised S-Bahn fleets,” at https://www.railwaygazette.com/traction-and-rolling-stock/db-seeks-to-order-standardised-s-bahn-fleets/68370.article .
Maybe US regional rail operators should join DB in ordering the same trains. Standardization and volume can drive railcar costs down.
I have long said trains should be catalog items. You get to choose from about 5 ISO standard sizes (floor height, door locations, and width must be standard, and if you system doesn’t fit remodel your system so they will). Wheel width is within limits a customization you make, as is outside paint. The inside though is one of the catalog color schemes. You must take 25kv overhead support, but third rail can be added. You don’t ask the manufactures to bid, you just look at their catalog of options and choose something for the predefined price with no bidding. The only other input is delivery date.
The point if 5 ISO standard designs (5 is a random number, but it seems reasonable) is if you know you will only support those you start designing jigs and automation and thus reduce costs. I want manufacturers to invest their own money into making/improving designs with the expectation that orders will pay for the investment in the long run. I don’t want any engineers working on adjusting train designs for custom orders.
The challenge is there are lots of different loading gauges and other restrictions.
@henrymiller74
I agree completely and have argued several times that the US federal government should refuse to fund any mainline rail project that does not meet “Amtrak gauge” i.e. the requirements to run on the NEC north of New Haven (standard gauge rail, AAR Plate C (or F), 25kV 60Hz overhead catenary, 48″ platform height, Type H tightlock couplings). For metros it should be New York City B Division requirements, except for legacy systems. Light rail needs a standard too, but I don’t see a obvious choice what it is. Probably LA’s standards as the largest network in the US.
@Matthew Hutton
That is the point, if you set a standard (and withhold money for not meeting it) then everyone will rebuild to meet it and get the money. Freight railroads have been working on their loading gauges for decades to bring their networks up to be able to take double stack freight wherever possible. Setting a metro standard is more difficult in this case (hence my legacy exception above) because redigging tunnels and rebuilding platforms inside of tunnels is darn near impossible and not worth the money. But for mainline rail the answer is clear, and the standard should be set before we invest billions in different infrastructure standards for the first generation of HSR projects (CAHSR, Brightline West).
I think loading gauge is horrendously complicated even outside of metros – see e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loading_gauge
Not in the US.
Every AAR Plate except for H and K allow 10′ 8″ (3251mm) width, compatible for ADA level boarding with the 10′ 6″ width of Amtrak equipment and other NEC rolling stock like the M8’s used by Metro North. AAR Plate B is designed for universal access on any track in North America, and at 15′ 1″ (4597mm) high accepts all current train cars except for bilevels and most locomotives. AAR Plate C is almost as widespread and takes every passenger locomotive except F59PH’s. At 17′ height Plate F takes every piece of passenger rolling stock every used in North American except a few super-tall “Ultra Dome” sightseeing cars used on the Rocky Mountaineer in Canada.
Build to Plate F for new infrastructure, upgrade existing to Plate C (if even still needing to at this point), purchase cars with the equivalent width, build platforms to match, and you are done, nationwide.
Fully agree that the Americans could have one standard then to reduce costs like the East Asians do.
It’s all across North America because freight goes everywhere.
Rumor on railroad.net is that Plate B is historical information and that everything everywhere with perhaps some obscure exceptions is Plate C. The only place where there is frequent service that isn’t Plate C is the LIRR tunnel to Grand Central.
There are hundreds if not thousands of Amtrak loading gauge platforms in the Northeast. Changing them would be expensive and disruptive. It’s almost Shinkansen loading gauge. Point out that Amtrak loading gauge is Shinkansen give or take a hand width the “off the shelf!!!” crowd has brain freeze.
The high speed train from Chicago to Cleveland can automagically turn into the train from Cleveland to Boston. Which means the train from Minneapolis or Kansas City to Chicago will be Amtrak loading gauge. Repeat in Atlanta. Everything east of the Rockies will be Amtrak loading gauge. Though anything west of I-35 is very unlikely.
Because Amtrak loading gauge is good enough. …. good enough for Shinkansen…
And if anything is used widely it’s the Shinkansen loading gauge which is used across East Asia.
I think in this particular case, should the contract for these coaches be terminated, are:
I’ll continue to engage with these legislators. I’m following Elissa Slotkin’s advice to focus on one thing, since at the federal level, CT doesn’t matter, and hasn’t mattered for some time, and doomscrolling the Trump presidency’s just a nightmare.
*bangs head on desk*
The leap down from EXISTING PLATFORMS across the gap would be unpleasant. You want something to pull into a train station anywhere in Connecticut, that has level boarding, it has to be Amtrak loading gauge. Or the passengers will be clambering up, down and across, unsafe gaps.
No it won’t. Amtrak is buying dual mode locomotives. Same concept as NJTransit’s ALP45s.
Chill.
It looks like FLIRTs are customizable for a variety of loading gauge. If they can’t reach Amtrak gauge then that’s my bad, but that’s all you had to say. This is hardly bang-head-on-desk territory. Where are we, Reddit?
Secondly – Amtrak is not buying dual mode. Metro North is buying dual mode Chargers, and those are for third rail services to replace the P42DMs running into GCT or Penn from the Hudson Line or New Haven Line branches. The ALP45s are capable of true dual mode operation off OCS or the diesel prime mover on the NEC.
Amtrak is buying ALC-42Es + APV, where the pantograph and transformer are in a Venture coach called the Auxiliary Power Vehicle, and the Charger is more or less unchanged except for the traction power link between the APV and the locomotive; and those are only for NE Regional consists. They are not true dual mode locomotives because they have to have the APV to work. Long distance and state supported services will still have ALC-42s; and that’s when they work in cold weather, which isn’t often. I’m guessing P42s will lead Valley Flyer and Vermonter consists for some time.
It’s my desk. I can do anything I want to do, to it.
fellow New Haven line commuter from bpt to the center of the universe: Stamford. The Walk bridge seems expensive to me since they’re doing so much on the river! Two floating barges with cranes
VRF has had webcams at the abandoned SONO tower just west of WALK for years (it’s a museum, now, and I think a pizza place) and while the westward cam is now members-only, the eastward one, showing the branch to Danbury, is free. I can tell you from many years of watching that CDOT (or MTA/MNR or their contractors – the state owns this section, not Amtrak) do nothing quickly.
Track 3 (furthest from camera) has been out of service past the Danbury branch switch for the better part of a year. For a while today, a crew of about 7 workers worked on something on Track 1 for an hour or two. That meant that 2 tracks were out of service entirely, Track 1 next to the workers on 2 was at Restricted speed, presumably with a foreman flagging trains, leaving only Track 4 at regular speed … which appears to be about 45 mph. And of that crew of ~7, one had a spike maul and the other was presumably setting spikes … like it was 1856 – the rest were supervising and/or managing. When they replaced the switch to the branch last summer (fall?) it took forever because they built the switch in place instead of making it off-site and dropping it in like HO snap-track like other railroads do (incuding, I think, Amtrak).
That their ideas for new bridges are so archaic *and* expensive surprises me not at all.
No one at CTDOT, FRA or Amtrak would touch it two years ago. I will try again.
https://ctexaminer.com/2022/11/19/a-tale-of-two-bridges/