Track Work to Disrupt Boston LSL Section

Track work being performed by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority will result in service disruptions to the Boston section of the Lake Shore Limited between July 23 and 26.

During that period, Train 448 will terminate at Albany-Rensselaer, New York, with alternate bus transportation provided to the missed stops of Pittsfield, Springfield, Worcester and Boston South Station.

No alternate transportation will be provided to the missed stops of Framingham or Boston Back Bay. Those traveling to Back Bay will ride the bus to South Station and take an Amtrak or MBTA commuter train to Back Bay.

Train 449 will originate at Albany with alternate bus transportation provided from Boston South Station, Worcester, Springfield and Pittsfield.

 No alternate transportation will be provided from Boston Back Bay or Framingham.

Back Bay passengers will be given the option of boarding at Boston South Station or traveling on alternate dates.

Passengers at Boston South Station should go to the Amtrak information desk for instructions on boarding the buses.

Passengers at Worcester will board the bus at the main entrance in front of the station. Boarding will not occur at the bus terminal.

Boston LSL Section Disrupted by Track Work

Track work being performed by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority will disrupt operations of the Boston section of the Lake Shore Limited through June 17 east of Albany-Rensselaer, New York.

On Monday through Thursday Train 448 will terminate at Albany. Alternate transportation will be provided to the missed stops of Pittsfield, Springfield, Worcester and Boston South Station. No alternate transportation will be provided to the missed stop of Framingham.

Passengers bound for Boston Back Bay station will be bused to Boston South Station and then take an Amtrak or MBTA commuter train between South Station and Back Bay.

Train 448 also will observe these schedule changes on June 5 and 12, both Sundays.

Train 449 will originate in Albany with alternate transportation provided to the missed stops of Boston, Worcester, Springfield and Pittsfield.

 No alternate transportation will be provided for the missed stops of Back Bay and Framingham.

Passengers traveling from Back Bay have the option of boarding at Boston South or traveling on alternate dates.

At Boston South Station passengers should go to the Amtrak Information Desk for instructions on boarding the buses.

At Worcester, passengers will board the bus at the main entrance in front of the station. Boarding will not occur at the bus terminal.

Track Work to Disrupt Boston LSL Section

Track work being performed by the Massachusetts Bay Tranportation Authority will affect operations of the Boston section of the Lake Shore Limited on March 28.

Train 448 will terminate at Albany-Rensselaer, New York. Alternate transportation will be provided to Pittsfield, Springfield, Worcester and Boston South Station but no alternate transportation is being provided to Framingham.

Passengers traveling to Boston Back Bay station will be bused to Boston South and take an Amtrak or MBTA commuter train to Back Bay.

Train 449 will originate in Albany with alternate transportation being provided from Boston, Worcester, Springfield and Pittsfield.

No alternate transportation will be provided from Back Bay or Framingham.

Passengers originating at Back Bay have the option of boarding at Boston South or traveling another date.

Passengers boarding at Boston South Station should go to the Amtrak Information Desk for instructions on boarding the buses.

Passengers boarding at Worcester will board the bus at the main entrance in front of the station. Boarding will not take place at the bus terminal.

There will be no business class or sleeping car between Boston and Albany on the affected date.

CSX Insists Pan Am Deal Will Enhance Competition

CSX is insisting that its acquisition of regional railroad Pan Am Railways will increase and not diminish competition in New England.

The carrier made the claims in filings with the U.S. Surface Transportation Board in response to contentions by Vermont Rail System, along with transportation officials from Vermont and Massachusetts that the deal will harm rail competition in the region and should be subject to a more thorough review.

CSX contends that a Genesee & Wyoming subsidiary that will oversee operations of Pan Am Southern will be a neutral operator.

Pan Am Southern is a joint venture of Pan Am and Norfolk Southern. CSX would assume Pan’s Am 50 percent ownership share of Pan Am Southern.

The G&W’s subsidiary, Berkshire & Eastern, will be obligated to operate in the interest of Pan Am Southern, not in the interest of G&W’s other New England railroads to the detriment of Pan Am Southern, CSX said in its filing.

CSX did agreed to ask the STB to extend the comment period by 30 days, as merger opponents have requested.

In its filing, CSX also contended the STB should consider the Pan Am acquisition  to be a minor transaction and thus not subject to the more stringent transaction rules applied to merger opponents.

Opponents of the sale want the STB to treat the Pan Am acquisition as a merger.

 “No party has offered a valid basis for requesting that the Board classify the transaction as ‘significant’ or to require the application to be re-filed,” CSX wrote in its filing. “The transaction was carefully structured to eliminate potential competitive harm, enhance competition, and improve the rail network throughout the Northeast. The only thing ‘significant’ about the Transaction is the extent to which it enhances competition and strengthens the rail network in the Northeast.”

In a letter sent to Massachusetts officials, CSX pledged to keep dispatching of Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority commuter service based at the Pan Am headquarters in North Billerica, Massachusetts, for the “foreseeable future.”

CSX also said it would work to maintain fluid commuter operations and cooperate with state officials to expand passenger service west of Worcester, Massachusetts, on its Boston & Albany route and elsewhere.

In its filing, CSX said it has 58 letters of support from shippers, government officials and local communities that favor the benefits the acquisition would provide.

Mass. Agencies Oppose CSX Deal to Buy Pan Am

Two Massachusetts transportation agencies have announced their opposition to the CSX acquisition of Pan Am Railways.

The Massachusetts Department of Transportation and Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority stated their opposition in filings with the U.S. Surface Transportation Board.

The agencies said the transaction will harm rail competition, potentially hinder commuter rail operations, and threaten a reservoir that provides drinking water for 3 million people in the Boston area.

State officials were also critical of a planned transaction involving Pan Am Southern, a joint venture that provides Norfolk Southern with access to New England.

They said the Pan Am Southern transaction should not be separated from CSX’s acquisition of Pan Am Railways and the STB should consider the related Pan Am Railways and Pan Am Southern deals as part of a single merger application.

CSX has sought to have the STB consider its Pan Am acquisition as a “minor” transaction but the Massachusetts agencies said it would be considered a “significant” transaction and thus subject to a more stringent and time-consuming review.

CSX also has asked the STB to exempt the Pan Am Southern transaction from board review.

Under terms of the transaction, CSX would hold Pan Am’s 50 percent ownership stake in Pan Am Southern while Norfolk Southern would continue to hold the other half.

Pan Am Southern would be turned over to a “neutral operator,” a subsidiary of short line holding conglomerate Genesee & Wyoming.

A dozen state Massachusetts lawmakers filed separately to urge the STB to consider the Pan Am acquisition in a more thorough review.

Saying the transaction involves the operation of 1,200 miles of railroad trackage in New England, MassDOT and MBTA argued that proponents of the deal “seem to not understand the public interest impacts of their proposals, except as they perceive them as a matter of promotion, business advantage and expedience.”

MassDOT and MBTA contend that their interests have been overlooked.

“Instead of rewarding such indifference, the Board would do all stakeholders a service by rejecting the application and the petition, and directing the parties to each filing to develop and file a single, comprehensive application encompassing all interdependent elements of the CSX-PAR and B&E-PAS Transactions, which the Board would then allow to be assessed under its significant transaction application procedures,” the agencies said in their filing.

Track Work to Disrupt LSL Boston Section

Track work being performed by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority will disrupt operations of the Boston section of the Lake Shore Limited starting July 29.

Nos. 448 and 449 will not operate between Boston and Albany-Rensselaer, New York, and passengers will instead travel on a chartered bus.

Between July 29 and Aug. 1 passengers aboard No. 448 bound for points east of Albany will disembark at the Albany-Rensselaer station and board a bus.

Buses will stop at all stations except Framingham, Massachusetts, and Boston Back Bay. In a service advisory, Amtrak said that during the period there will be no alternative transportation to either point.

Those bound for Back Bay are advised to disembark at South Station and ride an MBTA or Amtrak commuter train to Back Bay.

Between July 31 and Aug. 3, No. 449 will not originate in Boston. Instead, passengers will board a bus to catch their train at Albany-Rensseleaer.

However, the buses will not serve Boston Back Bay or Framingham.

Passengers boarding at Boston South Station should go to the Amtrak Information Desk for instructions on boarding the buses.

Passengers boarding at Worcester, Massachusetts, will board the bus at the main entrance in front of the station. The buses will not board at the bus terminal.

During the service disruption period, there will be no business class or sleeping car service on Nos. 448 or 449.

A Little of the Bay State in Berea

I was sitting in Berea one day last fall when a westbound CSX train approached. As usual, I looked at the lead locomotive, saw that it was a CSX unit and sat back in my seat.

Then the train got closer and I spotted something looking very foreign trailing in the motive power consist.

It was Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority HSP-46 No. 2000. If that model designation seems foreign to you, it was to me, too.

An HSP-46 is a 4,650 horsepower, four-axle locomotive built by MotivePower, Inc., for commuter train service. That means that we won’t be seeing those units very often in Northeast Ohio.

The locomotives are EPA Tier 3 compliant and MBTA was the launch customer. The first HSP-46 to arrive on the property, No. 2001, was delivered to MBTA on Oct. 24, 2013, for testing and training.

No. 2001 began revenue service on April 16, 2014.

So what was No. 2000 doing going westbound and away from Boston? I will never know for sure, but MotivePower is based in Boise, Idaho, and I can only speculate that No. 2000 was headed there to have addressed a mechanical issue.

What I do know is that I could have made a better photo of No. 2000. By the time I realized that this CSX train had something unusual in its motive power consist, it was too late to get out of my car and step back to get in a better position.

So the angle of this image is not what I would have liked. But I still managed to come away with something and something is almost always better than nothing.

Photograph and Article by Craig Sanders

Track Work Again Affects Boston LSL Section

Track work being performed in the Boston region will affect operations of the Boston section of the Lake Shore Limited on Dec. 1, 4, 5 and 6.

The work is being performed by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, which operates commuter rail services in the Boston metropolitan area and will affect eastbound No. 448 on Dec. 1, 4 and 5 and westbound No. 449 on Dec. 1, 5 and 6.

Passengers traveling to and from Pittsfield, Springfield, Worcester, Framingham, Boston (Back Bay) and Boston (South Station) will ride a bus between Boston and Albany-Rensselaer, New York.

On days when track work is being performed, Nos. 448 and 449 will not stop at Boston Back Bay station and bus service will not be provided. Amtrak has suggested that passengers contact MBTA to inquire about travel options to Back Bay station.

Passengers boarding at Boston South Station should go to the Amtrak Information Desk for instructions on boarding the buses.

Amtrak passengers boarding at Framingham should board their bus at the drop-off/pick-up area track 2 platform (at Waverly Street).