NEC capacity

[Nngo11]

On the days around Thanksgiving or during a busy weekday rush hour, is the NEC running at near capacity? I understand the tunnels under the Hudson are but it looks like a solution is being worked on (THE Tunnel), but other than that, how many more people could be carried on the NEC?

On a side note, took Metro-North from Stamford to GCT today and the train was PACKED. They really need to add some more holiday trains or add some more cars, if they have any.

 

[AlanB]

On the days around Thanksgiving or during a busy weekday rush hour, is the NEC running at near capacity? I understand the tunnels under the Hudson are but it looks like a solution is being worked on (THE Tunnel), but other than that, how many more people could be carried on the NEC?

First this question needs to be clarified a bit. If we assume that only Amtrak was running trains, then no the NEC is no where near capacity. It's only when coupled with commuter service that capacity issues start to enter the picture.

Now, you've already named one big choke point the Hudson River tunnels, but there are others. First is the capacity at Penn to handle more trains, one reason that in conjunction with the tunnels a new station is being built under 34th Street.

Then there are capacity contraints at Boston's South Station that while not currently a problem, could become a problem as the T adds more trains and if Amtrak also wants to add more. There is also a potential for problems between Attleboro, MA and South Station if more too many more trains are added. Moving south, the potential for conflicts increases on Metro North territory, especially if there are any problems.

South of Penn we have the two track Portal bridge not far from Secacus Junction which is almost at capacity right now, and will need capacity improvements before anyone can really take advantage of The Tunnel. The next potential choke point is Wilmington Del, where things are ok right now, but any substantial increases by SEPTA or Amtrak will start to create problems.

Further south from Perryville, MD to the Gunpowder River could become a problem if MARC ever needed to triple, possibly double, it's current service levels. Then just south of Baltimore things are already getting tight in the tunnel just beyond the station. Part of the problem here is simply the low speeds, so fixing things up to increase speeds would help. But it wouldn't be a permenant solution if service levels continue to increase.

Finally some improvements would need to be made to the interlocking leading into DC, if service levels were to be increased by much more than what they currently are. The speeds across the interlocking are just to slow to keep things fluid with many more trains. Of course going southbound they really can't go too much faster without risking using the station as a bumper block, and we don't need to park another engine in the basement like the Pennsy did with that GG1 many years ago. But northbound things could really be helped by increased speeds.

On a side note, took Metro-North from Stamford to GCT today and the train was PACKED. They really need to add some more holiday trains or add some more cars, if they have any.

Well Metro North is having a big problem right now with flat wheels thanks to the fall leaves. I saw a news report not too long ago that IIRC stated that they had over 200 cars out of service thanks to the slippery rail conditions caused by the falling leaves. They were running their wheel truing shop 24/7 trying to catch up, but even then I think that they can only fix about 18 cars per day, so there is a big backlog.

All that said, they probably should have tried to run a few more trains than what was planned even before they lost all those cars.

 

[Nngo11]

Wow I didn't expect that detailed of answer. See below.

Then there are capacity contraints at Boston's South Station that while not currently a problem, could become a problem as the T adds more trains and if Amtrak also wants to add more. There is also a potential for problems between Attleboro, MA and South Station if more too many more trains are added. Moving south, the potential for conflicts increases on Metro North territory, especially if there are any problems.

Could this be solved just by starting trains at Back Bay Station? Or are the yards in the wrong place?

I imagine there is no real solution to the Metro-North capacity issues because there isn't room for another track, I imagine, and also because it takes Connecticut 50 years to do anything.

South of Penn we have the two track Portal bridge not far from Secacus Junction which is almost at capacity right now, and will need capacity improvements before anyone can really take advantage of The Tunnel.

I think the plans for THE Tunnel include adding a track here.

The next potential choke point is Wilmington Del, where things are ok right now, but any substantial increases by SEPTA or Amtrak will start to create problems.

That's interesting - why would Wilmington be a choke point but not Philadelphia? or Trenton, for that matter?

Further south from Perryville, MD to the Gunpowder River could become a problem if MARC ever needed to triple, possibly double, it's current service levels. Then just south of Baltimore things are already getting tight in the tunnel just beyond the station. Part of the problem here is simply the low speeds, so fixing things up to increase speeds would help. But it wouldn't be a permenant solution if service levels continue to increase.
Finally some improvements would need to be made to the interlocking leading into DC, if service levels were to be increased by much more than what they currently are. The speeds across the interlocking are just to slow to keep things fluid with many more trains. Of course going southbound they really can't go too much faster without risking using the station as a bumper block, and we don't need to park another engine in the basement like the Pennsy did with that GG1 many years ago. But northbound things could really be helped by increased speeds.

So to summarize your post, is this fair? The curent choke points, in order of of severity are

1) Hudson River tunnels

2) Portal Bridge

3) Baltimore tunnels

4) DC interlockings

5) Wilmington, Del.

6) Metro North New Haven Line conflicts

7) South Station/MBTA

1-2 are being worked on (it seems); 4 doesn't look too hard. 3 has been talked about forever but I'm not sure if anything can be done about it, given cost limitations etc.. I profess ignorance about potenial solutions to 5, 6 and 7.

 

[Nngo11]

I forgot to add Perryville, MD to Gunpowder River to my summary, but I assume this would take last place on that list.

 

[AlanB]

Wow I didn't expect that detailed of answer. See below.

Then there are capacity contraints at Boston's South Station that while not currently a problem, could become a problem as the T adds more trains and if Amtrak also wants to add more. There is also a potential for problems between Attleboro, MA and South Station if more too many more trains are added. Moving south, the potential for conflicts increases on Metro North territory, especially if there are any problems.

Could this be solved just by starting trains at Back Bay Station? Or are the yards in the wrong place?

Probably not, but not because of the yard being in the wrong place. There is a wye track from the yard that would allow trains to reach BBY without needing to go to South Station. The track was cut for the big dig project and I'm not sure if it is back in service yet or not, however restoring it wouldn't be a big problem. The problems would be the need to cut across the 3 tracks that run between BBY and BOS, coupled with the fact that BBY only has 3 NEC tracks so capacity isn't wonderful at BBY.

I imagine there is no real solution to the Metro-North capacity issues because there isn't room for another track, I imagine, and also because it takes Connecticut 50 years to do anything.

Actually capacity on MN could be increased a bit without adding a 5th track, if they restored the 4th track south of New Haven down to Milford. The other thing that could be done, although it wouldn't be easy, would be to eliminate or at least mitigate some of the sharp curves on the line. With proper banking and gentler curves, speeds could then be increased for both Amtrak and MN, thereby increasing capacity. There is a finate limit to how much capacity could be increased that way, but it would help some.

South of Penn we have the two track Portal bridge not far from Secacus Junction which is almost at capacity right now, and will need capacity improvements before anyone can really take advantage of The Tunnel.

I think the plans for THE Tunnel include adding a track here.

I'm not sure if the Portal Bridge is actually included in the plan for The Tunnel.

The next potential choke point is Wilmington Del, where things are ok right now, but any substantial increases by SEPTA or Amtrak will start to create problems.

That's interesting - why would Wilmington be a choke point but not Philadelphia? or Trenton, for that matter?

Trenton has 4 thru tracks, along with 2 side tracks, Philly of course has many tracks and Amtrak is seperated from SEPTA at Philly. Wilmington is an issue in part because the station only has 3 tracks, and SEPTA turns most of it's trains on one of those tracks, and because both entering and leaving the station you drop down to 2 tracks only for a short distance.

Further south from Perryville, MD to the Gunpowder River could become a problem if MARC ever needed to triple, possibly double, it's current service levels. Then just south of Baltimore things are already getting tight in the tunnel just beyond the station. Part of the problem here is simply the low speeds, so fixing things up to increase speeds would help. But it wouldn't be a permenant solution if service levels continue to increase.

Finally some improvements would need to be made to the interlocking leading into DC, if service levels were to be increased by much more than what they currently are. The speeds across the interlocking are just to slow to keep things fluid with many more trains. Of course going southbound they really can't go too much faster without risking using the station as a bumper block, and we don't need to park another engine in the basement like the Pennsy did with that GG1 many years ago. But northbound things could really be helped by increased speeds.

So to summarize your post, is this fair? The curent choke points, in order of of severity are

1) Hudson River tunnels

2) Portal Bridge

3) Baltimore tunnels

4) DC interlockings

5) Wilmington, Del.

6) Metro North New Haven Line conflicts

7) South Station/MBTA

1-2 are being worked on (it seems); 4 doesn't look too hard. 3 has been talked about forever but I'm not sure if anything can be done about it, given cost limitations etc.. I profess ignorance about potenial solutions to 5, 6 and 7.

That's probably a fair representation. #5 could be helped by adding a third track both north and south of the station and if need be, by not turning SEPTA trains in the station. I already mentioned a few things regarding #6, yet another would be to rebuild the Shell interlocking as originally planned when Acela was concieved. Shell interlocking is where Amtrak leaves the MN tracks, just south of New Rochelle.

I'm not real sure what could be done to help #7 at present, but if the big dig had included a rail connection to North Station, that would have helped South Station considerable, as trains would have been able to run through. It takes time to change ends and get out of South and that is what creates the potential for bottle necks if too many more trains start showing up at South Station.

 

[Nngo11]

http://www.njtransit.com/nn_press_release....RELEASE_ID=2250

Portral Bridge: it's being studied and "the project is expected to be completed for the opening of THE Tunnel in 2016," to be taken with a grain of salt though. You're right though in that in that it's not directly a part of the THE Tunnel project.

 

[JAChooChoo]

On the days around Thanksgiving or during a busy weekday rush hour, is the NEC running at near capacity? I understand the tunnels under the Hudson are but it looks like a solution is being worked on (THE Tunnel), but other than that, how many more people could be carried on the NEC?

On a side note, took Metro-North from Stamford to GCT today and the train was PACKED. They really need to add some more holiday trains or add some more cars, if they have any.

Your last point is the best answer, Acela capacity could be doubled without any additional track capacity with six more cars, and I doubt there are many 12 car regionals running.

 

[AlanB]

On the days around Thanksgiving or during a busy weekday rush hour, is the NEC running at near capacity? I understand the tunnels under the Hudson are but it looks like a solution is being worked on (THE Tunnel), but other than that, how many more people could be carried on the NEC?

On a side note, took Metro-North from Stamford to GCT today and the train was PACKED. They really need to add some more holiday trains or add some more cars, if they have any.

Your last point is the best answer, Acela capacity could be doubled without any additional track capacity with six more cars, and I doubt there are many 12 car regionals running.

If only Amtrak actually had the extra cars to add to the consists. Alas there are no extra cars to add.

 

[battalion51]

I don't think the issue that will get people on to the trains is necessarily the number of seats, but rather the frequency of those seats. I'm ok with the Acelas as is, but if we could get more departures, and a little shorter more consistent runs the business people would have a hard time ignoring the lure of the train. The next big thing with Acela though will be Internet Access, whenever that occurs. In the business would the more connected you are, especially while in transit, the better. If they can get high speed internet to the business boys you better believe those trains will be packed.

 

[GG-1]

All that said, they probably should have tried to run a few more trains than what was planned even before they lost all those cars.

Aloha

Depending on a safe headway, wouldn't it provide more capacity, to add cars, to existing trains rather than extras? Assuming the cars are available and the capacity of head end is not exceeded.

 

[Nngo11]

If only Amtrak actually had the extra cars to add to the consists. Alas there are no extra cars to add.

But buying new cars, I would guess, is cheaper than a lot of the large capital projects we were talking about. My question, though, would be if the extra cars, particularly adding six more to the Acela, would have a (significant) effect on trip times.

 

[AlanB]

All that said, they probably should have tried to run a few more trains than what was planned even before they lost all those cars.

Aloha

Depending on a safe headway, wouldn't it provide more capacity, to add cars, to existing trains rather than extras? Assuming the cars are available and the capacity of head end is not exceeded.

Well in this case since we're talking about Metro North and not Amtrak, most of their trains are MU's so there is no worry about exceeding the head end capacity. The limiting factor is platform length and most of their trains are already 8 to 10 car trains, and I believe that some are even 12 (not postive about that). So the odds are that they can't add more cars, or at least many more, without having issues with cars that don't land on the platform.

 

[AlanB]

If only Amtrak actually had the extra cars to add to the consists. Alas there are no extra cars to add.

But buying new cars, I would guess, is cheaper than a lot of the large capital projects we were talking about. My question, though, would be if the extra cars, particularly adding six more to the Acela, would have a (significant) effect on trip times.

I don't think that adding more cars would have a huge impact on running times. After all the Acela is already over-powered for it's needs. The HHP-8 can haul at least 10 to 12 cars and it's HP rating is 8,000. Acela boasts two power cars each with 6,000 HP.

The problem is the expense of the cars, not to mention that it is a major project to add cars to the trainset. It's not a simple yard procedure like it is with all other Amtrak cars. You must shop the train to add or subtract cars. So adding cars just for a holiday weekend doesn't make sense and the other alternative, hauling around empty cars the rest of the year also doesn't make sense.

Then of course you'd actually have to get Bombardier to agree to build them, which might not be possible considering the outcome of the lawsuits over the Acela project.

Finally, while the cost of buying additional cars for Acela would be cheaper than some of the affore mentioned projects, buying new cars only helps Acela. Perfoming any of the track improvement projects helps all Amtrak trains, as well as potentially many commuter trains too. That makes the investment worth while.

 

[Nngo11]

All that said, they probably should have tried to run a few more trains than what was planned even before they lost all those cars.

Aloha

Depending on a safe headway, wouldn't it provide more capacity, to add cars, to existing trains rather than extras? Assuming the cars are available and the capacity of head end is not exceeded.

Well in this case since we're talking about Metro North and not Amtrak, most of their trains are MU's so there is no worry about exceeding the head end capacity. The limiting factor is platform length and most of their trains are already 8 to 10 car trains, and I believe that some are even 12 (not postive about that). So the odds are that they can't add more cars, or at least many more, without having issues with cars that don't land on the platform.

Yes, can confim that my PACKED train had ten cars today and since there were people standing up and down the entire aisle of most cars (so far as I could tell), just adding two more cars would have only helped a little. I think twelve cars is the Stamford platform length. I however managed to get a seat because I was not intimidated by two 'tough guys' with a suit case on the seat in between them. They glared, but moved it when I asked.

 

[George Harris]

Part of the NEC capacity is the variety of services operated. If all trains ran the same stops, the same power to weight ratio, and had the same maximum speed, you could run them at headways of about 3 minutes all day long with only two tracks. However, that is not the case. That is why, in particular the mostly two tracks only section south of Perryville makes the list.

A straight four track section through Baltimore would do a lot for the overall capacity, not to mention save a few minutes of time.

Unless it has changed, the speed in Washington Union Station is 15 mph on the turnouts and 30 mph on the throat tracks until off the curve under New York Avenue. Due to clearances, this curve has no superelevation and the radius make the 30 mph close to the practical limit. You could save a couple of minutes here by improving this curve and putting in some higher speed crossovers.

The other situations I do not know that much about.

George

 

[battalion51]

Part of the NEC capacity is the variety of services operated. If all trains ran the same stops, the same power to weight ratio, and had the same maximum speed, you could run them at headways of about 3 minutes all day long with only two tracks. However, that is not the case. That is why, in particular the mostly two tracks only section south of Perryville makes the list.

Excllent point George. The fact that there are so many different types of trains, making different stops, slowing for curves, and so on and so forth is what makes things interesting, and a dispatchers life hell. I personally think triple tracking would do wonders for the currently double track segment in the Baltimore/DC area, and quad tracking would help even more.

 

[Rafi]

I guess it depends on one's definition of the NEC, but it seems to me that we shouldn't forget the Washington-Newport News corridor, either, which has notorius congestion woes. First on the priority list in that section of the corridor is the Quantico bridge, which is a single-track nightmare, bottlenecking VRE, Amtrak, and CSX traffic. All three entities are currently working to add another bridge parallel to the current one, which supports two additional tracks (although I can't recall if they're installing two tracks to begin with, or just one). I believe that process is nearing completion, thankfully.

Second on the list is Acca Yard in Richmond, which has a variety of traffic congestion problems, although I'm not too familiar with them. I do know that the speed limit through that area is pretty slow, however.

And I guess third on the list would be the Potomac River long bridge out of Washington, which is two tracks and is nearing capacity between CSX, Amtrak, and VRE traffic.

Just my two cents...

-Rafi

 

[battalion51]

Good point Rafi, most people don't consider WAS-NPN truly part of the NEC because such a small percentage of NEC traffic sees it, and Amtrak does not have ownership of the road. The new bridge at Quantico is nearing completion. The deck does have the capacity for two tracks to be laid, but only one will be laid initially. Even this will help traffic flow immensly since you will have the ability to have rolling meets. Acca does have a large number of problems, and I as you do not know these issues well enough to comment. The key to improving the WAS-RVR corridor is going to be further investment by the State of Virginia and more cooperation by CSX.

 

[Nngo11]

Part of the NEC capacity is the variety of services operated. If all trains ran the same stops, the same power to weight ratio, and had the same maximum speed, you could run them at headways of about 3 minutes all day long with only two tracks. However, that is not the case. That is why, in particular the mostly two tracks only section south of Perryville makes the list.

Excllent point George. The fact that there are so many different types of trains, making different stops, slowing for curves, and so on and so forth is what makes things interesting, and a dispatchers life hell. I personally think triple tracking would do wonders for the currently double track segment in the Baltimore/DC area, and quad tracking would help even more.

I imagine the NEC must be unique in the world in having such a high density of very different equipment and operators. The whole thing, other than New Haven to New Rochelle, is dispatched by Amtrak now. I imagine the chances that MN will be give up dispatching responsibilities to be pretty low, but would this help at all -- having only one company dispatch the length of the corridor probably couldn't be too bad. And after all, the MBTA did give up dispatching on their section of the NEC at some point, if I'm not mistaken, and they haven't fared poorly after doing so.

 

[battalion51]

Well the big thing is that because Amtrak has such a large number of dispatchers they can develop better training programs since they have more people to train, and a larger knowledge base to tap. This also means that any new dispatchers are going to be trained by other dispatchers that know their territory well and can help teach the newbies their craft well. I know many new dispatchers for CSX are trained on the BA desk (Auburndale, Miami, and Homestead Subs) because it's one of the more difficult to dispatch, but has some of the best dispatchers as a result.

 

[Joel N. Weber II]

I don't think that adding more cars would have a huge impact on running times. After all the Acela is already over-powered for it's needs. The HHP-8 can haul at least 10 to 12 cars and it's HP rating is 8,000. Acela boasts two power cars each with 6,000 HP.

How long does an HHP-8 take to go from 0 to 125 MPH when pulling 10 coaches?

The problem is the expense of the cars, not to mention that it is a major project to add cars to the trainset. It's not a simple yard procedure like it is with all other Amtrak cars. You must shop the train to add or subtract cars.

Why is that? What's involved in adding cars to an Acela trainset?

Regarding MBTA capacity, it looks like there's a decent chance the North South Rail Link will get built in the next 10 or 15 years.

I think the more interesting question is the capacity between Rhode Island and South Station. Extending the MBTA Orange Line to Readville and getting rid of the commuter rail stop at Hyde Park might help with some of the issues with running trains with different mixes of stops. The original Orange Line plan through that corridor apparently included two branches off of Forest Hills, one to Readville and the other along the Needham Line (which has the potential to get the Needham trains off the three NEC tracks heading into downtown Boston). If there's enough space in the right of way south of Readville, quad track might be a good idea; I suspect in the long run it would be good to have MBTA express trains going between Rhode Island and downtown Boston that skip a bunch of the stops.

 

[AlanB]

I don't think that adding more cars would have a huge impact on running times. After all the Acela is already over-powered for it's needs. The HHP-8 can haul at least 10 to 12 cars and it's HP rating is 8,000. Acela boasts two power cars each with 6,000 HP.

How long does an HHP-8 take to go from 0 to 125 MPH when pulling 10 coaches?

Sorry, but I have no clue.

The problem is the expense of the cars, not to mention that it is a major project to add cars to the trainset. It's not a simple yard procedure like it is with all other Amtrak cars. You must shop the train to add or subtract cars.

Why is that? What's involved in adding cars to an Acela trainset?

Acela does not use standard RR couplers. So one can't just roll back to an extra car and couple on like normal. It requires tools, nuts, and bolts to couple two cars together, and then you've got some work on the diagphram to hook that together. It may even require a bit of reprogramming to the computers, so as to ensure that all cars tilt for the proper amount of time.

I think the more interesting question is the capacity between Rhode Island and South Station. Extending the MBTA Orange Line to Readville and getting rid of the commuter rail stop at Hyde Park might help with some of the issues with running trains with different mixes of stops. The original Orange Line plan through that corridor apparently included two branches off of Forest Hills, one to Readville and the other along the Needham Line (which has the potential to get the Needham trains off the three NEC tracks heading into downtown Boston). If there's enough space in the right of way south of Readville, quad track might be a good idea; I suspect in the long run it would be good to have MBTA express trains going between Rhode Island and downtown Boston that skip a bunch of the stops.

I believe that capacity at South Station will become a problem long before capacity through the BBY - Readville corridor. As for south of there, it would probably be pretty easy to add more track. In fact, the station platforms at Route 128 look like they were built with the idea in mind that one day there might just be a 4 track main running through there.

 

[Joel N. Weber II]

There certainly has been some discussion of relocating the post office to be able to build something like two new tracks at the existing surface station (or maybe it was four?) but I haven't heard anything about that in a while, and that's probably unneeded if the North South Rail Link actually does get built, although moving the post office might go somewhat faster. Then again, I find it really convenient that the almost-always-open post office is right by South Station, and will be disappointed if it goes somewhere else.

We apparently are surviving the opening of the Greenbush Line without capacity upgrades at South Station; the next things that seem likely to get added that will require more capacity at South Station are more trains to Worcester whenever CSX and the state stop arguing about liability, and the Fall River / New Bedford trains (the MBTA website's commuter rail map currently shows the Stoughton branch being extended and diverging into two branches as the proposal, but the news stories claim that they're studying all the options and haven't made up their minds yet; there's probably no track that needs to be constructed if they went via Attleboro or Middleboro).

 

[jis]

On the days around Thanksgiving or during a busy weekday rush hour, is the NEC running at near capacity? I understand the tunnels under the Hudson are but it looks like a solution is being worked on (THE Tunnel), but other than that, how many more people could be carried on the NEC?

If number of train movements are considered then the tunnels under the Hudson are at capacity only for an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening during rush hours. If the total possible capacity to move people is considered they are nowhere near capacity even in those hours, since many trains that run during those hours are not near the full length possible.

Incidentally, THE Tunnel will only marginally release train movement capacity (about 20% or so) in the current Hudson tunnels, but the difference is spoken for by additional NJT movements. Amtrak gets only one more slot per hour out of it. Most of its capacity in the new tunnel is spoken for in the form of new services, and the rest with service that is moved from the current tunnels to the new ones, all NJT traffic of course.

In terms of how many more "people" can be carried, I am sure even carrying double the number of people currently carried is not out of the realm of possibilities. Afterall none of the corridor trains are at full possible length (12, they are mostly at 8) nor at full possible density of seating. As for number of train movements, except in the rush hours there is room for quite a bit of growth. Even in rush hours there is some room for growth specially with improvement of signaling, shorter blocks and deployment of ACSES across the board, some of which has already been applied to the Hudson tunnels to achieve the 25 or so tph that it can handle now (the choke point at present is not the tunnels but A Interlocking conflicts within Penn Station).

In short there are many low hanging fruits to be picked in this area before one has to start taking any drastic steps, except in a few choke points, where a double track segment sits between two triple or more track segments. But even there more capacity would open up with more aggressive packing of trains using shorter blocks and better use of advanced overlays on the existing signaling system.

 

[Joel N. Weber II]

Are you saying that Amtrak is going to continue to use the present tunnels after THE Tunnel is built? I would have thought it might make more sense to move all the Amtrak traffic to THE Tunnel to open up the possibility of Amtrak operating full-height bi-level cars on its whole system.