Progress seen on South Coast commuter rail

Things are looking up again for supporters of commuter-rail service to Fall River and New Bedford.
After languishing for years in environmental permitting while even larger doubts about financing loomed, this year the dream project of leaders on Massachusetts’ South Coast has seen significant progress on both fronts.
This fall, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers completed a five-year environmental review of the project and recommended it be built as an extension of the Stoughton line, the state’s preferred route.
And before the end of November the House Transportation Committee was expected to endorse a transportation-bond bill with up to $2.2 billion in borrowing for South Coast Rail. The bill is expected to be taken up by the full legislature soon.
“This has been a good year,” said Robert A. Mellion, president and CEO of the Fall River Area Chamber of Commerce, a staunch South Coast Rail supporter. “A year ago I was concerned. But there has been such a push from so many different groups – from the governor to the legislature, through southeast Massachusetts and various groups and businesses. What is changing is how Boston sees the South Coast. Boston wants to tap into the resources here.”
Even with the progress, making the service operational is at least three years away and could easily be sidelined by political opposition, especially if the next governor does not share the same enthusiasm for the project as Gov. Deval L. Patrick.
So South Coast Rail supporters hope to accelerate the pace of incremental advances to a point where there’s too much invested in the project to turn away from it, a strategy that proved effective with the creation of the Greenbush commuter rail line on the South Shore.
They point out that millions of dollars have already been spent on various aspects of the project, including studies and rehabilitation of the old freight rail lines on the South Coast that would eventually be used by commuter trains. The state is using a $20 million federal transportation grant to rebuild three bridges around New Bedford. “What we are hoping to see before Deval Patrick leaves office is millions in infrastructure – actual contracts – to repair the lines and start working up to Boston,” Mellion said. “That will get us to the point of no return.”
With the large conceptual-level approvals now out of the way, Jean Fox, the Mass. Department of Transportation project manager for South Coast Rail, said the next step will be designing all of the different individual pieces of the project and getting them approved at a local level.
“It’s a very large project and we have to work with each community on the design,” Fox said. “And then because it goes on bridges over navigable rivers, we have to work with other agencies, including the Coast Guard and [Mass. Department of Environmental Protection].”
As currently planned, trains to Fall River and New Bedford will extend from the end of the Stoughton Line, itself a branch off the Providence Line, using old rail right-of-ways south to Taunton, where it will connect with existing freight tracks.
Just south of Taunton, the line will split, with one branch heading to Fall River, stopping at stations in Freetown and at Davol Street and President Avenue, before terminating at a Battleship Cove Station at the end of Broadway.
The other branch will head to two new stations in New Bedford, one at King’s Highway and another called Whale’s Tooth between Herman Melville Boulevard and Acushnet Avenue.
To reduce the travel time to Boston and improve air quality, the Army Corps of Engineers recommended using quicker electric engines instead of the diesels used on the rest of the Mass. Bay Transportation Authority commuter-rail system currently.
The electric engines are more expensive, but the Army Corps estimated they will be able to get from New Bedford to Boston’s South Station in 77 minutes, six minutes faster than diesels and 13 minutes faster than the average rush-hour car trip.
Current plans call for 38 daily trips on the new line – six more than terminate in Stoughton now – with about half going to Fall River and half to New Bedford. Fox said even without additional work at South Station or along the Northeast Corridor tracks, the six additional trains are not expected to cause any new delays on the Providence line.
The Mass. Department of Transportation estimates that 4,750 people will use one of the 10 new stations on the average weekday. The Army Corps environmental analysis projected 840 daily boardings at Fall River’s Davol Street station alone.
Despite the enthusiasm for commuter rail among South Coast political and business leaders, there are still significant concerns about whether the service will generate enough demand to warrant its cost.
Providence-based urban-affairs analyst Aaron M. Renn said on paper South Coast Rail appears to suffer from some of the same weaknesses Rhode Island is trying to overcome with new MBTA stations in Warwick and North Kingstown.
Renn said Massachusetts would be better served investing in improvements that will improve the frequency, speed and convenience of existing service in and around Boston instead of growing the footprint of the network.
“In Boston the goal has really been coverage area instead of high-quality service,” Renn said. “It makes more sense to provide higher grades of service where there is existing demand.”
In New Bedford and Fall River, leaders see new train stations stoking development in the surrounding real estate.
“Historically when these types of projects get done, there is a lot of development around the rail,” said Roy M. Nascimento, president and CEO of the New Bedford Area Chamber of Commerce. “We have seen that in other communities. In Brockton after they received an extension, there was revitalization that came in with investments in market-rate housing near the station.”
Mellion at the Fall River Area Chamber said rail service fits into the redevelopment of the city waterfront already underway and he sees investment interest starting to pick up in anticipation.
“I know a group is looking at a hotel project along the waterfront; restaurants are starting to look at the waterfront,” Mellion said. •

No posts to display