Boston — The state Department of Transportation yesterday released its much-delayed final report on the agency’s east-west rail study, but questions about how to pay for it remain because it’s an open question as to whether ridership would be sufficient to meet benchmarks for federal funding.
Click here to read the 17-page executive summary released by MassDOT, along with charts and graphs. The study has sparked considerable interest in the Berkshires, with its many popular cultural institutions, because of the possibility of a passenger rail link between Pittsfield, eastern Massachusetts, and the Boston area.
MassDOT released a draft report last fall that indicated significant federal dollars would be needed to get the project off the ground. But the final report said the required cost-benefit analyses, which include projected daily boardings versus costs, would pose a “major impediment to federal funding.” See pages 10 and 11 in the report for boarding projections.
“Because the federal methodology considers only a limited range of benefits, the Commonwealth … likely would not qualify for federal funding for East-West Rail. MassDOT will work with the Congressional delegation and other key stakeholders to advocate for changes to the federal benefit-cost analysis method to better capture all of the potential benefits of investment in passenger rail.”
Here are the three options, along with projected riderships and capital costs in 2020 dollars:
- Alternative 3 could provide direct passenger rail service between Pittsfield and Boston along a shared track/shared CSX and MBTA corridor. Projected use: 922–1,188 passengers per weekday. Cost: $2.4 billion.
- Alternative 4 could provide direct passenger rail service between Pittsfield and Springfield along a shared track/shared CSX corridor, along an independent passenger track between Springfield and Worcester, and along a shared track/shared MBTA corridor between Worcester and Boston. Projected use: 1,157–1,379 passengers per weekday. Cost: $3.9 billion.
- Hybrid Alternative 4/5 could provide direct passenger rail service between Pittsfield and Springfield along a shared track/shared CSX corridor, along an independent passenger track with high-speed shortcuts between Springfield and Worcester, and along a shared track/shared MBTA corridor between Worcester and Boston. Projected use: 1,296–1,554 passengers per weekday. Cost: $4.6 billion.
The ridership estimates are an increase over initial projections released last year, when the then-most expensive option, fully electrified service between Boston and Pittsfield at top speeds of 150 miles per hour, was projected to cost as much as $25 billion.
Among various members of the state Congressional delegation MassDOT could work with to change the cost-benefit analysis method are Rep. Richard Neal, D-Springfield, and chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, and Senators Ed Markey and Elizabeth Warren, all of whom have supported the project.
In Berkshire County, state Sen. Adam Hinds and state Rep. Patricia Farley-Bouvier, both D-Pittsfield, were also co-sponsors of the bill that created the East-West Passenger Rail Study. Hinds was also the chief sponsor of the proposed Berkshire Flyer, weekend seasonal rail service from New York’s Penn Station to Pittsfield using an Amtrak line north through the Hudson Valley and turning east in the Albany area to Pittsfield.
In addition, President-elect Joe Biden is a passenger rail enthusiast, having commuted, while he was in the Senate, on Amtrak daily from Washington to his hometown of Wilmington, Del.
It’s also worth noting that Biden recently nominated as his transportation secretary former South Bend, Ind., mayor Pete Buttigieg, who is close friends with state Sen. Eric Lesser, D-Longmeadow, himself a passenger rail supporter and former Obama administration aide who met Buttigieg when both were studying at Harvard.
But the COVID-19 pandemic has thrown a monkey wrench into the works. It’s an open question as to whether this kind of money should be spent on mass transit projects when people are suffering, unemployment is still at high levels, and people are dying. There is also concern that the Baker administration has not been very enthusiastic about the plan.
“Everyone feels the weight of the pandemic,” Ben Heckscher, co-founder of the advocacy group Trains In The Valley, told Mass Transit Magazine. “It’s hard to work on a transformative transportation project when people are being thrown out of their homes and there is a public health crisis. But we’re hoping that in a few months we’ll be through the worst of the virus and we can focus on this.”
Great Barrington resident Karen Christensen is founder of the Train Campaign, a passenger rail advocacy group with a focus on restoring passenger service from New York City to Pittsfield, along the Housatonic rail corridor.
As for the east-west study, Christensen said the Train Campaign and other members of the Western Mass Rail Coalition “are generally in favor of a phased approach.”
“More generally, the rural-urban divide is one of the urgent political issues of our time, as president-elect Biden has made clear in recent remarks,” Christensen said. “The work being done to connect rural New England, and rural Massachusetts in particular, by rail to Boston and New York is utterly on target.”
She characterized passenger rail in Massachusetts as a “best-of-both-worlds” concept that can open economic and educational opportunities to rural communities, while giving urban workers more options, reducing congestion and emissions in cities and “bringing back the dynamism that characterized western Mass towns, large and small.”
“I’m delighted that MassDOT has finally recognized that East-West rail should connect to Albany,” Christensen said. “With Pittsfield as the hub, it’ll also connect to New York City on the Housatonic Line, and the Berkshire Flyer via Albany will add additional connectivity.”
“The East-West Passenger Rail Study is a step forward in realizing the potential for enhanced service within the corridor,” said MassDOT Deputy Rail and Transit Administrator Meredith Slesinger. “The study’s next steps could advance opportunities for turning East-West passenger rail from a subject of study to a project that can be designed, permitted, funded, built, and operated.”
