ity in Brunswick, Maine. The project should be finished in late 2014. Trains are currently serviced in Portland and must deadhead to Brunswick for the first morning departure for Boston and deadhead back to Portland after the last evening arrival. Once the new layover facility is in service, the Downeaster will make an additional daily round trip between Brunswick and Boston as the need for deadhead moves to and from the currently Portland layover yard will be elimi- nated. Trains will be brought inside and shut down for servicing in order to eliminate noise and exhaust fumes from the neighboring resi- dential area. The facility will accommodate three train sets, including locomotives.
Genesee & Wyoming Puts Its Stamp on Former RailAmerica Lines
GENESEE & WYOMING INDUSTRIES is making an effort to display its imprint on each of the 45 railroads it acquired in its purchase of the RailAmerica group. In addition to assigning at least one locomotive wearing GWI’s corporate image to each railroad, the company has pur- chased its first brand-new locomotives since Genesee & Wyoming MP15DC’s 45 and 46 in 1980. The new power includes R.J. Corman Railpower RP20BD gensets like Central Railroad of Indi- ana Nos. 2001 and 2002, pictured at Cleves, Ohio, on February, 23, 2013. In Texas, the Dallas, Garland & Northeastern will receive five new RP20BD’s numbered 142-146, while elsewhere, freshly painted former RailAmerica locomotives are being shuffled around the system. To expe- dite the image change, GWI has been painting locomotives at St. Albans, Vt., on the NECR, at Cochocton, Ohio, on the Ohio Central, and at other facilities.
THE VERMONTER SPEEDS UP: On March 18, 2013, a new schedule went into effect which trimmed a half hour from the Vermon- ter’s time between St. Albans and the Massa- chusetts state line. The 190-mile New Eng- land Central route was rebuilt with $53 million in stimulus funds in a project that in- creased the top speed in non-signaled territo- ry (St. Albans to White River Junction) to 59 m.p.h. and in CTC territory (WRJ to East Northfield) to 79. The entire line was relaid with new 115-136 lb continuous welded rail and had 140,000 new ties installed, while 50 bridges were strengthened and 52 road cross- ings were improved. Besides raising the speed limit, the freight car load limit has been in- creased from 263,000 lb gross weight to the in- dustry standard 286,000 lb. The two-year project started in October 2010 and was fin- ished on time in October 2012, despite Hurri- cane Irene’s wiping out large sections of the newly-rehabbed track north of White River Junction in August 2011. The Vermonter’s schedule will be shortened even more in the near future after it’s moved to the direct 48-mile former Boston & Maine Connecticut River Line between East North- field and Springfield, Mass., from its current NECR/CSX route via Palmer. And south of Springfield, Amtrak will soon begin work to double-track its Springfield Line to Hartford and New Haven, Conn., and ultimately in- crease speeds to 110 m.p.h. On the northern end of the route, work is starting on upgrad- ing the NECR between St. Albans and the Canadian border to support higher speeds and 286,000 lb freight cars, while Vermont Gover- nor Peter Shumlin and Québec Premier Pauline Marois are working to re-establish
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Amtrak service to Montréal, which lost the overnight Montrealer from Washington, D.C, in 1995.
DOWNEASTER LAYOVER FACILITY: The Northern New England Passenger Rail Authority (NNEPRA) has awarded a contract for the construction of an indoor layover facil-
POINT DEFIANCE BYPASS: On March 1, 2013, the environmental review for the pro- posed Point Defiance Bypass between Tacoma and Nisqually, Wash., was approved, clearing the way for the Washington Department of Transportation receive $89 million in federal funding to upgrade the line to 79 m.p.h. stan- dards between Lakewood and Nisqually for Amtrak passenger service. The project will reroute Amtrak’s Cascades Service and Coast Starlight from BNSF Railway’s congested route along Puget Sound through Point Defi- ance to the former Northern Pacific Prairie Line via Lakewood. The Lakewood-Tacoma segment was rehabilitated in 2012 for Sound Transit, which began service to Lakewood on October 6, 2012. Work may be delayed, however, by a law- suit brought against WDOT by the city of Lakewood, which claims WDOT did not ade- quately address the additional noise and traf- fic delays that will be caused by additional rail traffic passing over the city’s seven grade crossings. The city wants the crossings to be grade separated, but the state says that would be too expensive.
Canadian National, BNSF Railway Ponder Natural Gas As Locomotive Fuel
SPLICED BY A NATURAL GAS FUEL TENDER, Canadian National SD40-2W’s 5258 and 5261 have been modified to run on a mixture of 90 per cent liquefied natural gas and ten per cent diesel fuel using conversion kits supplied by Energy Conversions Inc., of Tacoma, Wash. The hybrid fuel locomotives are expected to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 30 per cent and nitrogen oxide emissions by 70 per cent. CN is testing the units between Edmonton and Fort MacMurray, Alberta. BNSF Railway has announced that it is also exploring of liquefied natural gas as a locomotive fuel with General Electric and Electro-Motive Diesel. BNSF expects to begin testing later this year; predecessor Burlington Northern had tested the technology in the 1990s.
BRYAN RICE
CANADIAN NATIONAL
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