[T]he release in June of a draft state rail plan has drawn attention to the status of the Winooski Branch, an inconspicuous eight miles of railroad track that links Essex Junction with downtown Burlington.
The Winooski Branch, owned by the New England Central Railroad, connects with the Vermont Railway System at downtown Burlington’s Union Station, which in a few years is expected to see passenger trains calling from points south for the first time since the 1950s.
The Aug. 26 meeting of the Vermont Rail Advisory Council may have accelerated the little-used freight line’s prospects for rehabilitation as part of the plan, due for finalization this fall.
While the Winooski Branch links Vermont’s two main rail corridors and knifes across the state’s biggest metropolitan area, the branch sees no passenger traffic at all, and little freight traffic. The New England Central Railroad uses it to bring wood chips to the McNeil Generating Station in the Winooski Intervale several times a week, and, about as often, to exchange freight cars with the Vermont Railway System. The 167-page draft rail plan makes little mention of the line, although, according Christopher Parker, president of the Vermont Rail Action Network, the state’s passenger rail advocacy group, the route lies “right in the middle of a lot of possibilities” for better freight and passenger rail service.
The branch line is the rail analogue of South Burlington’s I-189, which connects I-89 with Route 7, western Vermont’s main highway corridor. But, in terms of condition, the tracks more closely resemble a long-neglected back road. The poor track condition limits freight-train speeds to 10 mph, in accordance with safety standards set by the Federal Railroad Administration. At present, passenger trains only visit the line for special excursions.
The route leads north, then east, from Union Station, skirts the Winooski Intervale, crosses the Winooski on a 1928 steel-truss bridge, swings by St. Michael’s College, Fanny Allen Hospital and the Champlain Valley Fairgrounds, and joins the New England Central’s main line just west of the Global Foundries plant.
While the route is destination-rich, and will connect two Amtrak lines, an upgrade of the tracks did not make it onto the draft plan’s list of passenger rail priorities, which consist of: extending the Ethan Allen Express train from Rutland to Burlington and the Vermonter from St. Albans to Montreal; re-establishing passenger service between Albany and Rutland via Bennington; upgrading all passenger routes to allow for a 79 mph speed limit; and adding a second train to the Vermonter route.
Carl Fowler, a member of the Vermont Rail Advisory Council, has proposed making the rehabilitation of the Winooski Branch the state rail plan’s highest priority after the Vermonter and Ethan Allen extensions. He said the lack of attention given to the branch line is the draft plan’s main deficiency. Council chair and deputy transportation secretary Chris Cole did not put the proposal to a vote, but no objections to Fowler’s proposal were expressed.
Commuter rail
The state is looking at the feasibility of commuter trains that would link Burlington with St. Albans and Montpelier, using the branch line between Essex and Burlington.
Fowler says extending the Ethan Allen could serve Essex Junction and St. Albans. That, he said, would allow the use of the existing service facilities in the Rail City to turn the train around on a wye, a triangular track formation which is not available in Burlington, but which the draft plan calls for building there, at unspecified expense, to turn the Ethan Allen around.
“And, of course, the service would gain ridership from [Essex Junction and St. Albans],” Fowler said. “In addition this would facilitate an eventual extension of the train to Montreal.” Upgrading the Winooski line to passenger standards would facilitate “one-seat” travel between Montreal and Vermont’s entire western corridor, including gateways to several ski areas.
Parker Riehle, president of the Vermont Ski Areas Association, is enthusiastic about an extension to Quebec. “That would be something we’d of course greatly support, to tap into the Montreal market for rail travel, to get them over to the western side,” Riehle told VTDigger.
State officials, however, are uncertain about the line’s suitability. Cole said the steepness of a grade going from Winooski up into Essex made it unclear what upgrades to the existing track would be necessary to generate the best return for the investment, since the hill limits speed on the line. Transportation planning coordinator Costa Pappis also pointed to the presence of “clearance issues” in the tunnel that takes the line under Burlington’s North Avenue.
As important, in VTrans’ view, is the lack of a state finding that passenger rail on the line is feasible. The commuter rail study now underway will likely make that determination.
Experts interviewed for this article said the gradient would not nix the passenger rail possibility. The steepest grade on the eight miles is 1.04 percent, according to Fred Anderson, a retired engineer from the NECR’s predecessor railroad, the Central Vermont Railway, who consulted track charts at VTDigger’s request. That is, a train climbs just over a foot for every 100 of lateral progress. Amtrak operates trains daily on grades as steep as 3.5 percent, and a now-defunct passenger service in North Carolina surmounted a 4.7 percent grade.
Pappis did not have detailed information as to the tunnel’s constraints. The line has hosted excursion trains each of the last two Christmases, and those trains negotiated the line without difficulty, using conventional passenger equipment. A Burlington contractor performed significant upgrades to the 1861 tunnel in 2008, allowing for clearances comparable to those, for example, of a major Baltimore tunnel used routinely by Amtrak.
The private ownership of a railroad restricts but does not preclude its availability for publicly sponsored operations such as commuter services. Trains run by Amtrak and commuter agencies all over the country make use of thousands of miles of privately owned track every day. Representatives of Genesee & Wyoming, which owns the NECR, declined to respond to questions from VTDigger, although, at the VRAC meeting, Charles Hunter, G&W assistant vice president for government affairs and a member of the council, voiced no objections to hosting passenger rail on the line.
While the suitability of the line for passenger trains is a complex question, a 1999 feasibility study commissioned by the Chittenden County Metropolitan Planning Organization found the possibility “practical to implement from engineering and operational points of view. Economically, passenger rail service is deemed to be feasible provided that it receives strong and committed long-term financial support from both public (federal, state and local levels) and private sectors.”
The study sanctioned the extension to Essex of a short-lived Charlotte-Burlington commuter service instituted in 2000; it did not address service to and from Montpelier and St. Albans, as the pending study for the Legislature will. At the time, Vermont’s senators, Patrick Leahy and Jim Jeffords, pushed through two federal earmarks totaling almost $7 million to bring the Burlington-Essex line up to passenger standards, former Jeffords aide Jeff Munger told VTDigger. But the appropriation had to be reprogrammed when, in 2003, incoming governor Jim Douglas put the kibosh on the Charlotte service and the Legislature refused to fund it any further, Munger said.
The draft plan proposes spending a total of $665.6 million for the state’s passenger and freight rail needs over the next 20 years. That does not include ongoing operating subsidies for the Vermonter and the Ethan Allen Express. The draft proposes some appropriations for improving freight routes, including $4 million for “non-passenger track upgrades” on the Winooski Branch to be completed by 2025. That would allow the line to be used by rail cars weighing up to 286,000 pounds, the standard capacity in the rail freight industry, and would thus benefit Vermont shippers.
VTrans will address questions about the draft plan after the public comment period closes on Sept. 15.
