Will they let Amtrak straighten this route?
Adapted from Robert Whitcomb’s “Digital Diary,’’ in GoLocal24.com
It was good to hear that Amtrak has begun to study ways to improve the railroad’s section between New Haven and Providence. Parts of the route should have been straighten long ago. The railroad says that it wants to “develop strategies to preserve and increase the frequency, speed, reliability and resiliency” of intercity and commuter service. But there’s a big catch: Amtrak said it would be “mindful of critical historical, environmental, and cultural resource concerns.”
It said it would “identify and evaluate new potential rail alignments alternatives and/or improvements to existing rail lines,” but “does not have a preconceived preferred alternative alignment or set of improvements.”
Translation of all this: The route could and should be made more direct, and therefore faster and smoother but Amtrak worries that affluent and so politically powerful people along any new “alignment’’ in coastal Connecticut and adjoining “South County,” Rhode Island, would fight it tooth and nail, whatever the greater good for the public of a realigned route.