The state Department of Transportation (MassDOT) has unveiled three potential plans it has for crossing the state from Springfield to Boston faster on more frequent trains in the future.
Franklin Regional Council of Governments (FRCOG) Transportation and GIS Program Manager Maureen Mullaney “said while it could take “quite a while” before that happens, it will be worth the wait, because it could boost the economy and allow people options for living and working in different areas of the state.
“The state is wrapping up the study it started at ‘ground zero,’” she said. “The three alternatives are a combination of using existing tracks and building new.”
Mullaney said one of the six original plans was to build high-speed passenger rail on the Massachusetts Turnpike, but it was decided that would be much too expensive.
“It was a revolutionary alternative to build down the Mass Pike, but it would have been extremely expensive, taken a lot of time and the Pike doesn’t go through communities,” Mullaney explained. “The renovation of Union Station in Springfield would have been for naught, because the Mass Pike doesn’t go anywhere near it.”
Mullaney said the final three potential plans are exciting and revolutionary in their own right, but there will now have to be a more in-depth study that will look at housing and the economic impact of east-west passenger rail.
“They’ll be looking at economic development, quality of life, housing and more as they study connecting Western Massachusetts to the east,” she said. “There will have to be some combo of building supplemental tracks along the existing ones.”
The next step is for MassDOT to further study how to achieve high-speed passenger rail, which could cost several billion dollars and take a decade or more. She said the project would not be able to move forward without a lot of federal help, which it hasn’t seen, so far.
“We haven’t seen a new infrastructure bill under the Trump Administration, like we were told there was going to be,” Mullaney said. “Our delegation and we will be advocating very loudly for one now and in the future.”
She said a project like the “once-in-100-years” east-west passenger rail investment needs resources to get everyone on board or it can’t move forward.
“This would give people the opportunity to work and live farther apart,” she said. “Of course, people would have to travel to Springfield to catch the train, but I don’t think people in Franklin County who want to work in Boston or that area would mind.”
She said people will have to be patient, though. Mullaney said it took more than a decade to get the Valley Flyer, which runs between Greenfield and New York City, up and running, and it was one of the first rail projects to get funding in the area.
“We’d been working on it two years prior to 2008, when it received funding,” she said. “There was a lot of planning and decisions before and it was on existing tracks. The Valley Flyer finally launched on Aug. 30, 2019.”
She said a lot of new track will have to be built for east-west travel from Springfield.
“Then, the study for passenger rail along Route 2 will start,” Mullaney said.
Sen. Jo Comerford, D-Northampton, asked for that study last year and both the state House and Senate unanimously approved it with thoughts of bringing passenger rail service that would link North Adams, Greenfield and Boston along Route 2.
Passenger rail service ran along the same route from 1875 to 1968, and Comerford said reviving it would not only make life easier for commuters but would cut down on the state’s carbon footprint.
That study would also project ridership levels and examine impacts to nearby towns; examine potential sources and availability of federal, state, local and private funding; and consider the resulting economic, employment, social and cultural benefits to the area, according to Comerford.
“North Adams-to-Boston rail service would be a boon to Western Massachusetts and its workforce,” Comerford said, “allowing people to work in Boston and live in Western Massachusetts without long commutes each day.”
Reach Anita Fritz at 413-772-9591 or afritz@recorder.com.