Philadelphia Transportation Thread

[Parkway]

Originally Posted by billpa

I was reading that it's led to homeless people riding for hours on end....I have no idea if that's true but something to consider, I suppose.

For what it's worth this is definitely the case with the Charm City Circulator in Baltimore.

[City Wide]

Originally Posted by mcgrath618

Construction on Ardmore's new station is set to begin this summer:
http://www.planthekeystone.com/Pages...r-Project.aspx

It was disappointing to read that of the 230' long new platform, only 28' is high level. If having high level platforms is one component needed to improve regional rail I'd think the time to build them is when a station rebuild happens. How much more expensive would it have cost?

[Busy Bee]

I believe there is some debate about this. Perhaps it was a typo. The rendering clearly shows a long elevated platform.

[Delthayre]

Google maps now has a transit layer for Philadelphia that includes the Broad Street Subway, Market-Frankford Subway-Elevated, Trolleys, Norristown High Speed Line, Regional Rail and Lindenwold Line. This is long overdue. (I thought that they had briefly added a less complete transit layer for Philadelphia some years ago, but that might be my imagination)

[mcgrath618]

Originally Posted by Delthayre

Google maps now has a transit layer for Philadelphia that includes the Broad Street Subway, Market-Frankford Subway-Elevated, Trolleys, Norristown High Speed Line, Regional Rail and Lindenwold Line. This is long overdue. (I thought that they had briefly added a less complete transit layer for Philadelphia some years ago, but that might be my imagination)

5th* I think that was a typo

In all seriousness, I think that when the census comes out that Philly > Phoenix.

[mcgrath618]

The AC line is to reopen early on May 12!
https://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/...ign=user-share

[mcgrath618]

2 things:

1) Everyone I have talked to has said that SEPTA is definitely returning to Phoenixville. Someone posted it in the Metro devs thread but basically Phoenixville has agreed to pay to lease 3 dual modes and have them do 6 trips every day. Kneuppel himself has been quoted as saying "we'll be back. We just don't know how soon."

2) The NHRR excursion in North Wales has entirely sold out. Glad to see stuff like that is still popular. I will be onboard and trackside all day.

[City Wide]

http://planphilly.com/articles/2019/...eid=322d8ab396


So the law suit against using turnpike tolls for mass transit is still on as it has progressed to the next level of appeals. Can someone with law knowledge please weight in why this law suit keeps the State from spending money its already collected? I can understand why SEPTA might not want to borrow money based on a cash flow it might not have in the future, but if the turnpike collects and/or borrows the money and hands it over to the State yearly or quarterly why not spend that cash? It's not like the turnpike is going to send refund checks out if they lose the law suit. If they lose the tolls will go down and hopefully the State will need to find a more logically method of funding transit.

[mcgrath618]

Apparently SEPTA is fine with steam excursions on its rails as long as a PTC locomotive is somewhere on the consist.

I was at the NHRR North Wales excursion yesterday and the conductor told me that NHRR and SEPTA are looking into expanding excursion operations in SEPTA territory.

[Delthayre]

Originally Posted by City Wide

http://planphilly.com/articles/2019/...eid=322d8ab396


So the law suit against using turnpike tolls for mass transit is still on as it has progressed to the next level of appeals. Can someone with law knowledge please weight in why this law suit keeps the State from spending money its already collected? I can understand why SEPTA might not want to borrow money based on a cash flow it might not have in the future, but if the turnpike collects and/or borrows the money and hands it over to the State yearly or quarterly why not spend that cash? It's not like the turnpike is going to send refund checks out if they lose the law suit. If they lose the tolls will go down and hopefully the State will need to find a more logically method of funding transit.

I believe that the Pennsylvania Turnpike has not been issuing debt, so there is no money to transfer and I believe that reimbursement of the transferred funds has been considered as a possible catastrophic consequence of a ruling in favor of the trucker's association. The Pennsylvania Turnpike has not been funding the $ 450 million transfers directly with toll revenue, but issuing debt supported by its toll revenue. There might be a specific legal reason why the lawsuit might impair issuance of debt, but practically the Turnpike probably has expected that no underwriters would facilitate their issuance of debt and that buyers would be reluctant to buy it because of the potential risk implied by the lawsuit. I don't recall exactly what it is, but Pennsylvania Turnpike debt has a low rating. It's still investment grade, but at a lower tier. That imposes an additional problem, because riskier debt must pay higher interest for buyers to be willing to assume the risk, making it more burdensome for the issuer.

Debt issuance has always been the lifeblood of the Turnpike Commission*. When it was created, Pennsylvania had a low, fixed debt limit, which it sometimes circumvented by creating independent authorities, such as the Turnpike Commission, the served public purposes, but could issue debt that was officially not Commonwealth debt, thus not limited. (In theory, should the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission default on its debt, no responsibility would fall upon the Commonwealth, but I can attest that PennDoT annually calculates how much of its revenue is available in the case of such a default to 'enhance' the debt)

*This is almost literal; section 15 of the Turnpike Commission Act provides that when the Commission's debts have been paid, it will cease to exist and the Turnpike will become a part of the Commonwealth highway system, thus no longer a toll road.

[mcgrath618]

Latest on the Wawa extension:
http://www.septa.org/rebuilding/pdf/...04.22.2019.pdf

[PhillyRising]

Originally Posted by City Wide

It was disappointing to read that of the 230' long new platform, only 28' is high level. If having high level platforms is one component needed to improve regional rail I'd think the time to build them is when a station rebuild happens. How much more expensive would it have cost?

The new station in Paoli is looking really nice. I love how they built it over the tracks. I wish they all were like that.

They built the new Comcast tower faster than they have been in the rebuild of the Exton train station. It's going on Year 3 or 4 and it's still not done.

[eixample]

It really bugs me that Septa is planning to keep the city bus redesign overhaul in house instead of hiring an outside consultant to do a review. Just seems like cheaping out on bus riding population which makes up the backbone of their ridership. Seems especially so considering how much capital funding goes towards each one of these RR stations. (Not that I am against these overhauls, although I think many of them cost way too much). Does Septa really have the talent to do a bus redesign in house? Wouldn't having an outside expert pronounce its findings provide cover for the difficult sell to cut routes and stops? I haven't heard anything more since that recent inquirer article came out so if anyone has any insight to share I would greatly appreciate it.

[volguus zildrohar]

Originally Posted by eixample

It really bugs me that Septa is planning to keep the city bus redesign overhaul in house instead of hiring an outside consultant to do a review. Just seems like cheaping out on bus riding population which makes up the backbone of their ridership. Seems especially so considering how much capital funding goes towards each one of these RR stations. (Not that I am against these overhauls, although I think many of them cost way too much). Does Septa really have the talent to do a bus redesign in house? Wouldn't having an outside expert pronounce its findings provide cover for the difficult sell to cut routes and stops? I haven't heard anything more since that recent inquirer article came out so if anyone has any insight to share I would greatly appreciate it.

They're essentially doing it themselves and having an outside firm look over their results to note anything they overlooked. Certain aspects of the redesign are being farmed out though.

I'm not completely against the idea of keeping it in-house if smart outside suggestions can be integrated into the final plan.

[JohnIII]

River Line is scale back indefinitely.

[resmith466]

Have any of you remembered where we live? Who's going to pay for all of these lofty dreams? Boring holes under Center City? Are you mad? We can't get a simple rail extension done in less than 20 years. (Wawa) The K of PA extension might be done by 2030. Most of the state lawmakers see us as a problem, they are not going to free up funds for any more projects.

[mcgrath618]

Amtrak Bullying Commuter Railroads, Newest Target is SEPTA

Amtrak is tightening the screws on three commuter operators using its infrastructure—Virginia Railway Express (VRE), Chicago’s Metra and now the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA).

In 2015, Amtrak lobbyists buried in a 1,030-page highway bill language to redefine its Northeast Corridor (NEC) to include track owned by Amtrak’s Washington Terminal Company. VRE’s contract operator, Keolis Transportation—which won a competitive bid to replace Amtrak years earlier—uses that track to reach Washington Union Station.

Had the provision—which no member of Congress admitted to sponsoring—not been excised after this column exposed the maneuver, it would have undermined VRE’s ability to seek Surface Transportation Board (STB) relief from Amtrak abuse.

In 2018, Amtrak sought to purge the common carrier status of Chicago Union Station (CUS) by merging it into Amtrak. The intent, says Metra, which carries 100,000 passengers weekly and accounts for 83% of CUS arrivals and departures, is to block Metra’s ability to seek STB relief were Amtrak to impose discriminatory access fees. A Metra challenge is pending before the STB.

Amtrak just can’t stop emulating 19th century railroad tycoons—termed “robber barons” in 1859 by The New York Times. Amtrak’s latest assault on the public interest is directed at SEPTA, which operates over Amtrak’s NEC some 200 daily commuter trains serving 40 stations and carrying 12 million passengers annually. Amtrak has sued SEPTA in federal court to end SEPTA’s rights to operate over the NEC. Success would allow Amtrak unilaterally to impose hefty station-rent increases, or sell or lease the stations for commercial development.

SEPTA’s opposition relies on a congressional mandate laid out in at least three statutes—the 1973 Regional Rail Reorganization (3-R) Act, the 1976 Railroad Revitalization and Regulatory Reform (4-R) Act, and the 1981 Northeast Railroad Service Act (NERSA). They created and transferred to SEPTA and other NEC commuter railroads permanent rights to operate over the NEC and use the
passenger stations.

In exchange, SEPTA bears all station costs directly, and pays Amtrak for use of its tracks under congressionally established cost allocations. SEPTA says it invested more than $228 million over the past 15 years in station capital improvements. Amtrak pays nothing toward six stations SEPTA and Amtrak share.

https://www.railwayage.com/regulator...targets-septa/

[Urbanthusiat]

SEPTA commits $34 million to build new Ardmore train station

[Urbanthusiat]

Might I just say that SEPTA's new transit map is dope: https://www.inquirer.com/transportat...-20190711.html

My only complaint is they didn't add the River line in NJ.

Edit: holy image size - not sure how to downsize, but it's high-res so you can see the details well.

[Nexis4Jersey]

delete