New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
DOT chief explains fare hikes, service cuts on Metro-North
HARTFORD — Faced with a directive from state lawmakers to trim costs along the state’s commuter rails, Department of Transportation Commissioner Garrett Eucalitto said this summer that the resulting changes would be unprecedented.
The resulting trimmed schedule — revealed last week along with a nearly 5 percent proposed fare increase — was indeed a first for the railroad.
On Fridays, when ridership has lagged, trains would run less frequently than on other weekdays. Even during the busiest Monday-to-Thursday travel days, officials have proposed cutting a pair of evening trains — one running in either direction — along the New Haven Line. Further cuts were proposed along the Danbury and New Canaan branch lines, as well as Shore Line East.
The decision faced immediate scrutiny from rail advocates, who said the proposed changes would force riders to pay more for less frequent service.
In a letter to the commissioner, state Sen. Tony Hwang, R-Fairfield, said that commuters deserved to know the rationale that went into picking which trains to cut, and criticized the department’s decision not to schedule public meetings in commuter-rich cities, such as Stamford or Bridgeport.
Instead, commuters will have the chance to weigh in at hearings next week in Hartford and New Haven. In addition, the department will host two virtual public hearings open to anyone in the state. If approved, the proposed train schedules could begin taking effect later this month, with fare increases rolling out on Nov. 1.
Ahead of those hearings, CT Insider spoke with Eucalitto and Bureau of Public Transportation
Chief Benjamin Limmer to discuss the proposed changes. The following conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Commissioner, can you talk about the process that went into determining these new schedules and where you would cut specific trains?
Eucalitto: If you look at the budget write-up, it said, ‘Reduce service on Metro North to 86% of current service levels.’ That was just an attempt to say, ‘If you have to reduce funding by this amount on the Rail Appropriation Account, what does that equal in terms of service adjustment?’ What ended up happening, though, was we went in with a scalpel, and we looked at data from every single train that runs on the line. Each M8 [car] has this thing called the load factor where it measures the weight of the equipment, and that tells you what the percentage capacity is on that train right now. So they looked at that data, as well as went out and did hand counts of passengers to ensure that we got accurate counts of what’s actually happening on the railroad on certain days of the week. We looked at which ones have the fewest number of passengers, but also have a backup train that someone can take. Then we talked about looking at, globally, what’s happening on the railroad? People are still taking the train, but they’re not taking it five days a week. So, in order to achieve the budget savings, let’s spare Monday through Thursday and reduce a little bit more on Fridays.
Was there a change in the number of express trains?
Eucalitto: No, same numbers.
What’s your response to those who say that the cuts to service will inevitably turn people away from the railroad?
Eucalitto: In reality, there’s more trains running on the line today than there were in 2019, even though we only have 70% of the riders. So, the cost to run the service has been pushed up to the state government, less so on the actual riders. We haven’t had a fare increase since 2018, and that was just the 1 percent fare increase to cover the cost of the M8s. I’m not aware of many other places that can go five, six years without increasing any costs while labor costs have gone up, electric costs have gone up. I think if we had come out with something that was what people had feared, which was cutting 40 trains per day, I would say 100%, they’re correct. Cuts like that could decimate and turn people away. But what an average commuter is seeing is two trains eliminated, per day Monday through Thursday. That’s a minimal drop in the bucket and I don’t think really anyone’s ever going to notice that.
Did you feel any pressure from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to follow their fare increase that was announced earlier in the year?
Eucalitto: No, they just wanted a decision. They just want to know what to do so they could sell the tickets.
Was there any attempt to fill some of the gaps in service with changes to the bus routes?
Limmer: There was a lot of planning work that went into evaluating the bus system throughout the state. What we heard from customers is that they needed more service at night, they needed more service on weekends to connect people to job opportunities. If you look at the various bus expansion proposals that exist throughout the state, that is the general theme.
Eucalitto: Statewide, it’s over $8 million per year in additional bus service. When you look at bus ridership statewide, Stamford bus ridership is far outpacing the ridership numbers they saw preCOVID, New Haven is back up to pre-COVID ridership, greater Bridgeport is close. Hartford is still lower. So what our team did there is more of a reallocation of resources within the Hartford region. We’ve been talking internally about ‘How can we build upon the success of Fastrak in Hartford?’
Just to clarify, were any of the bus routes or services intended as a way to bridge the gap in the loss of a train?
Eucalitto: No. Limmer: Really, it was built in order to further enhance the connections to the rail service.
Why are these cuts coming at a time when the DOT is investing hundreds of millions of dollars to buy new train cars. Does that send mixed messages to people?
Eucalitto: So I don’t think it’s necessarily sending mixed messages. We launched [the Hartford Line] without new equipment, we had leased equipment, which we have to get rid of. The Harford Line is doing great in terms of ridership, it’s close to where it was preCOVID. We think there is going to be an opportunity there to build upon the Hartford Line. We see what is happening with Massachusetts, they just received over $108 million to do track work from Worcester to Springfield. If Massachusetts continues to do their side-of-theborder investments, we’ll be able to connect Hartford to Boston, which is the Holy Grail for us. That’s that missing link.
Limmer: The one thing I’d add is the investment in the new rail cars will allow us a huge amount of operational flexibility. So, as ridership patterns change on the New Haven Line, the branches, Hartford Line, we will be able to move our vehicles around to meet the ever-changing travel patterns.
Earlier this week, Senator Hwang criticized the decision to hold next week’s public hearings in Hartford and in New Haven. His argument was that at least one of those meetings should be in Fairfield County, or in an area where we see more commuter population. What’s your response to that?
Eucalitto: What we found since COVID, we do public information meetings all the time on projects, and we are seeing a vast majority of people prefer virtual public meetings because they can do it from home, while they’re cooking dinner or helping their kids with homework. But, I heard him ,I listened to his concerns, we are going to hold a popup session in Stamford Station next week. It’s going to be a table set up with copies of the schedules, the changes, public comment cards, and our staff there to answer questions.
On the Shore Line East, the cuts there are steeper than they were on New Haven. That’s about one-third of the weekday schedule. What’s the future of that rail line?
Limmer: Ridership recovered very, very strongly on many of the lines, especially the Hartford Line, Waterbury Line, the main line, but the ridership recovery lagged behind on the Shore Line East. The budget that was approved by the state Legislature is reflective of those ridership levels hovering right about 30% [of what they were pre-pandemic].
Eucalitto: Gov. Lamont has said publicly that if you look at the station areas around Shore Line East, there’s a significant lack of density around those stations. In an era of telework, where people have the opportunity and they don’t have to go in the office five days a week, that type of suburban station with no housing near it is really going to struggle. So I think we need to work with those communities to really do some infill and housing, mixeduse density around those stations, I think, in order to revitalize the ridership on the line.
Lawmakers are always talking about ways to expand rail service; talking about new lines to places like New Milford, Bristol and Rhode Island. Given the ridership trends that we’ve seen and the budget numbers and the cutbacks being what they are, how feasible is such an expansion in the future?
Eucalitto: I don’t necessarily think rail service expansion is feasible in the near future. What is feasible is potentially doing bus expansion. I think that is a much cheaper alternative that can pilot the expansion of public transportation in areas that currently are not well served. That’s how you can build the ridership to justify a very capitalheavy expansion that would be necessary to do any of those alternatives that are being floated. Ultimately, our existing infrastructure has so many needs, billions upon billions of dollars just to fix what we have today, that I don’t want to take my eyes off that and focus on something else.