MBTA TO TEST EMUs ON THREE LINES
ON THE EAST COAST,
the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority is in the early stages of planning to electrify Boston’s commuter railroad. While ridership on the MBTA’s 12 lines hovers around 20% of pre-pandemic levels, the need is much like that at Caltrain: provide more frequent, less polluting, broader service. The MBTA designated three commuter rail lines as priorities to go electric.
The first and easiest of these, which could see a pilot program as soon as 2024, is the route from Boston South Station to Providence, R.I., where commuter trains share Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor. The catenary system is already in place except for a 1.7-mile gap along a fourth track at Attleboro station used only by MBTA trains. Work is underway to fill that gap, and it is due to be completed by June 2022.
The agency is coordinating with Amtrak and local power utilities to determine how the traction power system will be affected by adding more electric train operations. “We believe we would run into capacity problems with our existing transformers,” says Alistair Sawers, senior director of rail transformation at the MBTA, presenting to its oversight board in April. An additional power feed will need to be added.
Besides the Providence line, the Fairmount Line will require installation of an overhead catenary system that can be fed from the Providence power feed. A segment of the Newburyport Line from North Station in Boston to Beverly, Mass., may see an alternate form of electric traction, such as battery- electric or hydrogenpowered trains.
Bridges and tunnels along these and other routes are being surveyed to ensure that clearances are sufficient or can be enlarged as needed. Station platforms may also need work to allow for proper door height alignment with electric multiple-unit trains, and new rolling stock will require maintenance and layover facilities on lines served both from South Station and North Station.
The authority estimates this first phase of its electrification goal for commuter rail will cost $1.3 billion over 10 years and has current funding of $50 million to plan the project.
MBTA hopes to decide by early next year on obtaining EMU trains with the goal of having them on hand in mid-2023 for pilot tests, trial runs, and operator training. The agency is targeting revenue service to start in spring 2024.
To meet that ambitious target date, the agency has to obtain
EMU vehicles in a hurry. Placing a new order with a railcar manufacturer usually means getting in the queue behind existing orders, adding years to final delivery. To get around that, Sawers says, “We are talking to a number of other public entities about their current orders of EMU rolling stock.” One possibility is that another agency may have add-on options in its procurement contract that it doesn’t plan to use. There may also be rolling stock available elsewhere that is now idled due to reduced ridership, or that is being replaced by newer equipment.
“Even an EMU pilot is not as simple as we would like it to be,” Sawers says. — Dan Zukowski
engage in programs to drive ridership that might not be financially sustainable over a decade, but for us, our biggest challenge right now is winning back as much of the market as we can and starting to build some new markets,” Petty adds.
Caltrain’s finances took a tremendous hit with the onset of the pandemic. Operating revenues of $112.8 million in fiscal 2019 slid to $84.5 million in fiscal 2020, which ended in June of that year, thus including only five months of pandemic effects. Figures were not available for the full 2021 fiscal year, but the Joint Powers Board budget projected slim operating revenues of $37.3 million for that period.
And last year, the railroad faced a political and financial threat that could have put it out of business.
A one-eighth-cent sales tax increase to support Caltrain, known as Measure RR, was on the November 2020 ballot. But San Francisco and Santa Clara County leaders wanted to grab control of the money. Their action appeared to stem from a longstanding political dispute with SamTrans, which runs the Joint Powers Board, of which both San Francisco and Santa Clara counties are members.
The move frightened Caltrain riders and supporters. A joint statement from U.S. Representatives Jackie Speier and Anna Eshoo, also signed by some state legislators, said, “While it’s wildly popular, Caltrain could shut down without its own funding.” According to the Palo Alto Daily Post, a
“side deal” was made that eventually brought the support of all three counties in return for changes in how Caltrain is governed. In November, Measure RR passed by a 69-to-31 ratio vote of residents in the three counties, and it’s estimated it will provide $108 million annually to the railroad for 30 years.
Federal COVID-19 relief programs also threw a financial lifeline to Caltrain. It received $111 million from the first two stimulus packages passed in 2020 and will receive an additional, undetermined amount from the 2021 American Rescue Plan. That program also added funds to the FTA Capital Investment Grant Program, of which $52.4 million will help Caltrain’s electrification project. “So we’re not in a position where we were a year ago, where we were worrying about existential survival,” Petty says. “That said, we’re still way down on ridership. Ridership was a substantial amount of income for us in terms of fares, so we’re not in an unconstrained financial environment either.”
At the June 2021 board meeting, members reviewed a proposed fiscal 2022 budget projecting total revenue of $161.9 million, of which $39 million is operating revenue. The balance is largely made up by
Measure RR funds and federal stimulus funds. That still leaves an estimated $14.8 million deficit.
“For us to really succeed, we have to bring back riders in a significant way,” Petty tells Trains. “And at some level, the average fare that is being paid by them will need to continue to be significant.”
THE TRACKS AHEAD
Max Auffhammer is a Bay Area commuter and environmental economist at the University of California, Berkeley. Trains asked what he sees ahead for Caltrain. “I think we’re going to see some pretty hefty fare increases because I think ridership is not going to return to pre-pandemic levels. The issue I’d worry about if I were Caltrain is the demand might just disappear.” He pointed to a publicly available mobility trends database, maintained by Apple, that displays changes in driving, walking, and transit use since January 2020. As of early June 2021, Bay Area car use is up 3% while transit use is off 41%.
Those running Caltrain are looking ahead and finding they need to update their long-range business plan, which was developed in 2019. That was a heady, prepandemic time when urban growth was seen to be unending, when Caltrain trains were crowded, and when it expected more than 200,000 daily riders by 2040. But a year later, things had changed. Caltrain’s assumptions about the future no longer worked. Rather than toss out the business plan, its managers are reworking it.
Growing ridership now requires attracting a wider segment of Bay Area residents. “We have to begin building multiple markets,” Petty says. Caltrain has to appeal to those traveling for personal, leisure, or educational reasons, trips they might otherwise make by driving. It also means a new emphasis on serving lower-income, transit-dependent riders through reduced fare programs, more off-peak and weekend service, and better integration with connecting transit systems. Nevertheless, Caltrain’s 2040 business plan remains in place. “The core of that vision is at least eight trains per hour, per direction, in the peak with a very simplified local and express style service operating at least 15-minute service during off-peak periods,” Petty says.
Caltrain now projects 2040 weekday ridership at 180,000, but that’s still more than three times the number of people that boarded its trains in 2019. “I think there’s a lot of reasons to be optimistic,” Petty says. “But I think we can’t kid ourselves that the next 30 years are going to look like the last 30 years.”
IN RESPONSE TO CHANGING RIDER NEEDS IN 2020, CALTRAIN ADDED MORE MIDDAY AND WEEKEND TRAINS.