3rd train Raleigh to Charlotte?

[hickorytrainlover]

I recently went to Florida from Greensboro, nc. The station staff told me they were working on the cars for a third mid-afthernoon train that takes the same route as the Piedmont. Has anyone heard anything on this? Also I hear Norfolk Southern wants 134 million up front to start service to Asheville. Will this ever happen??

Thanks

 

[AlanB]

I recently went to Florida from Greensboro, nc. The station staff told me they were working on the cars for a third mid-afthernoon train that takes the same route as the Piedmont. Has anyone heard anything on this? Also I hear Norfolk Southern wants 134 million up front to start service to Asheville. Will this ever happen??
Thanks

I haven't heard about it, but if they need cars, Amtrak's got 20 some odd Amfleet I's sitting in storage.

 

[George Harris]

If you want information from the horse's mouth, go to www.bytrain.org This is the North Carolina Dept. of Tranportation's web site for rail matters. It appears to need updating, however, as in a lot of it the last update is a year or more ago.

I was under the impression that the third train was waiting on replacing some or all of the double track sections between Greensboro and Charlotte that had been removed in the 1960's. At that time the railroad was converted to alternating section of single track and double track, generally about 10 miles each. Between Greensboro and Charlotte there are four sections of single track, two north of Salisbury and two south of Salisbury. The web site shows the two north of Salisbury being restored at a cost of about $2 million per mile. This is supposed to have already happened, but so far as I know it has not as yet.

What has happened in the last five years is that the Raleigh to Greensboro section has been given signals, some long 45 mph sidings, and some other work to eliminate slow speed areas. The speed limit on this is now for the most part 79 mph instead of the former 59 mph. In addition, Selma to Raleigh has had its speed limit raised from 50 mph to 59 mph. At some point this section is also supposed to get signals, adn with them a hgiher speed limit.

I do not think there is any problem iwith NS on adding trains between Raleigh and Greensboro, only on the section between Greensboro and Charlotte.

The Charlotte to Greensboro to Raleigh, and on to Selma, Goldsboro, and Morehead City is owned by the state of North Carolian and is the North Carolina Railroad. In was leased by the Southern, or predecessor Richmond and Danville for 99 years in the 1890's or thereabouts. When that expired there was a good deal of negotiation between the state and NS, and that is putting it politely, after which there is now a new lease, so the railroad is operated by NS but owned by the state. This state ownership has a lot do do with North Carolina being able to do what they have in the way of funding and promoting passenger trains.

The amount quoted for Salisbury to Asheville sounds about right. This service is shown as simply being on hold on the NCDOT web site. NS is claiming congestion on the Salisbury to Asheville line and requesting a good deal of work on new and higher speed sidings. Some of the money is for increased superelevation on curves to improve the run time, which is not really an NS requirement, but needed to have a reasonable run time. Even with this, Salisbury to Asheville will still be fairly slow due to the mountainous terrain.

George

 

[hickorytrainlover]

If you want information from the horse's mouth, go to www.bytrain.org This is the North Carolina Dept. of Tranportation's web site for rail matters. It appears to need updating, however, as in a lot of it the last update is a year or more ago.
I was under the impression that the third train was waiting on replacing some or all of the double track sections between Greensboro and Charlotte that had been removed in the 1960's. At that time the railroad was converted to alternating section of single track and double track, generally about 10 miles each. Between Greensboro and Charlotte there are four sections of single track, two north of Salisbury and two south of Salisbury. The web site shows the two north of Salisbury being restored at a cost of about $2 million per mile. This is supposed to have already happened, but so far as I know it has not as yet.

What has happened in the last five years is that the Raleigh to Greensboro section has been given signals, some long 45 mph sidings, and some other work to eliminate slow speed areas. The speed limit on this is now for the most part 79 mph instead of the former 59 mph. In addition, Selma to Raleigh has had its speed limit raised from 50 mph to 59 mph. At some point this section is also supposed to get signals, adn with them a hgiher speed limit.

I do not think there is any problem iwith NS on adding trains between Raleigh and Greensboro, only on the section between Greensboro and Charlotte.

The Charlotte to Greensboro to Raleigh, and on to Selma, Goldsboro, and Morehead City is owned by the state of North Carolian and is the North Carolina Railroad. In was leased by the Southern, or predecessor Richmond and Danville for 99 years in the 1890's or thereabouts. When that expired there was a good deal of negotiation between the state and NS, and that is putting it politely, after which there is now a new lease, so the railroad is operated by NS but owned by the state. This state ownership has a lot do do with North Carolina being able to do what they have in the way of funding and promoting passenger trains.

The amount quoted for Salisbury to Asheville sounds about right. This service is shown as simply being on hold on the NCDOT web site. NS is claiming congestion on the Salisbury to Asheville line and requesting a good deal of work on new and higher speed sidings. Some of the money is for increased superelevation on curves to improve the run time, which is not really an NS requirement, but needed to have a reasonable run time. Even with this, Salisbury to Asheville will still be fairly slow due to the mountainous terrain.

George

The Double track issue is correct. The amtrak employee did say it wouldn't happen til after the doubletracking is completed. North Carolina already has the cars and are refurbishing them and waiting on the track work according to the Amtrak employee.

Anthony

 

[AmtrakWPK]

It would certainly be nice to get as far as Asheville. We have been to Montreat NC several times in recent years, and that line goes through Black Mountain NC, which is only about three miles from Montreat. Black Mountain is something like 10-20 miles East of Asheville I think. There is still a depot physically at Black Mountain although I think it's in use as something else now. Of course from the perspective of being down here in Florida, the proposed line to Asheville wouldn't do us much good because it heads East and North from Asheville, and as planned I don't think there would be any way to get from here to there unless we traveled most of the way from Florida to D.C. to catch a connecting train into NC.

 

[hickorytrainlover]

It would certainly be nice to get as far as Asheville. We have been to Montreat NC several times in recent years, and that line goes through Black Mountain NC, which is only about three miles from Montreat. Black Mountain is something like 10-20 miles East of Asheville I think. There is still a depot physically at Black Mountain although I think it's in use as something else now. Of course from the perspective of being down here in Florida, the proposed line to Asheville wouldn't do us much good because it heads East and North from Asheville, and as planned I don't think there would be any way to get from here to there unless we traveled most of the way from Florida to D.C. to catch a connecting train into NC.

91 gets into to Raleigh in the morning and could connect with proposed train from raleigh to Asheville. That could also work in reverse. I go Greensboro to Raleigh to Florida but cut that connection very close but the Piedmont is normally on time if not early so it can be done. I live in Hickory so the drive to Greensboro, isn't that bad but would nice to get on a train here. Maybe someday, It's seems like North Carolina wants it really bad.

 

[battalion51]

I did see somewhere (maybe on the Trains.com newswire) that there will be a midday departure added, most likely with the Spring Timetable. Now what the rolling stock will be for this train I don't know, but I can pretty much guarantee that both of NCDOT's F59PHI's will be used daily. And we may even see NCDOT's GP40 used every now and then.

 

[AmtrakWPK]

From WPK to Black Mountain is roughly 600 mies. From WPK to Raleigh (600) to Black Mountain ((231) is about 831 miles, about 60 miles less than WPK-WAS. What is needed is the link from JAX-ATL and then somehow to Western NC from there. Otherwise it's just a really round-about way of getting there from down here in FL. Maybe that's still the result of the "US (NEC) vs. THEM ('Indian Country')" mentality of the planners in the NEC. You can get to wherever you want to go fairly directly if you're in the NEC. Otherwise, good luck.

 

[George Harris]

As has been said before, both main lines between Jacksonville and Atlanta, NS via Valdosta and Macon and CSX via Waycross, Cordele, Manchester are heavily congested, so any service that way would be fairly unreliable.

However, NS's ex CofG route from Savannah through Macon to Atlanta is not heavily traveled, and in fact this Atlanta to Macon line NS is happy to host passenger trains on it. This is the line to be used by the proposed Atlanta to Lovejoy commuter service. From Macon to Jesup, the ex-Southern line used by the Kansas City Florida Special is still in place and is lightly used, but needs lots of work to achieve decent speeds, and is also unsignaled, - as is the Cof G line out of Savannah to Macon.

There is another way. Run a Columbia SC to Charlotte NC section off the Silver Star. Thsi would give a late night south early morning north train out of Cahrlotte. It would help if the norhtbound Star was a few hours later. What genius decided that the two New York to Florida trains had to run almost head to tail? Back when Southern had passenger trains on this line, the 108 miles from Columbia to Charlotte took about 3 hours, and without a lot of curve revisions, that is about what it would take now. So; say about 9:00 pm SB connecting to about an hour earlier SB Star, then arrive about 7:00 am northbound off about a 2 hour later NB Star.

Of course if Saluda was reopened, then you could resurrect the Skyland Special as a connection to the Star, and get to Asheville about 10:00 am, and leave Asheville about 7:00 pm.

George

 

[AmtrakWPK]

An Atlanta to Savannah would at least somewhat restore the southern transcon route that the intact Sunset provided, as well as provide the southern link between both Silvers (and Palmetto) and the Crescent, and provide a link southward from the NC state trains. Doesn't do anything to restore Florida Panhandle service, or the lost direct southern transcon route that the loss of Sunset east of NOL caused, but it would at least help in the other respects.