METRO NORTH NEW HAVEN RAIL COMMUTER COUNCIL
(Established in 1985 under Connecticut Public Act 85-239, now Sections 13b-212b and 13b-212c of the Connecticut General Statutes)
MINUTES OF NOVEMBER 14, 2007
THE OFFICES OF SWRPA
STAMFORD GOVERNMENT CENTER
STAMFORD, CT
Present were: Jim Cameron, Chairman; Bob Jelley, Joe McGee, Terri Cronin, Joe McGee, Stan Trybulski, and Jeff Steele, members of the Council; Gene Colonese, CDOT; Ed Lydecker, Jeff Watson, and John Longobardi, Metro North Railroad; Mark Ginocchio, Stamford Advocate; Harold Cobin, The Hour; John Austin, Sr., Steven and Donna Kapsinow, Roger J. Cirella, Christ Trani and Kristan Tulp, members of the public
The meeting began at 7:00 pm.
The Minutes of the October 17, 2007 meeting were approved.
OCTOBER OPERATIONS REPORT
Ed Lydecker spoke about the October Operations Report. Joe McGee asked the reason for the 4% growth in ridership, and went on to raise the question of parking at all of the New Haven line stations. He suggested that ridership was likely to grow even more with the arrival of the new M-8 cars beginning in late 2009, and said that planning for increased parking ought to begin now so that there would be enough parking for the increased ridership. Gene Colonese mentioned that the new West Haven station with 1,000 parking spaces will be completed in 2011, and that a new Orange station with 1,000 additional parking spaces will be completed sometime later. Jeff Steele mentioned the new Black Rock station in Fairfield, which will have 1,400 new parking spaces available in 2009.
Mr. McGee went on to say that the practice of leasing station parking to the towns to operate should be rethought, and that there should be a new more uniform policy on rail parking. Jim Cameron said that many of the towns were not acting responsibly about rail parking. Mr. Steele said that the new Black Rock station could have more than 1,400 parking spaces if multi-level parking were built, as opposed to the present plan for surface parking. Mr. Colonese said that he would get back to us at the December meeting with further information about plans for increased rail parking.
FARE SURCHARGE
Mr. Cameron reported that the Legislature had finally passed the Bonding and Transportation Bill, which replaces the $1.00 fare surcharge scheduled to begin January 1, 2008 with a fare increase of 1.25% in calendar year 2010 (after the new cars start being delivered) and a further increase of 1% per year through 2016. In response to a question about additional fare increases, Bob Jelley commented that the DOT has told us that there would be no fare increases through 2009, and he suggested that it would be very difficult for the DOT to come up with additional fare increases just as the 1% per year increase goes into effect.
MAIN LINE ISSUES
Terri Cronin raised once again station issues about the South Norwalk and East Norwalk stations. Mr. Colonese said that he had had a meeting with the Town on November 1st. He said that Metro North was going to provide more trash receptacles on the platforms. He pointed out that the Town of Norwalk owns the South Norwalk station but the DOT owns the platforms. So a joint effort is needed to make improvements at the station. With respect to the lights at East Norwalk, Mr. Colonese suggested calling the Town first with lighting problems because even though the station was entirely owned by the DOT, it was leased to the Town of Norwalk.
Mr. Jelley spoke of his investigation of the problem of a higher percentage of New Haven line trains coming into GCT on the lower level than Harlem and Hudson line trains. He explained that the difficulty of coming in on the lower level was that there are stairs to get from the platform to the lower level concourse and the stairs slow people down. He mentioned that there are additional stairs at the front end of the train, but that crowding makes it difficult to get around the stairs that most people use in order to get to the ones at the front of the train. Ms. Cronin said it takes her an additional 10 minutes to get to work from the lower level.
Mr. Jelley said that he had gotten through Mr. Colonese an explanation from Metro North of the design considerations behind the Connecticut catenary replacement project. He said that he was satisfied with the explanations of why Metro North and the DOT had decided not to construct additional catenary supports on curves, not to construct, in some cases, additional catenary supports at interchanges, and to tension both the catenary support wire and the power wire with one set of pulleys and weights, as opposed to two.
Mr. Steele spoke of a morning train at the Fairfield station on Thursday, November 8 that had stopped at the Fairfield station but was apparently unable to open its doors, pick up passengers, and went on. He said that there were no announcements on the platform about what was happening.
BRANCH LINE ISSUES
Mr. Cameron announced that as a result of efforts by the Council, branch line passengers are now able to sign up for separate web advisories for their branch line. (Previously there were no web advisories about branch line problems). There was then discussion of the use of buses on the Danbury line to avoid slippery tracks from falling leaves. There was discussion of a Danbury line train that got stuck on one of the hills, and John Longobardi said that the sand dispenser was inoperative on the train that got stuck. He said that the conductor, who had not given information to the passengers on the train, was subsequently disciplined. He also said that there are 400 conductors on the New Haven line and only 20 supervisors, so that supervisors are not able to see everything that conductors do.
There was a question about having electric signs on the platforms that would announce when trains were arriving and when there were problems, and Jeff Watson offered to lead a tour at North White Plains station where such signs are being experimented with.
Mr. Colonese spoke of the holiday weekend service on Shore Line East scheduled to begin the weekend before Thanksgiving and continue until the end of the year. He said that it was an effort to “test the waters” and that the State intended to establish permanent weekend service in April or May. Mr. Jelley commented that although the DOT’s proposal for weekend service, which was endorsed by the Legislature, had envisioned every two-hour service from New Haven and Old Saybrook all day long on Saturday and Sunday, the holiday service was planned to run only from 7:00-11:00 in the morning and from 4:00-9:00 in the afternoon and evening with no midday service. He suggested that it would have been better to have “tested the waters” with all day service in order to see when people wanted the trains. Mr. Colonese said that it was primarily designed for people from the Shoreline who wanted to go to Stamford or New York and spend some time there. He also said that for the people who missed the 6:07 train from GCT and therefore missed the 8:00 Shore Line East train from New Haven, there would be a 9:00 bus from New Haven. Mr. Jelley also commented on the failure to have any Shore Line East service on New Year’s Day. He said that with weekend service on December 29 and 30 and regular service on December 31, it seemed unreasonable to make it easy for people on the shoreline to get to New York for New Year’s Eve and for people in New York to get to the shoreline for New Year’s Eve, but to have no way to get back again on New Year’s Day. Mr. Colonese said that DOT had decided to stick with having no service on holidays. Mr. Jelley also commented on the failure of weekend Shore Line East service to easily serve New Haven by having the train stop at State Street station. Mr. Colonese talked of weekend construction work on the Grand Avenue Bridge. Mr. Jelley pointed out that there was a crossover track between State Street Station and the Grand Avenue Bridge that would permit Shore Line East trains to platform at State Street and use the crossover track between State Street and the regular Amtrak tracks. Mr. Colonese refused to discuss that alternative.
Mr. McGee concluded the discussion by saying that he assumed the Council supported improvements in Shore Line East.
Mr. Colonese announced that two new locomotives for use on the Danbury branch would be received by December, and said that after they had been qualified, they would be put in service. He also announced that there was a scheduled change planned for the April timetable change that would provide a one hour earlier morning train from Danbury to GCT.
MISCELLANEOUS
Mr. Colonese announced that the $35 million of bonding for the new Stamford parking garage had been passed and said that the developer was anxious to begin development.
Mr. McGee said that Metro North was the second biggest user in electric power in Connecticut, after the casinos. He suggested that the DOT look into buying electric power itself, rather than having Metro North buy power. There was also discussion of use of fuel cells to provide power. Mr. Colonese said that he thought the fuel cell technology was not yet right for rail traction, but could be used for other purposes.
The meeting adjourned at 8:45 p.m.
The next meeting with be at SWRPA at 7:00 on December 19, 2007.
Bob Jelley
Secretary
Phone: (203) 498-4306
e-mail : rjelley@wiggin.com
