CDOT plans to spend $16 million during the next three years to make improvements to the stations in Branford, Guilford, Madison, Clinton and Westbrook and build the State St. Station in New Haven. During the next month riders will have an opportunity to comment on the proposed designs for the stations in Clinton, Madison and Guilford. Presentations were made in New Haven, Branford and Westbrook during the past month. CDOT and Baker Engineering Inc. will present the plans for the Clinton station at 7:30 pm on Tuesday, November 30 in the Green Room of the Clinton Town Hall. The plans for Madison will be presented at 7:30 on December 8 at the Town Campus in Madison. The meeting for Guilford is tentatively scheduled for January 11th at the Guilford Community Center. Please come out and see the new plans. If the plans are any indication, the new stations (see architect's draft pictures of the Westbrook and Clintonstations) will be an asset to the towns and serve to attract many new riders to Shore Line East.
STATIONS, NEW AND RENOVATED
The station improvements will include high-level platforms, similar to those in New Haven, canopies, additional parking, and the installation of elevators or ramps in order to make the stations ADA compliant. Construction in Branford and Westbrook is scheduled to start next fall and be completed during the fall of 2001. Construction in Guilford, Madison and Clinton is scheduled to begin in early 2001 and be completed by the summer of 2002. Design and planning continues for the new State St. Station in New Haven. This station will be located on State Street between Chapel and Court Streets, making it an easy walk to the Green, thus cutting commuting time for many of our riders. Construction is tentatively scheduled to begin in August 2000 and be completed by summer 2001 in time for the beginning of the Q-Bridge reconstruction.
ON-TIME PERFORMANCE IMPROVES ...
In case you had not noticed, on-time performance has improved dramatically since May. After nearly a year of deteriorating on-time performance that reached a low of 79.95% in April, buses replaced several of the morning and afternoon trains in order to improve on-time performance. Since the bus substitution, on-time performance has climbed back above 90%. During both September and October the trains were on-time nearly 95% of the time.
SO RIDERSHIP BEGINS TO CLIMB AGAIN ...
Coinciding with the improvement in the on-time performance has been a steady improvement in patronage during the past five months. Since August, daily ridership has grown by an average of 4.8% over last year, and more than 20% compared to April and May of this year. During the month of October SLE averaged 1135 riders a day.
BUSES BECOME TRAINS AGAIN
Amtrak’s electrification project is scheduled to end at the end of December, ending over three years of delays and inconvenience. In January look for new timetables as trains will replace the buses currently providing transportation for the 9:48am arrival in New Haven, the 3:20pm, 8:16pm and 9:37 pm departures from New Haven, and all reverse expresses.
Q-BRIDGE CONSTRUCTION AND SLE IMPROVEMENTS
With the impending Q-Bridge construction project we have been working with our local elected officials to encourage CDOT to make further improvements to SLE service. In addition to the station improvements CDOT has agreed to add two additional trips to New Haven in the morning. We are also encouraging them to provide additional evening service as well as midday, weekend and reverse peak service.
Top of this page | SLERA home pageCreated 11/24/1999 by E.C. Schroeder. Last Updated 11/24/1999
Contact: E.C. Schroeder at edwin.schroeder@yale.edu URL: http://www.trainweb.org/slera/news.htm
