Can we expect this to appreciably speed up the travel time to Charlotte etc or mainly make it more reliable?
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Gotta think this won’t matter for speed too much but will make a big difference in reliability. It’s also a good chunk of infrastructure needed for the future commuter rail/regional rail, which is essentially what GoTriangle seems to be banking on; we can’t fund the entire project at the local level, so they’re relying on incremental improvements such as this. Fortunately, there are a lot of interested parties in making that happen for various reasons.
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There are a lot of slowdowns on the line due to worn track. Definitely matters for speed.
Gonna suck when Project 2025 completely dismantles the entire passenger rail system and ushers in a new dark age for transit in the US.
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If we sit on it long enough the commuter rail will build itself? lol
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Not exactly sure. Speeding up the trip doesn’t appear to be the main purpose. The curve realignments might save a minute by themselves. A significant part of the schedule is padding due to unreliability so there might be an improvement due to that too. I believe these improvements will also (eventually) enable higher frequency. Gradually moving closer to hourly service!
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Is that crossing closure where this bridge they mention in the headline is going?
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Good question, I figured it would be at Glover and Ellis Rd where there is a planned realignment, but Cornwallis could be it, too. Possibly both; this $34m project (which NCDOT planned to fund anyway) is NCDOT’s “match” for the federal funds. The Glover/Ellis project could be receiving federal funds.
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The proposed sidings at Elon and Hillsborough are really short so they will primarily be used for passenger traffic. Also adds flexibility for when NS has trains sitting crewless in the sidings at Mcleansville and Mebane. Getting Fetner to Clegg done and you have double track from Raleigh to RTP… intriguing possibilities.
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I’ve certainly had a few Piedmont delays in Morrisville, and this would fix that situation.
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Obviously WNC has more important things to worry about but a little disappointed that passenger rail connection to Asheville has been postponed indefinitely
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There were four historic routes via rail into Asheville.
- From the east, via Black Mountain and Old Fort
- From the north, via Marshall and the French Broad River
- From the south, via Hendersonville and the Saluda Grade, closed in 2001.
- From the west, via Waynesville, Bryson City, Murphy, and Blue Ridge, GA. Abandoned between Murphy and Blue Ridge in the early 1980s. Interestingly, this is the only route that escaped catastrophic damage in the 1916 floods.
Norfolk Southern has announced plans to restore service to Asheville via the French Broad River by January 2025. They have not yet announced anything about the line via Old Fort. I am quite worried about the ultimate fate of this line.
Worst case scenario, they close it, it’s never restored, and train service to Asheville is off the table forever. Whatever part of it is left would make a pretty spectacular rail-trail though.
Best case scenario: they close it, the state buys it and upgrades it with more tunnels, fewer curves, and a significantly faster passenger rail journey. The old route becomes a rail trail. This would require a 5-mile tunnel and likely have a ten-figure price tag.
Mid range scenario, the route is eventually rebuilt and restored as it was. This will probably require a state subsidy or buyout. Passenger rail may happen but it will be slow and not as useful.
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Feel a little bad saying this, but maybe it will put more focus on the Wilmington route and that gets a better chance of happening.
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I do know that Salisbury → Asheville got a CID grant, so hopefully the FRA will eventually be willing to contribute some serious $$.
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I’m kinda with you on this. As much as I love the idea of taking the train to Asheville and would absolutely do so the first chance I got, it’s not competitive enough with driving to be much more than a tourist attraction. The Wilmington route, on the other hand, will almost certainly be competitive with driving and will also serve some of the more impoverished parts of the state along the way. It’s going to be a really popular service. Plus it’s a relatively quick build and terminates right in downtown. I think the Winston-Salem route should be (and is, thanks to the feds) another focal point for similar reasons.
To summarize: that Asheville route is going to be incredible, but I think service to Wilmington is going to go a lot further in reducing car dependency in North Carolina.
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I think to make the Asheville Route more than just a tourist attraction, it needs to connect west through mountains, to Nashville and then St. Louis. Current Amtrack from east coast to west all either go through Chicago or New Orleans - Which is ridiculous.
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Building infrastructure through mountains is brutally expensive. I love the idea in theory, obviously, but you might be robbing a lot of Peters to pay one Paul.
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Take a look at a topographic and population density map and you’ll readily see why there are no Amtrak routes crossing the spine of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
Back in the day this was the route of the Southern’s “Carolina Special” which ran from Cincinatti (with through coaches from Chicago) to Asheville, and then split into a NC section, bound for Goldsboro, and a SC section, bound for Charleston. It was nicknamed the “Carolina Creeper” because its route across the Blue Ridge Mountains was torturously slow.
Without a multi-billion dollar investment it would he hard to make this route any faster, and it’s hard to justify prioritizing this when there are so many better options for east coast <->Midwest links elsewhere.
It’s not that it isn’t technologically possible; it is, of course! But if, as a country, we can’t scrape together the resolve to build a High Speed Rail link from Pittsburgh to Harrisburg, (thereby linking NYC and DC to the entire midwest) then we have no business upgrading rail through Asheville either.
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All good points. I realize it’s a pipe dream in the US. But I look at countries like Switzerland who have built a very robust rail network criss-crossing the alps. Including numerous tunnels through the mountains like Swiss Cheese. Surely we can do it through the Appalachian’s.
In the end it all comes down to money and political will power.
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Well Switzerland certainly has no shortage of money…
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It’s going to take money to cross the Appalachians for sure - but if federal dollars are being spent, they should spend it on the #1 national priority first, which would be connecting NYC to Chicago. NC to Nashville via Asheville would be like the 5th priority, at best.
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