More trains may be headed down Bristol's tracks

State transportation decision-makers were all aboard Thursday for moving down the track on plans on a comprehensive study of the possibility of establishing passenger rail service between Waterbury and Berlin.
“We will do everything we can” to make rail service happen as long as the data shows it’s in the long-term interest of the state, said Albert Martin, deputy commissioner of the state Department of Transportation.
“It seems like a realistic proposal to me,” state Sen. Donald DeFronzo, a New Britain Democrat, told a Central Connecticut Regional Planning Agency workshop session at Bristol’s Main Library Thursday.
“We have a window of opportunity here,” said the senator, who co-chairs the transportation committee.
Molly McKay, a Bristol native who lives in Mystic, said the public “is ready for this” and urged officials to keep moving aggressively forward.
McKay, transportation chair for the Connecticut Sierra Club, told officials, “What you’re saying today is music to my ears.”
James RePass, president of the Boston-based National Corridors Initiative, said that rail is “a green industry” and should be promoted much more heavily, for moving both passengers and freight.
He said he was encouraged to see local, regional, state and railroad officials working together to push the idea forward.
Ken Shooshan-Stoller, a regional planner, said the session was put together to see how the area can utilize the 24.5-mile rail line more fully.
“We want to be imaginative and we want to consider all the options that we have,” Shooshan-Stoller said.
Roger Bergeron, a vice president with Pan Am Railways, which owns the track, figured it would cost as little as $11 million to make changes that would allow for passenger service.
That doesn’t include depots or associated infrastructure, however.
Officials said that if passenger rail were to get rolling, there might be a need to make costly changes to prevent trains from tying up traffic on Route 6 in Bristol at Maple End or busy New Britain intersections.
Currently, there are four trains a day between Plainville and Berlin and one that runs between Bristol and Waterbury, Bergeron said. He said it could easily handle much more.
State Rep. Frank Nicastro, a Bristol Democrat who serves on the transportation committee, said he knows nothing can happen overnight, but he called for “less talking and more action” to get the trains rolling.
“Timing is of the essence. And the timing is now,” said Mayor Art Ward.
DeFronzo said he figures that an allocation for a comprehensive feasibility study could be made next winter and a report finished, perhaps, by the end of 2009.
At that point, he said, “we would have a real sense of where we’re going.”

Reporter's notebook:
Forget those images of a big black locomotive spitting steam, whistle wailing, churning down the tracks.
What we got instead was a GMAC 2500, a big SUV with Guilford Rail System’s logo on the side. But it wasn’t quite typical because, in addition to its normal tires, it also had train wheels that could grip the rails.
On a largely forgotten piece of rail line near Amtrak’s Berlin station, railroad vice president Roger Bergeron maneuvered the vehicle onto the tracks to begin a 24.5 mile odyssey through the industrial backyards and forests on the way to Waterbury.
City Councilor Cliff Block stood between the rusting rails, singing Arlo Guthrie’s “City of New Orleans,” while officials scurried to get ready for the journey.
I piled in to Bergeron’s pseudo-train along with Mayor Art Ward, state Rep. Frank Nicastro, Nicastro’s intern, Bergeron and a photographer.
“You want me to collect the tickets?” Ward asked Bergeron, who mustered a smile in response.
Most of the City Council and another reporter followed in a second specially equipped SUV.
As we started off down the line, we could hear – and feel – a low rumble, soon followed by the regular thump-thump-thump that came every time we hit a new rail.
“We’ll do about 25 miles an hour,” Bergeron said, and less at street crossings and whenever there’s a connecting line.
We headed off into New Britain, eyeing the heaps of debris behind shuttered factories.
“All that stuff is unbelievable,” Nicastro said.
As we crossed over Route 9, Bergeron complained that the railroad bridge there is poorly designed, allowing ATVs to dislodge the stones between the ties so that they fall onto the highway below.
“There’s no way to clean them up,” he said, aside from vacuuming up the rocks from grills that can’t be swept.
Between downtown New Britain and Plainville are countless concrete walls adorned with brightly colored graffiti that, for the most part, can only be seen from the tracks.
“Some of it’s really good,” said Josh Nolan, a Western Connecticut State University junior who’s interning with Nicastro in Hartford.
“There’s some great artists,” Nicastro added.
Even odder were the many variants of “Dump Bush” painted here and there, many of them obscene, almost none of them visible to anyone but the occasional railroad worker.
We saw a few people beside the tracks, some of whom gaped at the strange site of two SUVs hauling along. One man in Waterbury scratched his head, to Nicastro’s delight.
Heading into Bristol, we could see the Pequabuck River, trees and the backs of unidentifiable buildings.
“Bristol looks a lot different from the rail,” Ward said.
The SUV trains made a quick stop near the American Legion post on Hooker Court so that everyone could use a friendly restroom. Ward bemoaned the Legion’s recent decision to stop selling hotdogs at lunchtime.
As we rolled west, Nicastro looked longingly to the side.
“Greer’s is right over there,” the hungry politician said.
“He doesn’t make crispy chicken anymore,” the mayor answered.
In Pequabuck is a stunning site – a 3,800-foot tunnel bored almost a century ago through hard rock and lined with concrete, a project that Bergeron said would cost a fortune today.
Nicastro, who grew up in Bristol’s West End, said he remembered walking through it “four or five times every summer” as a child – sometimes to steal apples from a distant orchard.
His intern got a kick out of that.
On the far side of the tunnel, the tracks meander through the southern part of Plymouth, through some beautiful country.
Bergeron said one nice thing about train travel is the sudden shift in scenery from urban to rural.
What was obvious on the three-hour journey, which included a side trip on the line owned by Bristol on Chippens Hill, is that Bergeron is right when he calls the tracks underutilized.
Along the way are scores of factories, car dealerships and other businesses that rely on trucks to make deliveries and haul away products. At least some of them might well do better to try the rail, Bergeron said.
For Ward and Nicastro, it was a pleasant break from the routine of dull government meetings.
“I’ve been trying to do this since I took office,” Ward said, “to get on the right track.”

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Copyright 2008. All rights reserved.
Contact Steve Collins at scollins@bristolpress.com