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shellshocker528 t1_isz2ezx wrote

There used to be a rail line that ran between Fitchburg and Worcester, creatively called the Fitchburg & Worcester Railroad. Currently, two sections have been converted into rail trails: the section between Fitchburg and downtown Leominster is the Twin Cities Rail Trail, the the section between Sterling center and Sterling Junction (right near the Sterling/ West Boylston line on Route 12) is the Mass Central Rail Trail. The section between Pratts Junction and Sterling Center is partially intact, but also partially built over, particularly around I-190. There are tracks in place between Leominster center and Pratts Junction, as well as between Sterling Junction and downtown Worcester. Both are currently owned by CSX. Rebuilding that rail is possible because of how the rails-to-trails laws work, but would be very expensive (see the South Coast Rail project, which is currently reactivating a long-defunct rail right-of-way). Without a greater need, I think a rail route between Fitchburg and Worcester will be a tough sell.

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SLEEyawnPY t1_it0edbm wrote

>Without a greater need, I think a rail route between Fitchburg and Worcester will be a tough sell.

Worcester to Providence would be a much easier sell and I don't see that happening anytime soon, either, even though with respect to tracks at least everything is in place.

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shellshocker528 t1_it2815t wrote

There is a company called the Boston Surface Railroad that has been trying to get Worcester to Providence commuter service started for several years now. They even acquired an old FL9 locomotive, which has sat on a siding along 146 for a while now. Unfortunately, it looks like they're still having a hard time getting it off the ground, though I hope they succeed.

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SLEEyawnPY t1_it2uyf9 wrote

That always struck me as kind of a fly-by-night operation. There's a long thread about the situation here:

https://railroad.net/boston-surface-railroad-worcester-providence-commuter-rail-t160242-750.html

As one commenter mentions the odds may have been better back when the Providence & Worcester was an independent locally-owned operation. But they got acquired by the Genesee & Wyoming which is a huge international RR holding company conglomerate and I expect they're not interested in sharing their right-of-way for anything less than serious $$$ up front.

In the ideal it seems like it would be a good route for DMUs, or perhaps even BMUs, someday. But not sure if the US regulations with respect to operating lightweight units on the same tracks as freight have changed, yet..the FL9 is a museum piece, hope some good Samaritans save it before it rusts away completely.

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Ahkhira t1_iszyatx wrote

Thanks for the history lesson! I was about to look it up myself, but research on mobile is a pest.

I really wish we had our trains back.

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SLEEyawnPY t1_it0f5ga wrote

>I really wish we had our trains back.

At one time circa 1950s, 1960s you could take an overnight sleeper train from NYC to Portland ME, it followed a kind of weird route, leaving the Northeast Corridor in Providence to head northwest through Woonsocket to Worcester, then running northeast to Lowell & Lawrence and on to Portland.

From there you could connect to Montreal and St. John NB by rail also, I believe if you had a sleeping car room and there was enough demand sometimes they'd just transfer the whole car to another railroad, and you didn't need to change trains yourself.

There were also regular commuter trains between Boston and Albany and Boston and Hartford, though the Boston to Hartford route was never that popular and didn't last past the 1950s.

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Ahkhira t1_it0mv6z wrote

I grew up near a part of the old Boston-Albany grade that was lost in a flood back in 1955. I spent many years running horses up a couple miles of leftover track bed, and that's what spawned my interest in railroad history, and also local history.

The section of the railroad that I lived near was destroyed by a flood in 1955. Unfortunately, the railroad never could have been rebuilt after that flood. The flood devastated several towns, and many lives were lost. The river literally moved itself, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers came and built the dams and the watershed that we have now. It was proven quite necessary. At least twice in my lifetime, I've seen the high water mark changed. If that dam wasn't built, I don't even want to think of the losses the local area would have sustained.

You can come visit and find old remnants of what was the Boston-Albany line if you know where to look. There is still some active freight railroad in the area, but it's a shadow of what it used to be.

Most of the rail near my house is now a rail trail. There are many fragments of rusted rails, rotten ties, old cinder trackbeds, steel trestles, and even some stone bridge abutments.

If you walk along the trail in the early morning fog, let your mind fade into black and white, breathe deeply, and let your imagination go, you can see the old steam locomotive coming through the old stone bridge by the river....

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