Mike D

I hope Mike keeps up the fight. The busway is a stupid idea. Rail makes way more sense for the Hartford/New Britain/Waterbury corridor. I need to find out more about this "Knowledge Corridor" in Massachusetts. Hope this can be some sort of precedent for Central CT.

Yes, CT, get this done! Its been too long. And put Hartford-Waterbury rail in there too! This way they can get a better deal on buying railcars, signals, new tracks, lighting and stations.

The Mets and, more likely, the Yankees would be the biggest losers if the Rays relocated to Hartford or New Haven. It would be the Yankees because the Rays are in the same division with the Yankees and Sox. Baseball and pro football largely tend to draw their fans regionally while hockey and pro basketball tend to draw fans more locally if there is a baseball and/or football team in the same market. An NHL team has a much better chance of succeeding in central Connecticut than an MLB for that very reason. The Bruins, Rangers, Islanders and Devils aren't popular in Connecticut. Then again, the Islanders aren't that popular in New York City anymore. I see more Rangers fans on the LIRR than Isles fans. On the other hand there is a significant amount of corporate might in southern Connecticut and around Hartford, probably more so in southern Connecticut because of its proximity to New York City, so putting a team in an area that can attract both areas might be desirable to Rays ownership. Not just that, but if 36-38 home games out of 82 are going to be against the Yankees and the Sox and maybe three more against the Mets during inter-league play, fans of those three teams, in Connecticut and in New York, Massachusetts and Rhode Island, might come to see their teams play the Rays there.

ConnDOT is still pushing for this idiotic busway? They've been doing so since I was a student at UConn in 2000. Even back then, I thought it was a ridiculous idea, seeing that there was a perfectly good right-of-way for trains to run there. Definitely no need to back in and out of Berlin station. Busway supporters would jump all over that issue. Didn't there used to be a track junction just north of the Berlin station that allowed trains coming from Waterbury/New Britain to turn north toward Hartford? Can't those tracks just be rebuilt? I'm just surprised that nothing has been done for 10 years and this isn't even a rail project.

I've wanted to see something done with that property for along time. Either remake the Clarion into a nice hotel or blow it up and start all over again with some other type of building. Now is the time for the city to act. Time to seize the hotel.

I'm glad to see the Griffin Line being reconsidered too. I remember hearing about it while I went to school at UConn. Dust off those 11-year old light rail plans and get some electric- or diesel-powered light rail trains running on the Griffin Line. I also believe ConnDOT should scrap those busway plans and run light rail from Hartford to New Britain. It's only nine miles, definitely doable as light rail. If they go all the way to Waterbury, then maybe go with commuter rail, although New Jersey Transit runs diesel light rail from Trenton to Camden, which is about the same distance as Hartford to Waterbury.

Hi. I used to be very active on these forums, but for some reason stopped. Now I'm back again. I remember when they were discussing the Hartford/New Britain Busway back in the early 2000s. I thought it was a dumb idea then and I think it is now. It's a abandoned rail corridor, so it should be brought back as a rail line. Count me in as a supporter of a Hartford/Waterbury commuter rail service. I would like to see them use self-propelled railcars to provide the service.

Yes, the state has been dragging its feet on the NH-Springfield commuter rail. This could and should have up and running many years ago.

I totally agree. MARC trains should run on weekends and more frequently on the Penn Line in order to better serve BWI. And for way less money. Why throw billions of dollars away on a Metro extension there? This would be a Metro extension that would only benefit DC and its suburbs and not Baltimore.

Portland does have light rail, the MAX lines. These use large, articulated light-rail vehicles. I believe they can reach up to 55 mph. They run in wide center street medians and private right-of-way outside of downtown. But there is also the Portland Streetcar. This is a smaller line that runs primarily in the northwest part of downtown Portland and almost entirely on city streets. They have smaller railcars (66' long, which is about 2/3 the length of a MAX car) which can not go as fast as a MAX train can. This could be the model for a Nashville streetcar. I consider MAX (and other recently-built light-rail systems) to be modern-day interurbans, becaue the rail cars are large (like the old interurban cars were) and many of them utilize private right-of-ways as the old interurbans did. Streetcars used private right-of-ways too, but generally not to the extent of interurbans. .

I've been reading about the Music City Star line to Lebanon. I hope it's a success so the other lines proposed in the system also get built. But once commuters get downtown, they might need to transfer to another vehicle to continue their trips. I think LRT should also be given a good look for Nashville. Granted, there are concerns that LRT is expensive (though a heavy-rail New York-style subway would cost much more). So I was thinking that maybe Nashville could start by doing a streetcar line from the Riverfront to Vanderbilt. It could use historic cars like in Memphis or Charlotte or modern ones like in Portland. Either way, it would be less money in the beginning and the streetcar line could serve as a foundation for a light rail system.

Defintely force the Moonies out of there. I'd still like to see another TV station move down there once Channel 3 leaves, maybe NBC 30 could move down there as part of a mixed- use facility.

I'd go with GADOT on the width of the transit corridor. It should have room for at least two tracks. Having only one track will produce limited transit benefits. Plus, Amtrak needs to be run to the MMPT. Amtrak trains should stop downtown to make them a more useful option for getting to Atlanta.

I really like the bottom photo. I'm going to take a look at the rest of your photos.

The Westin kind of looks like a big silver cigar.