Ohio Passenger Rail News
Intermodal
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Issue E-6
Intercity Rail
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Commuter Rail
All Aboard Ohio
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Public Transit
January 2016
All Aboard Ohio gets 2016
advocacy off to busy start
Calendar of Events:
LOCAL MEETINGS:
All meetings start at 10 AM
on the second Saturday of
each month:
CLEVELAND -- 3rd-level
conf. room above AAO
office & Tower City food
court, 230 W. Huron Rd.
COLUMBUS -- Grandview
Public Library, 1685 W.
First Ave., Columbus.
TOLEDO -- Amtrak station,
Toledo MLK Plaza, 415
Emerald Ave., Toledo.
COMING EVENTS:
National Train Day May 7
With the start of the new
year, All Aboard Ohio has
begun advocating to
decision-makers the
recommendations of our
recent report which
identified the most costeffective expansions of
passenger rail service.
The report, issued in
September 2015 following
input from and unanimous
approval by the All Aboard
Ohio Board of Directors,
ranked expansions based
on relative ease of
implementation, ridership
and financial performance.
The top two Ohio
passenger rail service
expansions we analyzed
are:
1. Increasing service to
daily on Amtrak's thrice-
Dearborn, MI's new station (Bob Johnston photo).
weekly Cardinal route
linking Chicago-CincinnatiWashington DC-New York
City.
2. Linking the Wolverine
(Chicago-Detroit) and
Keystone (PittsburghPhiladelphia-New York
City) corridors by rerouting
the Capitol Ltd. via
Dearborn, MI, extending
the Pennsylvanian west to
Chicago via Dearborn,
and/or extending a
Wolverine train east to
Pittsburgh via Toledo,
Cleveland & Youngstown.
All Aboard Ohio also is
looking at cost-effective
ways to restore service to
Columbus, the nation's
largest city without any
regularly scheduled
passenger rail service.
AAO Annual Mtg. May 21
Cincy Streetcar schedule OK'd
Inside This Issue:
Let's get Oxford,
Miami U. on track!
Pg 2
Stations near Ohio to
see improvements
Pg 2
New W. Detroit track
avoids freight traffic
Pg 3
PennDOT seeks 2nd
train west to Pittsburgh Pg 3
AAO's fun-fundraisers
are a success
Pg 4
Cincinnati City Council on
Jan. 5 approved the SW
Ohio Regional Transit
Authority's recommended
schedule for the streetcar,
due to start service by Fall.
The daily schedule was
constrained by the amount
of operating funding so
adding service frequency
at one time of the day
would require cutting it at
another. All Aboard Ohio
and other advocacy
groups supported the
recommendation. We
thank City Council for
supporting it too.
SORTA RECOMMENDATION - OK'D BY CITY COUNCIL
This schedule offers more service at the busiest times.
January 2016
Ohio Passenger Rail News
Page 2
Let's get Oxford, OH & Miami U on track!
Following a very positive ridership
study, Amtrak has approved adding a
train station stop at Oxford, Ohio on
its Chicago-Cincinnati-Washington
DC-New York City Cardinal route.
A local committee of city officials,
Miami University representatives and
civic-minded citizens identified
Chestnut Street just east of Main
Street as the preferred site for a
station facility. The site is city-owned
property and is closest to the
university campus as well as to
housing and shops.
Now the challenge for the community
will be to gather the local dollars to
leverage scarce federal funding.
There is a standard-design station
scaled for small towns that's been
built since 2010 in Amtrak-served
communities like Alliance, OH and
Connellsville, PA. Constructing those
unstaffed stations cost about $1
million each.
The case for adding a train station in
Oxford is strong. It should be no
surprise that Southwest Ohio is home
to most of Miami University's nearly
Connellsville, PA Amtrak station on Dec. 28, 2015 (Bryn Enoch photo).
20,000 students. But it may surprise
people to learn that the #2 hometown
for RedHawk students is Greater
Chicago. Also many of Miami's
students are international and enter
the USA at Chicago's O'Hare Airport.
International students are accustomed to having a rail link for the last leg
of travel to reach a college town.
All Aboard Ohio also is busily
advocating for expanded passenger
rail service through Oxford, between
Chicago and Cincinnati. That likely
starts with increasing Cardinal service
from thrice-weekly to daily. But it could
also include expanding the ChicagoIndianapolis “Hoosier State” train
service to Cincinnati via Oxford.
Share All Aboard Ohio's Oxford station flier today! Contact us at [email protected] or download it HERE.
Stations near Ohio to see improvements
Just over the state line in Kentucky
and Indiana, two stations will see big
improvements in 2016.
The Waterloo, IN station (a glorified
bus shelter used by many Ft. Waynearea residents) has the state's thirdhighest Amtrak ridership with 22,000
passengers per year. The city has a
$1.6 million federal TIGER grant to
relocate and use a 19th-century
depot, provide restrooms, a heated
waiting room, plus well-lit and marked
parking lot and walkways. The project
has been planned for 10 years; work
should start and finish this year.
“It’s been slow and quiet until this
point and now we’re going to move
really fast,” Waterloo Town Manager
Tena Woenker told WANE-TV.
Waterloo is served by four Amtrak
trains daily on the Chicago-ToledoCleveland-East Coast routes of the
Capitol and Lake Shore limiteds.
Meanwhile in Mayville, KY across the
Ohio River from Aberdeen, OH,
Amtrak and city officials will move
forward this year on improving the
CSX-owned, Amtrak-leased station.
Amtrak is responsible for providing
ADA access at the historic station
which Amtrak has served for decades
on its Chicago-Cincinnati-Washington
DC-New York City Cardinal route.
A community group called Citizens of
Maysville lobbied Amtrak, CSX and
the city for funding to fix up the
station. Amtrak is providing $500,000
and the city is seeking a $250,000
grant to make improvements to
Maysville's West End, including work
on the depot plus sidewalks and
signage in the area. The city will
coordinate work with Amtrak to get
the most out of the available money.
"We've been talking for a long time
and it's finally going to work," City
Manager Ray Young told The Ledger
Independent.
Amtrak's work to improve station
parking, platforms, walkways,
entrance, restroom, wheelchair
lift/enclosure and station signs could
be completed by Fall 2016. After that,
the city would then have a better idea
of what remains to be done before
deciding how to direct the grant
money, Young said.
January 2016
Ohio Passenger Rail News
Page 3
New West Detroit track avoids rail freight traffic
Holiday travelers in “that state up
north” got a nice present in
December. The week before
Christmas, Michigan Department of
Transportation crews completed
construction and testing of a new
passenger-only rail line that allows
Amtrak's Detroit-Chicago Wolverine
service to bypass the busy West
Detroit Junction, the Federal Railroad
Administration reported this week.
The $15.8 million West Detroit track
project was designed to create a
safer, faster and more reliable route
for passenger train service through
Detroit. The project was funded in
part by a $7.9 million FRA grant, the
agency announced on social media.
The federal grant was announced in
2012 as part of an effort to address a
bottleneck of freight- and passengerrail traffic in the Detroit area.
Meanwhile, track improvements,
advanced signal system installations,
enhanced grade-crossing safety
devices and other construction work
A Detroit-Chicago Amtrak train on the new West Detroit track (FRA photo).
is progressing east of Kalamazoo to
Dearborn to raise passenger train
speeds to 110 mph on that stateowned portion by the end of 2017.
Train speeds already were increased
to 110 mph on the Amtrak-owned
portion west of Kalamazoo to Porter,
IN. When the work is done, more than
200 of the 280 route miles between
Chicago-Detroit will be rated at 110
mph. Also, the number of trains is
proposed to increase from 3-4 each
way per day to 10 daily each way,
according to Michigan DOT's plans.
PennDOT seeks a 2nd train west to Pittsburgh
At the request of the Pennsylvania
Department of Transportation
(PennDOT), Amtrak is evaluating the
operating costs as well as availability
of track and train equipment to offer a
second daily round trip between
Pittsburgh, Johnstown, Altoona,
Harrisburg, Philadelphia, New York
City and other enroute stations.
While Amtrak and PennDOT provide
14 trains each way on weekdays (8
per weekend-day) east of Harrisburg
at 110 mph, they provide only one
train a day each way west of
Harrisburg to Pittsburgh at 79 mph.
The big difference is that Amtrak
owns the tracks east of Harrisburg
while freight railroad Norfolk Southern
(NS) owns the right of way west of the
state's capital.
As part of the state-requested
analysis, Amtrak will check with NS
about adding another passenger train
into its busy schedule of frequent
freight trains. Amtrak will inform
PennDOT if any capital improvements
are needed before service can begin
and how much they could cost.
Amtrak will also provide the
commonwealth with an annual
operating subsidy estimate.
“With our existing funding, we can't
afford billions of dollars of
improvements, but we might be able
to afford this,” said Jennie Granger,
project manager for PennDOT's state
rail plan, to the Pittsburgh TribuneReview. “Part of it is the negotiations
with Amtrak and Norfolk Southern,
and part of it is seeing what that
subsidy is and gaining that support
and maximizing the available dollars.”
PennDOT last year paid Amtrak
$14.5 million for the cross-state
Pennsylvanian train and the frequent
Keystone Service from Harrisburg to
Philadelphia. Two advocacy groups,
the Downtown Pittsburgh Partnership
and Western Pennsylvanians for
Passenger Rail, joined forces to
advocate for adding two more daily
trains each way east of Pittsburgh.
The expanded service is projected to
nearly double cross-state ridership
from 220,000 passengers per year to
about 414,000.
Advocates welcomed PennDOT's
request to Amtrak but said more
service and higher speeds were
needed based on Downtown
Pittsburgh Partnership's recent report
(CLICK FOR REPORT). All Aboard
Ohio has contacted Pennsylvania
advocates about westward expansion.
More ambitious and expensive
proposals are being organzed to
create two new routes between New
York City and Scranton and the
Lehigh Valley (Allentown/Bethlehem).
January 2016
Ohio Passenger Rail News
Page 4
All Aboard Ohio
OHIO ASSOC. OF RAILROAD PASSENGERS
230 West Huron Road #85.53
Cleveland, Ohio 44113
844-464-7245 (toll-free)
[email protected] (click it!)
PLACE MAILING LABEL HERE
www.allaboardohio.org
Click here to JOIN All Aboard Ohio!
All Aboard Ohio's fun-fundraisers a success!
as members and thanked sponsors
Prus Construction, Acme Lock &
Hardware, AGAR marketing, Cincy
Red Bike, Dr. Mark Manley & Annette
Januzzi Wick, Envoi Design, Moerlein
Beers, Pi Pizzeria, DJ Fuseamania
and musician Santino Corleon.
One event was a party at a nightclub
with a DJ and dancing. The other was
a Saturday matinee movie with the
family. But both were fun events
organized by All Aboard Ohio!
On Nov. 18, more than 300 people
filled The Transept in Cincinnati to
celebrate completion of the streetcar's
infrastructure. We also welcomed 120
persons who joined All Aboard Ohio
All Aboard Ohio's SW Ohio Director
Derek Bauman organized this
tremendous event in Cincinnati which
also generated a lot of print and
broadcast media coverage (see
image of Santino Corleon at left).
On Dec. 19 at the Grandview Theatre
in Columbus (actually Grandview Hts)
nearly 80 people attended a showing
of The Polar Express animated movie
starring Tom Hanks. Thanks to
Warner Brothers Entertainment Co.
for permission to show the movie and
promotional images (shown at right).
Combining family, the holiday season
and trains are a magical combination
to boost the Christmas spirit of giving.
Thanks to Larry Robertson and Norman Della Colletta for their generous
sponsorships and to event organizer
All Aboard Ohio's Central Ohio
Director Eric Childress for a great
first-time holiday movie fundraiser!
If you missed these All Aboard Ohio
events, don't worry! More fun fundraisers are due to arrive in 2016.