Urban Commuter / Light Rail / Modern Streetcar News!
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IOWA, USA - Alliant Energy Transportation is changing its name to Travero to better reflect the services it now offers, including rail transportation, freight management, warehousing and transloading.

Travero's portfolio includes Cedar Rapids & Iowa City Railway Co. (CRANDIC Rail), which provides regional rail service with cross-continental connections; Travero Logistics, a freight brokerage and third-party logistics provider; Logistics Park Dubuque, a warehousing and river transloading facility in East Dubuque, Illinois; and Logistics Park Cedar Rapids, a new multipurpose warehouse and transload facility in southwest Cedar Rapids,

Iowa. A lot has changed at the Cedar Rapids and Iowa City Railway Co. (CRANDIC) over the past 110 years. The railroad launched freight and passenger service on Aug. 13, 1904, as the Iowa Railway & Light Co., then added an intercity bus line in 1929, discontinued passenger service and introduced all-freight service in 1953, acquired a Milwaukee Road line in 1980, relocated its shops in 1996, established a new main route in 2001 and recovered from heavy flood damage in 2008.

"The transformation from Alliant Energy Transportation to Travero builds on over a century of creativity and flexibility to solve customer needs," said Travero President Kevin Burke in a press release.

LOS ANGELES, CA - Progressive Railroading reported in late August that the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (LA Metro) exploratory task force is expected to begin working in September on a proposal to eliminate all rail and bus fares. The task force is charged with providing a fareless plan to LA Metro Chief Executive Officer Phillip Washington and the authority’s board by year’s end, including funding scenarios and sources.

No other large transit system in the world has gone entirely fareless, LA Metro officials said in a blog. Eliminating fares would be an economic development tool that would help improve mobility and put money back in the pockets of riders — who need it the most while recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic, they said.

Combined with other work to reduce traffic congestion, fare-free transit would greatly increase transit ridership, remove a noticeable number of cars from roads, help create more public spaces that better serve the majority of people and improve the area’s air quality, LA Metro officials believe.

Car 705, one of fifty AnsaldoBreda built vehicles that exclusively work Los Angeles' current Gold Line!

“LA Metro has a moral obligation to pursue a fareless system and help our region recover from both a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic and the devastating effects of the lack of affordability in the region.” said Washington in the blog. “I view this as something that could change the life trajectory of millions of people and families in L.A. County.”

Comprising LA Metro staff members, the task force will study ways to pay for a fareless program; its impact on ridership and on other transit agencies in Los Angeles County; the current cost to collect fares; and how the proposal would mitigate and/or eliminate fare enforcement issues and affect homelessness in the region. For example, the fareless program could be funded by local, state and federal funding opportunities, and/or by re-prioritizing budget dollars, LA Metro officials said.

Next year, the authority expects to test the concept in a pilot location.

MINNEAPOLIS, MN - Progressive Railway reported that the Metropolitan Council in early August announced it will explore alternative routes for the planned Blue Line light-rail extension in Minneapolis after failing to reach an agreement with BNSF Railway Co. to use the Class I’s right of way. After years of discussions, Met Council, Hennepin County and other elected officials could not reach an agreement regarding collocation of light rail and freight rail in the Bottineau Corridor. 

Above is an artists rendering of the planned Blue Line station in Golden Valley, Minnesota provided by the Metropolitan Council.

“Unfortunately, over the last four years, cooperation stopped, and the railway is unwilling to find solutions to move the project forward together,” Met Council officials said in a press release.

Now, the project will go back to planning to hopefully advance the extension without using BNSF right-of-way, officials said. Met Council will convene a meeting of the Corridor Management Committee on Aug. 13, when project partners will discuss next steps.

The Blue Line extension was planned to operate northwest from downtown Minneapolis through north Minneapolis, Golden Valley, Robbinsdale, Crystal and Brooklyn Park, Minnesota.

Meanwhile on September 12th, Metro Transit will expand its light-rail schedule by offering service every 10 minutes on the Blue and Green lines. In July, light-rail ridership was down about 75 percent compared to the same month last year, Metro Transit officials said in a press release.

An increase in service will help riders keep a safe distance on trains to prevent the spread of the coronavirus as more people begin to return to transit during and after the pandemic, agency officials said. 

Metro Transit riders can provide feedback on the service changes online through August 27th. Rider input will help inform near-term service decisions and long-term planning.

The Northstar commuter-rail line will continue to operate on a limited, weekday-only schedule due to low demand.

NEW YORK CITY, NY - In a development that is sure to become almost universal, MTA New York City Transit (NYCT) on August 12th announced that 310 subway stations, or roughly two-thirds of the system’s stations, are now equipped with the agency’s One Metro New York (OMNY) contactless fare payment system. 

OMNY fare validators allow riders to pay their fare using contactless bank cards, smart phones and wearable devices. OMNY will ultimately replace the MetroCard fare card in 2023, NYCT officials said in a press release. 

NYCT yesterday also announced that other than the Eastern Parkway-Brooklyn Museum Station, which is  undergoing upgrades to improve accessibility, every numbered line in the system is now equipped with OMNY validators.

The system’s installation was suspended nearly six weeks due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the entire project remains on time and on budget due to accelerated work, NYCT officials said. All stations remain on schedule to be equipped with OMNY by year's end.

Overall, the system has recorded more than 16 million 'taps' or uses since launching in May 2019.

PHILADELPHIA, PA - The Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) designated employees at rail stations dyring August to promote mask-wearing compliance and social distancing on the rail system during the COVID-19 pandemic.

One to two "social distancing coaches" were assigned per station across the system through August 27. Two days per week the staff members were located at the 69th Street Transportation Center, Frankford Transportation Center, and 15th Street Station on the Market-Frankford Line. Riders on the Market-Frankford Line complied with the mask requirement just 63 percent of the time, according to a recent SEPTA survey. 

Coaches were staffed at other locations throughout the month, including at Broad Street Line stations, regional rail hubs and outlying suburban rail stations, SEPTA officials said in a press release.

PORTLAND, OR - During August, the Tri-County Metropolitan Transportation District of Oregon (TriMet) will temporarily close the Steel Bridge over the Willamette River in Portland to perform major repairs to the MAX light-rail system.

The upper deck of the 108-year-old bridge will be closed August 2-29 while improved lift joints and locks, new switches and signal equipment are installed. In addition, crews will replace 9,000 linear feet of rail and expansion rail. The improvements are necessary to reduce incidents that slow or disrupt bridge access, TriMet officials said in a press release. The closure will disrupt all MAX lines; shuttle buses will replace some service.

Several classes of light rail vehicles (LRV) operate on the TriMet system. The first class is referred to as Type 1. Between 1984 and 1986, 26 LRVs (series 101-126) were purchased for the original Eastside MAX line and manufactured by Bombardier. Each car has run reliably for more than one million miles since their first arrival.

In 1992 TriMet conducted a “Level Boarding Study” on low-floor vehicles and concluded that they were the least costly way to provide universal, level boarding on the entire light rail system. This feature eases boarding for people using mobility devices. TriMet first ordered 35 Type 2 low-floor LRVs for the Westside Light Rail Project, supplied by Siemens and assembled in Sacramento. With subsequent add-on orders for system ridership growth and an extension to the airport Red Line, the total grew to 52 LRVs (series 201-252) by 2000.

TriMet ordered 17 Type 3 LRVs from Siemens for the Interstate MAX Yellow Line, and 10 more for ridership growth. These 27 LRVs (series 301-327) are essentially the same as the Type 2 vehicles, except they have automatic passenger counters and improved air conditioning systems.

Type 1 LRV

Type 2 LRV

Type 3 LRV

The next group of low-floor vehicles were built for the light rail project that became the MAX Green Line. These Type 4 LRVs (series 401-422) are three feet longer than Type 2 or Type 3 LRVs and have eight more seats per two-car consist. Yet a lighter weight and advanced electronic systems allow the Type 4 cars to slow down and stop at stations even more smoothly than their predecessors. TriMet received 22 of the new cars, bringing the total light rail vehicle fleet to 127.

18 Type 5 LRVs (series 521-538) were added to TriMet’s Max fleet as part of the Portland-Milwaukie Light Rail Transit Project, raising the total number of LRVs to 145. This next generation of MAX LRVs offers improvements over the Type 4s, including reconfigured seats to improve legroom and sight lines, improved air conditioning system and better ergonomic cabs for operators.

Type 4 LRV

Type 5 LRV

TriMet, (formally known as the Tri-County Metropolitan Transportation District of Oregon), is a public agency that operates mass transit in the area that contains mpost of the Portland metropolitan area in the Oregon. Created in 1969 by the state legislature, the district replaced five private bus companies that operated in the three counties. TriMet started operating a light rail system, called MAX, in 1986, which has since been expanded to 5 lines that now cover 59.7 miles (96.1 km), as well as the WES Commuter Rail line in 2009. It also provides the operators and maintenance personnel for the City of Portland-owned Portland Streetcar system.

On August 18, Progressive Railroading reported that the Tri-County Metropolitan Transportation District of Oregon (TriMet) had reached the halfway point on major repairs of the MAX light-rail system on the Steel Bridge over the Willamette River in Portland. Work on the upper deck of the 108-year-old bridge has included demolition, rail replacement, and the installation of new switch sections and new signal system.

So far, all switches and rail have been removed, and approximately half of the bridge’s rail has been replaced. All new signal system equipment has been installed and is awaiting connections to rail later this week, TriMet officials said in a press release. On the final day of construction, TriMet will run test trains through the rebuilt part of the light-rail system near and on the bridge itself to ensure new track, switch and signal equipment works as intended.

The bridge is scheduled to reopen to light-rail and bus service on August 30. The nearly month-long closure disrupted all MAX lines.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - On Tuesday, August 25th, The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) yesterday announced it will shut down all Muni Metro light-rail lines and replace them with bus service for several weeks due to overhead electrical line failures and because an employee tested positive for COVID-19. 

The shutdown occurred just days after the agency reopened rail service following five months of being closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The first of Muni's third generation LRVs from Siemens-Mobility!

A critical component of the OCS infrastructure that powers Muni light-rail vehicles had failed twice the same week, SFMTA officials said on August 25th in a press release. A fix has been identified that must be implemented before bringing light-rail back fully again.

On top of that, SFMTA learned on Monday that an employee who works on the real-time deployment of Muni trains and buses has tested positive for COVID-19.  The employee worked in SFMTA’s Transportation Management Center, considered the nerve center of the city’s transit system. With the related quarantining required based on contact tracing, SFMTA determined that it would not have sufficient staff resources to effectively manage rail service, agency officials said. 

SEATTLE, WA - Sound Transit in September will add service to its Link light-rail and Sounder commuter-rail systems in response to an uptick in ridership during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Seattle agency announced earlier this week. Beginning September 19, light-rail trains will run every eight minutes during peak hours on weekdays. Trains will run every 15 minutes on weekends and off peak on weekdays, and every 30 minutes on evenings. In May, the Link ran trains every 20 minutes during the day.

On September 21, Sound Transit also will add two roundtrips to its weekday Sounder South schedule, increasing the service from seven round trips to nine. There will be no changes to Sounder North service. Sound Transit hopes to continue to operate these levels of service stably through March 2021, agency officials said in press release.

The Link currently operates both light rail and streetcar type vehicles: Line 1 (formerly Central Link) in King County, which travels for 20 miles (32 km) between Seattle and Seattle–Tacoma International Airport; and Line T (formerly Tacoma Link) in Pierce County, which runs for under 2 miles (3.2 km) between Downtown Tacoma and Tacoma Dome Station. The 62 light rail vehicles, shown below left were built by Kinki Sharyo betwwen 2009 and 2014 and the streetcars, example shown below right, consist of 3 Inekon 12-Trio cars delivered in 2007 and 7 Inekon Trio Type 121 cars, delivered in 2017, that can operate off wire.

WASHINGTON, D.C. - On August 28, 2020, the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) announced it will allocate a total of $400 million for four transit infrastructure projects in Arizona, Indiana, Missouri and New Jersey. 

The projects are advancing towards readiness to receive a Full Funding Grant Agreement under the FTA’s Capital Investment Grants (CIG) Program. The projects must meet additional requirements before a grant can be awarded.

One of the current Kansas City Streetcars during delivery!

The federal funding includes:

• $248 million for the construction of the Portal North Bridge Project, a new two-track fixed structure across the Hackensack River in Hudson County, New Jersey, along the Northeast Corridor;
• $50.8 million for the Kansas City Streetcar to extend its Main Street route 3.5 miles;
• $50.6 million for Valley Metro to extend its light-rail system 1.5 miles from northwest Phoenix to the Metrocenter Mall; and
• $50.6 million for the Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District to construct a second track on 26.6 miles of the South Shore commuter-rail line in northern Indiana between Gary and Michigan City.

All projects are in the engineering phase of the CIG program.

"These critical rail transit infrastructure projects will help communities improve transit service as they continue to address the impacts of COVID-19 and recover from this public health emergency," said FTA Deputy Administrator K. Jane Williams in a press release.

Baltimore Semi-Convertible Models!
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by Richard Allman

In July 2020, Baltimore Transit Semi-convertible (semis) cars 5583 and 5646 entered operation on my Main Line Transit. The prototypes were part of the 885-car deck roof fleet of Baltimore Transit and its predecessor, United Railways and Electric Company, which had initially purchased the semi-convertibles. This series of cars was actually two separate orders: 5560-5644 were delivered in 1914 and 5645-5744 arrived in 1918. Both series had 11 windows.

Both were one-man cars, unlike the final series of deck roof cars that Baltimore would acquire, the 13-window cars 5745-5884 which were MU-equipped and two-man cars. The latter were utilized on the heaviest lines, most notably, the Route 26 Sparrows Point line which served the large Bethlehem Steel plant. Baltimore was one of the last large systems to acquire deck roofed cars and one of the last to operate them. The deck-roofed car era ended in 1955 with the bus conversion of the cutback of route 9 Catonsville Junction-Ellicott City, a line that previously had been through routed to downtown Baltimore. In the final years, the Ellicott City line ran the 13-window cars. Baltimore was distinctive in mixed operations on many lines, with deck roof cars, Peter Witts, and PCC’s all interspersed. Many routes lacked loops, which prolonged the lives of the deck roof cars. Fans visiting Baltimore were often drawn to the “jerkwater” shuttle lines which often operated with one or two cars and ran through scenic rights-of-way. Nonetheless, the deck roof cars were ubiquitous in Baltimore and ran on the entire system. Before National City Lines acquired and aggressively converted eventually all trolley lines to bus operation by 1963, one-man deck roof cars were painted yellow and cream, which I did with 5583 and two-man cars were red with white windows. National City Lines changed to a simplified yellow scheme, which I applied to 5646. All of the semis had grimy black roofs.

The Models.

I chose cars 5583 and 5646 because the CN5001 decal sets from Custom Traxx came with these numbers. For car 5583 I chose Route 35 Walbrook Junction-Lorraine Cemetery-a semi-rural classic operation and fan favorite. I applied the pre-NCL one-man color scheme to 5583. For car 5646, I chose Route 9 Catonsville Junction-Ellicott City, a shuttle remnant of one of the long downtown-suburban lines and the last route in Baltimore to run deck roof cars. I selected the NCL scheme for this car.

The shells were 3-D printed and were a collaborative endeavor by Australians Joseph Spinella and Greg King. Joseph has a model manufacturing business and Greg is a noted O scale modeler and retired motorman instructor in Melbourne and an active volunteer at the heritage tram operation at Ballarat. Joseph initially had the shells printed by Shapeways but began printing them on his own 3-D printer. The Shapeways shells were quite nice but the quality of the printing was in no way comparable to the excellent results achieved with Joseph’s printer. The shells were cleaned with an overnight soak in soapy dish washing solution and a one-hour soak in 90% isopropyl alcohol followed by one more dish soap wash and rinse . Some anecdotal suggestions included oven cleaner, but I admit to timidity with unfamiliar chemicals that might damage or even worse dissolve the shells. Joseph’s shells were far less waxy and much easier to clean, and much smoother in texture.

The cars are powered with the Bowser 125130 4 ft.10 in. drive with 33-inch wheels. I am using poles from Rich Eaton. The pole bushing in the powered pole was fabricated from a piece of thin one-sided PC board and a piece of brass tubing that we were sure to align exactly at 90 degrees vertically. A wire from the positive terminal swipes the underside of the PC board and makes excellent electrical contact.

We fabricate the floors with 0.32 brass and utilized underbody details using items from our stash. We collaborated with Joseph early in the process and he added suitable mounting tabs to the bottom of the model. The air tanks Bob Dietrich (my indispensable mentor) fabricated from styrene tubing. We got the dimensions from a plan book of Baltimore cars. Bob made the fenders from of all things, HO scale fence material. Bowser couples were used with the linking pins snipped off. Shims with a thickness of 0.09 inches were placed between the bolster and the floor to make the floor the correct height off the railhead.

The shells were anchored to the floor with styrene tabs cemented to the back platform The tabs were tapped for mounting with 0056 screws.

George Huckaby of Custom Traxx borrowed a shell that I had and made an excellent decal set. I gave him a list of needed decals and lettering, destination signs and route numbers and the red striping for the one-man car; he made the measurements and did the rest. I neglected to give him one needed decal (ENTER AT FRONT) for the left sided front doors but Greg had some that I used on the NCL version car.

The colors chosen were Badger Rail Box Yellow, Antique White and Grimy black. This was our first experience with Badger paints, and we cannot say enough good things about them. They spray beautifully and unlike some other available paints, can be brushed for touch-up. Bob applied some intense weathering as befits Baltimore cars. A gray primer was fine for the underbody and side frames.

There were some rough patches along the way. The floors under the vestibules make inserting the glazing a challenge, especially the route numbers in the upper center end windows. The side frames are difficult to press fit into the trucks, A #53 drill makes the holes in the trucks for the side frames easy to cement. I had some issues with car 5583 tracking through a left-hand Orr turnout at one point on my layout: it insisted on walking over the point instead of taking the diverting track. Finally, with some advice from Bob and George and some major tweaking that I wish I could have avoided, it has been resolved for now.

Now for the credits:

To: Joseph Spinella and Greg King who responded to my pleadings and produced the shells. They deserve the thanks and support of the traction modeling community. Previously they had produced a similar shell in O scale. To Bowser for the drive that powers the car nicely.

To: George Huckaby of Custom Traxx who has been an essential player in this endeavor: providing the decal sets, needed advice and for expeditiously providing the drives.

To: Rich Eaton, whose poles make operation nearly flawless.

To Badger: They have filled a huge void in model railroad acrylic paint availability after Testors so aggressively sought to acquire Polly Scale then discontinued the line. Badger is manufacturing a huge variety of railroad colors.

To my wonderful late friend: Edward S. Miller, whose outstanding photos of Baltimore were essential for reference for both color and lettering. Ed would have loved these models. When he was a motorman on Capital Transit from 1948 until 1952, his days off were Wednesday and Thursday. He would often head to Baltimore to photograph trolleys and no one did it better or more intensively. Check out his fabulous Baltimore color photos at https://collections.digitalmaryland.org/digital/collection/btpe

To my closest friend, mentor, and patient counselor: Bob Dietrich. I could not have done these cars without his assistance. He sprayed the cars perfectly after I masked them, and his company has helped preserve my sanity during these isolated times. His Baltimore semi that he is beginning to build will be outstanding.