Passenger Trains > Denver RTD A Line 1-Year Anniversary

‪CBS News4 reporter Jamie covered Denver RTD A Line anniversary 4/21/17 Denver Union Station, Denver, CO.‬ The line to DIA has been plagued by positive train control grade crossing signal issues. Flag men are stationed at grade crossings along the route to the airport.

Mark, Gentleman with the guitar was enjoying Denver Union Station/The Crawford Hotel ambience April 21, 2017.

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Nice photos, hope I can get down there again soon to visit and enjoy the girls at Twin Peaks. I never knew the A Line was that young.

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When the grade crossing issues are resolved, any idea how much that will speed up the trip to the airport?

The line to DIA has been plagued by positive train control grade crossing signal issues. Flag men are stationed at grade crossings along the route to the airport.

Any update on a fix? It's been a year already. And here is what RTD has to say about the Gold line to Wheat Ridge. Last update November 21, 2016.

G Line Opening Update
We have not announced a date for the G Line opening pending further progress on the University of Colorado A Line. The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) has worked very hard with RTD, and has indicated that our contractor, Denver Transit Partners (DTP), needs to make significant progress on the University of Colorado A Line at-grade crossings. The G Line has the same at-grade crossing technology as the University of Colorado A Line, and DTP has to meet FRA requirements regarding the at-grade crossings on the University of Colorado A Line in order for the G Line to open. Once those issues are resolved, testing will resume on the G Line and we can move towards an opening date. Thank you for your patience during this time.
11/21/2016

And, by the way, the University of Colorado A line goes nowhere near the Univ. of Colorado in Boulder. UC paid $5 million for the naming rights on the trains. Sort of like Coors field for the Rockies, or Sports Authority field for the Broncos (since Sports Authority went bankrupt last year have they changed the name yet?)

Major error  was  cutting  tracks  directly to the  southern part of the  state. 

march_hare Wrote:
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> When the grade crossing issues are resolved, any
> idea how much that will speed up the trip to the
> airport?

To my knowledge trains have always been moving at track speed through the crossings and I have seen no evidence to indicate otherwise. There should be no difference in trip times.

The primary issue is that the crossings activate too early and are slow to recover per FRA standards. But they do activate.

Cumbresfan Wrote:
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> And, by the way, the University of Colorado A line goes nowhere near the Univ. of Colorado in Boulder. UC paid $5 million for the naming rights on the
> trains. Sort of like Coors field for the Rockies, or Sports Authority field for the Broncos (since Sports Authority went bankrupt last year have they
> changed the name yet?)

I'm trying to figure out why only this forum seems to have a hang-up about the naming rights. Who cares? Everyone calls it the "A-Line" or the airport train and knows it runs from downtown to DIA. I've yet to hear a single example where someone boarded the train thinking they were going to Boulder. No updates yet on selling the naming rights on the football stadium. I recall that got tangled up in the Sports Authority bankruptcy case.

cutboy Wrote:
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> Major error was cutting tracks directly to the southern part of the state.

It's been 30 years since DUS was "stubbed" (45+ years since the last passenger train departed Denver for La Junta) and again, the only people who seem to have an issue with it are a few railfans. As I have noted before, there is room to build a connection between the Joint Line and the Buck Main at the 23rd Street crossing to permit operation from the south directly into DUS. There just needs to be a reason for it to exist. I'll note that once again there's talk of funding a study of Front Range passenger rail. I would love to be proven wrong (and hope I am) but I believe we're 20+ years away from seeing a scheduled passenger train depart Denver for Colorado Springs and Pueblo.

niagara484



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/21/17 22:04 by niagara484.

It seems to me from a far off uninformed position (Ohio) that any front-range passenger service would have to coupled with the proposed bypass track from Ft. Morgan to LaJunta.

by pass track, and the freeway out there is done it appears. with the fossil fuels drop, wait a couple of more years perhaps the rr's will be more agreeable to passenger trains on the front range

MEKoch Wrote:
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> It seems to me from a far off uninformed position
> (Ohio) that any front-range passenger service
> would have to coupled with the proposed bypass
> track from Ft. Morgan to LaJunta.

I see less and less justification for that eastern bypass given what appears to be an inevitable slow decline in coal-fired power plants. Personally I think it would make more sense to add some capacity to the Joint Line. The biggest issue for a SB passenger train today is getting stuck behind a coal drag lumbering upgrade to the Palmer Divide between Denver and Colorado Springs. Perhaps the solution would be double-tracking the current NB main between Littleton and Palmer Lake and then double track between Palmer Lake and Colorado Springs.

There's actually an interesting question going north. No existing route allows you to effectively serve all the population centers between Denver and Ft. Collins (or Denver and Cheyenne). Use the BNSF Front Range Sub and you leave out service to Brighton, Greeley and all the areas filling in east of I-25 (Firestone, Frederick, Windsor, etc). Use the UP Greeley Sub from Denver to Cheyenne and you leave out Boulder, Longmont, Loveland, and Ft. Collins. I suppose we could always build a brand-new ROW alongside I-25 and just inconvenience everyone! But as I-25 is the defacto transportation corridor north of Denver maybe that's not such a bad idea.

niagara484

well RTD owns the dent branch to ? pretty close getting out of town

march_hare Wrote:
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> When the grade crossing issues are resolved, any
> idea how much that will speed up the trip to the
> airport?


Scheduled time from Union Station to the airport is 37 minutes. Delays are from, as Niagara484 said, the PTC triggering gate activiation (and sometimes braking as a result) way too early. From what I've seen, this is relatively rare, and from what I've read they've improved on how they recover from these events, but still too frequent for the FRA's liking.

RTD isn't paying for all this, by the way, that's on the contractor (DTP) who, presumably, is taking most of the cost out of the PTC provider.

.



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 04/24/17 18:46 by darkcloud.

darkcloud Wrote:
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> niagara484 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
>
> > I'm trying to figure out why only this forum
> seems
> > to have a hang-up about the naming rights. Who
> > cares? Everyone calls it the "A-Line" or the
> > airport train and knows it runs from downtown
> to
> > DIA. I've yet to hear a single example where
> > someone boarded the train thinking they were
> going
> > to Boulder. No updates yet on selling the
> naming
> > rights on the football stadium. I recall that
> got
> > tangled up in the Sports Authority bankruptcy
> > case.
>
> I don't know, is it because you're being a
> reflexive apologist? If the Kansas City Chiefs
> bought the naming rights to Denver's stadium and
> officially had it changed to "Kansas City Chiefs
> Field", how do you think that would go over?
> Because hey, everyone going to the game in Denver
> knows the stadium is in Denver, so what's the big
> deal?
>

If the Chiefs actually had the guts to try it, I'd die laughing while grabbing the popcorn and watching the ensuing &*%^show, which BTW would be far more entertaining than the actual football. They could implode the football stadium and I wouldn't shed any tears. I do appreciate that others would have a different opinion.

In the end, it is just a name, one that put $5 million in RTD's coffers. Not too bad.

>
>
> > It's been 30 years since DUS was "stubbed" (45+
> > years since the last passenger train departed
> > Denver for La Junta) and again, the only people
> > who seem to have an issue with it are a few
> > railfans.
>
> Self-serving BS.
>
>
> > As I have noted before, there is room
> > to build a connection between the Joint Line
> and
> > the Buck Main at the 23rd Street crossing to
> > permit operation from the south directly into
> DUS.
>
> Which would be a lousy fix to offset a stupid
> planning blunder. A longer route that would take
> more time to reach the platforms, even more so
> with a sharp curve. Would require either
> reversing ends or backing in or out if the train
> continued to the north, more wasted time.
>
> Which is why the plan is to eventually put a
> platform next to the west side LRT portion of the
> far flung station. But that is premised on
> spending big dollars for a regional freight
> bypass. Without the bypass they can still
> probably squeeze in 1 through platform, but it
> will require either a partial curved platform (so
> may need a gauntlet track on the main track side
> if BNSF insists on 3 tracks through there and the
> ADA requires level boarding, not sure if that will
> apply in this case) or moving the LRT platform
> (which likely will require curtailing their tail
> and extra tracks.) And that still leaves at least
> a 1/4 mile walk just to transfer from Front Range
> intercity trains to commuter rail lines. Not the
> end of the world but needless extra time wasted
> because of a short-sighted
> political/Utopian-driven planning blunder.
>
> Further, stub ending the station significantly cut
> capacity, a through station can quickly empty/load
> commuter trains and then scoot them out the other
> end to storage tracks, instead of reversing out
> the same north end they entered. We've already
> seen limited track space delay Amtrak, and
> ultimately it will limit buildout of commuter rail
> lines. While not needed now, in several decades
> it will likely be wise to add lines to the
> northeast on the BNSF, east branching off from the
> airport line, perhaps even a separate line to
> Greeley (depending on if NIMBY's block off
> completely extending the soon to open north line
> and other factors.) Some/most of those now will
> have to be shifted to a future platform 1/4 mile
> west by the LRT. But if there is room for only 1
> platform (serving 2 tracks) at times there will be
> congestion that delays either the intercity or CR
> trains (even if intercity is just 1 per hour
> clockface each direction.) Avoidable if they had
> done the initial station planning correctly, as a
> through station with sufficient platforms for
> future needs. They planned for couple of decades
> instead of for a 100 years.
>
> If they luck out that coal has dropped off enough
> and BNSF becomes willing to work with the state on
> Front Range passenger service without a freight
> bypass (I am not at all assuming this is the case)
> then they might get partially bailed out on that
> planning blunder, but that shouldn't excuse them
> from criticism.

That's fine. I suppose it just gets old to hear the same old lament all the time. It happened and there's nothing we can do about it at this point. In the mid-1980s there was no light rail, no commuter rail, no reasonable expectation of either (studies notwithstanding), and what intercity trains existed entered and exited the station from the north with a back-up move. The decision made sense 30 years ago.

Want to put some salt in the wound? Union Station is RTD's property and Amtrak is a tenant. Need more room for commuter trains? Tracks 4-5 could be rebuilt for high-level platform loading and Amtrak told to take a hike, maybe to a new facility out by the 38th/41st or Federal Blvd G-Line stations. Everyone has a price; would dangling a big bag of cash and the promise of a new station in front of Amtrak be enough to compel them to move out?

I'll be honest that I'm not holding my breath on seeing Front Range passenger rail. Would it be nice to have? Absolutely, 100% yes. But we are decades away from those wheels ever turning and who knows what will change by then. Unfortunately this is an area where Colorado lags far, far behind its neighbors in Utah.

niagara484