Passenger Trains > is the west chester railroad connected to septa?

can the west chester railroad still run rare mileage and store equipment in the septa yards? It’s connection is so close to wawa station

nick

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The track is physically connected..  Whether or not West Chester Rwy can operate on septa track, is up to Septa.    Its all politics, as usual.

Of course, if the ppl in the PHL suburbs werent so cheap, there would still be rail service to West Chester and Newtown (northeast of Phila) , which could really use it today.

Like a lot of ppl, I miss what used to be.  Glad im not there now to have to live with the remains.

Yes, the Septa track is indeed connected to the West Chester RR tracks in Wawa. In fact, there has been talk in the past about having some of the tourist trains connect to Septa trains at Wawa which would be very nice.

The current (November 2022) issue of Railpace magazine has an excellent article (four pages plus a partial cover photo) with many photos of the recent Wawa station gramd opening and initial SEPTA service.  An additional page has photos of the "old" Wawa and West Chester stations.

The tracks are conected to get WC train into the station and tracks have been rebuilt, so things are in the work to change the conection from being FRA class "Excepted" (no passenger allowed) to Class 2 for passenger trains.



















t

Looking at the goog.....
Track appears to be rebuilt with new catenary for septa use, past the Wawa station to the Chester Creek Bridge.  I expect its so a train can layup west of the station if needed.   From the chester creek bridge to Glen Mills..the track appears to be so-so, at least at the time of the google photo.

AFAIK, this is SEPTA track, which they have used in the past to get ballast from the Lenni quarry.  The siding for the quarry is still there.   These used to be occasional nighttime moves to Lenni for ballast......usually 2 geeps and 10-15 cars.
I believe the change from SEPTA to WCRR is east of the glen mills station, just west of the quarry...

Sounds like the New Hope & Ivyland with the SEPTA at Warminster - only connects one day per year, if that. The 2 railroads could each do a brisk business if they connected on a regular basis. 

Yes it would be good for both septa and the shortlines if they could establish some sort of occasional but regular thru service.

Problem is that SEPTA ppl have no incentive to work out anything out of the ordinary....much like most govt employees.  You dont get paid any more, and the ppl who you'd need to work with, dont want the extra work for no extra pay.....and the rank and file ppl you'd need would get overtime, or more days of work...which the shortsighted govt bean counters would look at and say.."we're not spending any more money on doing something different, period"

Remember when we used to have fan trips fairly regularly?    RR people in Mgmt would donate their time.  Probably no RR ppl left in any RR mgmt anymore, let alone the govt agencies.

pdt Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> Problem is that SEPTA ppl have no incentive to
> work out anything out of the ordinary....much like
> most govt employees.  You dont get paid any more,
> and the ppl who you'd need to work with, dont want
> the extra work for no extra pay.....and the rank
> and file ppl you'd need would get overtime, or
> more days of work...which the shortsighted govt
> bean counters would look at and say.."we're not
> spending any more money on doing something
> different, period"
>
I have no opinion on what SEPTA does or does not do with respect to the West Chester Railroad.  However, your statement that SEPTA people "have no incentive to work out anything out of the ordinary"   is not true.  On the contrary, SEPTA is undertaking a comprehensive evaluation of its Regional Rail network to determine what changes can and should be made to attract people who are not currently using the system.  Here is a link with information abot this initiative:

https://planning.septa.org/projects/regional-rail-master-plan

In this COVID/post-COVID era when so many former commuter riders are working from home, this is exactly the kind of planning which commuter rail systems should be undertaking.  I am not aware of any other commuter rail systems conducting similar planning.  If you know of similar efforts, feel free to share here.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/27/22 16:54 by RuleG.

OK, I looked at it.   I lived in  Philadelphia more years than i ever wanted to .     18 month study?   Really?      I can tell u the bottom line problem right now....Ppl in phila, overall are either poor or are cheapskates.   Some very good rail lines lost their service in  the 1980;s cause no one in the cheap ass suburbs wanted to fund any mass transit....

.....and also... ...in the incredibly backwards and racist and segregated burbs,  the politicials still run on the undercurrent thought that "we'll keep the black people out of your neighborhood"  And part of this big lie of fear is the idea that "Mass transit will bring black ppl to your neighborhood.

So its money and fear and the nimby's that rule.
  
Typically what happens is that ppl get paid to make all these reports, and then politicians just do whatever they want to, anyway.   
And even so....the report has little mention of new routes....its mostly advocating lowering train fares and making heavy rail more frequent.   They also talked about having more stations, closer together, which has got to be the dumbest idea ive heard in a long time. 

The biggest advocacy for masss transit in Phila, its that the roads are terrible, and anyone who commutes by car has got to be a lunatic.
Ive seen the Schuykill at a standstill  from city line out to King of Prussia.    And ppl just sit in this traffic.  I guess they think its better than  having to meet some black or indian or asian ppl on the train.
And the bad news is that Phila is progressive compared to central PA, where they challenge the deep south in the "who can be more facist and racist" competition.

Now...I havent lived there for about 15 years now...some maybe someone can tell me that its getting better.  I sure as hell hope so.  

FWIW...some "professional city planners" came to our town out here in central california and made a presentation, that im sure they got paid for....    All they proved, is that they knew nothing about our town.   And their "model city" that they thought everyone should emulate...was this dump of a city to the south, that no one ever said "I want to live there"   The "professionals" were a waste of money, that, thankk goodness, no one paid any attention to.