From: nilknocgeo@earthlink.net

"Glen Labah"  wrote in message
news:gl4317-F646CD.21000722042014@mx05.eternal-september.org...
> In article ,
> Stephen Sprunk  wrote:
>
>> On 22-Apr-14 08:58, conklin wrote:
>> >
>> > How nice 2% of stops might have something near them.  Now they need,
>> > like the RRs, a $60 million station like Raleigh is planning at
>> > public expense for a couple hundred passengers a day.
>>
>> If the local taxpayers want to build some extravagant monument to
>> wasteful spending, as in Raleigh, that is their choice, but it's not
>> _necessary_, nor should Amtrak be saddled with the cost of such
>> wastefulness.
>
>
> It's probably best to read about this supposed "extravagant monument"
> before judging what George has written.
>
> According to their web site:
> http://www.ncdot.gov/projects/raleighunionstation/
> the existing station is frequently overcrowded and has platforms that
> are too short to serve longer trains.
>
> There is also quite a lot of track work involved, which includes two new
> passenger tracks so that freight trains no longer pass through the
> station tracks and obstruct the platforms.  It also says that one
> platform will have to be accessed from a tunnel under the tracks, so
> that unlike the mess we have at so many Cascades stations you won't have
> to worry about what to do when two trains are at the station at the same
> time.
>
> The project will also have to replace freight yard storage capacity that
> gets removed when the new track work is completed.
>
> It's probably a bit more than they really need for right now, but at the
> same time if the current station is overcrowded then at some point they
> need to do something.  Which is more wasteful?  Knocking down a wall and
> expanding the existing station a few feet every few years, or building a
> new station that has room for future growth?
>
> --
> Please note this e-mail address is a pit of spam due to e-mail address
> harvesters on Usenet. Response time to e-mail sent here is slow.

The existing station is "small" only to the degree that parking is too
limited.  But spending $60 million  + to handle a few passengers (about 100
at one time, and that is from the NYC train) is the reason why train travel
for passengers is so inefficient cost-wise.  The three Charlotte-Raleigh
trains are short.  So basically you are spending huge sums on two trains: a
monument.  The Cary, station, by the way, is quite large and quite empty.
The Florida train has to make two stops there to board the sleeping cars,
then pull forward to board the rest of the train.  Why?  The platform is
short and two roadways intersect the tracks.  It is the old Seaboard track
and the NC RR track is next to it, but separate.

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