Union Station, at 1 Main Street, scored highest among five potential sites in a final report released by the Chittenden County Regional Planning Commission on July 17. The report considered costs, noise and impacts on current rail operations, among other factors.
The report is the final draft of a study released last summer that also endorsed Union Station, according to Eleni Churchill, the commission’s transportation program manager. The commission beefed up its data collection on noise and air quality after neighbors voiced concerns at a public meeting in June 2018, she said.
The commission studied four other locations to store the 680-foot-long train: The Northern Urban Reserve, a parkland north of Waterfront Park along the bike path; Southern Urban Reserve, an area immediately north of the Lake Champlain Community Sailing Center; Vermont Rail System’s railyard near Perkins Pier; and Flynn Avenue, adjacent to the new City Market, Onion River Co-op store.
The Vermont Agency of Transportation will make the final decision, but it isn’t bound by the report’s recommendations or to any particular timeline, according to Dan Delabruere, the rail program director at VTrans.
“We are actually going to look at that study and even other options,” he said. “We really need to look at everything to make this decision. I don’t know that we’re close to making a decision at this point.”
The Ethan Allen Express train shuttles passengers between Rutland and New York City. Once other upgrades are complete, it will include northern stops in Middlebury and Vergennes before overnighting in Burlington from 8 p.m. to 7 a.m.
All potential sites would need some upgrades to accommodate the trains.
At $300,000, Union Station is the least expensive option. The costliest is the railyard: It would cost upward of $50 million to relocate the existing railyard to make room for the passenger train, according to the study. Both Urban Reserve sites are in the $2.2 million range, where Flynn Avenue would cost about $1.5 million.
The station scored high for its existing electrical infrastructure and low impacts to both natural resources and existing train travel. But it was the only site of the five to score a zero, the lowest possible rating, for both its proximity to residences and air quality impacts.
Union Station is located closest to residences — the nearest is just 50 feet away — compared to a nearly 530-foot buffer at all the other sites. But it impacts the fewest homes overall — just 26, about half as many at either Urban Reserve, according to the report.
While Delabruere didn’t want to comment much on citizens’ concerns, he did dispel the notion that the trains would idle overnight. The trains would be outfitted with “hot start” equipment, he said, which only require a 20- to 40-minute warm up and cool down. They’d only idle for longer periods if the outside temperature is -20 degrees or colder, he said.
Amtrak service can’t start in Burlington, however, until Middlebury finishes its own massive rail project. The Addison County town is in the midst of replacing two century-old rail bridges with a new tunnel, Delabruere said.
“There’s some time between now and when the Middlebury tunnel project will be complete,” he said. “We have some time to think about this, and I don’t know that we’re forced into making a decision.”
Burlington Mayor Miro Weinberger said the city hasn’t taken a formal position on the issue, noting it’s “in conversations” with VTrans as the agency deliberates.
“We don’t have control, but we definitely have a voice,” Weinberger said. “This is something we’ve fought for and wanted to see happen for a long time, so it’s exciting that we’re getting to the point where we’re actually talking about the details.”
Read the final report below:
Related Stories
Got something to say?
Send a letter to the editor and we'll publish your feedback in print!
Why would they park a 680ft barrier between Echo and Union Station in the MOST congested area along the route? Was density of people moving about in the area a factor? Was cost of moving the bikepath a factor?
Report available here:
https://www.ccrpcvt.org/our-work/transport…
As a long time supporter and advocate of Amtrak returning to Burlington and the CEO of the company that built the train station on the east side of Union Station – installing a second rail line by reducing the pedestrian/bike path from 15 feet to 8 feet in order to install another rail line and storing a train 8 feet from residential homes – when there is a Rail Yard a block away is insanity. Trains should be stored and serviced in the Rail Yard. There should not be additional rail tracks returned to the waterfront. There does not need to be a second rail line to bring Amtrak into the station to drop off and pick up passengers. The Rail Yard is the only logical location for trains to be stored and serviced and I do not believe the Citizens of Burlington want another Rail Line to be installed between King and College street on our most populated part of the Waterfront where trains can then be parked and serviced forever. We love trains and want them to bring folks to and from our City – but we do not want any additional rail lines installed when there is a rail yard a block away – and I don’t think the citizens of Burlington do either. We can have Amtrak without a second rail line on the Burlington Waterfront. This study has many problems.
8:00pm to 7:00am hmmm I don’t have a problem with that small price to pay to be connected to NYC and one day maybe even MTL
It’s quieter than the F35s that will be flying over us. I used to live by the railyard and the only noise that bothered me was the train whistle…
We want the train . . .
. . . but we dont want to SEE it.
We dont want to see it parked in front of AN ACTUAL TRAIN STATION.
We dont want to see it parked in front of an actual train station AFTER 8:00 AT NIGHT, when its dark 9 months of the year and virtually nobody will be there to see it.
We dont want to see it parked in front of an actual train station, after 8:00 at night, when its dark and when nobody will be there to see it, EVEN THOUGH IT WILL NOT OBSTRUCT ANYONES ACCESS TO ANYTHING ON THE WATERFRONT.
We just dont want it there. Period. Make it someone elses problem.
OMG a train parked in Burlington. Park the damned thing in Coventry or Lowell where all the other lousy infrastructure is. Landfills and HUGE windmills. That’s the Burlington way. Watch out, disruptive demonstrations will be next.
What happened to the proposal to rehab the tracks to Essex Junction and run the train all the way there? That makes a lot of sense. It wasn’t studied.
Final report recommends closet for storing clothes.
A few important additional details about this study:
1) In the first draft of the report, presented in June 2018, VTrans proposed that the Union Station overnight site would be a new track laid between the existing track and the Wing Bldg., less than 10 feet from the west wall of that bldg. Much of the stakeholders’ outrage was directed at that completely tone-deaf “solution,” which I believe was first proposed by VT Railway. The final draft neatly avoids the question of whether that sidetrack is still under consideration. So 3 possibilities: either 1) it’s still on the table, but they’re hiding that to avoid a renewal of the stink that caused, or 2) sidetrack will be to the west, which will likely cost more than the $300K estimated; or 3) there will be no sidetrack, cheaper but: leaves the train in the way of summer operations for VT Railways’ dinner train, which they would probably push back very hard against. Disingenuous, or what?
2) VT Railways’ refusal to base the train overnight in the railyard & proposal that the state buy out & relocate the entire railyard was little more than a ‘straw man’ all along. VT Rail could accommodate that if they really wanted to. ALL of VT Railways’ service runs along tracks purchased by the state in the early 1960’s under Gov. Phil Hoff. We still own it. Why would we buy them a new railyard, when it’s OUR tracks? (hint: think of all that very valuable waterfront real estate which would suddenly become available in that event!)
Having a train sitting on our waterfront goes right along with Miro’s cement pad City Hall Park, high rise sardine can housing, more sewage dumps into the lake, more traffic snarls, trucks double parking on city streets to deliver supplies to eateries and clogging traffic in the process.
Can we store it in the pit?
“Can we store it in the pit?”
No, because your buds at the so-called Coalition for a Livable City would immediately file a lawsuit.