It amazes me how the largest cut, fill and concrete project in the world could be completed as quickly as it was over 100 hundred years ago with rudimentary equipment (by today's standards). It now seems that every 100 yards is a bureaucratic or environmental nightmare. I recall an article in the NJ Herald in 2015, citing D E P issues. I hope it goes smoothly, it will be an asset to our state.
I'm from Western Pennsylvania, this is the best news I've heard in a long time,I would surely get a train out of Pittsburgh and travel out east just to take that ride. Love traveling through the Northeast Mount Pocono Scranton Susquehanna Binghamton.
I just looked up the Delaware River Viaduct on Google Maps, and it goes right over I-80, the highway I take whenever I go to NJ from my home in Michigan! I've seen a few videos about the Cutoff, can't believe I've missed the bridge every time! It would be amazing to have trains use this purpose-built high-speed rail line again, I hope all of the plans go ahead!
My father worked for Lackawanna, Erie Lackawanna, Conrail and then New Jersey transit. My father and mother took the phoebe snow from New Jersey to honeymoon at the Niagara Falls in 1958.
Back in the 1950’s, Niagara Falls, NY, had a train station, but only a shuttle service to/from Buffalo. Through trains from Buffalo to Toronto, and west, stopped at a station in Niagara Falls, Ontario.
My dad ran out of port jervis and Hoboken and God only knows where. He became the youngest engineer on the Erie. I have all his papers and binders and such. He left me 8 years ago. I miss him every day.
Chuck. Phoebe Snow has been around a lot longer than 1949. In the days of steam engines, her white dress was meant to demonstrate that cleaner anthracite emissions produced a more pleasant passenger experience than found on other rail roads using bituminous. The 1970s singer Phoebe Snow, lived next to the Lackawanna mainline in NJ and adopted it as her stage name.
Tim, it actually dates back to 1899 and Mark Twain. But I decided against going into that detail and how Phoebe Snow was phased out by WWI because of the shortage of anthracite, which was used in the war effort.
I actually think that it would be better to route trains west once past Binghamton to places in the Southern Tier instead of north to Syracuse for two reasons. 1) There would have to be a reverse move out of Binghamton in order to transfer to the Syracuse line (maybe a Syracuse-Cortland-Binghamton shuttle could work but not a main line routing) 2) More places could be served in the Southern Tier such as Hornell, Elmira, Waverly, as well as the rest of the stops from the old routing of the Phoebe Snow.
I don't think the reverse move out of Binghamton would be as big a deal - you can feasibly run with a cab car from Binghamton to Syracuse's current station, and then they'd also be facing forward to continue to Rochester and Buffalo if they wanted to run it as a variant of the Empire Service. If they do restore the cutoff and separately expand Empire Service with more runs every day, I think Amtrak should consider running the Maple Leaf on the Southern Tier Line. Given just how much prettier that trip would be than the water level, I think it would open up some cool ways to market it towards tourists (maybe a stop inside Letchworth before or after the viaduct?).
Actually, the reverse move would not be a problem, if the train were of the Acela model powered at each end - trains in Europe change direction very easily this way. I do concur with the Southern Tier route - Syracuse is already served by the NYC-Buffalo route. Could Syracuse-Binghamton ridership warrant such service? It would be great to see a revival of the Phoebe Snow route, however.
In one of my previous updates, I'm recording the episode and about half-way through Larissa started making all sorts of faces behind the camera like I was doing or saying something wrong...a guy had climbed up onto one of the refuge bays on the viaduct and looked like he was going to jump! He eventually got down.
Great news, Chuck. And a smart proposal by Amtrak. The Cut-Off is the epitome of what the U.S. desperately needs; high-speed rail service. The Roseville Rd. culvert looks great too. Everything west of Port Jervis is the NYS&W, with only five trains per week.
Will believe it when I see it. This conversation has ben going on for 50 years. Now they are saying just another fourteen years. Possible we should ask the Chinese for assistance and get it done in two.
Your idea has some fictional precedent. While it’s not the Chinese... in Prime Video’s Man in the High Castle, the post WW2 Nazi Germans, who conquered the US, run a rocket train along what is unmistakably the Lackawanna main line, up and into the far Poconos and presumably beyond.
Yeah I've been on them. They are pretty uncomfortable and wait in tons of traffic. People would rather jump on a train and be able to work on their laptop in comfort and not have to worry about traffic on 80.
Jamestown, New York has a fully restored and beautiful Erie Lackawanna Railroad Station. Trains ran anywhere from NYC to Buffalo to Chicago from here. It would be awesome to have rail service here in Jamestown again!
Ha! If they make it to Andover by 2035, I’ll be shocked. Amtrak already runs from NYC to Syracuse on a much faster route. There is a zero percent chance of this happening
Yep, tend to agree with you!! Lots of pipe dreams in this !!. I have a NJT brochure from 1996 that said the Cutoff to Slateford would be in service by 2003.. lol
Passenger and (if the Association of American Ralroads' prohibition against advertisements on railroad cars is rescinded) advertisment revenue are the loads of money that would be realizable by AMTRAK (who's mangagement would rather keep AMTRAK dependent on involuntarily- and forceably-taken tax money from those who can't use AMTRAK?) for funding service that would be vastly usable by the public IF routed and scheduled to run evenings-to-next-mornings between origins and final destinations about 500 miles apart for overnight sleeping car service for business and personal travel between these points and rush-hour commuter coach service between adjacent stations because of such usuable scheduling along about half of the length of AMTRAK's existing lines. Such massive revenue from passenger fares (suplementable by adveritisement revenue if the AAR's ban on ads on railroad cars is rescinded) from correctly-scheduled and through-routed (not dead-end truncated lines) passenger trains would enable AMTRAK to pay host railroads the equivalent of a freight train's revenue for each AMTRAK train ran on host railroad's tracks as well as AMTRAK paying off all its present debt and becoming solvent (something that socialists might not like for AMTRAK to become).
Chuck, it's been a long time since any one has been on a train that was using the cutoff to get anywhere. Has anyone spoke of how many named trains in Amtrak colors will be coming back from the dead ?
My late father was from Pittston, PA which is midway between Scranton & Wilkes-Barre. He used to ride the Laurel Line to & from Scranton when he went to Penn State-Scranton. It would be great for Amtrak service through Scranton to & from New York City & Niagara Falls, Philadelphia to Syracuse, Scranton to Washington,DC. The interstates can only handle so much traffic, train service is the best alternative. I travel long distance on Amtrak.
I don't see passenger service producing enough benefits to justify the cost. If they want to make reactivating the Cut-Off beneficial they will need to find some way to get freight on the line.
@@LackawannaCutOff Hopefully Amtrak can make it work. They put a lot of effort into building the Cut-off and it would be good to get some use out of it.
i know this is a rail enthusiast channel but Scranton already has private bus service into NYC every 30-60 minutes on weekdays at no cost to tax payers. If you want to drive into the city or park and ride with NJ Transit that's pretty easy too. I'd rather have flights from Scranton to JFK. That would really save us time, money, and hassle. Sorry.
@@LackawannaCutOff i know many people from this area who travel all over the world from jfk... i've never met a pennsylvanian who willingly went to north jersey
@@matthewjunio, I understand now. I was confused since "row" is an abbreviation for right-of-way. I doubt that we'll see multiple tracks on the Cut-Off, except perhaps for a passing siding, in my opinion.
Given Pres Biden’s affinity for Scranton and Amtrak, and that at least some of his infrastructure spending plan will make it through Congress, it isn’t much of a stretch to think that he might also support assigning some of the proposed $billions for passenger and freight rail improvements to this project. Although, I think articulated locomotives and cars would be needed to address the time slowing curves in the Poconos that would make a 3 hour + train run to Hoboken, less attractive than a (typically) shorter bus run right into NYC. But, yes. I’d rather take the train and PATH or ferry to Manhattan.
@@LackawannaCutOff My wife and I were married in 1969. We had an apartment next to the Chatham train station. We witnessed an Erie-Lackawanna passenger diesel pulling a coach, a sleeper, and a dining car eastbound. The bell rang the whole way. The chef stood in the doorway looking downcast. It had been announced as the final run of the Phoebe Snow. We made a point of watching it because I used to ride it between Summit and Owego to get to Ithaca. So if it wasn't the Phoebe Snow, what was it?
@@LackawannaCutOff Ah! That was what we saw. Thanks!! It was a sad sight. I still think that the E-L route to Chicago should have been used by Amtrak as well as the Lake Shore route. It would have been faster, I think.
I thought the best way for Amtrak to run the line and Mk Transit would be to have the trains types that run from Trenton to Camden ,the Riverline type tram trains-they could save on further electrification of the unfinished portion,on up to Scranton,on thru.
@@LackawannaCutOff Of course,seeing trams going maybe 65-70 with the Amtrak logo on them might seem humorous,though,huh?!!As fast as the regular Amtrak trains go?!?
@@ronmartin4793, track speed west of Andover could be 79 mph, or higher if Amtrak is willing to do the track inspections. In PA, except for the section on "top" of the mountain, I'd expect mostly 60 mph or less running due to speed restrictions.
@@LackawannaCutOff I was.just pointing out the river trams would look with Amtrak emblazened on them.Usually those trams don't seem like they would go that fast,when you look at them,y'know?????
Great update! I hope with the new federal infrastructure bill alot of transit projects get completed, especially the cutoff!
It amazes me how the largest cut, fill and concrete project in the world could be completed as quickly as it was over 100 hundred years ago with rudimentary equipment (by today's standards). It now seems that every 100 yards is a bureaucratic or environmental nightmare. I recall an article in the NJ Herald in 2015, citing D E P issues. I hope it goes smoothly, it will be an asset to our state.
Good news! Let’s hope it aids into speeding up the restoration of the cutoff.
As my father, who’s childhood home in South Orange backed up to the tracks, would say “A pleasure and delight to take the road of anthracite “...
Where in SO? I grew up along the tracks on Vose Avenue.
I'm from Western Pennsylvania, this is the best news I've heard in a long time,I would surely get a train out of Pittsburgh and travel out east just to take that ride. Love traveling through the Northeast Mount Pocono Scranton Susquehanna Binghamton.
I just looked up the Delaware River Viaduct on Google Maps, and it goes right over I-80, the highway I take whenever I go to NJ from my home in Michigan! I've seen a few videos about the Cutoff, can't believe I've missed the bridge every time! It would be amazing to have trains use this purpose-built high-speed rail line again, I hope all of the plans go ahead!
Mogo???
@@UnionCountyPhotography oh hey yeah it's me, mogo75!
@@emjeebutterz4405 knew that profile picture looked familiar
Thank you for the update. I have a good feeling about this ❤️🚂🙏🏻
My father worked for Lackawanna, Erie Lackawanna, Conrail and then New Jersey transit. My father and mother took the phoebe snow from New Jersey to honeymoon at the Niagara Falls in 1958.
Back in the 1950’s, Niagara Falls, NY, had a train station, but only a shuttle service to/from Buffalo. Through trains from Buffalo to Toronto, and west, stopped at a station in Niagara Falls, Ontario.
@@dennismcgowan4059 My dad was a Carmen.
My dad ran out of port jervis and Hoboken and God only knows where. He became the youngest engineer on the Erie. I have all his papers and binders and such. He left me 8 years ago. I miss him every day.
Chuck. Phoebe Snow has been around a lot longer than 1949. In the days of steam engines, her white dress was meant to demonstrate that cleaner anthracite emissions produced a more pleasant passenger experience than found on other rail roads using bituminous. The 1970s singer Phoebe Snow, lived next to the Lackawanna mainline in NJ and adopted it as her stage name.
Tim, it actually dates back to 1899 and Mark Twain. But I decided against going into that detail and how Phoebe Snow was phased out by WWI because of the shortage of anthracite, which was used in the war effort.
Very good news Chuck! Keep up the great work!
I actually think that it would be better to route trains west once past Binghamton to places in the Southern Tier instead of north to Syracuse for two reasons.
1) There would have to be a reverse move out of Binghamton in order to transfer to the Syracuse line (maybe a Syracuse-Cortland-Binghamton shuttle could work but not a main line routing)
2) More places could be served in the Southern Tier such as Hornell, Elmira, Waverly, as well as the rest of the stops from the old routing of the Phoebe Snow.
I don't think the reverse move out of Binghamton would be as big a deal - you can feasibly run with a cab car from Binghamton to Syracuse's current station, and then they'd also be facing forward to continue to Rochester and Buffalo if they wanted to run it as a variant of the Empire Service.
If they do restore the cutoff and separately expand Empire Service with more runs every day, I think Amtrak should consider running the Maple Leaf on the Southern Tier Line. Given just how much prettier that trip would be than the water level, I think it would open up some cool ways to market it towards tourists (maybe a stop inside Letchworth before or after the viaduct?).
Actually, the reverse move would not be a problem, if the train were of the Acela model powered at each end - trains in Europe change direction very easily this way.
I do concur with the Southern Tier route - Syracuse is already served by the NYC-Buffalo route. Could Syracuse-Binghamton ridership warrant such service? It would be great to see a revival of the Phoebe Snow route, however.
Never give those rail trail advocates an inch.
Would like to say that you are saying the thing I've been saying for years.
I think i speak for everyone when I say I hope this can happen
Scranton, Pa is a Beautiful Place
If Amtrak brings service to Steamtown, that would be awesome!
Did anyone notice the two people walking on the viaduct behind chuck’s head??
Yes lol
In one of my previous updates, I'm recording the episode and about half-way through Larissa started making all sorts of faces behind the camera like I was doing or saying something wrong...a guy had climbed up onto one of the refuge bays on the viaduct and looked like he was going to jump! He eventually got down.
@@LackawannaCutOff that's actually scary. Thank God nothing bad happened.
Great news, Chuck. And a smart proposal by Amtrak. The Cut-Off is the epitome of what the U.S. desperately needs; high-speed rail service. The Roseville Rd. culvert looks great too. Everything west of Port Jervis is the NYS&W, with only five trains per week.
It would be nice to see something west of Port Jervis.
And north of Port Jervis,up to Canada,along Rt.87 corridor,extended up to Montreal!Eh?!?
Every time I drive on 80 and pass under the viaduct just before crossing the Gap I imagine the day trains will once again run on it.
I want to be on that train someday...
Will believe it when I see it. This conversation has ben going on for 50 years. Now they are saying just another fourteen years. Possible we should ask the Chinese for assistance and get it done in two.
Your idea has some fictional precedent. While it’s not the Chinese... in Prime Video’s Man in the High Castle, the post WW2 Nazi Germans, who conquered the US, run a rocket train along what is unmistakably the Lackawanna main line, up and into the far Poconos and presumably beyond.
Several buses go daily now from Scranton to New York City.
Yeah I've been on them. They are pretty uncomfortable and wait in tons of traffic. People would rather jump on a train and be able to work on their laptop in comfort and not have to worry about traffic on 80.
I always thought that service to Scranton by Amtrak made more sense than NJT running all the way.
Jamestown, New York has a fully restored and beautiful Erie Lackawanna Railroad Station. Trains ran anywhere from NYC to Buffalo to Chicago from here. It would be awesome to have rail service here in Jamestown again!
I hope this happens Chuck. Thank you for the update. I was also glad to hear that the Roseville Tunnel rehab is on the calendar for October.
Wow maybe, just maybe in my lifetime I’ll see a train go over the Delaware River viaduct. I’m 46 yo
Cool ! Hope to live long enough to see it finished.
With Amtrack now getting on board with the idea the hole project now has a brighter future . Bandit
Ha! If they make it to Andover by 2035, I’ll be shocked. Amtrak already runs from NYC to Syracuse on a much faster route. There is a zero percent chance of this happening
Yep, tend to agree with you!! Lots of pipe dreams in this !!. I have a NJT brochure from 1996 that said the Cutoff to Slateford would be in service by 2003.. lol
Passenger and (if the Association of American Ralroads' prohibition against advertisements on railroad cars is rescinded) advertisment revenue are the loads of money that would be realizable by AMTRAK (who's mangagement would rather keep AMTRAK dependent on involuntarily- and forceably-taken tax money from those who can't use AMTRAK?) for funding service that would be vastly usable by the public IF routed and scheduled to run evenings-to-next-mornings between origins and final destinations about 500 miles apart for overnight sleeping car service for business and personal travel between these points and rush-hour commuter coach service between adjacent stations because of such usuable scheduling along about half of the length of AMTRAK's existing lines. Such massive revenue from passenger fares (suplementable by adveritisement revenue if the AAR's ban on ads on railroad cars is rescinded) from correctly-scheduled and through-routed (not dead-end truncated lines) passenger trains would enable AMTRAK to pay host railroads the equivalent of a freight train's revenue for each AMTRAK train ran on host railroad's tracks as well as AMTRAK paying off all its present debt and becoming solvent (something that socialists might not like for AMTRAK to become).
Chuck, it's been a long time since any one has been on a train that was using the cutoff to get anywhere. Has anyone spoke of how many named trains in Amtrak colors will be coming back from the dead ?
My late father was from Pittston, PA which is midway between Scranton & Wilkes-Barre. He used to ride the Laurel Line to & from Scranton when he went to Penn State-Scranton. It would be great for Amtrak service through Scranton to & from New York City & Niagara Falls, Philadelphia to Syracuse, Scranton to Washington,DC. The interstates can only handle so much traffic, train service is the best alternative. I travel long distance on Amtrak.
Great video!
This would be great news! I now drive an hour to Hamilton NJ to get to NYC.
Nj Transit,not MK.(my typing error)
This is great news. Thanks for the update. Looking forward to more!
Really hopefully this project comes to fruition. Great video as usual Chuck.
Monacello ny trains we would like too
Are there three viaducts on the cutoff, or one that is called by three different names? They all look similar.
Two viaducts on the NJ Cut-Off (one is half in PA), and two on the PA Cut-Off, part of separate projects, but the same contiguous mainline.
Question, what will the route be called?
That will be up to Amtrak. Not even sure which line NJ Transit would assign Andover to...either MOBO or the Morristown Line.
@@LackawannaCutOff okay
Also will the route run 1 train a day or. Like 15 every day
@@abbyaidanandalexacosta6656, three trains in each direction with Amtrak.
@@LackawannaCutOff Not bad
I don't see passenger service producing enough benefits to justify the cost. If they want to make reactivating the Cut-Off beneficial they will need to find some way to get freight on the line.
Through freight isn't in the cards, but that makes the route much more attractive to Amtrak because of that lack of interference.
@@LackawannaCutOff Hopefully Amtrak can make it work. They put a lot of effort into building the Cut-off and it would be good to get some use out of it.
Chuck should be given a cab ride on the first train over the Cut-Off.
I'd really like this, but it could get really crowded up there with all the people who deserve to be there even more than me.
@@LackawannaCutOff Yeah, I thought it might be crowed up there with the officials and dignitaries. Ok, trailing unit if they have one.
To bad greedy Conrail did not turn over the old lines to amtrak instead of tearing it up in the first place
That's water under the bridge.
i know this is a rail enthusiast channel but Scranton already has private bus service into NYC every 30-60 minutes on weekdays at no cost to tax payers. If you want to drive into the city or park and ride with NJ Transit that's pretty easy too. I'd rather have flights from Scranton to JFK. That would really save us time, money, and hassle. Sorry.
Flying to JFK doesn't get you to northern NJ, and with terminal wait time can add 3-4 or more hours to your trip.
@@LackawannaCutOff i know many people from this area who travel all over the world from jfk... i've never met a pennsylvanian who willingly went to north jersey
If Amtrak does use this line as well as NJ Transit, will they have to make most of the line row tracks to make it more efficient?
Not sure what you mean. Row tracks?
@@LackawannaCutOff yeah. That’a why I meant. A row of tracks instead of one. I apologize if I did not explain it clearly before.
@@matthewjunio, I understand now. I was confused since "row" is an abbreviation for right-of-way. I doubt that we'll see multiple tracks on the Cut-Off, except perhaps for a passing siding, in my opinion.
Crossing fingers with both hands.
Nice to lean a little something new. Rail can connect us to our past and our future.
Great video Chuck!
Given Pres Biden’s affinity for Scranton and Amtrak, and that at least some of his infrastructure spending plan will make it through Congress, it isn’t much of a stretch to think that he might also support assigning some of the proposed $billions for passenger and freight rail improvements to this project. Although, I think articulated locomotives and cars would be needed to address the time slowing curves in the Poconos that would make a 3 hour + train run to Hoboken, less attractive than a (typically) shorter bus run right into NYC. But, yes. I’d rather take the train and PATH or ferry to Manhattan.
@@Thedecider1984, please explain. Otherwise, this will be considered a troll comment and deleted.
Excellent! Thank you for the update!
The Phoebe Snow had its last run in 1969, not 1966.
No, the last Phoebe Snow ran on November 27, 1966.
@@LackawannaCutOff My wife and I were married in 1969. We had an apartment next to the Chatham train station. We witnessed an Erie-Lackawanna passenger diesel pulling a coach, a sleeper, and a dining car eastbound. The bell rang the whole way. The chef stood in the doorway looking downcast. It had been announced as the final run of the Phoebe Snow. We made a point of watching it because I used to ride it between Summit and Owego to get to Ithaca. So if it wasn't the Phoebe Snow, what was it?
@@paulsomers6048, the Lake Cities was the last EL passenger train. Its last run was on January 5, 1970.
@@LackawannaCutOff Ah! That was what we saw. Thanks!! It was a sad sight.
I still think that the E-L route to Chicago should have been used by Amtrak as well as the Lake Shore route. It would have been faster, I think.
@@paulsomers6048, it might have been faster, if it had survived.
Good news.
I BEEN saying for yrs we don't need a train ... Make it a bike trail
I thought the best way for Amtrak to run the line and Mk Transit would be to have the trains types that run from Trenton to Camden ,the Riverline type tram trains-they could save on further electrification of the unfinished portion,on up to Scranton,on thru.
That has been talked about.
@@LackawannaCutOff Of course,seeing trams going maybe 65-70 with the Amtrak logo on them might seem humorous,though,huh?!!As fast as the regular Amtrak trains go?!?
@@ronmartin4793, track speed west of Andover could be 79 mph, or higher if Amtrak is willing to do the track inspections. In PA, except for the section on "top" of the mountain, I'd expect mostly 60 mph or less running due to speed restrictions.
@@LackawannaCutOff I was.just pointing out the river trams would look with Amtrak emblazened on them.Usually those trams don't seem like they would go that fast,when you look at them,y'know?????