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South Coast Rail cleared another hurdle on Wednesday, carrying its first passengers who were not part of a work crew at top speed on a test run into New Bedford.
“This excitement about this was not only could we run trains, but we could run them at full speed,” said Phil Eng, general manager of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority.
Eng, a few other agency officials and state legislators were on board for part of an afternoon ride that started in South Station, Boston, and ended at the station near Acushnet Avenue — at certain points reaching a maximum speed of 79 mph.
Eng spoke Wednesday evening at Taunton City Hall after he and members of his staff delivered an update on the long-delayed commuter rail, now expected to start service next May. The cost has been put at $1.1 billion.
That’s the same schedule Eng announced in appearances in June in Fall River and New Bedford after start dates in 2023 and 2024 were scratched. Eng and Project Manager Karen Antion assured an audience of about 70 people that South Coast Rail will complete months of system testing and a federal review in time to start carrying passengers in May 2025.
Antion said the first of two test phases has been completed, culminating in the full-speed “inspection trip” on Wednesday that could not happen without the OK of the Federal Railroad Administration. She said about 40% of the work has been done in a second test phase due to wrap up at the end of January.
Once that’s completed, FRA inspectors arrive for a close look that is expected to take about another 90 days. The review includes a full dress rehearsal, minus passengers: trains running the schedule, stops announced, doors opening and closing.
Federal approval would clear the project for launch.
“We have every confidence” that the MBTA will get federal approval on schedule, Antion said. “As we stand here today we’re still very much on track.”
In response to a question about recent delays, Eng said that not long after starting his position with the MBTA last year, he realized that the previously announced start dates — one in late 2023, then summer of 2024 — did not allow enough time for extensive system and safety tests.
Eng also said he had to make personnel changes, including hiring Antion.
“We realized we needed to add more operational people,” and people to work on signaling systems, said Eng, who took charge at the MBTA after serving as New York City’s transit chief and president of the Long Island Railroad.
Antion said all six stations are “substantially complete,” with the most work yet to be done on the elevator and stairway of the East Taunton location. That structure is the most complex of the six, as it includes an elevated section crossing over one track to a central platform serving both tracks.
The other stations are in Middleborough, Fall River, Freetown and two in New Bedford. The Church Street station is in the North End, and the one simply dubbed “New Bedford” is on the east side of Route 18 near the Whale’s Tooth parking lot.
The arched pedestrian bridge from Purchase Street over Route 18 to the station is about 60% complete, Antion said.
Ryan Coholan, the MBTA’s chief operating officer, said the schedule is expected to include 17 trips daily to and from New Bedford, up from the 13 originally planned, with fewer trips on weekends. The full fare to Boston will be $12.25 one way — reduced fare will be $6.
State Sen. Marc Pacheco of Taunton, who rode the train Wednesday, said there have been many times since work on the project began when “I was wondering if I was ever going to be able to do that.”
The project has been through several false starts and restarts after the state began preliminary studies in the early 1990s, when then-Gov. Bill Weld declared “if you don’t have commuter rail by 1997, sue me.”
State Rep. Bill Straus of Mattapoisett, who chairs the Legislature’s Joint Committee on Transportation, boarded Wednesday’s test run with Eng at South Station. He said he was struck by how smooth the ride was over the new track, even at high speeds.
He told the crowd that over the years, when he has posted about the project on Facebook, he could count on seeing postings with a constant refrain: “I’ll believe it when I see it.”
Email reporter Arthur Hirsch at ahirsch@newbedfordlight.org.
Yay
So we can finally go see the Red Flops next year without the traffic!
It’s Massachusetts. What could possibly go wrong?
Your noise mitigation is BS I live on the Braley road Crossing and swear at that Damn train every time it goes by. You guys ever going to take care of the drainage and maintenance of the drainage in front of our homes!? I thought I would be a champion for this project but I’m not.