On Borrowed Time
Keolis/MBTA train 743 curls around the Lewis Wye off the Franklin Line (former New Haven Midland Division) and on to the Framingham Secondary for the just under four mile trip to their endpoint at Foxboro Station. The service to Foxboro was a year long pilot program that began in Oct 2019 funded in part by Robert Kraft to provide service for employees and customers of his massive Patriot Place shopping, entertainment, and sports complex centered around Gillette Stadium. But the Pandemic decimated whatever (dubious) demand their was so come November 1 these trains will disappear. Allegedly they will return in the spring of 2021, but I have my doubts if they ever will.
Given their endangered nature I figured a few photos were worth my effort especially on a line that saw no regular daily passenger service after 1933 until these trains returned.
For those interested in history the line to Foxboror was buiilt as the Mansfield and Framingham Railroad in 1870 and the 21 mile route between its two namesake points came under the aegis the Old Colony Railroad in 1879 and then the New Haven in 1893 when that system absorbed the OCRR. 40 years later passenger service ended, but for the past 86 years the line has been an important freight route. Passing from the NH to PC, CR, and ultimately CSXT the line was sold by the latter in June 2015 to MassDOT for $23 million. The line is now dispatched and maintained under contract by Mass Coastal (except for the four miles from Walpole to Foxboro under Keolis control) with CSXT retaining the perpetual freight rights. Excepting the rebuilt and signaled portion between here and Foxboror the branch line is a 10 MPH railroad that normally sees 4 trains a day on its fairly flat route through wooded semi rural and suburban Boston bedroom communities.
Standing at left in the background is the 1893 Union Station originally served the Old Colony Railroad (along the present day Framingham Sub side) and the New York and New England (along the present day Franklin Line side) although by 1898 it was all under the aegis of the New Haven.
Walpole, Massachusetts
Wednesday October 7, 2020
On Borrowed Time
Keolis/MBTA train 743 curls around the Lewis Wye off the Franklin Line (former New Haven Midland Division) and on to the Framingham Secondary for the just under four mile trip to their endpoint at Foxboro Station. The service to Foxboro was a year long pilot program that began in Oct 2019 funded in part by Robert Kraft to provide service for employees and customers of his massive Patriot Place shopping, entertainment, and sports complex centered around Gillette Stadium. But the Pandemic decimated whatever (dubious) demand their was so come November 1 these trains will disappear. Allegedly they will return in the spring of 2021, but I have my doubts if they ever will.
Given their endangered nature I figured a few photos were worth my effort especially on a line that saw no regular daily passenger service after 1933 until these trains returned.
For those interested in history the line to Foxboror was buiilt as the Mansfield and Framingham Railroad in 1870 and the 21 mile route between its two namesake points came under the aegis the Old Colony Railroad in 1879 and then the New Haven in 1893 when that system absorbed the OCRR. 40 years later passenger service ended, but for the past 86 years the line has been an important freight route. Passing from the NH to PC, CR, and ultimately CSXT the line was sold by the latter in June 2015 to MassDOT for $23 million. The line is now dispatched and maintained under contract by Mass Coastal (except for the four miles from Walpole to Foxboro under Keolis control) with CSXT retaining the perpetual freight rights. Excepting the rebuilt and signaled portion between here and Foxboror the branch line is a 10 MPH railroad that normally sees 4 trains a day on its fairly flat route through wooded semi rural and suburban Boston bedroom communities.
Standing at left in the background is the 1893 Union Station originally served the Old Colony Railroad (along the present day Framingham Sub side) and the New York and New England (along the present day Franklin Line side) although by 1898 it was all under the aegis of the New Haven.
Walpole, Massachusetts
Wednesday October 7, 2020