Boston entrepreneur pursues inexpensive start-up Worcester-Providence train service

Many professionals in and observers of the railroad industry are jaded and skeptical of the idea that a group of private investors could start a successful or even profitable passenger train service — beyond occasional tourist or excursion runs — in the US without government subsidy or assistance. But one 45-year-old native Bostonian with a background in consulting on electric energy technologies has quite the opposite attitude. Vincent Bono readily offers statistics from memory to show that a market exists for his proposed service: a daily commuter train connecting residents of Woonsocket, RI and Worcester, MA with jobs in Providence. 

Bono, the sole investor in the venture, and four other Board members founded the Boston Surface Railroad Company (BSRC) in 2014, borrowing the name from a defunct company founded in the 1970s to explore novel means of powering passenger trains. That name, in turn, is borrowed from that of the Boston Elevated Railway, which was the city’s primary transit provider from its founding in 1894 until it was absorbed into the Metropolitan Transit Authority, predecessor to today’s Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA), in 1947.

BSRC contracted with Jacobs, a Boston-based transit planning consultancy, along with Boston law firm Burns and Levinson to prepare a market and feasibility study for the Worcester-Providence route, completed in August 2015. It has also agreed to a Memorandum of Understanding with the Providence & Worcester Railroad, a regional short line freight carrier that owns the tracks between its namesake cities, and also has an MOU with Amtrak, whose cooperation it will need in order to access the Providence station on the national passenger carrier’s Northeast Corridor. BSRC submitted its MOUs with P&W and Amtrak along with a Petition for Exemption to the federal Surface Transportation Board, and presented its Safety Plan to the Federal Railroad Administration. 

The P&W already has trackage rights over the NEC between Pawtucket, RI (just north of Providence) and Groton, CT (where it connects with P&W’s line between there and Worcester via Norwich), though the freight carrier is relegated to a track that bypasses the passenger platforms at Providence. The P&W operates occasional passenger excursion trains on a Worcester-Groton-Providence-Worcester triangle route, using a set of a head-end power car, three ex-Amtrak Heritage coaches, a dining car and a parlor car, all decked out in its livery and each bearing the name of a Northeastern state, hauled by its freight diesels. BSRC chartered this equipment for one such trip this past Saturday, on which I traveled and spoke with Vincent Bono. My fellow Trains correspondent Scott Hartley was also aboard and wrote this report for our News Wire (paid subscriber-only content).

BSRC anticipates spending $10 million over the next five years to get to where it wants to be. The company seeks to buy or lease an initial fleet of three F59PH diesel locomotives and 12 to 16 older single-level coaches for three trainsets: two active two-car sets and one “protect” set that will be ready to substitute if one of the active sets is damaged or experiences mechanical problems. Bono cannot yet disclose which fleet owner has given BSRC the option to lease equipment, but it is not the MBTA. He envisions running two weekday Worcester-Providence round-trips (southbound in the morning and northbound in the evening) and several more Woonsocket-Providence round-trips during the day and on weekends with those two trainsets. 

BSRC plans to offer a very basic food service on board the trains: coffee, tea and pastries for the morning runs and light snacks and beverages (including alcohol) for the evening trips. Bono envisions refurbishing the coaches’ interiors to include 2-and-2 seating, at-seat power outlets and high-quality WiFi.

Between 12,000 and 14,000 commuters drive south from Worcester daily, and an additional 15,000 drive south from Woonsocket. Bono says he would be happy, and his company profitable, if BSRC could capture just three percent of that market. He will price train tickets to undercut the daily cost of gasoline and parking in Providence. There are no commuter buses on the route, with only two or three intercity bus trips connecting the cities daily, operated by Bonanza Bus Lines.

BSRC plans to use P&W train and engine crews and to contract out equipment maintenance to a third party, keeping some electrical maintenance in-house. The only infrastructure needs for the initial service are an equipment storage and maintenance facility in Worcester, a passing siding halfway between the two cities (near Northbridge, MA), and a switch allowing BSRC trains to access the platforms in Providence without having to bypass the station and then do a backup move. BSRC plans to pay for these capital improvements.

Bono describes the current circumstances as presenting a unique opportunity for his planned service. Twenty years ago, he explains, gas was cheap, parking was free, and the highways were empty. Now, all of those scenarios are the opposite, and studies show that eight to 15 percent of commuters will get out of their cars if a short (under one hour each way) train trip is available. 80 percent of the jobs in greater Providence — New England’s second fastest growing job market — are located within walking distance of the Providence Amtrak/MBTA station, Bono said. The resident populations of Worcester and Woonsocket are also growing. BSRC has had initial favorable discussions with two large Providence employers: Hasbro Children’s Hospital and Bank of America.

One other passenger on Saturday’s charter trip used the word “boondoggle” in reference to BSRC’s plans. When asked his reaction, Bono said “People armchair quarterback every industry there is. If you’re not willing to put your own money in and work hard, then you’re not serious.”

“Our mission is different from that of government commuter rail, which needs to serve all aspects of the populace,” Bono continued. “Our job isn’t to stimulate the economy, but only to serve an existing commuter base.” 

Bono’s undaunted determination to see this project through, from the perspective of a businessman looking to make a buck, is refreshing. If he succeeds in getting BSRC service up and running for less than it would cost Amtrak or MBTA to run it and earn a sufficient return on his investment over time, it should inspire others to consider that a business venture in passenger rail doesn’t need to have flashy new equipment or an expensive new high-speed line in order to attract enough passengers to be successful. Even a conventional passenger train on a viable route using older equipment, if it runs reliably and frequently enough, can draw enough passengers to more than cover its costs. 

If I were asked to think of a list of routes that were ripe for new or improved passenger train service in the US, Worcester to Providence would not have sprung to my mind. But it will take bringing service inexpensively to more routes like that to rebuild the train-riding culture in America necessary to whet the public appetite for the more substantial investments needed to grow and modernize the network on a large scale.