A small, but very vocal group has been pushing for the removal of the rails from the old NYC Adirondack Division, to be replaced by a hiking an biking trail.
At this point, they have been successful in convincing NY state to review the "Unit Management Plan," (http://www.dec.ny.gov/docs/lands_forests_pdf/remplacidump.pdf) which currently calls for rail operations during warm weather and use as a snowmobile trail in the winter. So far, this arrangement has worked just fine.
The trail advocates insist that 20,000 (or is it 250,000? The number seems to vary) people per year would use this "world class trail." The trail would run through several wilderness areas of the Adirondacks. Many portions of the trail would be extremely remote, with no cell phone service or any other services for that matter.
Your own experience with local trails may help color that assertion.
The Adirondack Scenic Railroad has carried over 1.2 million people in the past 21 years. Currently the operation includes 22 miles of trackage over a short line, 40 miles of active track (Remsen-Big Moose) and another 10 miles of active track between Lake Placid and Saranac Lake. The entire corridor is on the National Register of Historic Places.
It's been estimated that approximately $15M in trackwork would allow 25 MPH service all the way from Remsen to Lake Placid. Some portions of the active trackage are already running speeds of 30-40 MPH. Obviously, more money would allow for upgrades to higher speeds (40 MPH throughout would be desirable).
Comments are being accepted by NY state until September 25, 2013. Of course, we'd love to have plenty of comments supportive of retaining (and upgrading) the rails. Most helpful would be comments which include the benefits the railroad can bring to the area.
I would opine that "foamer" comments (ie, "I love trains! You can't take away the trains!") would be taken less seriously.
You can send comments to:
NYSTravelCorridor@dot.ny.gov,
fax to 518-457-3183,
or mailed toRaymond F. Hessinger, Director, Freight & Passenger Rail Bureau,
NYS Department of Transportation,
50 Wolf Road, POD 54,
Albany, NY 12232.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
I live in Tennessee and I would like to help with this effort. Would they be interested in comments from out-of-staters?
I would hope so, especially if you can tie in local (TN) experience with comparable facilities (ie, trail usage, upkeep, etc).
The trail advocates have been collecting signatures on petitions from anyone they can buttonhole at local events. Sincerely written comments from rail advocates would certainly be of value.
Edit: I should add that the trail advocates do not favor ripping up the rails on the entire corridor, only those north of Big Moose, which includes the route through the center of the Adirondack forest and on to Lake Placid.
I recently read an article from a 'trail director' on a rail trail in PA that was complaining about the amount of maintenance that was required to keep the rail-trail open and in a sufficient state of repair to be usable and looking for funding sources to provide the maintenance. Trail maintenance is something very few trail promoters ever think about.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
BaltACD I recently read an article from a 'trail director' on a rail trail in PA that was complaining about the amount of maintenance that was required to keep the rail-trail open and in a sufficient state of repair to be usable and looking for funding sources to provide the maintenance. Trail maintenance is something very few trail promoters ever think about.
Nobody ever worries about maintenance. They just all gather for the ribbon cutting, pop the champagne, then they go home and forget about what they created As it is now time for the next new thing. The American way!
It's been fun. But it isn't much fun anymore. Signing off for now.
The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer, any other railroad, company, or person.t fun any
Though I cannot personally attest to this line, my grandparents have ridden it and thoroughly enjoyed it.
That brings up another point: What of the people who cannot physically walk a trail? While I make no assumption that all of the elderly cannot use walking trails, some can't. Then we have physically handicapped, as well as small children. Creating a walking trail invites only those physically active to use it.
tree68 ... Edit: I should add that the trail advocates do not favor ripping up the rails on the entire corridor, only those north of Big Moose, which includes the route through the center of the Adirondack forest and on to Lake Placid.
...
I heard that the trail people wanted to rip-up everything beyond Old Forge (I suppose they meant Thendara).
Add to your list:
Hope that warped assumption on the salvage value also includes the $15-20K per mile* to survey and monument the corridor after they rip the monuments and evidence of occupations out (ie - the rails) that witness a corridor that has been in place since well before the civil war. Every adjoining landowner ought to be yelling bloody murder over this. Once it's gone - it's gone! (and re-establishing boundaries without the rail is a giant pain in the butt. There probably are giant encroachments (gaps and overlaps) in the corridor already caused by greed and or ignorance. Solving the issue is messy and few lawyers do well with real estate law, esp railroad law.)
NYC's mapping is generally over simplistic/ bad compared to those around them and I question whether the state bothered to get all it really should have acquired when it bought the line from PC.
The buttonpushers with their GIS and GPS will be at a total loss to say where the boundary lines really are. (plus or minus several yards ain't good enough)
EDIT #1: The cost of just about any adjacent landowners survey with the track/monument removed would most certainly jump (double or more?) due to all the extra retracement costs incurred by the surveyor and the costs associated with title insurance caused by the title lawyers shielding themselves from future lawsuits over migrating boundary lines and title uncertainty. Those associated costs will get dumped in the landowner's lap.(no such thing as a free lunch rule)
EDIT #2: So noted that that some of the line is ex-D&H and that a good portion of the line is post-1870.
*probably more because it is New York.
MC,
Wouldn't be poetic justice, from a perspective of knowledgable bystander, (not a railfan) to see the advocates remove the rail only to "lose" the corridor altogether. I can just hear the judge ruling," If you can't locate it legally, it must not exist."
rrnut282 MC, Wouldn't be poetic justice, from a perspective of knowledgable bystander, (not a railfan) to see the advocates remove the rail only to "lose" the corridor altogether. I can just hear the judge ruling," If you can't locate it legally, it must not exist."
I am not a hiker or a runner, but I would not deny those who do hike a trail--but I certainly am against their selfishness in denying pleasure to those who enjoy riding trains and to those who are unable walk far but want to enjoy the scenery along the railway.
Johnny
The hikers, bikers, snow mobilers, ATVers, etc, don't need the railroad right of way to do what they want, there are millions of acres and thousands of trails and land for them. The railroad right of way is precious to the needs of mass transportation in, out, and around the area which would take too much to duplicate if given away and will pay for itself in the short and long run. What these people really are about, I'm suspicious to say the least....
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Railbanking is supposed to save endangered RR right of ways not kill them outright....its time to call rails to trails on there own BS!!!!!!!!!!
The ulterior motives of one of the main people involved in this farce is well known if you want to look around for it.
If the Adirondack Scenic Railroad made any mistake here, it has been not taking these people seriously enough. Their near silence while the opposition grew and kept selling their nonsense has led to many of the local governments involved to side with them and quite possibly lead to the death of their ambitions. They were so confident that they were in the right, that their hard work spoke for itself, and that the constant revolving door of politicians in Albany would always be on their side that they've seemingly had their head in the sand until recently and still don't seem to be doing much to sway opinions in their favor.
It might already be too late to successfully fight.
Fellow forum members,
What follows is the text of a letter I am going to send to Raymond Hessinger, who was mentioned above as being the one to contact about the situation with the trail versus the Adirondack Scenic Railway. I am asking for your feedback before sending it. I do not want to send something that will do more harm than good. If it sounds stupid, say so. Obviously, I will fill in the address and other things a proper business letter would have. Thank you all in advance.
===========================================================
Dear Mr Hessinger,
I am writing to you out of concern about the movement to remove the track of the Adirondack Scenic Railway and replace it with a trail. My purpose here is to lay out some reasons why the railway should be left in place to continue on as it has since 1996.I must say at the outset that I don’t live in New York State. I have never visited your fine state, but I would like to go there in the future, if circumstances permit. Let me tell something about myself. I live in the Nashville, Tennessee area and I volunteer as a car host for a group whose mission is similar to that of the Adirondack Scenic Railway. We run an excursion train from Nashville to points east on the Upper Cumberland Plateau, which is a very scenic area of our state of Tennessee. We do this about twenty times a year during the spring and fall. Our train consists of eleven cars that were all built in the fifties and have been restored. The train will hold 450 passengers.
A tourist train operation brings money into the local economy, in particular, to restaurants. In our case, local chambers of commerce will hold actives in their towns to which we will deliver people using our train. Examples include a Jazz festival, a mile long yard sale and a veteran’s day WW2 gathering. There are other events too. Usually what happens is that we will leave Nashville in the morning and arrive at the destination town in the late morning or early afternoon. The passengers will deboard and attend the activity or just have lunch. They return to the train and we take them back, arriving at Nashville early in the evening. Obviously, 450 people invading a small town means a lot of extra money for the local restaurants and other businesses too.
The presence of a railroad makes possible the location of industry, along with the good jobs and tax revenue that industry brings, to towns along the line. A railroad is the most cost effective way to move large and bulky freight. Many large industries choose to receive their raw materials by rail for that reason. Conversely, the absence of a railroad could send an industry somewhere else.
A tourist train operation, when properly run, is a huge amount of fun for all involved, passengers and crew alike. Consequently, it is, without a doubt, the best way of show casing the area the line runs through to those who don’t already live there. The tourist train passenger sits still, in the comfort of an air conditioned coach, while the country outside passes before them. These people could range from older couples looking for a place to retire to corporate CEO’s looking for a site for a new plant. They get to see a day in the life along the line unfold before them, for example, livestock grazing in fields, fishermen and canoeists on the river, all sorts of wildlife, farmers on tractors, adults sitting on back porches, hunters in the field, children stopping their play long enough to wave enthusiastically at the train. From what I understand, the Adirondack region is a great place to live and work. There is no better way to make that point than with a good train ride through the Adirondack region .
Finally, there is an alternative to removing the track and installing a trail. Why can’t the track and the trail coexist on the same right of way? While I don’t know the particulars of your situation, most railroad rights of way are from 75 to 100 feet wide. A trail is about ten feet wide, the track structure is about twenty feet wide. We have an extensive greenway system here in Middle Tennessee which features paved treadways, foot bridges over waterways and other amenities. I have walked it many times myself, I guess you could say I am sort of a day hiker. While I am not an expert, the greenway does not look to be more than 8 feet wide. It looks to me like it and a railroad could safely share a 100 foot wide right of way. To force the removal of a successful railroad in favor of a trail, given the benefits of that railroad and the possibility of both of them sharing the same right of way violates every standard of fairness I have ever known or been taught.
Mr. Hessinger, I hope you will take into consideration what I have said here. Let me know if you have any questions or if I can help you in any way.
Sincerely,
George
Bonaventure10 Railbanking is supposed to save endangered RR right of ways not kill them outright....its time to call rails to trails on there own BS!!!!!!!!!!
As MC says, it's not railbanked, just out of service for hauling passengers.
The "real" rails-to-trails people have essentially disavowed this effort. RTT is interested in repurposing abandoned lines, not removing active rails.
Overall: AREMA looked at trails and rails co-existing several years back. The consensus was the pedestrians and bikers on the trail were far too much of a liability. No rational engineered solution could protect the trails people from their own recklessness. Final recommendation was to discourage the concept of co-existence for liability reasons. (read stupid people cannot be fool-proofed)
In my ongoing research on this situation, I remember reading that much of the ROW is thru wetland, and the level top of the fills is only as wide as the ties, which is actually slightly narrower than the 10' standard for developed bike trails. This was given as one of the reasons why rails-plus-trails fell out of favor.
overall Dear Mr Hessinger, ....I must say at the outset that I don’t live in New York State. I have never visited your fine state, but I would like to go there in the future, if circumstances permit. ...
....I must say at the outset that I don’t live in New York State. I have never visited your fine state, but I would like to go there in the future, if circumstances permit. ...
Some politicians might not read past "I don’t live in New York State". Other people might wonder about your sincerity in referring to a "fine state" which you have never visited. A possible suggestion: While I have not visited your state yet, I am hoping to; and as a railfan, I would be specifically interested in riding the Adirondack Scenic Railroad.
I like the rest of your letter.
Thanks to Mudchicken and Midland Mike for your input. I will revise the text and incorporate what you both suggested.
There is something fishy going on up there in the Mountains which the locals don't want others to know about...it could be illegal activities involving agriculture, hunting, fishing, and the like. Or it could be that they are selfish and want the woods to themselves...hermits, loners, very private citizens who just like to be left alone. There are millions of open acres for snowmobiling, ATVing, hiking, etc. so this 50 foot wide path through the woods and mountains shouldn't be taking anything away from them but they certainly couldn't afford to excavate and construct such a path on their own, either, with relatively easy grades and all. But, roads and highways would be more intrusive and costly and damaging to the environment than this railroad right of way; and a railroad would be more environmentally friendly and less obtrusive and take less land away should highways and road be built. You would think that those so interested in their privacy and the stated planned uses for the land would think less greedily and parochially and be in favor of the railroad zipping people through without stopping; unless they do have something to hide.
Larry (tree68)
I surely hope that this effort to rip out and destroy what would amount to a National Asset, Certainly, it is a wonderful asset for your State and Area. Cannot get to fruition in the destruction of the ASR.
Mention above by a couple of the Posters here, is the annual cost of Maintenance of a Trail. Monies that will be very hard to separate from the Budgets of State and Local Political entities. The one given is that the Construction Costs will just be the first expenses. The ongoing maintenance will most likely increase, exponentially in the future.
Most likely, it will require the funding and expense of a new Bureaucracy to look over the "Trail" . As you had previously mentioned, a number of isolated landowners in that area use "Hi-Rail" vehicles to access their properties and other recreational resources, via the inactive rail properties (R.O.W.). They will most likely require additional roads ( and attendant expenses for that).
It would be a shame for such a long term asset that is funding itself, to be done away with by a group of 'Special Interest, individuals' who at some point in the future will forget all about their "Trail' as their lives take them in other directions. Leaving the railroad-less landscape to try and heal itself. And the loss of a tourist income producing property to go away.
Admittedly, I have not been in that area, in a number of years, but I still have mental pictures of the beauty and grandure of that Adirondacks still .
Please feel free to use this if it will help. ( or commuicated via F.B.)
Reaards,
Sam
Could someone name some names here as to who is exactly behind any conspiracy that might exist here.? Name some names and I will make sure they will end up in some scandal involving some public restroom along a bike trail somewhere in upstate ny.
Naming names with such allegations would not help the cause.
The trail advocates have a website (you can look it up) which lists their board of directors, among other things.
That there is a suggestion of hiding illegal doings (unrelated to the efforts of either the railroad or the trail advocates, to be fair) just adds to the question of the true motives of the trail advocates. On the surface, they seem to honestly believe what they dispense.
There is an undercurrent, however, that suggests that removing the rails is simply a means to an end, and a trail may or may not figure into those plans. They have come out against rail+trail, which makes one wonder, as well.
One of the trail advocates has been campaigning for a road to his remote location along the rails for years. Rumor has it he also wants to sell that property, the value of which would rise substantially if there was a road.
Some folks suspect that the ultimate goal of the trail advocates is simply to have the portion of the corridor in question return to wilderness, minus trains, snowmobiles, and even people.
But for the present, we have to play with the cards dealt and not with what cards the other players may have up their sleeves.
In the case of the railroad, the goal is quite simple - run trains all the way over the line to Lake Placid. Everyone else, we aren't so sure.
Phoned STB today and talked to an attorney there...It depends on if the railroad was abandoned by Penn Central to begin with and BTW NJ Transit Princeton is being looked at will update asap.
Poor Rudy, Nancy and Christine....
Larry,
I read part of the PDF from the DOT. Too long to read all of it.
What isn't clear is whether they want to trail the entire ROW or just the portion from Remsen to Lake Placid.
Norm
From what I have read here and elsewhere, those opposed are opposed to the whole railroad venture. And again I insinuate there are other reasons than stated for their not not wanting visitors coming into their domain. The main opposition was started by a lodge or campground which once used the ROW for their guests to snowmobile and ATV willy nilly but can't if rails and trains exist. So they started a campaign against the railroad several years ago. They have recruited other recluses with fear tactics and thus brought us to where it is today. I am very suspicious of their reasons.
Norm48327 What isn't clear is whether they want to trail the entire ROW or just the portion from Remsen to Lake Placid.
Remsen to Lake Placid is the entire corridor. The trail advocates want to lift the rails between either Thendara or Big Moose (depends on what day it is) and Lake Placid. The portion from Remsen to Thendara or Big Moose would remain. Utica to Remsen is MA&N (a GVT property).
Drawing on Henry's post, the effort to get a road into the property he alludes to has been going on for years - longer than ASRR has been in existence. The chief proponent there has latched on to the trail effort (actually based on the north end of the line) since he sees the possibility that he'll finally get his road. Before ASRR came into existence, he could hi-rail the line with impunity. That's no longer the case.
The snowmobile community has latched onto this campaign in favor of the trail because they hate the rail structure itself - they need 8" of packed snow to stay over the top of the rails. Getting rid of it might add a few weeks to their sledding - they already use the corridor as a trail for most of the winter as it is, so this effort will add zero miles to their available trails.
While I'm not as convinced of the "criminal" angle as Henry (can't discount it, though), I personally suspect that the main trail advocate group simply wants to see the rails gone from "their" forest. If that part of their campaign is ultimately successful, it remains to be seen what happens to the trail part of their project. I suspect that the trail will never come to be.
Tree, I'd like to congratulate (at least I think so) on the apparent victory. (Check the News Wire) I fear, however, that this isn't the end.
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