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Amtrak and Metro-North trains operating east of New York City on the New Haven line will be able to run faster and experience fewer delays in the future thanks to an overhead catenary replacement program that began last spring, and to a planned flyover at New Rochelle, N.Y.
Metro-North let a $32.4-million contract to replace the 13kV 60Hz a.c. electrification from Woodlawn 14.5 miles eastward to Port Chester, on the New York-Connecticut state line, to L. K. Comstock, Inc., a Danbury, Conn., based electrical firm. Morrison Knudsen is the design and construction supervision company. Work is expected to be finished in early fall 1993. Meanwhile, Amtrak NECIP (Northeast Corridor Improvement Project) funding is being assembled to finance the building of a twin-track flyover at the Shell Interlocking, just west of the New Rochelle station. The estimated $65 million project will lift Amtrak expresses clear of Metro-North movements to and from Grand Central Terminal starting in 1998.
* FIRST STRINGING: 1907. The Metro-North restringing project involves replacing the oldest catenary used on any main line North American railroad.The wires date back to 1907 when the former New Haven electrified its four-track main line from Stamford to Woodlawn, where the line joined the New York Central to GCT. The New Haven installed a then-revolutionary overhead single-phase a.c. system, in contrast to the third rail d.c. on the New York Central and on the Long Island and the Pennsylvania. The wires were extended to New Haven in 1914 and on branches to Danbury and New Canaan. The Danbury line was later dieselized. The Woodlawn-Stamford section used unique triangle-shaped wire hangers made of gas pipes.
As the catenary aged, however, it became weak and brittle. Metro-North officials said the wire would either snap through contraction when the temperature was low or sag with expansion as much as eight feet in every mile in hot weather. This occurred also because the catenary was rigid and therefore had little tolerance for conditions. Metro-North had to put speed restrictions from 70 mph to 60 mph on some curves because the contract wire would be out of alignment with equipment pantographs. This also affected operations east of New Rochelle.
Replacing the ex-New Haven catenary is a 2.5 mile extension of the ex-NYC 650V...