Ridership Surges on Metro-North

While the Rell administration and state lawmakers are enmeshed in a nasty debate over cost overruns for a proposed New Haven Line rail yard project, the fact is that more and more Connecticut residents are riding the rails to get to work.

The release of recent ridership figures for Metro-North's commuter rail lines in the state greatly underscores why the state Department of Transportation must act with greater urgency to expand parking at rail stations and work out financial problems that arose this month with the proposed New Haven rail yard.

The welcome news is that ridership on the New Haven Line, Shoreline East and the Waterbury branch line increased greatly in 2007 compared to the previous year.

The New Haven Line, one of the nation's busiest commuter rail lines, saw a 4 percent growth in passengers last year. It carried 36 million riders.

Likewise, riders on the line's Waterbury branch between Bridgeport and Waterbury jumped 6.9 percent and on Shoreline East between New Haven and New London, 5.5 percent.

Rail ridership overall on the lines increased by nearly 1.4 million new riders. With gasoline prices soaring and major highway congestion getting worse, residents are turning to the rail lines. The largest increases in ridership, according to the DOT report, were among people traveling within Connecticut.

That's major progress for changing people's habits toward utilizing mass transportation, but it also points to glaring deficiencies at the DOT in arranging for expanded parking at rail stations.

For example, despite steadily increasing ridership figures for several years, a planned parking garage at the Stratford station and an expanded garage near the Bridgeport station have been significantly delayed.

The situation will only get worse once the shipments of 342 new M8 passenger cars begin arriving late next year.

Which brings us once again to the proposed New Haven rail yard, a massive facility that is being designed for maintenance and storage of the new cars. In 2005 it was projected to cost $300 million, but in a shocking disclosure last week that cost has risen to $732 million and could go as high as $1.17 billion if construction is done in phases through 2017.

Officials of the DOT and the Rell administration, who bear the blame for concealing the spiraling costs, and Assembly leaders must examine this cost escalation in detail and come to a resolution fair to taxpayers on how the plan will go forward.

The facility is essential now and will be even more essential in the future if ridership increases.