Boston Subdivision

The Boston Subdivision is a railroad line owned by CSX Transportation in the U.S. state of Massachusetts. The line runs from Worcester west to near Springfield along a former New York Central Railroad line. Its east end is at Amtrak's Northeast Corridor (this portion owned by the MBTA) at Back Bay Station, over which CSX has trackage rights to the east to reach the Dorchester Branch. Its west end is in Wilbraham, east of Springfield, at the east end of the Berkshire Subdivision. Along the way, the line junctions with the Framingham Subdivision and Fitchburg Subdivision at Framingham.[1][2]

The line east of Riverside is owned by the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority; from Riverside west to Framingham Station, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) owns the line, while the portion from Framingham to Worcester is owned by the state of Massachusetts. MBTA Commuter Rail Framingham/Worcester Line trains operate over the line east of Worcester.

History

The line originally had four tracks to Riverside station (two curved to the south and are currently used by the MBTA's Green Line D branch light rail service). The number of tracks running into downtown Boston was reduced to two in the 1950s, in order to build the Massachusetts Turnpike, which parallels the easternmost ten miles of trackage, although CSX retains the original Boston and Albany Railroad trackage rights.

The Boston and Worcester Railroad opened its line from Boston west to Worcester in 1834 and 1835.[3][4] The Western Railroad opened from Worcester west to Springfield in 1839.[5] The line became part of the Boston and Albany Railroad, New York Central, and Conrail through leases, mergers, and takeovers, and was assigned to CSX in the 1999 breakup of Conrail.

The state took over ownership of the line between Worcester and Boston in 2012, and took over dispatching in 2013.[6]

Freight

Major freight facilities served by the subdivision include intermodal container yards in Worcester and Springfield, a transload facility in Westboro, near I-495, and the Northeast Automotive Intermodal Gateway in East Brookfield.

gollark: Still, 42% done.
gollark: I'm technically a contributor to the new wiki, but I don't do much for that and there's a LOT to cover.
gollark: Basically the documentation is incomplete everywhere and all is suffering?
gollark: The old one isn't either, to be fair.
gollark: That's the edu version.

See also

References
  1. http://wiki.radioreference.com/index.php/BO-Boston_Sub CSX Boston Sub
  2. http://www.multimodalways.org/docs/railroads/companies/CSX/CSX%20ETTs/CSX%20Albany%20Div%20ETT%20%234%2011-1-2004.pdf CSX Albany Division Timetable
  3. "PRR Chronology, 1834" (PDF). (79.7 KiB), June 2004 Edition
  4. "PRR Chronology, 1835" (PDF). (95.9 KiB), June 2004 Edition
  5. Hon. Edward Appleton, Railway Commissioner, History of the Railways of Massachusetts Archived 2009-08-03 at the Wayback Machine, 1871
  6. Jessen, Klark (7 August 2013). "State Takes "Absolute Control" over Worcester to Boston Line". Massachusetts Department of Transportation. Retrieved 7 August 2013.
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