|
The Hartford Courant, Conn., Tom Condon column: Worcester Downtown Riding High On Rail
(Hartford Courant, The (CT) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Oct. 19--What is New England's second-largest city? If you said Providence, and I suspect many of you did, go to the back of the class. It is actually Worcester, whose growing population of nearly 176,000 has slipped past that of Rhode Island's capital.
My daughter goes to college in the area, so I've gotten to know Worcester a bit, and it's a good town. It's got some fine neighborhoods with sturdy triple-deckers and converted mansions; a dozen colleges, top restaurants, some first-rate arts institutions, a surprisingly good urban school system. Still, it's not immediately apparent why Worcester's population has grown by more than 9 percent since 1980.
Having 30,000 college students doesn't hurt. The city is also a major medical center, with the University of Massachusetts Medical School and other institutions.
But the biggest reason the numbers are up is that people began moving out from Boston. And how do many of them get back and forth? The train. Yes, some people waste gas and time on the Mass Pike, but increasing numbers hop on the MBTA train at the white, twin-turreted Union Station and ride the 45 miles to Boston.
Service was extended from Boston in the mid-1990s, and has gradually been growing. Earlier this month, state officials announced a major agreement with CSX Corp. that will result in 2 1/2 more round trips a day, bringing the total to 12 1/2 with more to come.
Under the multi-year agreement, the state agrees to increase the height of highway bridges so CSX can move freight on double-stack rail cars. The deal also calls for the purchase of CSX tracks to extend commuter rail service to New Bedford and Fall River, and sets a framework for the eventual purchase of the Worcester-to-Boston line.
The push for rail service to Worcester was led by one of the people who now periodically uses the train. Lt. Gov. Timothy P. Murray was the mayor of Worcester from 2002 to 2007, and understood that a better connection to Boston could only help his city.
In a telephone interview Wednesday, Murray said there is a "direct correlation" between the growth of rail service and the increase in the city's population.
"If you talk to the real estate people, they'll tell you that their clients like the convenience of rail, they want the option (to take the train). Since you can work on the train, it breaks down the sense of time and distance" (especially with WiFi on the trains, which began this year on the Worcester line and is being expanded to all MBTA trains).
With transportation available, Worcester housing is a great value, and thus a hot real estate market. "You might pay $250,000 for a triple-decker in Worcester, while one floor would cost you $700,000 to $800,000 in Boston."
With more than 5 million people a year using the Worcester-to-Boston line, up from 3 million in 1995, downtown has enjoyed transit-oriented development. Murray said rail service "is literally and figuratively the economic engine in downtown." He said development has moved in concentric circles away from the restored Union Station. He said a half-dozen projects have been completed and the huge CitySquare project, a mixed-used replacement of a dead mall, is in the pipeline. Colleges are moving programs downtown.
Worcester has had many of the same problems Hartford has, including a highway through the center of town. Conversely, Hartford has many of the assets Worcester does, such as a fine arts community. Worcester may have done a little better at exploiting its assets; in the 1980s, officials wisely turned a former state mental hospital adjacent to the medical school into a biotech park that now has a bunch of innovative companies.
But a real difference is the rail connection to the bigger city. Hartford is in a position to tie into both Boston and New York, were high-speed rail available. It is crazy that workers cannot commute by rail to and from cities that aren't that far away from each other. Get commuter rail going from Springfield to Hartford and New Haven, and all the towns on the line will prosper. We should be moving ahead on New London-to-Worcester rail service as well.
But we're plodding along on commuter rail. There is zero sense of urgency. That is what Tim Murray brought to it in Worcester, and it's working.
--Tom Condon can be reached at tcondon@courant.com.
To see more of The Hartford Courant, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.courant.com/.
Copyright (c) 2008, The Hartford Courant, Conn.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.
[ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]
|
INDUSTRIES
Activate Email 
INDUSTRIES
Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.
