Plan to Speed Up Amtrak’s Northeast Route Faces Opposition in Small Towns

Lawmakers in Connecticut, Rhode Island balk at $120 billion expansion that would slash travel time by adding track lines

By Joseph De Avila

joseph.deavila@wsj.com

Updated Jan. 16, 2017 5:50 p.m. ET

The federal government has a $120 billion plan that would cut Amtrak’s Acela Express travel time between New York and Boston by 45 minutes, making it a two-hour-and-45-minute trip.

To get it done, however, it is going to first have to get through Old Lyme, Conn., where opposition is strong to the project that would bring four new track lines and as many as 110 trains a day under its historic downtown in a tunnel.

“That really is the heart of our community,” said Bonnie Reemsnyder, who leads the town board as first selectwoman of Old Lyme, a community of 7,600 people southwest of Boston that traces its history to colonial times.

It isn’t just Old Lyme that objects. Lawmakers across Connecticut and Rhode Island are pledging to fight the Federal Railroad Administration’s proposal. They said the new tracks would cut through farmland, wetlands and private property along a 35-mile stretch where the new trains could zoom through at speeds of as much as 220 miles an hour. Current speeds are limited to 50 miles an hour in some spots.
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