The Pelham Bay Bridge, also known as the Amtrak Hutchinson River Bridge, is a two-track movable railroad bridge that carries the

Northeast Corridor The Northeast Corridor (NEC) is an electrified railroad line in the Northeast megalopolis of the United States. Owned primarily by Amtrak, it runs from Boston in the north to Washington, D.C., in the south, with major stops in Providence, Rhod ...

(NEC) over the

Hutchinson River The Hutchinson River is a freshwater stream located in the New York City borough of the Bronx and Southern Westchester County, New York, United States. It forms on the New Rochelle– Scarsdale municipal line off Brookline Road in the latter c ...

in the

Bronx, New York The Bronx ( ) is the northernmost of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. It shares a land border with Westchester County, New York, West ...

, upstream from the vehicular/pedestrian Pelham Bridge. It is owned by

Amtrak The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, Trade name, doing business as Amtrak (; ), is the national Passenger train, passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates intercity rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous United Stat ...

, which provides passenger service, and is used by

CSX Transportation CSX Transportation , known colloquially as simply CSX, is a Class I freight railroad company operating in the Eastern United States and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. Operating about 21,000 route miles () of track, it is the lead ...

and the Providence & Worcester Railroad for freight traffic.

History

The

New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad The New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad , commonly known as The Consolidated, or simply as the New Haven, was a railroad that operated principally in the New England region of the United States from 1872 to 1968. Founded by the merger of ...

completed construction of the bridge in 1907, which originally consisted of three parallel two-track spans. Amtrak partially rehabilitated it in 2009. The bridge is obsolete and requires extensive ongoing maintenance, with speeds restricted to . The lift span is staffed and required to open on demand; it does so several times per day for commercial boats.

Bridge replacement project

Amtrak plans to replace the bridge with a new high-level fixed bridge with clearance for maritime traffic. Preliminary work began in 2013. MTA's

Metro-North Railroad The Metro-North Commuter Railroad Company , also branded as MTA Metro-North Railroad and commonly called simply Metro-North, is a suburban commuter rail service operated by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), a New York State publ ...

has proposed the

Penn Station Access Penn Station Access (PSA) is a public works project underway by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority in New York City. The goal of the project is to allow Metro-North Railroad commuter trains to access Penn Station on Manhattan's West Sid ...

using the bridge for a so-called Hell Gate Line service which would allow some

New Haven Line The New Haven Line is a commuter rail line operated by the Metro-North Railroad in the U.S. states of New York (state), New York and Connecticut. Running from New Haven, Connecticut, to New York City, the New Haven Line joins the Harlem Line ...

trains to access

New York Penn Station Pennsylvania Station (also known as New York Penn Station or simply Penn Station) is the main intercity railroad station in New York City and the busiest transportation facility in the Western Hemisphere, serving more than 600,000 passengers ...

. In January 2019, Amtrak and the MTA reached an agreement regarding Penn Station Access. As part of the deal, the MTA would pay to replace the Pelham Bay Bridge. In August 2022 the

Federal Railroad Administration The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) is an agency in the United States Department of Transportation (DOT). The agency was created by the Department of Transportation Act of 1966. The purpose of the FRA is to promulgate and enforce railroa ...

(FRA) awarded a $4.5 million grant to Amtrak for the bridge replacement project. In November 2022 the FRA published its inventory of pending improvement projects for the Northeast Corridor. The report lists the replacement of the Pelham Bay Bridge as one of 15 "Major Backlog Projects" which have the highest priority for funding. In June 2023, Amtrak applied for additional FRA grants to support multiple improvement projects in the Northeast Corridor, including additional work on the Pelham Bay Bridge project.

References

External links

Pelham Bay Bridge Replacement Project
, Amtrak {{NYC Bridge, state=collapsed Amtrak bridges Bascule bridges in New York (state) Bridges in the Bronx Bridges completed in 1907 Concrete bridges in the United States New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad bridges Pelham Bay Park Railroad bridges in New York City Steel bridges in the United States Warren truss bridges in the United States

History

Bridge replacement project

See also

References

External links