The North-South Rail Link

Boston’s North and South Stations are stub-end terminals located a little over a mile apart, each hosting commuter rail service as well as Amtrak’s long distance trains. As a result, arriving commuters must often transfer onto the city’s already overcrowded public transportation system to reach downtown or the new Seaport District.  Similarly, passengers on the Northeast Corridor continuing on to Maine must face an awkward cross-town transfer to catch their connecting train. Linking the two stations with a tunnel would allow direct Amtrak service from New York to Portland, and unify Boston’s North and South Side commuter rail systems into a seamless network enabling more efficient operations and allowing countless workers and visitors to get more directly to their final destinations.

Currently, the Commonwealth is planning yet another massive expansion of South Station after expanding it only a generation ago—this time from 13 tracks to 20. The proposal would entail taking down the South Postal Annex, only to increase the number of dead-end tracks coming into the terminal. It is, at best, a temporary solution to the overcrowding at this important transportation facility, which will be overwhelmed again in the coming decades by the expected growth in passenger traffic. Instead of planning to electrify the commuter rail system, yet more diesel locomotives shuttling in and out of the Station will greatly aggravate air pollution downtown and in neighborhoods abutting the layover yards where the train sets are stored and serviced. Finally, this proposal does nothing for travelers coming into Boston from the North, who will still have to transfer at North Station to get anyplace else.

Instead, the Commonwealth must revisit its long-shelved plans for a direct rail connection between North and South Stations. According to the North-South Rail Link’s Draft Environmental Impact Report Summary published in 2003, construction of the Rail Link would result in more than 55,000 auto trips diverted daily onto public transportation which would result in a significant reduction of greenhouse gases. The Chapter believes that a far more responsible approach to expanding South Station would be to put its new platforms underground, allowing the tracks to be extended north at a later date. While proponents of the present expansion proposal claim it is an “incremental” improvement that would not preclude later construction of the Rail Link, the ballooning high cost of what critics have called a "billion dollar band-aid" (now estimated at $1.6 billion) might well prevent the Link from ever being built. Boston deserves better!

John Kyper, Chair North-South Rail Link sub-committee