>>1770503>>1797671>>1797669Case Study #2
This is going on in "Wawa Pennsylvania," near Philly. (Yes, exactly like the convenience store/gas station.) Currently the line "ends" at "Media/Elwyn," about 3 miles up from Wawa PA. The rail tracks continue on from there, but are active only for a tourist railroad whose site and location I could never quite figure out because I'm turbo-dumb. Unlike the Lackawanna Cutoff, it was electrified the whole way to a town called West Chester PA, until they truncated the line in the '80s for budget reasons.
Eventually traffic along US Route 1, Route 322, I-95, and I-476 got so bad that they decided to slightly expand it by 3 miles. This was a smaller project, a mere 3 mile extension.
The initial estimated cost in 2009 was $51 million, which is...well, for 3 miles, that's a lot. More, in today's dollars, but still. Current completion estimate is $177,900,000. That's a lot over-budget. SEPTA's annual budget for 2009 was around $80 million. So, this thing's gotten out of control and I doubt they're willing to keep extending to West Chester. That said, in all fairness, they did build a new substation, new catenary, retaining walls, and went 'all out' in upgrading the line, (likely using federal funds). With a new substation, they can probably expand the line a lot further down at a lot less cost.
Still, something to keep in mind is that in 1911, we finished building the Lackawanna Cutoff- All 28+ miles of it, all several stations, all cuts, culverts, fills, tunnels, bridges, stations, freight houses, double (or quadruple in spots) track, and more, for just $334,881,996.01, or about double the cost of what it took to build 3 miles, or, 1/9th the distance, for half the cost.
Try scaling that up to a nationwide project, OP, you will NOT like those figures. Look at how much it cost for three miles. Look at how long it has taken to build- 13 years for those 3 miles, along already-laid track. (See: Side Note)
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