The New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) Board has approved a base order of 60 M8 rail cars that will be placed into service on Metro-North Railroad’s New Haven Line. The base order includes an option for an additional 34 cars and is also expected to include the retrofit of 10 existing M8 cars into café cars. The cars will supplement the 405 M8 cars already in use on the line and New Canaan Branch.
The additional cars will allow the railroad to lengthen rush hour trains, retire its last 36 older M2 cars and have flexibility to increase train service in the years ahead to meet ridership increases. New Haven Line ridership growth has been at or above the high end of expectations, and the railroad has responded with significant service increases every year since 2012.
“The approval of these additional railcars will improve service for commuters throughout the region on the nation’s busiest commuter rail line,” stated Connecticut Governor Dannel P. Malloy. “For decades, we as a state and nation have failed to make investments in transportation a top priority – and we have witnessed the results with failing roadways and aging public transportation systems. But today we are taking a new approach. Through actions like today’s, we are showing the public that investments in infrastructure must be made to continue the level of service the public, and our economy, have come to depend on.”
“If we want to remain competitive, giving our residents and businesses the best chance to prosper, we must continue to make desperately needed investments across our entire transportation infrastructure,” added the Governor.
The new M8 cars are designed to be enabled with Positive Train Control from the time they enter service. The cars have third rail shoes that can receive 700- to 750-volt direct current to power the trains between Pelham and Grand Central Terminal, and the capability to run under two types of alternating current from overhead wire. The New Haven Line and its New Canaan Branch use 60 cycle, 12.5 kilovolt power but the cars can also operate at the higher, 60 cycle, 25 kilovolt power, which is used on the Shore Line East route east of New Haven
The M8 cars have achieved very high mechanical reliability. Through September, the cars are averaging 460,277 miles between mechanical breakdowns, the best rate for New Haven Line cars in decades and 53 percent above the railroad’s goal for the cars.
The M8 coach cars for use on the New Haven Line are funded 65 percent by the State of Connecticut and 35 percent by the MTA Capital Program. M8 café cars are funded entirely by the State of Connecticut.
The existing M8 cars, like the rest of Metro-North’s fleet, are being upgraded to enable them to operate with enhanced Positive Train Control and are also being retrofitted to include security cameras in engineers’ cabs and in the customer areas of the trains. The new M8 cars will not need to be retrofitted; they will come enabled with cameras and Positive Train Control equipment when they are delivered to the railroad.
The M8 cars are manufactured in Lincoln, Neb., by Kawasaki Rail Car, Inc. The first cars are expected to enter service in three years.