Let’s put it this way: I live in a small upstate NY city with roughly 100k people in its metropolitan area, but am still two hours driving distance from the closest Amtrak station. How much bigger should we get before we should expect a station in a state that’s better than most for rail service? We once had rail service here via the Erie Lackawanna Phoebe Snow, and those tracks were demolished decades ago.
Oh that one. IDK how far the plans extend, but I've heard the Lackawana cutoff is going to be revived. The ROW and bridges are still there. But you're right, there's a whole lot of things we had which were foolishly demolished, and New York state and city are no strangers to that fact. A solid half of transit proposals I see consist of reactivating some line that was already built 100 years ago and has laid dormant for 50.
It's terribly sad, and yes I'm excited about the ongoing work to connect Scranton. Lots of people commute daily via bus between Scranton and NYC and I feel for them.
I've heard mixed quotes from people who've talked in person with Schumer on whether this will eventually connect Binghamton, Elmira, Corning, or the rest of the Southern Tier and eventually to Buffalo. Some say he said they're talking about it and others have said he said there's no chance.
