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Portland Meeting

Ms. Patricia Quinn, NNEPRA's Executive Director, delivered the Downeaster's Performance Report for the first half of FY2010. 

 


The chart details ridership from July-December for the last three years. One outlier in the data was December of '09 which indicated an 18% increase in passenger load over the same period of 2008. That is a misleading figure because in December of '08 the service was down for a week due to a heavy ice storm that killed power to signals along the line.

Ms. Quinn pointed out that the 2009 ridership figures were consistently ahead of 2007 and that 2008 was the period of $4/gallon gas. Overall, the Downeaster maintains its "solid performance" during the recession.

* FY10 to date: On Time Performance was 85%
* FY10 to date: Ridership was 246,082, down only 4% from FY09 July-Dec

* FY10 to date: Revenue was $3,511,523, down only 3% from FY09 July-Dec

Federal Railroad Authority

The FRA decision on NNEPRA's grant request to extend service to Freeport and Brunswick has now moved from "January" to "sometime this winter" according to an FRA spokesman. MeDOT Commissioner Cole, a member of the board, congratulated Ms. Quinn and the NNEPRA staff for working long and hard in creating am "outstanding" application.

A NNEPRA Retirement

It was announced that Len Mulligan, Passenger Services Manager, was retiring. 'Lennie', who has worked tirelessly helping stations and passengers along the Downeaster route, will be sincerely missed. His 'I-can-solve-it' attitude and friendly approach to any and all problems AT ANY TIME OF THE DAY set a high standard. Enjoy the 'Golden Years', Lennie. NNEPRA has received more than 100 applications to fill his job.

Transportation Bill

There was discussion about the congressional habit of passing continuing resolutions instead of focusing on passing the five-year $500 billion Surface Transportation Bill. The current resolution runs out on Feb. 28th - likely to be extended again.


 

Federally-funded transportation programs, including the Downeaster, are affected by this indecisiveness. There is an excellent story in The Hill about the politics of the current situation.