Franconia CAG Meeting #2 Zoom Recording   11/24/2025

Thanks for joining us.

Welcome to the Community Advisory Group meeting for Fairfax County Rail Projects.

This meeting is hosted by Virginia Passenger Rail Authority and Virginia Railway Express.

We hold these meetings on a quarterly basis and this is our second meeting.

We held our first Community Advisory Group meeting for Fairfax County in August.

Let's begin by introducing our team here today.

I'd like to start by going across the top.

And I am Meredith Judy.

Hi, everybody.

I'm Jeff Pelletier with the VPRA.

I'm the Senior Director for Engineering and Construction.

Good afternoon, everyone.

I'm Sarah Hoover.

Good afternoon.

Great, thank you everyone.

Let's go to the next slide.

A brief overview of what we'll cover today.

We have an hour and we plan to provide an overview of VPRA and VRE for anyone who wasn't here for our first meeting.

And then we'll dive into updates on each of our projects and the latest construction activities.

We'll also talk about some upcoming service interruptions that will occur during our construction period.

And then we'll finish with a question and answer period.

We want to leave plenty of time to hear from you, your questions, your concerns,

and to understand how we can best connect with the community over time.

Our Community Advisory Group, that's you.

You are our sounding board for community questions and concerns and impacts.

You represent the diverse interests in the Northern Virginia community.

We have residents on the line, HOA representatives, property managers, business owners, special interest groups, Northern Virginia agencies and elected officials and staffers and other key stakeholders.

The idea, as I've mentioned, is to hold these meetings on a quarterly basis.

The Virginia Passenger Rail Authority is part of the state of Virginia.

We were created by the General Assembly in 2020, and we're responsible for expanding and promoting passenger and commuter rail.

We manage passenger rail.

We design and build rail.

We don't operate.

We partner with Amtrak and Virginia Railway Express in order to operate our services.

Next slide.

A main focus of Virginia passenger rail right now is what we call our Transforming Rail in Virginia capital program.

And one of the main focus areas is between Washington, DC and Richmond.

We have 11 major capital projects underway in that segment.

And with those improvements, we'll be able to not only provide significantly more rail service,

and significantly more rail opportunity, but also create more dependability in the schedule.

Today, we'll focus on two of those projects, which are the Franconia Springfield Bypass and the Franconia to Lord and Third Track.

And of course, we have Jason here today talking about Virginia Railway Express' Franconia Springfield Station Project.

Virginia Railway Express

is a treat, a key transportation connector in our region.

Burbankhead has two lines, the Fredericksburg line and the Manassas line, with 16 daily trips on each corridor.

And it connects our Northern Virginia communities into the commercial core in DC.

Okay, thanks for the introduction, Meredith.

So now we're going to zoom in a little bit on the projects in Fairfax County.

Our focus for the next few years in Fairfax will be the existing two-track segment from Franconia to Lorton that you see here.

It's about six miles long, which is one of the critical bottlenecks in the rail network between DC and Richmond.

We have multiple projects underway to relieve that bottleneck that you see here in a few minutes.

of the project managers from VPRA and VRE provide some descriptions and updates on the Franconia, Lord and Third Track project, which includes the replacement of the railroad bridge over Newington Road, the Franconia Springfield Bypass, and the Franconia Springfield Station Improvements project.

Next slide.

And as of August, we are under construction on the bypass project.

We expect the other two to kick off in full in mid to late 2026, which you see here on the anticipated start dates.

We've also started some early enabling work on the third track project back in August.

We're installing some new crossover tracks and switches at a location north of the station in the Franconia Springfield Station.

along Fleet Drive and next to the crossing at Franconia Road.

Sarah is going to provide some updates on this work in just a few minutes.

Lastly, we have multiple utilities that either run along the railroad or across it.

Many of these utilities do need to be moved as part of our projects, and they'll be done by the utility owners themselves for the most part, and we expect them to start as early as next month.

Next slide.

So the PMs will provide more details in their presentations, but I just wanted to provide a few high level updates on the Franconia projects.

First, we're rapidly approaching the completion of our design efforts.

All of our projects are at the 100% design phase, and we're actively working on our environmental permits to move forward into construction.

As I mentioned, we do have elements that are under construction on the bypass and third track projects.

Much of that early work is focused on things like earthwork, grading, drainage, and stormwater protections.

That gives us the foundation to build our bridges, our walls, and ultimately the track structures.

The early work that I just mentioned underway at Fleet Drive, that's part of the overall plan to retire the Ravensworth Interlocking.

That's a network of crossovers, switches, and signals that exist behind the Lois Dale Estates neighborhood that we plan to remove, move up north,

and convert back to straight track behind Lowesdale Estates.

And we're going to continue our community outreach in the corridor.

That includes this meeting, engagement with the adjacent neighborhoods, and in some cases, direct coordination with the homeowners that are immediately adjacent to the work.

Next slide.

While railroad construction is generally less visible to the public than highway construction or new buildings, there are some noticeable impacts that will certainly be noticeable to nearby residents and the traveling public.

For one, construction vehicles and equipment will be using the public roads to access project sites, and in a few locations, lane closures and detours will be necessary to construct new bridges over the roadways, notably

at Newington Road and at Lorton Road.

In those two locations, we don't expect to start the new traffic patterns until late 2026 or most likely early 2027.

As we get closer to those dates, we will certainly share what those plans are with this group.

But some of that is still part of our final design efforts.

We expect that there will be some gradually increasing truck traffic along the corridor.

and at our multiple project access points.

The two access points that we plan to use soonest, one is the Barry Road cul-de-sac in the Windsor Estates neighborhood, and then the existing access road that's on the northwest side of the railroad bridge over Newington Road.

We have other access locations that we're currently working on, and again, once we have those ready and are about to start using those, we'll share that with this group so you're aware where construction traffic might be headed.

You should expect to see multiple construction crews throughout the corridor working both day and night shifts.

We expect most of the work will take place during daytime hours, especially in the first year or two.

And we also expect that the employees of those of the construction contractors are going to be transported to the site rather than parking around the site just because there is such limited parking adjacent to the corridor.

and then finally Jason will hit on a lot of this on the VRE side, but for VRE service we do expect that there will be some platform closures and some train schedule adjustments at the Franconia, Springfield, and Lorton stations to accommodate construction.

Those changes will be communicated to passengers well in advance of their trips.

We don't currently have Amtrak service at those two stations, Franconia, Springfield, and Lorton,

and we do not expect that our work is going to affect the auto train station in Morton either.

Next slide.

We expect to start construction on temporary tracks known as shoeflies in the next few months.

Adil is going to, in just a minute here, is going to describe those in more detail.

And those of you that live close by will see a lot of earth moving and grading happening in the near term, as I mentioned.

We'll be working on some retaining walls in the corridor and we've actually started some of that work just adjacent to Los Del Estates.

It was out there yesterday and we saw some of that work going on.

Throughout construction, we expect that there will be a good amount of work in that barrier road cul-de-sac area, not just for construction access, but there actually is permanent construction work that will take place in that area.

We're going to be relocating a sanitary sewer that crosses the cul-de-sac.

We have a retaining wall that will be supporting the future third track in that area.

And VRE is going to be conducting or constructing a pedestrian tunnel to access the new reconfigured Franconia Springfield Station.

Okay, next slide.

And finally for me, you may have noticed since the last or the initial CAG meeting in August that we've ramped up our community outreach this fall.

We did neighborhood tabling events at Windsor Estates and Lowest Hills Estates.

We've had a public meeting for right-of-way acquisition for the Third Track Project.

We've done door-to-door flyering, direct mail distribution,

and we're in frequent contact with both Supervisor Lusk, Supervisor Stork and their teams.

We continue our outreach, we will continue our outreach in the coming months and of course we're always available if your organization or neighborhood has questions or concerns that you want to raise with us.

One last note, we can't deliver these projects without coordination from our partner stakeholders in the corridor that includes VDOT, WMATA, Fairfax County DOT,

Fairfax County DPW, and Fairfax County Park Authority.

At a minimum we're talking to these organizations monthly and in some cases much more frequently than that.

In fact, just about an hour ago we had a meeting with Fairfax County and we've been talking with VDOT all week to try to finalize our plans for the Newington Road bridge replacement.

A lot is going on at all different ends on the outreach effort.

So with that, I am going to step OA aside here.

I'm going to pass to Adil.

So as Derek mentioned, there's shoot fly, right?

So what is a shoot fly?

And the easiest way to describe it, it's basically a detour.

And unlike road detours,

take another street, right, with a railroad.

So what we have to do is we have to build these temporary tracks that's shown in purple or pink and really adjacent to the existing track to basically do for the trains around.

And why do we do that, right?

We do that because what we want to avoid is, you know, working right next to trains.

We're shifting trains away from the people that are actually doing construction, and that helps us avoid doing night work.

and we want to minimize night work as much as possible because that's when you know less trains are running so that's where we can you know we get larger work windows to do the work so we're just shifting tracks away from our workers and being able to work you know during the day so minimize the service disruptions it shortens our construction schedule it helps with the phasing that we have to do and obviously the biggest one is ensures the safety of the train and train crew then construction for

What are we using?

So we're primarily using that on the bypass.

As Derek mentioned, is my microphone still on?

Is this any better?

Okay, sorry.

If you want to go back.

So basically if you fly, like I said, it's a detour, right?

So what we're trying, we can, similar to like a roadway detour, you know, but different in a way that we can't just take any other street, right?

There's no, there's no, there's not another route that the trains can take.

It's like 500 plus miles.

So what we're doing here is basically shifting the tracks that are shown in pink on the screen.

We're shifting the tracks.

so that we're basically moving the trains away from where construction needs to happen.

And once we do that, we minimize night work, because that's where the larger windows are, where we can work in between trains, less train traffic at night.

So we're trying to minimize that and making sure work is happening during the day.

So that minimizes service disruption, it shortens our schedule, as well as it ensures, the biggest one is it ensures the safety of train crews and construction workers.

and we're implementing it at Franconia-Springfield Bypass, which is what you see on the bottom of the screen, as well as Newington Road and Fohit Creek.

So next slide.

As Jeff mentioned, construction has started.

You'll hear construction happening, primarily trucks coming in and out of the site.

That's probably what you're seeing right now, trucks coming in at Berry Road.

Excavation starting so they're going to start taking soil out of the site.

So you'll hear excavators, you'll hear bulldozers.

We're going to be drilling very soon, so you're going to start hearing that a little bit as well.

And then just on a construction site, trucks with their backup alarms, and we have what

what these noise levels sound like on the screen and what, you know, just to give you an idea of what it will be like out there.

Next slide.

So we want to talk about the safety in the work zone and, you know, what the impacts to the community are due to the safety in work zones.

Obviously, it's a federal requirement that we have to follow to provide safety during, you know, in a railroad active railroad corridor.

And what that means is basically we have a flag man on site who's managing train operations during the, not during, but in the construction area.

And what his job is to ensure that there's safe operations through the area and making sure that equipment is out of the way of the train when it passes through.

So like I said, this is required by a federal law.

The goal is to ensure safety when crews are working near active track and obviously maintaining train operations.

We don't want to delay trains, right?

Because a lot of people use these trains to get to where they need to be as well.

And a lot of goods travel through this area as well.

And what it really means where the community is, part of this regulation, they have to blow their horn when they go through this area.

So you're going to hear more horn noise.

you know, when work is ongoing.

You probably noticed that already, right?

And then these horn noise will go back to normal when construction is complete or when the flag is not needed anymore.

So, next slide.

So a quick update on project schedule for bypass, and then I'll hand it over to Sarah to talk about the Franconia dirt track.

So for bypass, like I mentioned, we're already in construction.

Contractors Mobilize, and I'll talk about that a little later on what actually is ongoing on the bypass project.

Thank you, Adil.

So regarding the Franconia to Lorton third track, as you can see on this calendar, we just finished our 100% design.

We're currently working on our information for bid documentation, which I'll touch on a little bit later.

The big piece that we're working through right now is property acquisition, and then we're hoping to in early 2026 work on procurements and then eventually move into construction, which will hopefully be completed at the end of Q1 in 2029.

So right now we're just closing out our permitting requirements and then some pre-construction activities that are active for this particular project.

Next slide, please.

So just a quick reminder about what Franconia to Lorton Third Track is, for those of you that may have not been on the first CAG meeting.

It is the construction of an additional six miles of a third mainline track between Alexandria and Lorton, basically.

It will create that continuous third track corridor, allowing for more train traffic to occur.

And as part of that, there will be the construction of railroad bridges over Newington and Lorton Road and other infrastructure like drainage facilities and similar items to accommodate that additional third track.

Next slide.

Okay, I just would.

Thank you.

Okay.

So to touch a bit more on the railroad bridge improvements that I mentioned, as I noted earlier, there will be new construction at Newington Road and Lorton Road.

Two other bridges that will be improved are across Accotink Creek and Pohit Creek.

So with Newington and Accotink, we're actually

constructing a new railroad bridge.

Sorry, let me correct myself there.

For Newington and Pohit Creek, we are constructing a new railroad bridge adjacent to the existing one, and then we are also removing and replacing the existing railroad bridge.

So that is a full teardown and replacement.

At Akaton Creek and Lorton Road, we are building a new railroad bridge adjacent to the existing railroad bridge.

So those are a little bit less work.

Next slide.

So for a progress update for Franconia-Lorton third track, we do currently have field crews out and active on the corridor specifically tied to our early works package.

These are not specifically for third track overall.

This is for prep work that needs to occur for us to be able to facilitate the construction of third track.

So you may all notice increased activity, specifically track and signal equipment installation occurring in certain areas.

So recently we did complete our 100% design comment resolution phase.

We are currently, we finalized our plots for right-of-way acquisition and currently working through the appraisal process.

And then we also completed as part of the early works package, I mentioned some drainage and grading civil work.

What we currently have ongoing, as I mentioned, is appraisals.

We are also developing our invitation for bid package.

and then we continue to coordinate with CSX on the new signals and track work that is going in.

Moving forward, we do have track construction that's part of the early works package that will not begin until January 2026.

There is both track work and signal work that's going to be occurring that I'll touch on here in a second.

And all of that early work should be completed in March 2026.

And then as we move into our

procurement phase, we're going to be working towards mobilizing for construction on that main line.

Next slide.

So, as I mentioned earlier, we do have an early works package that's currently underway.

We are working along with CSX to remove

What is an existing interlocking at Ravensworth, so that is near Jerome Street in Darby Lane, for those of you that are familiar with that area.

And we are relocating that interlocking to what is called milepost 99.5 on the main line.

It will be called Control Point Beltway or CP Beltway near Fleet Drive, which is north of Franconia Road.

Jeff had mentioned earlier that interlocking is a rail junction where all these tracks will merge, where there are numerous switches that will be installed and signals that will also be installed.

And this will allow for more train movement from one mainline to another between this first, second, and eventual third track that will be going in.

One of the reasons why this has to, or a couple of the reasons why this has to occur is for safety improvements.

And then also just operational efficiency so we can really take advantage of this third main line that we're installing and also to allow for that shoe flight construction that Adil had mentioned earlier.

So as I noted earlier that civil work has already been completed.

That is the next couple of images I will show you for this.

Next slide.

So for those of you near Fleet Drive, if you've seen construction going on in your area, this is what you're seeing.

On the left, we have grading that's been completed near the new control point beltway.

On the right, we actually have switch or turnout panels that have been delivered as part of the interlocking construction.

They have not been assembled yet.

They're just currently being staged there for construction in January.

Next slide.

Also, we do have signal work, as I mentioned.

So on the right, we have the signal house equipment that's being delivered.

And then you can see where the crews have marked that location out in the field for that new installation.

We also have been seating the nearby slopes where all that civil work has occurred just to ensure that we can minimize erosion to the best of our ability.

Next slide.

And then just some final items.

As I mentioned earlier, there's some additional infrastructure that's going in as part of the project.

So you can see that here on the left, we had drainage that was installed as part of the early works at Control Point Beltway.

And then on the right, we had removed old signal structures and were installing new foundations for the new signals when they come in.

So those are the updates for the third track.

Thanks, Sarah.

So I'm pretty sure you've seen these renderings plenty of times before, but this just shows you what this Franconia Springfield Bypass project is, basically a flyover of the existing tracks.

Next slide, please.

So like I mentioned, we are in construction right now.

So the contractor has mobilized.

and they've gone through the initial site setup.

We've had kickoff meetings with the Department of Environmental and Quality.

We've had a site walk with them as well.

And then access road construction has been completed as well as what we're just finalizing right now is final engineering plans for the project.

Ongoing right now, brush clearing,

site survey, erosion sediment control installation, and awesome pictures of that to show you what I'm talking about.

We have utility relocation coordination ongoing, as well as a lot of equipment and delivery happening right now, and then construction of railroad crossings for access.

I have pictures of that as well later.

And then what's coming up, right?

So we're going to continue installation.

erosion and sediment control.

And the major activity we'll start seeing is retaining wall construction.

So the excavation for that has kind of started already.

So I wanted to talk a little bit more about construction access at Berry Road.

And I know it's a very busy slide right here.

So I'll just try some of these colors.

The orange, what you see in orange is the construction access that our contractor is currently using for the Franconia Springfield Bypass Project.

What they're going to do is they're going to build a new culvert and then switch over to the blue.

And maybe if you want to hover on those a little bit, the blue access path is going to be, yeah, the blue access path is what they're going to switch to.

It provides just better access, you know, with that sharp turn that we have.

And also,

What needs to happen is that VRE, you know, is going to come in next and start building the pedestrian tunnel that's shown in purple right there.

So they're going to need that access for that.

So, you know, we'll be out of their way so they can start accessing for that pedestrian tunnel construction.

And then in red, that's the future FCDOT cinder bed by PAT that's going to come last after we're all done.

So, okay.

Next slide.

So just some pictures of, you know, construction that's completed or ongoing.

So right, what you see on the left is, you know, a surveyor out there surveying.

They've staked pretty much, you know, the limit of disturbance and just making sure, you know, they're identifying where everything is.

We're also doing, locating underground utilities right now.

And on the right,

Erosion Sediment Control Measures being installed.

So you'll see that black fabric pretty much on both sides of our construction limits.

Next slide.

Access Road, that was constructed on the left so that, you know, there's a bulldozer right there pushing dirt around and a compaction happening as well.

And then on the right-hand side, you'll see some part of the

Great Crossing that we were mentioning.

So CSX has come in and installed what needs to be constructed around the tracks, and then our contractor needs to finish up the rest of the Great Crossing there.

Next slide.

Good afternoon.

So up here we've got the schedule for the Franconia-Springfield Station improvements project.

As you can see, we are wrapping up final design.

We've just received 100% plans last week, and we are routing those through VPRA and CSX for a kind of final stakeholder review, concurrence against their larger adjacent projects.

You heard Sarah reference that their project is six miles long, ours is maybe about a quarter mile within that six miles.

We'll also be using those same documents to finish our obtaining all of our necessary permits and things like that.

We are starting to work through getting our project documents ready, getting our documents ready for advertisement, for an invitation for bid for contractors in early 2026.

Next slide please.

So what does the project include?

This includes largely expanding our existing platforms to be long enough to accommodate eight-car train sets.

On the west side of the corridor adjacent to the WMATA station, we can only open two doors at a time.

On the east side, we can get about five doors, but by expanding it to be able to open all doors, that shortens our dwell times, increases operational flexibility,

We'll also be constructing a pedestrian underpass.

You'll be able to see better visual of that on the next slide when we get there.

But that is to maintain connectivity down to Barry Road with the new third track coming through.

In this photo, so WMATA is on the right-hand side.

They're Franklin County Springfield Metro Station.

On the left-hand side of the photo is where the new third track will be.

So it actually runs behind the platform.

Even though there is a track, will be a track on that side, we will not be

to provide service on that track.

We'll still only have it on the two existing tracks.

While we're there, we will be doing a variety of station rehab activities, including steel repairs, concrete repairs, replacing the deteriorated glass panels with metal screening that we've had success with at some of our other facilities.

Next slide, please.

So this is just a top-down view of the same station here.

In the yellow is the existing footprint.

You could see on this top side, closer to WMATA, that platform is very short, so we don't get a lot of doors open on that platform.

So we'd like to rectify that.

and we'll be doing the same on the east side to a lesser extent.

In green is the new pedestrian underpass.

It will start as a ramp at the end of the platform and work its way down towards Berry Road.

And you can see in the light blue running across just beneath that is the new third track.

We will be maintaining access for pedestrians and cyclists and all through.

The construction period and so there may be periods where it is a little bit of, you know, where we're putting in a temporary access road parallel to the existing, so widening it a little bit just to maintain that connectivity.

But there will be continuous access through us over to WMATA and also I think Jeff made reference to potential platform outages.

Just want to clarify that we may have one platform out

while maintaining service on the other, but we will be maintaining service throughout.

So we'll not be closing the station for any period of time, but it might be that we're predominantly boarding on one platform versus the other.

Next slide, please.

And this just to help visualize what the tunnel looks like.

So it starts, if you look at the photo in the top right, it starts with the

You know, kind of ramping up towards the platform and you have these large protective walls on either side to support the railroad tracks.

And then as you get deeper, it ultimately becomes a covered box, which would be the top left.

And that's actually the section where it is crossing underneath the track.

So the track is above the tunnel.

What's not included in the rendering model in the bottom right

is that once that box goes in, there will be additional fill material brought in on either side of it to put in the additional track.

If you look at that top right visual, the two existing tracks are on the left.

The new track is on the right.

And if that gives you a feel for, you know, they're about the same height.

And if you're familiar with walking out there or if you look at the photo in the bottom left, you can see that service road is much lower than that track.

So there will be some fill coming in to bring it up and over.

Next slide, please.

Thank you, Jason.

So as the team has mentioned, we are advancing some critical major construction, not just here in the Franconia and Fairfax area, but

to the north in DC with our Long Bridge project and that project will have some service impacts beginning in January and we have over the last several months been working closely with our partners VRE and Amtrak and CSX to ensure that we are maximizing and

the most service and optimizing performance for all of these operators, but we will have to carve out a work window for some productivity for our teams due to DC noise and vibration constraints.

There's also some space constraints within what we call Long Bridge North, the DC part of the project.

We have

carved out a schedule that we are working with our partners to finalize.

There's also work in the Northeast Corridor with Amtrak and at Washington Union Station that requires some adjustments for service.

And so we, again, are finalizing the schedule.

There won't be as much impact to VRE service as there will be to the Amtrak Virginia schedule.

and we, as I mentioned a little earlier, are finalizing those schedules as we approach January, but wanted to, because this is such a critical group, put this on your radar as we approach January.

We have developed a website, a webpage on our website.

BRE also has landing pages on their website.

to encourage folks to plan their trip if there is slight alterations to their daily commute and also how to maximize their transit benefits.

As some folks, some of the trains may end in Alexandria and it's a two-seat ride into DC.

More information to come but wanted to put this information on your radar.

Thank you.

and then how to stay informed about our projects that you've just heard about.

We have projects landing page where you can buy more information about these projects we've heard about today and also all of our projects.

We've also developed a construction disruptions map and you can put in your address and you'll see any

of disruptions to the road or other means of travel on that map.

We have a construction information line and a construction direct email address that you can reach us.

And then you can always sign up for email updates if you're not getting those at VirginiaPassengerRailAuthority.org backslash contact.

And then also do please follow us on social media and we will have the recording of

This and all other meetings that we have on our YouTube.

And there's also helpful information videos about our projects on our YouTube and our other social media platforms as well.

We'd like to open it up for questions.

If there are any, you can either

Hover over the chat box at the bottom and type in your question or raise your hand or just begin to speak out and we'll be glad to answer your questions.

Okay, Dale, go ahead.

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you very much.

Excellent briefing so far.

Question for you.

We've done calculations to know what we'd be dealing with in regards to runoff and drainage and such.

I don't know, Jeff,

I just ask as the intersection right there floods on a hard rain and the stormwater currently doesn't have enough.

I mean, we certainly have responsibilities to design for any increase in stormwater.

So I don't know specifically where we stand on that.

That's certainly something we can follow up with you on and what is planned for that area.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you, Dale.

We have a question in the chat from Michael Miller.

What is the expected end date for full completion of Newington Bridge project?

And I can do part two.

We currently do not have a locked in date yet for the Newington Bridge project.

Part of that is an ongoing discussion we're currently having with VDOT and Fairfax County in regards to how we're dealing with MOT enclosures and such in that area.

When we do have that finalized, we would be able to provide a more accurate timeline regarding Newington Bridge specifically.

In regards to the federal funding, we are receiving federal funding for these projects.

The projects do have federal funding as portions of them.

There are some grants that are pending.

We don't have any concerns right now whether those funds are in jeopardy.

We have had grants that have moved through.

recently.

So I mean, we are in the impression that things are moving forward with our federal funding.

We also received funding through Amtrak as well and that funding is also secure as we understand it.

And I guess I can maybe add a little more context on Newington Bridge.

We are targeting, I mentioned it in my comments, we're targeting early 2027 to open up the Newington area.

We expect it will take about 18 months to do the full replacement.

Yes, thank you.

I have to apologize first.

I was out of the country in August, so I am finding out today that there's a lot of stuff I need to catch up on.

So, and I won't ask all of them, but I heard a term that I did not recognize today, and that was the Ravensworth Interlocking.

I think it is probably right behind my house, but I've never heard of it.

So basically an interlocking is a location where numerous switches are installed in order to allow for trains to swap from one mainline to another.

So in this case, there's a double mainline that runs behind your home in order for trains to access or to move from main one to main two.

You need to have these sequences of switches in place in order to make that movement.

And usually that also will coincide with a collection of signals in order to control that movement from a dispatcher perspective.

So in this instance, Ravensworth, it's the terminology CSX has for this.

So all of these control points or interlockings have different names or identifiers or milepost identifiers specific to CSX.

Okay, thank you.

I guess the Ravensworth term was the thing that

Got it.

Thank you.

Clayton Medford with the Nova Chamber.

Thanks for the presentation.

I just wanted to make a suggestion or request that for these kinds of presentations for us, if we could have some context, particularly like ridership numbers and estimates and things like that for these projects.

I know the purpose of these meetings is to talk about these kinds of details about the impacts of the construction and all that.

But whenever I put something in our newsletters that we talk to members about,

That's the most common question I get is for ridership numbers and the kind of context, what's the service that's going to be provided?

I just don't want us to lose the opportunity to be able to go back to our people and say, like, not just, here's what the impact is going to be, but of, you know, the current state, but what in the future are we going to get?

What's the benefit that we're going to get from this ultimately?

So just in the future, if we could have had those numbers as well, that'd be a huge help for me.

That's a great note, Clayton.

We'll make sure

We are wanting to make sure people are prepared for the impacts, but to bring it back to the benefits, we'll make sure that in the intro we can speak to that a little bit more.

It's always good to go back to that.

We have a question in the chat before I go back to Dale.

Matt Boulio, I'm sorry if I'm not pronouncing it properly, looks like your question is,

There is.

The grant is currently at FRA for final approval.

Okay, thank you.

Yes, ma'am.

Question on the increased truck traffic expected.

Do we have a volume number on that?

Lorton Road is heavily impacted by commuting.

And it is good to hear you've actually improved.

It's now going to go late 2026 to early 2027 before those lanes will be closed off.

And that's correct, right?

For Lorton, yeah, that one comes, Sarah, if I'm not mistaken, Lorton comes later than Newington, right?

So we're probably looking at 2728 for Lorton bridge widening.

In terms of volumes, I think that's something that we could look at for future meetings, but it varies, obviously, depending on what work is going on.

But it's usually multiple trips daily.

It's usually heavier up front when we're bringing in fill material or bring out excavated material when you just have dump trucks in and out.

But I think that's something we can look at in terms of what the estimates would look like at various times.

When I shared with our community group the impact on the potential lane closures, one on either side of Lorton Road, and seeing that the auto train is about 25 feet, the entrance to the auto train is about 25 feet from that, that is going to have, and you said you don't anticipate a significant impact on that, that's going to be a huge impact because of the number of cars turning in

coming north on Lorton Road as well as those trying to come off of the I-95 and turn left into it.

So I would strongly encourage you guys to continue to meet with VDOT to come up with some alternatives because the left turn in, I can't even imagine it's going to work with one less lane and the one less lane over a period of 27 months.

So this is a significant impact.

on not only the local traffic, people trying to get to shopping and back and forth medical appointments, but then the commuters coming through there because right now Waze and Google Maps, etc., all list that as your fast dump out for the construction going on.

123 and 95 further in Woodbridge.

So this is great news for our VRE people and I think it's smart to state for people to look at the VRE website to get the updated changes potential given the Union Station

closure pieces as well, but this is not an easy one for us to take, guys.

And so the more we do up front and the more we can do to minimize it in planning and execution, and that may take having to sit with VDOT and realign with jersey barriers, barrels, whatever it takes to get that area taken care of because losing that lane is going to be, I mean, we

440,000 people go through the Auto Train in a year.

Now, that's not 440,000 cars.

It's probably only 200,000 cars.

But that's a significant number for us to have to work around.

And I appreciate these briefings with the specificity you have in them to let the community know.

That's a fair point.

I should clarify, when I said not affecting Auto Train, we're not affecting the physical station or their operations.

Of course, we know that cars line up, you know, starting in the morning outside of the station and that does back up onto Wharton Road.

We'll work with Amtrak and do that on how to mitigate that as much as possible.

I also know that Amtrak is working on a project to modify the station as well for better access and fewer backups.

We've not touched base with them in some time on where that project stands in terms of time frame or whatnot, but

Thank you.

One last question, don't mean to monopolize.

How much farther south on will that third track extend past Lorton Road?

Not that much further.

But I will say to touch to your earlier question, we are actively speaking with VDOT as we speak as part of our 100% design resolution process in order to create maintenance of traffic plans that make sense for this work in regarding to detours and lane closures, et cetera.

Does anyone else have any questions or comments?

Hello, this is Andy Norman of Poet Estates.

Sorry, fiddle-farting around here, couldn't raise my hand.

But I had some computer problems, this came in late.

Can you put in some kind of a link to what, if I want to go back and re-read, not re-read,

Watch the whole meeting.

We will send an email out.

We'll get all this information posted on our website, and then we will email all of you with a link so that you can go and watch the video and look at the PowerPoint slides.

Ideally by tomorrow.

OK.

A question again from Michael Miller.

Well, since I said it, Sarah, I'll answer.

It would be more in middle of 2028 if things go according to plan.

It seems like we got all the questions.

We want to thank you again for joining us this afternoon.

As I mentioned, we'll be posting all the materials on our website and we'll send you an email to let you know when everything's available.

We will be hosting another one of these sessions in February as we stick to our quarterly

schedule, and we thank you very much for taking time to be here.

Please feel free to reach out to us even before the next session at any time.

We're happy to answer questions or have a conversation.