I rode the Syracuse Branch numerous times in the 1990's on NYS&W excursions. It is a 30 - 40 MPH railroad competing against a 65 MPH I-81. It takes about 3 hours. It was never very fast.
That's mostly due to track condition. There is no particular reason it couldn't be running at 65 mph for most of its distance; it merely requires investing in it. The geometry's OK and the worst curves have enough ROW around them to speed them up. (Exception being a bit right near Syracuse.)
I don't want to be rude, but perhaps you don't understand how rebuilding railway lines for passenger service works?
Currently the Lackawanna Cutoff, which will be used from Scranton to NYC, is a combination of sections which need bridges rebuilt, sections which need tunnels rebuilt, sections which need earthworks rebuilt, and sections with 30 mph speed limits. This does not reflect its potential for passenger service.
Regular passenger service ended in 1959, around when the last portion of I-81 was completed between Marathon and Cortland. I have read several local history books about all the railroads through Cortland County. Trains would also have to reverse in Binghamton go north.
Depends where the new Binghamton station actually ends up being placed, but not an issue regardless (pretty much any new service is going to have cab cars and be operated bidirectionally).
Thruway buses radiating from Binghamton to Cortland, Ithaca, and Corning I think are the best options.
Buses are junk. We have buses. We have LOTS of buses. We have enough buses per day to NYC to easily fill a train from Ithaca to NYC, if we could find a route (as I pointed out, the routes to the south are even more obstructed than the route to Cortland which is essentially unobstructed).
There are also plenty of junk buses from Syracuse to Binghamton via Cortland. A train service from Syracuse-Cortland-Binghamton-Scranton-Ithaca would be popular and successful, and those tracks just require upgrading, not land acquisition (which would really be necessary on any route into Ithaca proper).
As for the Lehigh Valley branch from Cortland to Ithaca, it is no way to get to Ithaca from points south. There is an apartment house sitting right on or right next to the junction with the old Auburn Branch in Freeville.
I believe it doesn't block the ROW. It's cheap if it does.
Wooden trestles are falling apart.
Obviously, you'd replace all the bridges.
Trails are a-building. This railroad is not recoverable.
It's the easiest option for actual Ithaca service. Which is, as I said, very difficult. It's essentially a rebuild-from-scratch, but try to find another ROW which doesn't require massive amounts of home demolition or running through the backyards of rich people's homes; it's still easier than rebuilding the Ithaca & Owego, which is probably the most direct route to the south.
Again, I don't want to be rude, but perhaps you don't understand how rebuilding railway lines for passenger service works?
It currently ends in Cortlandville.
Correct.
There is rush hour Cortland County bus service to Ithaca, but most of it ends at TC3 Community College in Dryden. There are many Tompkins County TCAT buses from Dryden to Ithaca.
Yeah. And there's a rush-hour traffic jam. Long-term I have thought we need rail to relieve the commuter pressure on Ithaca, but nobody in power is thinking that way...
Trailways was a Thruway bus operator for Amtrak between Syracuse, Cortland, and Ithaca until the pandemic. Now it is some internet bus company, forgot the name, with no affiliation with Amtrak.
Yes, Trailways is very mismanaged. They failed to publish timetables for the Ithaca service for a decade, and then used the pandemic as an excuse to drop it. One of the fly-by-night Internet bus companies filled the void, temporarily. Who knows how long that will last.
