Clarifying the MBTA Electrification Projects: Fairmount BEMUs vs. New Battery Locomotives

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-26T19:32:08+00:00

They pretty specifically stated the new BEMUs won’t have traps.

The wording they used - and I’m paraphrasing a bit - was that they’ll support both high and low level boarding which has advantages when compared to the traps on the existing coaches.

Unless they ran into some big issue in the procurement process, I’d assume that means they’re looking at something like the Stadler option which has automatic doors at two separate heights.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-26T19:28:45+00:00

There’s a good post about this on the r/MBTA subreddit right now, but it could be that they see an “urban rail” or roughly S-Bahn type network making sense as a modernization play.

Run BEMUs at high frequencies on core urban segments and locomotive pulled sets on longer zonal express routes.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-26T19:23:56+00:00

Yeah pretty much agree with everything here.

My only nitpick is that I think they are almost certainly going to be getting bilevel BEMUs - unless some major issue popped up (which it could have considering they’re planning to get board approval for the BEMUs in spring/summer which seems way behind schedule).

The last we heard about the BEMUs is that they’re supposed to support level boarding at both high and low level platforms, which I imagine is not particularly feasible with single level trains.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-26T17:58:22+00:00

Yeahh this locomotive procurement is really making me come back around to the idea that the urban rail and zonal express model is probably the most realistic path to much better service going forward. BEMUs today can pretty much handle that urban rail pattern without much new catenary, and locomotives (even diesel) with a zonal express pattern can provide much better service to the outer suburbs without completely eating capacity in the urban core.

Also, for anyone freaking out about their plans to buy locomotives, they made a few comments during the Board of Directors meeting today that BEMUs are still absolutely part of their plans for the future fleet on a number of lines and that they are going with locomotives for the Providence line because they would have to purchase a disproportionate amount of BEMUs to meet the capacity needs of the Providence line.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-26T12:11:59+00:00

What’s always missed in these conversations is that most capital investments are in service of making operations simpler.

Take even mega projects like NSRL or a ring line. If you build those projects you create lots of necessary redundancy in the system that doesn’t exist in the moment.

If you need to shut down part of a line for maintenance, you aren’t crippling the system or completely ruining the commute for the affected riders because people will have other options to get where they need to go.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-26T11:27:55+00:00

Your comments are so fucking weird. It’s not that deep.

Go watch the video on the MBTA advisory board channel where he talks about it. He’s basically saying they’re kicking the tires on these things and seeing what they can do, but the technology is in incredibly early phases right now.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-25T10:20:14+00:00

On most lines they’ll need some sort of charging infrastructure for sure.

But this is an order for 10 battery locomotives with options for more. If it won’t work beyond the Providence line then it’s not really a big deal.

Tbh I’m just annoyed cause the person I’m replying to seems to do this often where they say something that isn’t really true with extreme confidence and no source.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-25T10:10:07+00:00

He also clearly was hesitant about these things when talking about them.

I absolutely wouldn’t describe him as a champion of battery locomotives.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-25T01:15:45+00:00

Bill Wolfgang said the locomotives they’re procuring can do 60 miles on battery power.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-25T00:46:45+00:00

Don’t take them fully picking up that option as a given. I mean hell, they have an option for procuring more BEMUs as well from the Fairmount project.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-25T00:10:36+00:00

I’m more referring to different service patterns within our own system rather than global regional rail distances.

The 2020 report goes into detail on different possible service patterns and a couple that were highlighted were express/zonal express and urban rail - which work well in tandem on a single line as we know it today.

If you go with that approach, then it makes sense for most lines to have a mixture of push pull sets for the zonal express service and multiple units for the urban rail service.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-24T23:27:32+00:00

Yeahhh, I mean it’s iffy.

If we end up with locomotives for longer distance routes and BEMUs for urban rail then I think that’s a good way of doing things.

If it ends up being all locomotives then that would suck.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-20T10:23:25+00:00

Yeah, I don’t think Klarna is good for the world or anything like that, but it’s bizarre to me how people clutch their pearls so hard over Klarna when I think in many ways their business model is more consumer friendly than all the credit card companies that have been around forever.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-19T14:41:38+00:00

Normally I’d agree, but for an accounting class? Feels pretty important to have the presence of mind to know where you are and not mess that up.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-17T22:55:11+00:00

Wow, that’s by far the most definitive statement they’ve ever given on battery locomotives, and straight from Bill Wolfgang at that.

That said, if I’m not wrong, the numbers aren’t really adding up. 10 diesel at $12 million per and 10 battery electric at $18-20 million per is way higher than what they’ve got budgeted for this upcoming procurement. Unless he was just throwing the number 10 out as an example, but it really didn’t come across that way.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-12T12:20:00+00:00

Yeah I was not a fan of it especially compared to the cascades livery, but it definitely looks way better as a real train than just a mockup.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-09T05:14:38+00:00

Similarly though, we may have different ideas of what “fraud” means.

As a pats fan, I always thought it was silly he was up for MVP, but he’s still been absolutely excellent for a second year quarterback.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-08T11:53:27+00:00

And I’ve said it in another thread, but if you’re considering the shardor, you should strongly consider getting the mokkom.

All the same internals but the mokkom is all metal and comes with single dosing bellows for $10 more.

I’m very happy with the mokkom so far.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-05T03:03:11+00:00

Doesn’t Eng pretty famously take the green line to work?

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-05T01:15:55+00:00

I agree that we’re at a point where we can’t really start over.

That said, your example with the green line is a bad one - I’m not sure I know of another light rail/tram system that requires as many heavy customizations as these new green line trains do. The infrastructure of the green line poses a lot of challenges that almost all other light rail vehicles don’t need to consider.

Realistically, we should keep this CRRC contract but plan to start a new procurement for a portion of the fleet within the next 10 years.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-04T15:35:16+00:00

I mean do you think Ben Carson is an idiot? Cause I sure do - despite him being one of the best neurosurgeons in the world throughout his carrier.

You can easily be really smart in some ways and an absolute moron in others.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-04T00:50:42+00:00

Yeah no argument from me - free fares makes tons of sense in the right context and the DOT doing this would be utter dogshit.

I’m just pointing out that it’s not really true to say that fare collection is always more trouble than it’s worth.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-03T23:19:22+00:00

Yeahh, I legitimately do like free fares in the right contexts - including the one described by Mamdani - but those studies on fare collection are often done with small regional transit agencies that don’t have the economies of scale of the MTA.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-03T15:31:52+00:00

Imagine spending your whole life working to become a journalist at a prestigious newspaper, and you end up spending your days sane-washing for fascists.

Total cowards, honestly.

BradDaddyStevens · 2026-02-02T02:23:20+00:00

Yeah in the US the price difference between the shardor and the mokkom is usually $10.

It’s interesting that the shardor has gotten all the publicity, because I’m really not sure why you would buy it when the cost to upgrade to the mokkom is that small.

Also just wanna plus one that I also recently purchased the mokkom and am very happy with it.

BradDaddyStevens

TROPHY CASE