CETA Professor Named to Task Force

Dr. Ladimer Nagurney, associate professor of Electrical, Computer, and Biomedical Engineering has been named to the Regional Rail Advisory Task force in western Massachusetts. The task force was formed to advise on the spending of stimulus funds for rail lines from New Haven, Conn., to Vermont and for other lines in western Massachusetts. The final report from the group is due by May 2010. The Massachusetts and Connecticut Departments of Transportation, both states congressional delegations and other elected officials are among the recipients of the group’s reports.

Among the proposals under consideration is extending the Knowledge Corridor, the rail lines and institutions along the Connecticut River from New Haven to Northampton, Mass., into a Knowledge Web. That Web would be achieved by interconnecting the existing rail lines from Amherst, Mass., south to Storrs and New London, Conn. In this plan, the land grant institutions in both Connecticut and Massachusetts could benefit.

The Knowledge Web was conceived because there are roughly 75,000 college students along the New Haven-to-Northampton corridor (which includes the University of Hartford) and another 75,000 along the Amherst-to-New London corridor. All of those students—and many businesses—would certainly be helped by more frequent and wider rail service.

While the stimulus money is intended to be used to improve passenger rail transportation, it will be used to improve roadbeds, change jointed rail to continuously welded rail, and improve grade crossings and bridges, all of which will also improve freight handling. As Dr. Nagurney says, “any vehicles, either passenger or freight, that we can move away from highways, will ‘green’ New England.