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State Sen. Adam Hinds says the steering committee for the Berkshire Flyer feels it has the 'last-mile' transportation connections in place to support passengers arriving in the Berkshires from New York City.
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The steering committee joins the senator at the Intermodal Center in Pittsfield to celebrate the launch of the Flyer.

Berkshire Flyer Is First Direct Rail Connection to NYC in 51 Years

By Brittany PolitoiBerkshires Staff
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The tracks in downtown Pittsfield will see the arrival of the first Berkshire Flyer passenger train on July 8. Sen. Adam Hinds has also been pushing for high-speed rail service between Western and eastern Massachusetts. 

PITTSFIELD, Mass. — The Berkshires will be directly connected next month to New York City through passenger rail service for the first time in more than 50 years.

After five years of planning, the Berkshire Flyer will begin transporting people from New York's Penn Station to Pittsfield via Albany-Rensselaer in New York on July 8. Officials are celebrating this as an economic development project that will enhance one of the county's key sectors: tourism.

The flyer was championed by state Sen. Adam Hinds, who took office in 2017 when the vision for the rail service was created.

"This is an exciting day," the senator said during a press conference at the Joseph Scelsi Intermodal Transportation Center on Wednesday morning.  "It's a long time coming for a lot of us."

The pilot season will run until Labor day and is being operated by Amtrak in conjunction with the Massachusetts and New York departments of transportation over the next two years. Tickets start at $55 each way.

The train will depart from Penn Station at 3:16 p.m. on Fridays and arrive at Pittsfield at 7:12. The four-hour trip will make the intermediate station stops in New York as the typical Amtrak Empire Service train does on Fridays, which includes Yonkers, Croton-Harmon, Poughkeepsie, Rhinecliff, Hudson and Albany-Rensselaer Station.

On the Sunday return trip, making all the same station stops, it will depart Pittsfield at 3 p.m. and arrive in New York at 7:05. Though there is set timing in place for his year, planners are working with Amtrak and hope to shift that in subsequent years.

Pittsfield was one of the many cities excluded from service when Amtrak took over passenger service in 1971. Since then, there has not been a direct connection to The Big Apple.

In 2017, Hinds got a bill passed to require MassDOT to conduct an economic feasibility study on the project and found it to be economically viable and beneficial to the Berkshire economy. A second study was done in the following year to work through operational details and funding was secured the year after that in the amount of $270,000 plus $100,000 for marketing.

The plans were modeled on the popular CapeFlyer that runs weekends through Labor Day between Boston and Hyannis on Cape Cod and the old "snow" trains that brought big city skiers to the Berkshire and Southern Vermont slopes every winter. 

The Berkshire Flyer was intended to start in 2020 but the pandemic pushed the three-year project out to five years.

Hinds explained that the instrumental details in the process were Amtrak being on board, MassDOT moving it forward, and a negotiation with freight company CSX, which he said catapulted forward in the last year.

The process was guided by a steering committee that included Mayor Linda Tyer and two city appointees: Commissioner of Public Services and Utilities Ricardo Morales and Special Project Manager Deanna Ruffer, members of the Berkshire Regional Planning Commission, members of 1Berkshire, and members of the Berkshire Regional Transit Authority.

There are several points to the rail service's vision, one being the desire to create a service quickly with no capital costs.

"And so with no capital costs, no capital investments required having an existing passenger rail in place, we figured that this was the moment to strike and to create something like a Berkshire Flyer," Hinds explained.

"So that's the first thing we wanted something that was quick implementation and with zero capital costs."

The study found that there are nearly 600,000 households in Manhattan without a vehicle and with rail service, the county is an easy pick for traveling. 

"This is the first step in a regular connection to New York City," Hinds said. "It's a seasonal weekend service but the idea is that it'll be a daily, year-round train connection between Pittsfield and the Berkshires and New York City. And so that's a key thing that we're focused on."

The steering committee has been addressing the need for transportation throughout the county after stepping off the train, also known the "The Last Mile" transportation. That had been identified as an enormous challenge because of the limited access to public and private transportation services.



"We have a lot of existing options, including the RTA services, we have taxis that will be here and we've been talking with taxi companies, Uber and Lyft, of course," Hinds reported.

"We have another company that will be providing a shuttle service when the train arrives, so going north and south for essentially a shared car, and rental cars will be available as well across the street. And so that's another key piece and once we had that in place, we felt it was important to come here today."

Committee member Anuja Koirala said there will be a $20 shuttle service through Transport the People that will take passengers to their destination in the county on Fridays.

Hinds added that in the age of rising gas prices, the ticket's price is becoming increasingly more affordable as compared to the cost of filling a gas tank for the trip.

"This provides a really unique transportation experience as well," he concluded.

The ambassador program addresses increased visitor presence during the summer and helps to relieve the demand for police presence downtown. On Wednesday afternoon, ambassadors received training at the BRTA.


Morales said the city is continuing to address the problem of last-mile transportation to ensure there is connectivity for travelers.

"We have plenty of options at the moment and I'm sure the market and demand will say the rest when people start arriving," he added.

"And there's going to be an increase similar to what we had pre-COVID, pre-pandemic. We were having 40,000 (yearly) rides in Pittsfield alone for Uber and Lyft pre-pandemic, we expect that that's going to pick up, especially with this program coming from the city."

Committee member Jay Green, who was a district manager for Amtrak before becoming town administrator for Adams, emphasized how great of an accomplishment it is to put a train into a new city.

"The barriers in front of us in order to expand rail transportation in this country are significant," he said.

"We have to work together to overcome that policy and we have to work together in order to start small and do these things. The ability for us to put a train on the tracks between New York and Pittsfield is significant."

Eddie Sporn, who is the program manager for the Berkshire Flyer, spoke on the scenic views that passengers will see on the railway.

"This is not an ordinary training ride," he said.

"It's a historic train ride because it's the first time in 51 years that trains are coming from New York City to Pittsfield but to go up the Hudson River, the main piece of this is to travel from New York City to Albany up the river, it is one of the most beautiful train rides in the United States.  It's extremely scenic."

Tickets are available for purchase on Amtrak.com, the Amtrak app, Amtrak ticket desks and kiosks, and through 1-800-USA-RAIL.


Tags: berkshire flyer,   passenger rail,   

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Free community college a boon for students, workforce and local economy

Linda Clairmont & Lori Moon Guest Column
It's no secret that the rising cost of college tuition, together with unprecedented increases in the cost of living, creates a barrier for many people seeking to better themselves through higher education. It's also no secret that this barrier can be even harder to overcome for historically marginalized people. At Berkshire Community College (BCC), we strive every day to break barriers and make quality education accessible to all.
 
Thanks to two programs launched by the Commonwealth, MassReconnect and MassEducate, getting an associate degree or certificate at BCC is more accessible than ever. The programs can provide free tuition and fees, and even an allowance for books, to eligible students.
 
These unprecedented financial incentives are having an immediate impact on community colleges like BCC. In the 2023-24 BCC academic year, there were 158 BCC students who received free tuition; in the 2024-25 year, initial figures show impressive growth with 254 such students. And, the number of total enrolled students at BCC has grown 29 percent this year over last, with nursing students comprising the largest portion of the student population.
 
Clearly, the financial incentives now available are taking hold, and we at BCC expect to see enrollment numbers increase further as awareness grows.
 
With the recent closure of Mildred Elley's Pittsfield campus, BCC welcomes all former students there to apply to the College — especially nursing students. The 2023 cohort of BCC's Practical Nurse (PN) program was ranked number one in Massachusetts and in the nation for its 100 percent pass rate of the NCLEX exam. Fully accredited by the Accreditation Commission for Education in Nursing (ACEN), BCC's PN program is chaired by Associate Professor Katie Polchlopek, one of four dedicated faculty. Just two weeks ago, BCC welcomed a full class into the program. Now that many nursing students can attend the College for free, BCC is ready to accept more students every fall and anticipates an ever larger, more diverse student nursing population.
 
Those interested in the healthcare industry can also earn a certificate in health information management or medical coding. Becoming a medical coder doesn't require a four-year college education — or even a two-year college education. You can earn a certificate in as few as eight months, and with a projected 7 percent rise in medical coding jobs by 2028, it is a fast and efficient way to transition to this profitable career path.Meanwhile, BCC's Workforce Development and Community Education department offers a wealth of job training opportunities, filling needs in the local workforce and, in turn, significantly boosting the economy of the Berkshires. For example, BCC conducts in-person and virtual emergency medical technician (EMT) training. Of the 13 students who completed the most recent EMT training sessions, nine took the required psychomotor test, and all nine passed the exam. This means that once these students pass the written exam, they will be ready for immediate employment as EMTs in Berkshire County, filling a critical workforce gap.
 
With a new focus on teaching trades, BCC offers an Advanced Manufacturing Technician (AMT) certificate and a Class B commercial driver's license (CDL) training course, which recently filled its first cohort of the year. Working with professional instructors at United Tractor Trailer School, BCC trains students for a career in trucking, a rapidly growing industry that offers competitive salaries in the Berkshires and across the country. The training includes 40 hours of classroom, field and on-the-road instruction, and tuition scholarships are available. In addition, we have developed a new curriculum for HVAC training and hope to launch our first class in 2025.
 
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