and "Take 2:" http://framwormbta.weebly.com/blog/heat-restrictions-take-2
According to scanner chatter on Monday 7/20/15, there are now four places that are subject to outbound rush hour heat restrictions. I'm not sure exactly where they are, but based on my observations, they may be:
1) Allston single track (from CP 3 to around milepost 5)
2) On either side of and through the switches at CP 11 (Weston)
3) From Framingham to Worcester
I'm not sure where the fourth one is, and I'm not even sure if that list is correct. I'll try to find out the real list, but the weather forecast indicates heat restrictions are probably not in the cards for the rest of this week.
On Tuesday, 7/21, I watched the PTIS (GPS) data for the outbound rush hours trains and created this table:
This table shows the scheduled vs. actual arrival times for the outbound PM rush hour trains on Tuesday 7/21/2015. Heat restrictions were in place from about 3:25 PM until after 8 PM. As noted in the table, there were other problems with P583 and P531, so that data may not be useful in our analysis. I gave up after P531 arrived in Worcester, so I don't know how late P533 was at Worcester.
The revealing data is that P525, P527, and P529 essentially arrived in Framingham on time - while all arrivals at Worcester were at least 20 minutes late. From my unscientific and only periodic watching of the train data, it appears that all trains operated up to 60 mph from Boston to Framingham, but no train exceeded 30 mph from Framingham to Worcester.
So perhaps my theories in "Heat Restrictions: Take 2" were correct, and they're making progress with the entire project.
Note that as I explain in previous posts, the heat restrictions are VERY complicated, which is why the MBTA justs advertises it as affecting the whole line. Issues:
1) Late outbound trains create late inbound trains due to equipment 'turns.'
2) There are NO repairs being made to the tracks used for inbound trains. So while an outbound train may be able to go 60 mph on track 2 from Boston to Framingham, an inbound train on track 1 on that same stretch is probably limited to 30 mph.
3) Late trains screw up the sequencing and shuffling of all trains at switches, meaning that an outbound train just going to Framingham may STILL be affected by the whole mess even if it doesn't have a reduced speed restriction.
Good news is PROGRESS! And it's great news for pax between Framingham and Boston, since heat restrictions appear to have a much reduced effect on them. Even Worcester pax benefit from being able to go fast all the way to Framingham.