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Project leaders picked up shovels in Northeast Washington, DC, to begin a critical infrastructure upgrade along the Northeast Corridor.
A joint venture between Bethesda, Md.-based Clark Construction and St. Louis-based Herzog Contracting. Joseph, Missouri, began on November 5 at $705 million Ivy City Rail Yard Modernizationpart of Amtrak’s Improvement program for railway yards. The upgrades will support Amtrak’s new Airo trains, which are expected to enter service in 2027, according to the release.
The impacts of the program are already visible up and down the hall.
Crews have begun work on the Philadelphia and Boston facilities, and New York’s Sunnyside Yard is slated for 2026. Amtrak also hopes to award a design services contract for its Albany-Rensselaer station in New York later this year. On the West Coast, construction company PCL has also started in Seattle King Street Yard Project.
In Ivy City, the joint venture will build an 860-foot-long maintenance facility encompassing more than 260,000 square feet of new and renovated space. The plans also call for five maintenance and inspection runways equipped with pits, drop tables, polishing systems and fuel pads at each end, according to the release. Once completed, the facility will serve as a daily inspection and cleaning site for Amtrak’s Northeast Regional trains.
“Today’s arrival brings us one step closer to introducing Amtrak’s new state-of-the-art Airo trains on the Northeast Corridor in 2027,” Amtrak President Roger Harris said in the statement. “This investment will help transform the customer experience.”
The work is supported by $22 billion from the Jobs and Infrastructure Investment Act, Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen said in the statement.
“Today’s innovation is an important step forward for Amtrak’s workforce and passengers throughout the Northeast Corridor,” Hollen said in the statement. “In addition to providing more efficient railcar inspections and repairs, this new Ivy City facility will play a central role in bringing new, state-of-the-art trains to the tracks, providing faster, safer and more convenient rail service for Marylanders and many more on the East Coast.”
Construction will continue in phases until 2030 and should not cause any major disruption to customers, the statement said.
