Metro-North Completes Maintenance Project at Croton Hub

Governor Kathy Hochul announced the completion of upgrades to MTA Metro-North Railroad’s vital maintenance and operations hub at Croton-on-Hudson, NY, which employs 1,200 people. With the opening of this new 400,000 square foot facility, known as the Harmon Shop, Metro-North will be able to maintain train reliability and meet the maintenance needs of its operations for decades to come.

“Today’s announcement builds on our commitment to ensuring our transit systems remain safe, effective and rider-friendly,” Governor Hochul said. “These upgrades are investments for the railroad to operate reliably for the public, with trains arriving on time and with enough cars to carry all the passengers who want to ride.”

New York Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins said, “The Croton-Harmon Yard plays a central role in ensuring the Metro North Railroad can provide reliable service to our constituents I am proud to have secured critical investments for the MTA Capital Program to ensure vital upgrades were completed for this busy hub and the opening of the Harmon Shop, a new state of the art facility that will ensure the MTA meets the maintenance needs of the Metro North train fleet now and into the future.”

The project, which includes state and federal funding, modernizes the railroad’s heart of operations. When Metro-North inherited the site from its predecessor railroads in 1983, it was immediately recognized as inadequate to meet the needs of crews who would maintain the railroad’s fleets of rail cars and locomotives. The MTA identified capital funds to make upgrades in the late 1990s, and work has been underway since 2001 to make these necessary upgrades.

The final phase of the project included the construction of a brand-new facility that includes repair and support shops. The state-of-the-art facility allows Metro-North to perform its Reliability Centered Maintenance program and account for unscheduled repairs on their entire electric fleet. The facility has been equipped with a dozen car-hoists, four pedestal tracks, and multiple door level and roof level platforms to assist in the preventive maintenance. The second floor is designed to streamline the parts distribution between the new electric shop and adjacent support shops and the consist maintenance shop by integrating a service corridor connecting all three buildings.

For over 100 years the Harmon Yard has played a vital role in the railroad’s daily operations. Through Metro-North’s foresight and diligent planning, design and construction, the project was completed over 23 years in five phases:

Phase 1: Crews built service tracks, a new employee overpass, and provided wayside power to the yard to significantly reduce the idling engines in the yard, reducing noise to the surrounding neighbors and producing less fossil fuel emissions.

Phase 2: Crews built Communication & Maintenance of Way buildings and made modifications to the Material Distribution Center.

Phase 3: Crews built a new Coach Shop and new Locomotive Shop as well as a new Wheel True Facility with a Tandem Underfloor Wheel Lathe designed to maintain Metro-North’s fleet of M-7 self-propelled electric railcars, and future fleets.

Phase 4: Provided for priority repairs on multi-purpose building to house shops, primarily on the western section of the building that will remain operational during construction, as well as the construction of a new Wheel Storage Canopy in the north yard.

Phase 5: Provided the complete replacement of the multi-purpose building in two stages. The first stage provided the construction of a new double-ended Consist Shop with two tracks each ten cars long. The second stage included construction of the EMU Running Repair and Support shops.

MTA Chair and CEO Janno Lieber said, “Metro-North service has never been better – 99% on time performance so far this year. A big reason is the way our car fleet is being maintained and repaired here at the Harmon Shop – a world class facility second to none.”