Metro-North workers clear cars damaged in Friday’s collision from tracks at the Bridgeport-Fairfield line. The speed of that work will allow restoration of damaged rails and ties and the resumption of full Metro-North and Amtrak service by Monday. (John Kovach Photo)

Citing “extraordinary” work by Metro-North, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said Monday that the New Haven Line should be fully operational by Wednesday morning’s commute.

That would restore service less than four days after one train derailed and was struck by another, heading in the opposite direction, shortly after 6 p.m. Friday, May 17.

Commissioner James P. Redeker of the state Department of Transportation said Amtrak service will also be fully restoreWednesday morning.

Until trains are running again, the plan used Monday remains in effect for Tuesday, May 21. That means a mix of limited rail service and shuttle buses. (Click here to read the plan by the Connecticut Department of Transportation and Metro-North.)

Rail ridership was down 81% in “the affected area” Monday, the first since the accident and resulting service disruption. Malloy, as he did Sunday, urged Connecticut residents to work from home and stay off the roads, and the City of Bridgeport opened its offices early to get cars out of rush hour. Bridgeport municipal offices will again open one hour earlier Tuesday.

The cooperation of local agencies and the MTA with the National Transportation Safety Board allowed the track to be cleared and repairs to begin quickly, Malloy said.

Malloy said Metro-North reached out to fellow rail providers, who pitched in with the equipment necessary to expedite the repair.

While some train stations were less full than usual, highway traffic did not astronomically increase.

Malloy said backups on the Merritt Parkway were less than the average Monday, and that any increased delays on I-95 could be attributed to fog.

“If people cooperate to the extent that they did today we’ll have another great day tomorrow,” Malloy said.

The DOT has stationed extra tow trucks along major corridors to clear accidents and disabled vehicles, and Malloy said paperwork involved in accidents is being done off the road.

Friday’s derailment and collision marked the first accident involving the new M8 rail cars,built to a new safety standards. Officials will be interested to see how the cars held up, Gov. Dannel. P. Malloy said Monday, May 20. (John Kovach Photo)

Citing “extraordinary” work by Metro-North, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said Monday that the New Haven Line should be fully operational by Wednesday morning’s commute.

That would restore service less than four days after one train derailed and was struck by another, heading in the opposite direction, shortly after 6 p.m. Friday, May 17.

Commissioner James P. Redeker of the state Department of Transportation said Amtrak service will also be fully restoreWednesday morning.

Until trains are running again, the plan used Monday remains in effect for Tuesday, May 21. That means a mix of limited rail service and shuttle buses. (Click here to read the plan by the Connecticut Department of Transportation and Metro-North.)

Rail ridership was down 81% in “the affected area” Monday, the first since the accident and resulting service disruption. Malloy, as he did Sunday, urged Connecticut residents to work from home and stay off the roads, and the City of Bridgeport opened its offices early to get cars out of rush hour. Bridgeport municipal offices will again open one hour earlier Tuesday.

The cooperation of local agencies and the MTA with the National Transportation Safety Board allowed the track to be cleared and repairs to begin quickly, Malloy said.

Malloy said Metro-North reached out to fellow rail providers, who pitched in with the equipment necessary to expedite the repair.

While some train stations were less full than usual, highway traffic did not astronomically increase.

Malloy said backups on the Merritt Parkway were less than the average Monday, and that any increased delays on I-95 could be attributed to fog.

“If people cooperate to the extent that they did today we’ll have another great day tomorrow,” Malloy said.

The DOT has stationed extra tow trucks along major corridors to clear accidents and disabled vehicles, and Malloy said paperwork involved in accidents is being done off the road.

Barlow, the No. 5 seed, fell behind 4-0 in the first half before cutting the deficit to 6-3 at halftime.

Olivia Sennett an Brielle Kolf led Barlow with three goals apiece. Jessica Balinski (one assist) and Samantha Taylor each scored one. Maggie McQuade had two assists.

Barlow now takes part in the state Class M tournament starting Saturday.

The remains of one of the early dams along the Mill River can still be seen in the woods near the intersection of Old Oak, South Park, and Buck Hill roads, below the current Easton Reservoir Dam. We don’t know for sure if these are the remains of P.T. Barnum’s original Dam #1 or BHC’s 1896 Dam #2. Most likely it’s the latter.

In the years from 1870 to 1910 Bridgeport’s population exploded from 20,000 to 100,000 people as industry boomed there. The growing city demanded large quantities of potable water.

The Aspetuck Landways Survey reveals that “…in 1885 the Bridgeport Hydraulic Company (BHC) bought its first land in Easton from Elihu N. Taylor, who once owned a gristmill along the Mill River.”

The Survey goes on to tell us that P.T. Barnum came to town in 1886 and bought land along the Mill River. Mr. Barnum had started a company called “Citizens Water Company” (CWC) to compete with Bridgeport Hydraulic. He built CWC dam #1 on the Mill River. But within two years the courts denied CWC the right to lay pipes under Bridgeport streets, and CWC sold its assets to BHC. BHC replaced the CWC dam with Dam #2 in 1896. BHC continued to acquire land in Easton to meet the growing water needs of Bridgeport as its industry and population grew.

In 1914 BHC built the Hemlocks Reservoir along Cricker’s Brook and bought upstream properties in 1920, including the mill that had been located behind what is now Greiser’s Store at Center and Westport Roads. In 1915 the Aspetuck Reservoir was built.

In 1926 the Easton Reservoir dam was built, flooding the Mill River valley. Through the depression, BHC continued to acquire land in the Saugatuck watershed in Weston, Easton, and Redding, and in 1940 the Saugatuck Reservoir was built, drowning Valley Forge in Weston.

Nearly every former mill site in Easton and along the Saugatuck in Weston was acquired by BHC. The mills were demolished. Many historic and prehistoric sites were inundated by the new reservoirs, but BHC’s land acquisitions brought other wonderful advantages to our town, including comprehensive pollution abatement programs.

While we might feel today that it would be nice to have those sites back and to have some of those mills as historic structures, the truth is that BHC and its activities in Easton have left us with one of the most bucolic towns in the country. Mills were sources of pollution along the waterways and also blocked the spring spawning runs of fish along those rivers. Now those problems were gone. Farms and homes along the watershed were also sources of pollution so they, too, were removed in most places.

Samuel Senior, who was president of BHC, lived here in Easton. He can be credited with the implementation of strong conservation efforts in our town. The coniferous woods that surround the reservoirs were planted by BHC and BHC personnel. Some of that, too, was driven by pollution and erosion concerns. As the level of the reservoirs changed seasonally, the exposed shorelines would erode and affect the purity of the water. The trees that were planted abated that erosion.

Next week — The forests grow back and the Easton that we have today takes shape.

Dr. Brian Fallon, right, presents some of the latest research into the disease. Both spoke last week at Wilton Library.

So often public programs on Lyme disease focus on how devastating the disease can be, especially for those who suffer from a chronic form of the disease and those who cannot get a solid diagnosis as to whether they have the disease at all.
So it was to an appreciative audience at Wilton Library on Wednesday, May 1, that Dr. Brian Fallon said he would be delivering good news, speaking about new research in the field in the last five years and where it is going.
He was joined by Dr. Charles Alexander, who spoke about the benefits meditation can bring to those who suffer from the disease and a study the two doctors are hoping to conduct that would measure real benefits Lyme patients might derive from meditation.
The program was particularly timely given that Friday, May 10, was Worldwide Lyme Disease Awareness Day.
Perhaps it was not surprising that the audience for this event nearly filled the Brubeck Room. Over the past five years, there have been more cases of Lyme disease in Fairfield County than in any of the other counties in the state, except for New London County in the two most recent years.
In Fairfield County the numbers were:
•    2011 — 305
•    2010 — 335
•    2009 — 699
•    2008 — 596
•    2007 — 470

Diagnostic test

Perhaps the biggest news Dr. Fallon related was a new diagnostic test being conducted called the xenodiagnostic method.
“Blood tests are not all that sensitive,” he said, and for the 20% of Lyme patients who do not show the classic symptoms of a rash, arthritis-like pain and flu-like symptoms — and to a lesser extent meningitis or cranial nerve palsy — getting an accurate diagnosis can be frustrating.
The xenodiagnostic method has been tested with mice. When a “clean” tick — a non-Lyme carrier produced in a laboratory — is placed on a mouse that has been given antibiotics, it will suck up any Lyme spirochetes in that mouse. When the tick is tested, the spirochetes become apparent. It is then possible to say that mouse had been infected with Lyme even if it was presenting no symptoms.
Dr. Fallon said such testing is now being done with humans and results could be available by the end of the summer. If the results are conclusive, that would be front-page news, he said.
Although there are strong beliefs on both sides of the Lyme disease debate, some previously held views have changed.
For example, it was thought that any symptoms remaining after a course of antibiotics were from some other cause. From animal models it is known the Lyme organism can persist after antibiotics are given, Dr. Fallon said.
A positive Lyme test may or may not indicate an active infection. “It could just be an old disease,” Dr. Fallon said, and he would not recommend treating someone if they did not feel ill.
Psychiatric symptoms may respond to antibiotics, he said.
The infection may trigger changes in a person’s brain chemistry that might need to be addressed by drugs or psychotherapy.
Recent studies with animals have shown the Lyme organism can persist even with antibiotics, Dr. Fallon said. “We have more bacteria in our bodies than healthy cells,” he said, and trying to kill them all off would not only be foolhardy but would probably not be possible. “We just want our immune system to keep the spirochetes at bay.”
Scientists have also discovered in a study of Lyme and lupus patients that both had high levels of antibodies that attack the nervous system.
Lupus is a known autoimmune disease.
“There may be heightened immune responses contributing to Lyme,” he said, which has always been considered an infectious, not an autoimmune, disease. To that end, he said, people can take heart from the large amount of work being done in the field of multiple sclerosis that will help those with autoimmune diseases.
Meditation study
Dr. Alexander spoke about meditation as a complementary treatment in chronic Lyme or post-treatment Lyme disease.
Its effect is primarily within the brain and can be used, he said, to lessen pain and relieve stress.
There are 100 billion cells in the brain, each making 10,000 connections to other nerve cells. The brain changes with age and although the brain cannot build new neurons, meditation has been shown to increase synapses within the brain. Meditation can also slow down the loss of neurons with age, he said.
Meditation can also increase cortical thickness, which is a measure of the layers of the cerebral cortex. It roughly relates to the number of neurons.
Studies have shown that meditation may reduce inflammation and that immune response may be improved by meditation.
Together, Dr. Fallon and Dr. Alexander, both psychiatrists, are developing a pilot study to see if Lyme patients following a daily course of meditation for eight to 12 weeks show any improvement. Dr. Alexander said they expect to begin within the next month or so.
“If that looks good we will refine it with a control group,” Dr. Alexander said. The hope is to get a grant to prove that meditation is helpful and to look at its effect on the immune system.
Anyone interested in participating or seeking more information on the study may call Dr. Alexander at 203-259-8700.
Dr. Fallon is the director of the Lyme and Tick-Borne Diseases Research Center, director of the Center for Neuroinflammatory Disorders and Biobehavioral Medicine, and professor of clinical psychiatry at Columbia University Medical Center in New York City.
Dr. Alexander is an assistant professor of psychiatry in the Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine at Quinnipiac University and co-founder of the Aquarian Path Holistic Health Center in Southport. He is also a certified teacher of Kundalini Yoga.

Sales of single-family homes in Connecticut declined to 4,067 in the first quarter, down from 4,216 in the first quarter 2012. This is the first time since the fourth quarter in 2010 that home sales posted a decrease.

Home sales also declined in the month of March, decreasing 6.7% to 1,529 from 1,639 in March 2012. This is the second consecutive month year-over-year home sales decreased.

“Low inventory is plaguing housing markets all over the country, and Connecticut is no exception,” said Timothy M. Warren Jr., chief executive officer of The Warren Group. “With mortgage rates low and prices rising, we’re hopeful more sellers will emerge and the trend in dropping home sales will reverse.”

The median price for Connecticut single-family homes sold in the first quarter was $235,000, a 9.3% increase from $215,000 in the same period in 2012. In the month of March, prices rose 9.9% to $245,000 from $223,000 in March 2012.

“It’s clear that the low supply of homes for sale is continuing to pressure prices,” Mr. Warren said. “And there is definitely concern that such steep price spikes will cause an affordability issue.”

A total of 1,123 Connecticut condominiums were sold in the first quarter, a 1.2% drop from the same period in 2012 when 1,137 sales were recorded. During the month of March, 406 condos traded hands, down 5.8% from 431 in March 2012.

Condo median prices also decreased in the first quarter. The median price dropped 1.9% to $156,000, down from $159,000 in the first quarter 2012. During the month of March, prices declined 1.5% to $160,000, down from $162,500 in March 2012.

Damage shows how an oncoming train scraped against one car before tearing into the next when an eastbound train derailed near the Bridgeport-Fairfield line Friday, May 17. The last of the damaged cars were removed Sunday, May 19. (John Kovach Photo)

Gov. Dannel Malloy said in a conference call this morning that train usage is down 81% today, although traffic patterns remain normal. A train crash in Fairfield on Friday night has left a section of the Metro-North New Haven line closed.

So far, one track has been restored, and work has been started on the second that was damaged when one train derailed and was struck by another traveling in the opposite direction.

Due to an expected increase in automobile traffic, both tree cutting and construction on the Merritt Parkway have been suspended.

Up to date commuter information may be found at http://www.ct.gov/dot/cwp/view.asp?A=1373&Q=524974.

The state Emergency Operations Center (EOC) will be open today until 8 p.m.

Mr. Malloy said he does not yet have official cost estimates, although  three rail cars have been lost. Those cars will potentially be salvaged for useable parts.

There were upwards of 70 injuries, some critical, as a result of Friday’s accident. There were no fatalities.

On Monday afternoon, Metro North President Howard Permut issued a statement calling the derailment a “serious occurrence” and saying that all employees were “working diligently to operate the railroad in the safest manner possible.”

“Everyone at Metro-North deeply shares the concerns of the families and friends of those involved in this tragic incident,” Mr. Permut. “We thank the first responders who assisted with safely removing the passengers from the trains and transporting those who were injured to area hospitals. We are actively supporting the National Transportation Safety Board in conducting an exhaustive investigation that will determine the cause of the incident.”

Mr. Permut said that of the four tracks of the New Haven Line at the scene of the incident, two are out of service due to the ongoing Connecticut Department of Transportation project to replace the overhead catenary wires that provide power to the trains. Additionally the two other tracks and the overhead wires there received “extensive damage” after the derailment and collision.

“We are working to rebuild the two affected tracks in the area as quickly as possible so that we can restore regular train service to you,” Mr. Permut said. “It is a significant undertaking that will take well into this week. Metro-North has marshaled all the necessary resources, with our forces working around the clock. During this time, we thank all the municipalities affected by this situation for their support and cooperation.”

Entry fee is $12 if pre-registered by May 22 or $15 thereafter and on race day. A T-shirt is guaranteed to all who pre-register. Post race water and food will be provided.

Runners may sign up on race day from 8 to 8:45 a.m. at the fire house or pre-register at eastonexchange.org. They may also mail a check payable to Easton Exchange Club to  P.O. Box 143, Easton, CT 06612.

The race starts in front of the Easton Fire House at 9 a.m. sharp and finishes at the Easton Town Hall.

All proceeds benefit the Joel Barlow Post Prom Committee, Easton Community Center and The Exchange Club Parenting Skills Center.

For race information or to volunteer on race day, contact Michael Kot, michaelpkot@gmail.com, 203-445 1739.

Awards will be presented for the first male and female overall finishers in each age category.

Ms. Tompkins is survived by her brother, Gene Tompkins and his wife, Adeline, of Devon, Pa.; her uncle, Roger Eichinger of Easton; and nephews, Andrew Tompkins and his wife, Lisa, of Woodbridge, Va. and Jonathan Tompkins of New York, N.Y.

Friends are invited to attend the funeral on Friday, May 24, at 1 p.m. at the Shaughnessey Banks Funeral Home, 50 Reef Road in Fairfield Center. Interment will follow in St. John’s Cemetery in Stratford. Friends may greet her family one hour prior to the service.

To send an online condolence, visit shaughnesseybanks.com.

—by the staff

Buses sit next to an empty platform awaiting riders displaced by rail service suspension Monday, May 20. Few boarded the buses. (John Kovach Photo)

Buses lined up at two of Fairfield’s three train stations Monday, waiting to ferry commuters who usually ride the train.

Few of those riders showed up.

The Fairfield Metro and downtown Fairfield stations were oddly empty Monday morning, May 20, as southwestern Connecticut faced the first of what could be days of commutes around a major rail disruption.

Service is suspended while Metro-North works to repair severe damage caused by Friday’s derailment and subsequent collision involving two trains, and replace track that amateur video shows has been strewn like matchsticks connected by twisted paper ribbons.

Fairfield stationed police at the downtown and Metro stations, where the MTA and Connecticut Department of Transportation arranged to replace trains with shuttle buses. There were no trains or buses in and out of the Southport station.

Around 7:10 a.m. Monday, normally a time of cars jockeying for parking spots and commuters dashing to catch trains, nothing was happening at Fairfield Metro. The parking lot was perhaps 80% empty. Many of the cars there likely were parked by police or Metro-North employees stationed there to handle the anticipated throng of rail riders. Instead, eight buses said lined up, shortly after one departed with three passengers.

“We spent the weekend planning for the absolute maximum with the MTA and our commuting partners,” Fairfield Police Chief Gary MacNamara said at the Metro station Monday. “We’re finding, at least at Fairfield Metro and the Fairfield main station, the lowest volume we’ve seen in months.”

• Visit Fairfield-Sun.com for more on the train collision, investigation and commuter information.

Click www.ct.gov/dot/cwp/view.asp?A=1373&Q=524974 for the full plan from Metro-North and the DOT.