Commuter rail service coming to Allegheny Valley?

One of the discussion points on the Pittsburgh Rail Fan net this evening was about a recent news story that a project was moving forward to carry passengers from Tarentum through Oakmont, Verona and make stops in the Lawrenceville-Strip District area.

I have been hearing about this project for years now and it never seems to get beyond the stage where some government official awards one half to one million dollars to some company to do a study on the feasibility of starting the service. I think we have spent enough money on "studies" to finance the service if the truth be known.

So while listening to the Rail Fan Net, held each week on the 146.880 mHz repeater at 09:30 local time, I did some Google searches and came up with the following two stories the latter of which seems to indicate that we may finally be reaching the point where this dream becomes a reality. Only time will answer this question.

Allegheny Valley Railroad commuter train project steams ahead.

Allegheny Valley commuter-rail service gets $350 million commitment and moves forward