AUBURN – By the time the train stops here, there will be a station to serve its passengers.

Don’t get in line just yet, though. If the whistle’s blowing, the train’s too far down the tracks to be heard.

Ron Roy, the man in charge of passenger transportation issues for the state Department of Transportation, said Tuesday there’s no set schedule for passenger trains to roll into Auburn, or Lewiston for that matter.

Still, he said, an agreement by Guilford Rail System last week to allow summer season excursion trains to use its track system north of Portland was an important hurdle to clear. It’s the first step in extending Amtrak’s Downeaster service to the Brunswick-Freeport area.

From Brunswick, local commuter rail could link with the Twin Cities via Lisbon by using what’s known as the Lewiston Lower Line.

Efforts also are under way to bring passenger rail service from Montreal through Auburn and New Gloucester, then on to Portland for Downeaster connections, said Auburn development chief Roland Miller. That transit scheme calls for using existing St. Lawrence & Atlantic Railroad freight tracks.

Miller notes the rail line would need to be updated to be able to handle passenger trains, which travel at higher speeds than freight trains.

Even so, says Miller, getting people on the rails through Auburn might be easier than bringing trains from Brunswick to Lewiston. “There are abandonment issues” involving the Lisbon link, he said. There also could be neighborhood disruptions if long-unused rights of way suddenly are eyed for renewed use, he noted.

That’s in part why Auburn, the state and the Androscoggin Transportation Resource Center, an agency of the Androscoggin Valley Council of Governments, are working to put an intermodal passenger station at the Auburn-Lewiston Municipal Airport. Roy said those plans are proceeding, and Miller added that environmental assessments are virtually complete for the facility.

The station will be designed to link rail, air and bus service. Parking and perhaps rental car agencies will be a part of the station complex. Having it, Miller said, will make train travel between Montreal and Boston, via Auburn, New Gloucester and Portland, easier for riders and help to promote commuter uses of the various modes of transportation.

Roy said that while the airport doesn’t now have regularly scheduled passenger service, it does see significant business travel through charter services and private flights. Having other transportation options available – trains, bus, private vehicles – makes sense.

He doesn’t think those alternatives will be needed very soon, though.

The year 2007 was mentioned last year by Don Craig, director of the ATRC, as a target date for passenger rail service arriving in Auburn. On Tuesday he said that date might have “slipped a little,” although it’s still a possibility.

Roy, however, said there is no timetable for the service right now.

MDOT’s first priority in passenger rail is seeing the lines between Boston and Portland enhanced to allow for higher speed service, he said. Next would be extending Amtrak service, or a commuter rail link to the Downeaster, extended to Brunswick.

Getting trains into the Twin Cities might follow that, he said.

Both he and Miller said that today’s higher gasoline prices might encourage more people to commute via rail, but Roy added that those prices “haven’t gotten painful enough yet” to drive people out of their cars.

He said the state will be watching Downeaster and bus service to see if higher fuel costs coax more commuters into their seats, but he doesn’t think that’s happened.

“We haven’t crossed the pain threshold,” he said.

Craig agreed.

“It’ll probably take higher prices than we have today to convince people to get out of their automobiles,” he said.

[email protected]