Conversations begin coherently and clearly on the chamber train, as if a foundation of substance will produce real solutions to those nagging problems at the heart of New Jersey.

By Philadelphia you learn not to pay attention to people anymore.

By Baltimore, you’re just praying no one throws a loose elbow – or that you don’t throw one.

In any case, Assemblyman Craig Coughlin (D-Woodbridge) cut through the swamp of talk with an in-focus presence just north of Edgar Allan Poe country.

“I’m going to be with the county,” Coughlin said, when asked if he will back retired Goldman Sachs banker Phil Murphy over his district-mate, Assemblyman John Wisniewski (D-Sayreville), who opposes Murphy in the Democratic Primary.

“I have served for seven years with John Wisniewski, but in the end I am going to be with my county. [Middlesex] Chairman Kevin McCabe has done a good job of keeping us together, and that is where I am going to be, in the end I am going to be with my county. I am going to be with Phil Murphy.”

Coughlin is a favorite to succeed Assemblyman Vincent Prieto (D-Secaucus) as speaker of the General Assembly.