Cities that should be connected by train

[dubu]

Boise Idaho and Bend Oregon

Medford Oregon and Redding California

[Busy Bee]

Every decent sized (50,000+) city to every other decent sized city in America. Ideally, even more connectivity to smaller cities.

[electricron]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

Every decent sized (50,000+) city to every other decent sized city in America. Ideally, even more connectivity to smaller cities.

Let's change that 50,000 metro population numbers to 5,000,000 - then run at least a daily train from Houston to Dallas. Before worrying about cities as small as 50,000 - let's connect cities of 500,000 and 5,000,000 first!

[isaidso]

Calgary and Edmonton.

[Car(e)-Free LA]

Phoenix, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas.

[SunDevil]

Originally Posted by Car(e)-Free LA

Phoenix, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas.

Phoenix in general. Nearest Amtrak is in the town of Maricopa, almost 30 miles from downtown Phoenix.

Another I would like to see would be Fargo - Sioux Falls - Omaha (with a spur to Lincoln) - Kansas City.

[mrnyc]

Originally Posted by isaidso

Calgary and Edmonton.

a big plus one to that. i was working up a trip out there to both cities and lake louise and wondering about renting a car as i noticed there is no rail service between the two. they do have nice, regular bus service though thankfully. when we go i'll probably do the bus and just rent a car for a couple days to head to lake louise or wherever.


and yeah kasich shooting down the three 3Cs plan in ohio was just asinine. unfortunately, the state government in ohio tends to cater to "i got mine" suburbanites who elected trump and screws over the rural areas, cities and anything like public transit. i believe florida has that money now for their rail projects.

[electricron]

Originally Posted by mrnyc

and yeah kasich shooting down the three 3Cs plan in ohio was just asinine. unfortunately, the state government in ohio tends to cater to "i got mine" suburbanites who elected trump and screws over the rural areas, cities and anything like public transit. i believe florida has that money now for their rail projects.

If I recall correctly, the 3C plan was kicked off as a HSR plan (200+ mph) that over the many years of planning and scheming deteriorated into a regional rail plan (79 mph). At those slower speeds, Ohio would be far better off investing state funds into local commuter or light rail projects. Intercity Bus services under private enterprise can deliver passengers at higher speeds, at a cheaper price, than publically subsidized trains. And there is a healthy competitively priced market for jetliners too, for those who must get there faster.
It’s not like there are a lack of choices already.....

[Swede]

Gothenburg - Borås - Ulricehamn - Jönköping.
It's an obvious line that should have been built over a hundred years ago IMO. But it never was. Would be great for both passenger service and freight.
There's been plans for HSR there (as part of the Stockholm-Gothenburg line), but that seems to be downgraded to a 250 km/h plan for ALL hsr in Sweden now

[Cirrus]

I mean, the entire US other than the NE corridor, California, and 1 or 2 lines out of Chicago. Besides that small handful, the Amtrak service that's there now sucks so much it may as well not exist.

But in the spirit of OP's question, I guess we should assume any existing rail connection counts as "already connected." So let's look at the Amtrak system map and see where there are holes:


chumwa on wikipedia

Obvious holes:

• New York-Scranton-Binghampton
• Clevaland-Columbus-Dayton-Cincinnati-Louisville
• Jacksonville-Atlanta-Chattanooga-Nashville-Saint Louis
• Atlanta-Chattanooga-Knoxville-Kingsport-Roanoke-DC
• Richmond-Roanoke OR Richmond-Charlottesville
• Tampa-Sarasota-Naples
• Dallas-Houston
• Oklahoma City-Tulsa-Kansas City
• Milwaukee-Madison
• Detroit-Flint-Lansing-Grand Rapids
• Quincy-Saint Louis
• Atlanta-Tuscaloosa-Jackson-Dallas
• Denver-Colorado Springs-Albuquerque-El Paso
• Los Angeles-Las Vegas
• Los Angeles-Bakersfield

[LMich]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

[*]Detroit-Flint-Lansing-Grand Rapids

Historically, trains have gone from Detroit to Grand Rapids via Lansing, and state transit advocates are currently pushing for this connection to be made again. There really isn't any demand for anything that connects Flint into this. More likely Flint would connect in with Detroit and interchange there, or you'd just take the train to Lansing and change trains there.

As far as ridership is concerned, all plans go through the south, with the only question being that after Ann Arbor do you connect to Grand Rapids via only Lansing or do you add in an intermediate stop through Jackson? The initial studies on this have shown the route only going through Lansing yields the highest ridership numbers, but that the route going through both Lansing and Jackson yields the highest ROI. The other route skipping Ann Arbor and Jackson altogether has been eliminated even though it's the most direct. Basically, you can't have any plans that leaves out Ann Arbor, which has the current highest ridership and highest ridership potential.



We're also trying to reconnect Northern Michigan to the state's passenger rail network with A2TC2, though that would be heavily seasonally focused given the small population up north.

[mhays]

Count Seattle-Portland as another that doesn't suck. Maybe Seattle-Vancouver. The former even gets fair business ridership including people traveling between my company's two offices, each a mile from the station.

Boise to Bend sounds like an odd pairing. Too small and far apart.

LA-Vegas-SLC? SD-Phoenix?

[Mister Uptempo]

-Columbus, OH to anywhere. (The Ohio 3C Route could have solved this, but Kasich sent the funds back to DC)
-Louisville, KY to anywhere.
-Nashville, TN to anywhere.
-Fort Wayne, IN to anywhere.
-Madison, WI to Milwaukee (Scott Walker handed $810 million back to the feds that would have done this.)
-Toledo to Detroit (Which would also permit trains from the east to connect with Detroit)
-Re-establish the National Limited - Kansas City-St. Louis-Terre Haute-Indianapolis-Dayton-Columbus-Pittsburgh-Philadelphia-New York. (Lots of abandoned/missing track)
-Looking at an Illinois route that the state could start - Moline-Galesburg-Peoria-Bloomington/Normal-Champaign/Urbana-Danville. But only after they get Chicago-Moline and Chicago-Rockford going first.

Plus there are city pairs that are served, just not very well. Chicago-Cincinnati connects only three times a week. Cities served by the Sunset Limited get only 3 round trips a week as well. Plus the segment from New Orleans to Orlando was never re-established after Hurricane Katrina.

Cleveland gets the Capitol Limited and the Lake Shore Limited daily, but they both hit town in the middle of the night. Same goes for Cincinnati and the thrice-a-week Cardinal.

[dubu]

Originally Posted by mhays

Count Seattle-Portland as another that doesn't suck. Maybe Seattle-Vancouver. The former even gets fair business ridership including people traveling between my company's two offices, each a mile from the station.

Boise to Bend sounds like an odd pairing. Too small and far apart.

LA-Vegas-SLC? SD-Phoenix?

I don't know, Oregon is not connected to any other states except to Washington. It's kinda weird. If at least Medford and bend were connected by trsins that were faster then cars

[Car(e)-Free LA]

Originally Posted by mhays

LA-Vegas-SLC? SD-Phoenix?

Yes and yes, though geography might force the SD-Phoenix line to route through Temecula and the Coachella valley. Also, Phoenix-Tucson is a short, logical extension that adds 1 million people.

[Streamliner]

Originally Posted by Car(e)-Free LA

Yes and yes, though geography might force the SD-Phoenix line to route through Temecula and the Coachella valley. Also, Phoenix-Tucson is a short, logical extension that adds 1 million people.

Downtown San Diego to Phoenix would most likely run via Yuma using the existing San Diego and Arizona Railway tracks. The infrastructures is somewhat in disrepair, and it goes through Mexico, so I'm not sure if modern passenger traffic would work.

But it'd be quite a scenic ride through the mountains/deserts east of SD:


Source

It's pretty nuts that every route west of the Mississippi gets funneled through either Chicago or New Orleans before continuing east. Incredibly inefficient.

... Denver <---> KC <---> STL <---> Louisville <---> Cincy <---> Charleston <---> DC or Richmond

or

... Denver <---> KC <---> STL <---> Indy <---> Cincy <---> Charleston <---> DC or Richmond

seem like obvious routes.

I assume most routes would have to go through Charleston because of the mountains?

[Hatman]

I think this might still be relevant:

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...=142002&page=2

That is from 2008, almost a decade ago. It is interesting to see how much of this is actually progressing. The Portland-Seattle corridor is receiving upgrades and higher frequencies. California's HSR is under construction. Colorado is considering an Amtrak-run commuter train along the front range. Dallas and Huston may be connected by the Texas Central private HSR project. There has been some motion on restoring the Gulf Coast Amtrak route under a different operating scheme than the Sunset Limited. Brightline is being built in Florida despite the politics there. The Heartford line in Connecticut will raise speeds and add capacity on that line. And Amtrak is buying new trainsets to replace the old Acela trains, and speeds on the NEC will be raised.

So progress hasn't stopped, though it certainly didn't achieve what we all wanted in 10 years.

I linked this map because I think the green long-distance line between LA-LV-SLC-Boise-Portland-Seattle could be a very plausible new Amtrak route. It would get Amtrak service closer to Bend, OR - but as far as a Bend-Boise service, there is no direct railroad track between the two cities. That would make rail travel between the two rather difficult, I think.

[dubu]

That's a cool line but that would go up into the Rocky Mountains, I guess there's a chance it could get built. Sucks Salt Lake City wasn't down between the two mountain ranges, then it would be a no brainer

[Mister Uptempo]

Originally Posted by dubu

Boise Idaho and Bend Oregon

Medford Oregon and Redding California

As both of these potential routes are less than 750 miles, passenger rail service to those towns would have to be established, and paid for, by the states being served.