High-Speed Intercity Passenger Rail Program (USA)

[202_Cyclist]

Why Can't the United States Build a High-Speed Rail System?

Read More: http://www.citylab.com/politics/2014...system/375980/

We've been investing in our interstate highway system for nearly sixty years. We've been investing in high speed rail for what, three or four years? Also, as the late Senator Frank Lautenberg noted, the federal government spends more on highways in one year alone than we've spent on Amtrak for its forty year history.

Construction is about to start very soon on high speed rail in California and the All Aboard Florida rail sounds very promising. It is too early to call high speed rail a failure.

[electricron]

Originally Posted by 202_Cyclist

We've been investing in our interstate highway system for nearly sixty years. We've been investing in high speed rail for what, three or four years? Also, as the late Senator Frank Lautenberg noted, the federal government spends more on highways in one year alone than we've spent on Amtrak for its forty year history.

Construction is about to start very soon on high speed rail in California and the All Aboard Florida rail sounds very promising. It is too early to call high speed rail a failure.

Your facts are correct. But you forgot to mention one important fact, interstate highways move freight. Freight from coast to coast, metro to metro, city to city, town to town, business to business, raw materials to finished products. There aren't that many high speed rail lines in the world moving much freight. There's a reason why 5 star general and president "Ike" wanted to build interstate highways across America, he realized that an army moves on its stomach, that a well fed and supplied army is a better army than a poorly fed and supplied army.
Even in rail friendly Europe, most freight (over 75.5%) is moved by trucks on highways. Rail moved 18.4% and waterways moved 6.2%.
http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/sta...ort_statistics
Data based on ton-kilometers inland.

In the USA, using older data (2001 vs 2011), railroads moved 47%, highways moved 33%, waterways 19.5%, and air moved 0.4%.
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/.../chapter02.cfm
Data based on tons-miles domestic.

Which would you rather have most of your freight moved on, publicly funded highways or privately funded railroads?

[Perklol]

^Railroads.

Why does a truck with food/goods have to travel 120 miles from it's processing facility to its destination?

[kilbride102]

Cost. Its pretty simple. Large distribution centers in suburbs or rural areas can serve several large metro areas with lower costs than a smaller distribution at each metro area.

[202_Cyclist]

Republicans for OPEC! Unbelievable-- Amtrak has set ridership records nearly every year for the past decade and the Ayn Rand-disciples in Congress want to cut funding for Amtrak. As I said in another thread, we can either have a decade-long war in Iraq and huge tax cuts for the wealthiest or modern infrsatructure in this country but not both. We need to make tough choices.

As the late Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) noted, we spend more federal money on highways each year than we've spent on Amtrak, combined, in its more than 40-year history.

House bill cuts Amtrak funding

By Keith Laing
09/11/14
The Hill

"The House is proposing a 40 percent funding cut for new Amtrak construction in a new passenger rail bill that was unveiled on Thursday by the chamber’s Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

Amtrak has received about $1 billion per year from the federal government since its inception in 1971.

Most of the proposed reduction comes in funding for new rail construction projects, which would be reduced from approximately $1.3 billion per year under the last Amtrak funding measure to about $770 million..."

http://thehill.com/policy/transporta...ing-40-percent

[Busy Bee]

Why is this news? Republicans repeatedly attempt to starve to death Amtrak almost since it's inception. After all it was never supposed to last this long, right? They're just doing what they're programmed to do, the only way to stop them is to wrestle them to the ground and pull the chip out of the back of their head. It's all really moot anyway, as House ideological kamikaze missions like 'sabotaging Amtrak to make it look insolvent so they can kill it for good' (like the P.O.) never make it past the Senate anyway.

[202_Cyclist]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

Why is this news? Republicans repeatedly attempt to starve to death Amtrak almost since it's inception. After all it was never supposed to last this long, right? They're just doing what they're programmed to do, the only way to stop them is to wrestle them to the ground and pull the chip out of the back of their head. It's all really moot anyway, as House ideological kamikaze missions like 'sabotaging Amtrak to make it look insolvent so they can kill it for good' (like the P.O.) never make it past the Senate anyway.

Of course, however, the Republicans, with a large tea-party contingent, have a very good chance of controlling the Senate as well after November.

[maybetoday]

The one bit of good news in this bill is that it specifically forces Amtrak to reevaluate boarding procedures at the 10 stations with the most traffic. I hope they will do away with the inane check in process they use today.

[202_Cyclist]

Originally Posted by maybetoday

The one bit of good news in this bill is that it specifically forces Amtrak to reevaluate boarding procedures at the 10 stations with the most traffic. I hope they will do away with the inane check in process they use today.

Agreed. At NY Penn Station, the boarding process is nothing less than absolutely chaotic and a clusterfuck.

[Busy Bee]

Glimpse of Siemens Charger and Viaggio coach model at Innotrans 2014 in Berlin:



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[202_Cyclist]

Amtrak posts ridership growth, but long-distance lines lag

By Ledyard King
USA TODAY
October 27, 2014

"WASHINGTON — Amtrak's ridership and ticket revenue increased in fiscal 2014, buoyed by continued growth in the Northeast Corridor, the rail service reported Monday.

But the numbers also indicate flagging activity on long-distance lines and regional services that rely partly on support from taxpayers in some states.

Amtrak President and CEO Joseph Boardman warned that ridership on those lines could continue declining unless freight railroad companies that own the tracks and operate the dispatching system do a better job accommodating passenger trains..."

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/n...ains/18000183/

[aquablue]

Originally Posted by 202_Cyclist

Republicans for OPEC! Unbelievable-- Amtrak has set ridership records nearly every year for the past decade and the Ayn Rand-disciples in Congress want to cut funding for Amtrak. As I said in another thread, we can either have a decade-long war in Iraq and huge tax cuts for the wealthiest or modern infrsatructure in this country but not both. We need to make tough choices.

As the late Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) noted, we spend more federal money on highways each year than we've spent on Amtrak, combined, in its more than 40-year history.

House bill cuts Amtrak funding

By Keith Laing
09/11/14
The Hill

"The House is proposing a 40 percent funding cut for new Amtrak construction in a new passenger rail bill that was unveiled on Thursday by the chamber’s Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

Amtrak has received about $1 billion per year from the federal government since its inception in 1971.

Most of the proposed reduction comes in funding for new rail construction projects, which would be reduced from approximately $1.3 billion per year under the last Amtrak funding measure to about $770 million..."

http://thehill.com/policy/transporta...ing-40-percent

It seems quite obvious that private rail is the best chance the country has. See AAF and Texas. It would be great if the NEC was taken over by private rail and they would upgrade it much faster than Amtrak/Feds to destroy the air shuttles. I'm seriously sick of Amtrak, the government, and the stupid mentality toward rail by half the country's idiot population. Without private funding, tied into real estate deals, etc, we'll be waiting along time for a friendly government and our rails for most of the country will be similar to eastern europe or developing countries or worse.

[Busy Bee]

I'm all for private services but the railway infrastructure should be nationalized-yes nationalized. Open access contracts for carriers on different or the same corridor increases competition and drives down prices. See the UK and to a lesser but growing extent the continent.

And before anyone says this is socialism, as if that would be the worst thing ever, this is exactly the way air travel works in this country. The airports and airway infrastructure are nationalized installations complete with federal ATC employees.

[202_Cyclist]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

I'm all for private services but the railway infrastructure should be nationalized-yes nationalized. Open access contracts for carriers on different or the same corridor increases competition and drives down prices. See the UK and to a lesser but growing extent the continent.

And before anyone says this is socialism, as if that would be the worst thing ever, this is exactly the way air travel works in this country. The airports and airway infrastructure are nationalized installations complete with federal ATC employees.

Not to quibble but airports are not nationalized. They are controlled by local or state governing authorities.

[202_Cyclist]

Congress and Amtrak
The perils of fast-tracking

The Economist
Dec. 10, 2014

"LIKE Plato's early dialogues inquiring into the meaning of justice or piety, Monday’s oral argument at the Supreme Court ended with no clear answer to the central question: what, exactly, is Amtrak? In the case of Department of Transportation v. Association of American Railroads, for which oral arguments were heard on December 8th, the justices grappled with whether the nationwide passenger train service is or isn't part of the government, and whether it unconstitutionally steps on the toes of other train companies.

Amtrak, it appears, is an inscrutably indeterminate entity. But some facts are clear. With the rise of the automobile and commercial aviation in the 20th century, passenger rail service took a huge hit; by the late 1960s the Pullman Company and the Penn Central, two big railroad companies, were headed for bankruptcy. In 1970, the federal government stepped in to save America’s moribund rail service from extinction, creating Amtrak under the Rail Passenger Service Act (RPSA). The company was an unusual public-private hybrid from its inception: a for-profit entity that has received billions in federal subsidies (starting with an initial grant of $40m) and whose board is appointed by the president. In 2008 Congress reauthorised Amtrak and tasked it with working with “the US Department of Transportation (US DOT), Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), states, and other stakeholders in improving service, operations, and facilities." This means that for the past six years, Amtrak has established standards for itself and for freight railroad companies rolling on their own tracks. In order to improve on-time rates and reduce delays, it has often given priority to passenger trains over freight trains.

It’s no wonder this did not go over well. Like the Biblical Joseph’s gift of the technicolour dreamcoat from his father, Amtrak’s favourite-son status rankled the Association of American Railroads (AAR). In its brief, the AAR calls the 2008 law "unprecedented and untenable". The preferential status enjoyed by “Amtrak trains limit[s] the host railroad’s ability to move freight. Thus, while Amtrak and the freight railroads do not compete for customers, they do compete for a limited resource: capacity, or the ability to operate trains within the limited slots available on a rail line.” Since passenger trains run faster than their freight-hauling cousins, the latter are often forced to pull over to let the Amtrak cars whiz by, literally fast-tracking Amtrak’s trains..."

http://www.economist.com/blogs/democ...ess-and-amtrak

[Busy Bee]

Steel Interstate

[electricron]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

I'm all for private services but the railway infrastructure should be nationalized-yes nationalized. Open access contracts for carriers on different or the same corridor increases competition and drives down prices. See the UK and to a lesser but growing extent the continent.

And before anyone says this is socialism, as if that would be the worst thing ever, this is exactly the way air travel works in this country. The airports and airway infrastructure are nationalized installations complete with federal ATC employees.

Some history from Wiki:
Britain's railroad network was controlled by the War Department during WW1. This revealed some advantages in running the railways with fewer companies, and after the war it was widely agreed that the required development of the rail network could not be achieved under the conditions that had existed before the war. Nationalization was avoided by a compromise of the Railways Act 1921. Under this act, almost all of the hundreds of existing rail companies were grouped together into four new companies.
The big four UK railroads merged their management at the start of WW2. During the war very little was invested in the railways and they became increasingly run-down. With only essential maintenance work being carried out during the war, the maintenance backlog increased even further. Rolling stock also began to deteriorate. After the war, it was clear that the rail network could not be maintained in the private sector. British Railways (British Rail) was established in 1948 as the railroads were nationalized.
Between 1994 and 1997, British Rail was privatized. Ownership of the track and infrastructure passed to Railtrack on 1 April 1994; afterwards passenger operations were franchised to individual private-sector operators (originally there were 25 franchises); and the freight services sold outright.

Some American railroad facts. The five remaining Class I freight railroad companies are still earning a profit, making sufficient profits to maintain their main lines at freight train speeds. Almost all passenger trains are subsidized by federal, state, county, and city transit authorities. Even Britain favored privatization when corporations could afford to maintain the trains and corridors. It's only when they realized the corporations couldn't that they nationalized the industry. American railroad corporations haven't reached that point yet.

[202_Cyclist]

Work on New Hudson Train Tunnels Chugs Along
Despite Christie’s Derailing of New Hudson River Tunnels, Some Progress Is Made


Amtrak's North River tunnels connect New Jersey lines to Manhattan. Photo: Kevin Hagen for The Wall Street Journal

By Andrew Tangel
Wall Street Journal
Jan. 25, 2015

"When opened in 1910, a pair of rail tunnels sped up trips for passengers who might have otherwise ridden ferries across the Hudson River.

These days, commuters often find the underwater tubes are the reason they are late to work.

Congestion into and out of New York Penn Station slows trains to a crawl. Broken-down trains and faulty signals force riders to sit and seethe as they cancel appointments and miss meetings..."

http://www.wsj.com/articles/work-on-...ong-1422240370

[Muji]

It's certainly a long-term project, but the Northeast's higher-speed rail network might make its way into western Pennsylvania someday. Improvements to the Keystone corridor between Philadelphia and Harrisburg have been very successful in spurring ridership and reducing operating subsidies per passenger (http://www.thetransportpolitic.com/2...tone-corridor/), so there should be good potential here.

Source: Tribune-Review

Cost of high-speed, Pittsburgh-Harrisburg rail link starts at $1.5B
By Bobby Kerlik
February 13, 2015 for Tribune-Review

PennDOT officials released a long-awaited study Friday detailing potential options to establish higher-speed rail service between Pittsburgh and Harrisburg.

The study detailed four options to improve rail connections, ranging in cost from $1.5 billion to make minor track curve modifications to $38.3 billion to build an electrified, two-track, high-speed train on a path similar to that of the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

[...]

The rail trip takes about 5½ hours. High-end improvements could cut the rail trip time to 4½ hours, although the study essentially ruled out the $38.3 billion option as being too costly. Lesser options could cut times by up to 35 minutes on the 244-mile corridor.

As typical of press coverage on anything non road-related, all articles that I've seen so far on this make a big deal of the projected costs, without giving them much context.

Some other study documents can be found here: http://www.planthekeystone.com/keystonewest.html

[M II A II R II K]

Bullet train developer's preferred station sites seen as boon to Dallas' Cedars area

Read More: http://www.dallasnews.com/news/trans...-southwest.ece

A company’s $10 billion plan to connect Dallas and Houston with a 90-minute high-speed train ride was hailed Friday as a “game changer” that could also spur dramatic development in South Dallas, just outside downtown.

Texas Central Railway narrowed its picks for a Dallas bullet train station to two spots just south of the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center. Both spots include land in the blossoming Cedars neighborhood. One of the preferred locations would put the station atop Interstate 30, creating a development bridge between downtown and the Cedars.

Texas Central also announced that it was creating a development company that would partner with the existing development firm Matthews Southwest to turn the station into a mixed-use development that could encourage more retail, residences and businesses in the gateway to the city’s southern half. The parcels identified are owned by Matthews entities or the city. Mayor Mike Rawlings, whose first term included the launch of a southern Dallas development initiative called GrowSouth, said he was “thrilled” about the potential station locations.

.....