High speed rail What would yo do?

[oltmannd]

QUOTE: Originally posted by tomtrain


Since O'Hare and Atlanta's airport are the two busiest in the nation, wouldn't it be wiser to establish HSR directly to them as a first step? HSR could become an integral part of air travel by serving cities within 1 to 2 hours from the airports. That would support air travel interests at the same time as introducing HSR to air travelers.

Also, the Illinois Tollway Authority is ready to spend over $5 billion in the next 10 years adding lanes and roadway in the Chicago area. The idea of expanding highways is alive and well.

EXACTLY!! HSR and air travel should be complimentary, not competitive. The best service and lowest overall cost to society will come when all parts in the transportation network mesh.

[Anonymous]

The problem is that NO ONE wants to build it!

[RudyRockvilleMD]

First a reality check. It's average speed that counts, and presently an aveage speed of 200 mph is not realistic; an average speed of 150 mph is realistic.
To be competitive with air the portal-to-portal travel time using high speed rail
should be equivalent to the portal-to-portal travel by air. Having said that let's answer the questions.
1. Will business travelers choose high-speed rail over air? Yes provided the total travel time by rail is the same as the total portal-to-portal travel time by air.
2. How many round trips would be needed in a day. This is route sensitive, but to be competitive hourly services must be offered.
3. What route to choose? I would choose routes that pass through heavily populated territory and that would limit the routes to between 300 - 450 miles

[Paul Milenkovic]

At one time they were talking about replacing O'Hare airport with an airport built on land reclaimed with dikes out of a patch of Lake Michigan.

What I would do is figure out what corridor you would like to develop, put a whole new airport way out in the boonies (a Chicago weather forecaster on TV loved that term), shut down O'Hare and sell the land for commercial development so you don't have the Reagan-National vs Dulles problem, and link the airport to the CTA network with your high-speed rail link.

We're gonna depend on air for the Chicago-New York, Chicago-LA, etc kind of thing into the forseeable future, but O'Hare is not going to handle the traffic, so why not build a megaplex airport with 4 parallel runways "way out there" and use this as an excuse to build a ground-up grade-separated rail line and use the rail line as a corridor for development that doesn't depend so much on highways.

[railman]

Fargo to Chicago. Plain and simple.

[espeefoamer]

To fly, one must allow 2 to 3 hours at the airport to get through security.This will tip the scales toward high speed rail.

[Anonymous]

Since O'Hare and Atlanta's airport are the two busiest in the nation, wouldn't it be wiser to establish HSR directly to them as a first step? HSR could become an integral part of air travel by serving cities within 1 to 2 hours from the airports. That would support air travel interests at the same time as introducing HSR to air travelers.

Also, the Illinois Tollway Authority is ready to spend over $5 billion in the next 10 years adding lanes and roadway in the Chicago area. The idea of expanding highways is alive and well.

[oltmannd]

QUOTE: Originally posted by CHPENNSYLVANIA

If you were incharge of a new 200 mph highspeed rail network what routes would you set up and what would the frequency of trains be?
I was thinking about this and Chi-NYC would take about 4.5 hours.
Nyc-Miami 6 hrs And cross country in like 18 hrs

1. Do you think a business person would choose this over air?
2. How many round trips would you need to have?
3. What route would you choose?

You want to AVERAGE 200 mph? I guess we're talking Mag Lev, then, with few or no intermediate stops.

1. No. ticket cost would be more than air and trip times longer. Why not fly?

2. Same as airline, if were talking the same markets - roughly hourly between major markets.

3. If you pick existing long haul airline end points, you're doomed. You'll be slower and more expensive. Better to be short/medium haul lanes where you can play "connect the dots" between decent sized population centers. Lots of these to choose from in the east - could build whole network east of the Mississippi. Wouldn't need mag-lev like speed to compete, 150 mph ought to do it. Actually, you could get started on existing track with 90-110 mph service and upgrade as you go.

[Anonymous]

Considering HSR.

The first place to build it would be Boston-NYC-Washington...

At 150 mph AVERGE speed (twice the acela afair) this would sweep airlines out of business. Of cour$e that require$ certain amount of ca$h.

There are two main problems.

1. there is no political goodwill to find the funding
2. current FRA crashworthiness standards are disconnected from reality. And running battletanks at 200 mph sure is expen$ive.

But if it was done right it would capture most of the traffic and (gasp!) would actually be profitable, As Acela (despite being technical failure) proved quite well.

[dldance]

I frequently travel Austin - Dallas and Austin - Houston. I used to fly - but with security delays it started taking as long to fly as to drive. So now I drive. Theoretically, I could take Amtrak to Dallas - but it leaves Austin at 10:30 am and arrives in Dallas at about 4pm. That shoots my whole business day - so I don't.

About 10 years ago there was a great drive in Texas for HSR connecting Dallas, Houston, Austin, and San Antonio. Actual went so far as to issue a preliminary design contract - but you can't believe the anti-HSR lobbying from the airlines (one of which was founded on the DAL/HOU/SAT routes.) And you think NIMBY is hard to overcome. So funding never happened and the project died.

dd

[BaltACD]

Everyone is looking at HSR in today's world, however, you have to look at the future world.

The Air Traffic Control system is currently near it's MAXIMUM capacity, the airports at major cities are at or near their maximum capacity. The Interstate System, at least East of the Mississippi has gotten to traffic levels where it is no longer an enjoyable experience to undertake long distance trips to or through major metropolitan areas. We are maxing out the roadways and the airways.....what else is left for additional transportation capacity??????

The freight railroads are experiencing record levels of freight, and with the growing gridlock and higher fuel costs of trucking, more and more freight will be made available to the freight hauler which will make AMTRAK even less reliable and desireable than it is today; and AMTRAK is not reliable nor desireable as an efficient means of transportation.

HSR is the only availabe means to increase overall transportation capacity at anything approacing affordable costs. If HSR would cost $10M a mile, expanding roadways would run $100M a mile.

HSR is for the future, not the past.

[TH&B]

Yes Mark but as you say yourself "as long as the price is competitive". But how is HSR going to be made price competitive? Just asking.

The explanation I have heard about 3 hours or less is that HSR is very expensive and bussiness people won't spend the full cost per mile for a 4 or 5 hour journy. But less then 3 hours the ticket price is reasonable and the time short enough.

The ICE that runs from Hamburg to Munchen is more then 3 hours but it serves large intermediate cities and the average traveler only rides along for less then 3 hours of its journey. Only a relatively small percentage stays on for the whole route and air trafic is still the faster choice. The average speeds are slower because of the many stops.

The TGV from Paris to Lyon is less then 3 hours and is a straight shot and much higher average speed.

Other considerations are, many bussiness travelers are not going to just downtown, many bussinesses are located near airports. And stuff like "Who wants to go to Cleveland fast anyways?" must be asked. ((insert large town of you choice))

If Chicago had been 300 miles from New York city a 1 hour and 30 mins HSR journey would probably be irresistable to build.

[gabe]

I don't think high-speed rail would be that successful. I am not suggesting that no one would use it, I just don't think it would be as good of a return on the investment as compared to the significantly lower cost of improving existing infrastructure.

(1) In terms of long-haul passenger rail, I don't care if you are able to consistently run the train at 200mph. Airlines will always win out and are the better place to use such investment. Given the tremendous cost of building such a long range system that would end up being about 2/5ths as fast as an airliner, it would seem that the logical thing to do is spend 1/20th the amount you would spend on the rail project on the airline industry while still getting the better return.

(2) Short-to-medium haul high-speed rail is more attractive, and I believe it could possibly compete with the airlines in terms of investment vs. ridership.

However, we are still talking about a lot of money. For instance, I imagine it would cost considerably less to upgrade Amtrak (eliminate some of the smaller stops, make it run at reasonable hours, get track speeds up to a consistent 84 mph, and—most importantly—make it run on time) than to build the massive rail system referred to above.

Admittedly, the massive high-speed rail project would attract more riders than an upgraded, efficient, well-run Amtrak. However, do you think the difference in the two would be worth the enormity of the cost of the high-speed rail project as compared to improving an existing infrastructure? I don't think a trip between Chicago and St. Louis made in an hour and 45 minutes is going to exponentially increase ridership as compared to a trip made in 3 hours and 20 minutes (so long as the 3-hour train is run on time).

Just a thought to stir up discussion—I am not really taking issue with anyone.

Gabe

P.S. To answer your question, though, the Chicago-mid west corridors, the Florida corridors, NEC, and possibly some California corridors are the no-brainers for my money.

[rrnut282]

One question that would impact this discussion is train capacity. At high speeds you can't just add cars as needed without sacrificing performance. Also, is it passenger only or more Chunnell-like in that trucks and cars and their occupants would be transported?

Instead of the hub and spoke model proposed, I think the loop model would interest/involve more people at the beginning. Either way, I would start with an area with lots of traffic and "poor" roads. Out west, I would start with Los Angeles to Las Vegas. The endpoints would have to be at public transportation hubs or it is doomed to failure, even if it's an Auto-train-like venture. All that boring desert to drive through might convince more to take the train. If that proves sucessful, I would link Las Vegas to San Fransisco, possibly via Reno. Then the final push would be San Fran to L.A. to complete a loop. From this base, I would then push up and down the coast and eastward to Denver or Phoenix via the Grand Canyon. These routes are not really business oriented, so I do not expect a lot of business travel on those routes. A minimum of 4 per day each way. If you wanted to capture more business travel, I would build it in Texas going, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, Fort Worth (& Dallas) as a base loop and build from that to other places like El Paso, Oklahoma City, New Orleans, Little Rock, etc. I think on these routes 6 trips would be useful in attracting business travelers. Back east, I would tackle Chicago-Detroit-Cleveland-Columbus-Cincinnati-Indianapolis-Chicago. Chicago-New York, IMHO, would be too long to make it past all the nimbys on the first go around. Also, I don't think 4.5 hours will cut it with all the potential intermediate stops.

[TH&B]

1)) The TGV and ICE people in Europe say that the trip needs to be 3 hours or less to be compeditve with airlines. So 4.5 hours is still too long and you are calculating an average of 200mph wich does not exist anywhere in the world yet.

2)) Hourly if it at even makes sense to have this high speed rail line.

3)) Close along the old NYC Waterlevel route or close to the old PRR because you will need to pass through the populated centers for stations. You would need to include Philly, Harrisburg, Pittsburg, Cleveland, maybe pass near Detroit? Is the region even economicaly wealthy enough to have HSR like this?

You have to find realy major cities that are less then 3 hours apart for HSR to work.

[Anonymous]

The problem with high speed rail is the high speed. Its hard to go from NY-Chic in 4.5 hours when one must stop in between. Why do you ask must they stop? Do you think that Ohio will allow a high speed rail system through the state without stopping. OK lets add Ohio. Where in Ohio? All them Reps in DC are going to want a stop!! No stop no money!! No more high speed rail!!

[BaltACD]

50 years ago there was talk of something called the Interstate Highway system. The conventional wisdom of the time was, 'There is no way we can afford it and besides, it's never going to get here and I'll never use it'. We all know how wrong all of those assertions were.

High Speed Rail is needed in the State of Florida. The Interstate System in Florida has had traffic increase to the extent that the system is in a state of virtual Gridlock for significant portions of the day at critical locations. The entire State cannot be paved over to handle the addition traffic.

The Air Transport System is at, or exceeding capacity of the Air Traffic Control System.

The only area available to increase traffic potential throughout the State is High Speed Rail. Such a system cannot serve every locality on day one, no system can. The Interstate System has been constructed over the period of 50 years. For the first 20 years the system was merely a number of disconnected segments that augmented the existing highway structure. However the system had to start somewhere and then be pushed and built to its conclusion.

High Speed rail is the same. The longest journey begins with the first step. Florida must take that first step toward its future and keep high speed rail on track and building to the future of Florida's transportation needs.

Those who can, must vote to continue the proces of building High Speed Rail in the State of Florida. It is on the ballot, AGAIN this year.

[Modelcar]

....Need to get some high speed rail initiated in this country...in the corridor areas. Start where high populations corridors exist. Get one running and see if the concept will be patronized and will it full fill the requirement. Perhaps the Florida concept of Orlando to Tampa might be the first {when...?}, to take a look at and then go from there.

[Anonymous]

It would be nice to have a high speed rail system with the ever lasting gas prices that keep going up.
1.no.
2.good question.
3.no clue.

[Anonymous]

Well, I know this is just in theory and all, but the trains won't constantly be running at 200 mph. Not to mention station stops, acceleration, braking... but anyway.

How long the trip takes, which all comes down to distance in the long run, would be the primary concern for most business travelers. Up to 4 hours would probably be good considering how long security takes now at airports, not to mention added comfort of the train and what not.

I would like to see high speed rail from Washington, D.C. to Atlanta via Richmond, Raleigh, Charlotte, and Greenville. I believe that 4 trips each way should be sufficient at the very start and add as ridership increases. Two in the morning, two in the evening for each direction.

Other routes:

Florida - Miami, Tampa, Orlando, Jacksonville?
Texas - Houston to Dallas
Chicago hub and spike system to surrounding cities
Many more that I can't think of at the second...

[Anonymous]

If you were incharge of a new 200 mph highspeed rail network what routes would you set up and what would the frequency of trains be?
I was thinking about this and Chi-NYC would take about 4.5 hours.
Nyc-Miami 6 hrs And cross country in like 18 hrs

1. Do you think a business person would choose this over air?
2. How many round trips would you need to have?
3. What route would you choose?