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A significant percentage of the Texas Central Railway leadership team appears to have vested interests in Japan. Tom Schieffer, Senior Advisor, was United States Ambassador to Japan, owns an international consulting firm that probably has Japanese clients, and probably has personal relationships with Japanese leaders.  Ambassadors are noted for their ability to develop important relationships in the countries where they are stationed. Japan, through JCR, has a vested interested in pushing its high speed rail technology.  If it can build the equipment for a high speed railway line between Dallas and Houston, especially if most of its is assembled in Japan, it can export unemployment and spread its fixed costs over the incremental units, thereby reducing the cost of any new equipment for its domestic trains. It is not unlike the U.S. selling weapons systems, i.e. tanks, airplanes, naval ships, etc. to other countries, thereby reducing the cost per unit for the U.S. military. Is the proposed high speed railway, which according to the TCR website will rely heavily on existing railway rights-of-way, i.e. the UP through College Station, the optimum solution for Texas' mobility problems, or is it a solution chasing a problem?  The fact that the proponents, which includes JCR, have identified Dallas to Houston is the best route for deploying Japanese high speed railway equipment in the United States suggests that it may be a solution chasing a problem. Supposedly the problem is getting people from the Dallas CBD to the Houston CBD quickly, conveniently, and comfortably. Is this really the most pressing mobility problem facing Texas?   Southwest Airlines has 48 flights a day between Dallas and Houston. Chock to chock time is 1 hour for most of the flights. It flies from Love Field, which is a 14 minute drive from downtown, according to Google Maps, to Houston's Hobby Field, which is a 22 minute cab ride to downtown. In addition, there are 68 flights a day from DFW to Bush Intercontinental.  DFW is 31 minutes from downtown, and Bush is 25 minutes from downtown. The time required to get from DFW to downtown will be reduced appreciably with the opening of DART's Orange Line to the airport in August. Moreover, given the disbursement of both metro areas,  i.e. most people are not going from downtown to downtown, a high speed railway running from downtown Dallas to downtown Houston will not appeal to the majority of the population. Whether it can attract enough customers is problematic. The proponents of the TCR argue that their solution is not just for today.  It is for tomorrow, when the skies will be crowded.  Maybe!  If the skies become crowded, SWA and the DFW carriers could do what Qantas did in the Melbourne/Sydney corridor. Increase the size of the airplanes. As noted in previous posts, I lived in Melbourne for more than five years. Qantas uses Boeing 767s and Airbus 330s on the Melbourne to Sydney runs. They can be configured to carry more than 300 passengers, which is nearly double what SWA's 737-700 models carry. It even uses a couple of 747-400s on the route. There is no reason why SWA and the other airlines could not use larger airplanes between Dallas and Houston if the traffic demanded.  And the upgrades required for the existing facilities would be limited largely to the gates. Both fields can take any of the airplanes listed. A push back on increased air service is the security issue.  The TCA has implemented improved security measures at Texas' major airports.  Pre-screened passengers, which could include all regular travelers, has reduced the time required to pass through security to just a few minutes.  Moreover, it is unlikelly that there would be no security screening for passengers on high speed rail. Amtrak currently verifies every passenger boarding its trains in Texas. The crews have been trained to look for suspicious persons. A better option would be moderate speed rail between the Metroplex and San Antonio, which would meet the needs of the intermediate communities mentioned above.  It would not be as spectacular as the high speed rail proposal, but it may be a better outcome.  Having said that, I know that once the momentum for the high speed rail gets going, there will be no stopping it.
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