Brightline Trains West!

[cirdan]

There will be no party on this one. It will be a comfortable and fast means of transportation.

I think you may be confusing this one with the other proposal called X-Train or something like that, which was intended to be a party train...

https://la.curbed.com/2015/8/11/9931670/los-angeles-las-vegas-party-train

Is the X-train even a current topic? I vaguely remember that they had given up some years ago.

 

[jis]

Is the X-train even a current topic? I vaguely remember that they had given up some years ago.

I have not seen anything about them. I had to search for a bit to find the article I linked. I only vaguely remembered it and did not even remember their name, which made the search a little more challenging.

 

[me_little_me]

You are right, I'm mixing them up.

But then there is no reason, if economically feasible, for Brightline West to add party cars at suitably higher cost to their trains.

 

[cirdan]

But then there is no reason, if economically feasible, for Brightline West to add party cars at suitably higher cost to their trains.

In the same way that airlines or bus companies could hypothetically add party areas at a suitably high cost. I guess that the problem is that such a suitably high cost is too high for the market to bear in a sustainable manner. Even for Las Vegas levels of extravagance.

I think even X-train wasn't thinking of running a multiple times a day schedule but at best a single round trip a day on selected days and that probably also seasonally dependent. That could be made to work with suitably modified pass-me-down equipment, but not for very expensive high speed train cars that would need to sit around idle for most of the time while still making enough money to recover their costs.

 

[user 1215]

Brightline West has a contract with Siemens for 200MPH Velaros.

A comfortable HSR trainset doesn't necessarily mean that Brightline can have the interior screwed up. The trains in Florida were nice. The seats were unbearable, in my own personal opinion.

...were going to start the party when you boarded, an amenity that isn't such a good idea by plane or car.

They tried that in Florida in the 90's. Google Florida Fun Train. Neat concept, woefully wrong direction with regards to cash flow. Thing that makes me upset is that I was in FL when they started ops and I never got a chance to try out the fun!

 

[me_little_me]

But then there is no reason, if economically feasible, for Brightline West to add party cars at suitably higher cost to their trains.

I think my words came out wrong. Probably should read:
But then there is no reason, if economically feasible, that Brightline West can't add party cars at suitably higher cost to their trains.

 

[user 1215]

I totally agree. If they can make their bank, added features - particularly those that generate revenue - should certainly be pursued.

 

[MARC Rider]

I totally agree. If they can make their bank, added features - particularly those that generate revenue - should certainly be pursued.

Depends how much the added features cost relative to the additional revenue generated.

 

[cirdan]

Depends how much the added features cost relative to the additional revenue generated.

If they expect it to pay its own way.

I understand a lot of stuff in Vegas does not pay its own way but is cross-subsidized by stuff that does. For example casinos cross-subsidizing hotels because they know that one wouldn't work without the other. If the train can be sold in that sort of category, the train only needs to bring in more benefits to those who pay the money than it costs them in support. Personally I doubt whether that will be the case. It would only be the case if it meant there are sufficient numbers of people who ride the train who would otherwise not be coming to Las Vegas at all.

 

[neroden]

Although I consider it depressing that this is true, selling alcohol is almost *always* highly profitable.

 

[Mailliw]

A bar car seems like a perfect fit for Brightline West, even if it's only half a car.

 

[cirdan]

A bar car seems like a perfect fit for Brightline West, even if it's only half a car.

True, but a bar car hardly qualifies it as a party train.

Or if it does then Amtrak is missing a trick.

 

[NorthShore]

I have not seen anything about them. I had to search for a bit to find the article I linked. I only vaguely remembered it and did not even remember their name, which made the search a little more challenging.

I actually still own one share of stock in the overriding company, which (having learned a lot about its history) I consider a sham. And, to my knowledge, their plan fell through and is no longer being pursued.

 

[cirdan]

I don't believe that the concept of HSR is compatible to that of party trains.

But just a thought here.

Maybe if a third party wants to sporadically run a party train, Brightline West might be more amenable to letting them use their ROW than UPRR (or whoever it is that that owns the current ROW there). People having a party don't necessarily want to arrive as quickly as possible, and thus conventional equipment moving at normal speeds could be used if it can be rendered compatible to the safety standards of HSR (which seems to be possible on NEC for example). Suitably positioned sidings could be used to get the party train out of the way and allow high speed trains to overtake as necessary.

 

[GDRRiley]

Brightline west should have spare capacity same with CASHR. We just don't know at this time what they'll do with time we could see through running on each. SF or SJ to vegas would be popular and again eat into a popular airline flight.

I don't believe that the concept of HSR is compatible to that of party trains.

you can get 150mph coaches and loco which would be cheaper. theres also the overweight abominations that are old acela express sets, but I don't know if ether track owner would let you run a 160mph set on their network, they may only want 200mph+ units.

 

[GDRRiley]

"25 daily round trips?" That's more than runs than in the Northeast Corridor, where they have 47 million people, and the train passes through at least 5 metro areas with populations of 1 million or more. This thing is going to run from a suburban transit hub passing through sparsely populated desert with the only large city directly served being Las Vegas. It will require a 2-seat ride from the densely populated parts of Los Angeles, which will probably depress ridership. It seems to me they'd be better off trying to make arrangements with Metrolink to run through trains.

Both the west coast HSR lines are planning on lots of service and trying to take low cost airline share which fly every 30-45mins between these places. The CAHSR plan is 8RT an hour SJ to LA with 4 extending south to Anaheim and 4 north to Sac. Brightline doing every 30 mins isn't a big stretch
through running on metrolink is an option but that would mean paying to double track and electrify it and potentially work on upgrades to support 110mph. Could it be done yeah will it maybe.

 

[jis]

But then there is no reason, if economically feasible, for Brightline West to add party cars at suitably higher cost to their trains.

I was at a gathering of FECRS yesterday which visited the Birghtline facilities at OIA. Among our hosts was a gentleman from the track construction department whose primary assignment is on Brightline West, but is currently on loan to Brightline Florida.

According to him Brightline West will be using articulated 7 car trainsets operating at 300kph (186mph). So there is no question of adding cars. Either the sets will have a party car or not, and according to him they won't.

I also learned that the Rancho Cucamonga plan involves building tracks along one of the I-15 RoWs down Cajon Pass to Rancho Cucamonga. He said that the I-15 RoW has fewer curves and has much higher gradient than the classic BNSF line. Those gradients are well within the capabilities of their planned electric trains. There will be no freight traffic on their line. It is too hard to maintain track alignment for high speed and run heavy freight on the same track.

 

[joelkfla]

According to him Brightline West will be using articulated 7 car trainsets operating at 300kph (186mph). So there is no question of adding cars. Either the sets will have a party car or not, and according to him they won't.

Will the bogies be located between cars, like Talgos?

 

[jis]

Will the bogies be located between cars, like Talgos?

Well, they won't be Talgos apparently. More likely that they will be something like TGVs if they use shared (Jacobs) trucks. But the details are not quite known yet.

 

[Cal]

I also learned that the Rancho Cucamonga plan involves building tracks along one of the I-15 RoWs down Cajon Pass to Rancho Cucamonga. He said that the I-15 RoW has fewer curves and has much higher gradient than the classic BNSF line. Those gradients are well within the capabilities of their planned electric trains. There will be no freight traffic on their line. It is too hard to maintain track alignment for high speed and run heavy freight on the same track.

That'd be interesting to see. I'm all for it.

 

[NES28]

Well, they won't be Talgos apparently. More likely that they will be something like TGVs if they use shared (Jacobs) trucks. But the details are not quite known yet.

The word is that they like the Siemens Velaro trains, like DB ICE trains. These could be built at the Sacramento factory.

 

[GDRRiley]

Will the bogies be located between cars, like Talgos?

No these are most likely Siemens Velaro Novas which look like the most likely option for both

According to him Brightline West will be using articulated 7 car trainsets operating at 300kph (186mph). So there is no question of adding cars. Either the sets will have a party car or not, and according to him they won't.

I also learned that the Rancho Cucamonga plan involves building tracks along one of the I-15 RoWs down Cajon Pass to Rancho Cucamonga. He said that the I-15 RoW has fewer curves and has much higher gradient than the classic BNSF line. Those gradients are well within the capabilities of their planned electric trains. There will be no freight traffic on their line. It is too hard to maintain track alignment for high speed and run heavy freight on the same track.

7 car sets is odd, they aren't doing 200m which would be an 8 car set?

186mph doesn't seem right, pretty sure its been confirmed Victorville to Vegas will be 200mph while Victorville to Rancho Cucamonga is 180mph. Yep 4-4.5% grades which is fine as the Velaro family already does 4% grades in Germany

The word is that they like the Siemens Velaro trains, like DB ICE trains. These could be built at the Sacramento factory.

They'll have to be built in the US if they are using federal funds. We could see a joint order between CAHSR and them as both to start don't need many train sets.

 

[Anderson]

I don't believe that the concept of HSR is compatible to that of party trains.

But just a thought here.

Maybe if a third party wants to sporadically run a party train, Brightline West might be more amenable to letting them use their ROW than UPRR (or whoever it is that that owns the current ROW there). People having a party don't necessarily want to arrive as quickly as possible, and thus conventional equipment moving at normal speeds could be used if it can be rendered compatible to the safety standards of HSR (which seems to be possible on NEC for example). Suitably positioned sidings could be used to get the party train out of the way and allow high speed trains to overtake as necessary.

Actually, IIRC the French occasionally did an overnight "party train" with their TGVs (Paris-Nice IIRC).

Another thought here: How one defines "party train" or "party car" is a good question. There are some conceptions which would be incompatible and others which would be quite compatible. For example, if you're just designating a car as a "party car" and giving them a fairly full bar to play with (and perhaps some big screen TVs on the walls at each end of the car), that seems doable. You could even go cashless-but-paid if you basically preauthorize somebody for up to $X (where $X is a fairly high amount - say, $150-200) and just bill them by scanning their tickets (since most tickets - physical or digital - are scannable with either a bar code or a QR code).

Even a "standing bar" concept wouldn't be too hard to envision - that's just an Amcafe with most of the seats pulled out. A situation where you have the following configuration for the train could enable that:

LOCO-COACH-COACH-COACH-COACH-COACH-CAFE/BAR-PARTY-PARTY-LOCO

["PARTY" is basically where the party-class pax would be seated.]

Another version would be something like this (based on the long Eurostar sets):

LOCO-PARTY-PARTY-CAFE/BAR-COACH-COACH-COACH-COACH-COACH-COACH-CAFE/BAR-BUSINESS-BUSINESS-LOCO

Both trains aren't married to car counts; it's just a general concept.

Essentially, you have two "premium class" areas with different classes of service aimed in different directions. You'd probably need 3-4 OBS for such a train: A "standard" cafe attendant for each cafe (though you could plausibly only use one cafe), an extra bar server for the Party Class Bar, and possibly an additional attendant for the other premium cabin for at-seat service.

 

[cirdan]

I agree, and think it comes down to how you define a party car.

I was on a private tour in Switzerland (this was about 25 years ago) in which we were in a saloon car that had tables and chairs at one and where food and drinks were served (the food came from a kitchen in an adjacent car, but this car had a well stocked bar with a wide choice of drinks to suit all tastes and a competent barman who knew how to mix whatever you wanted). At the other end of the car was a large area that had been cleared of all seats and there was a small band (a guy on a keyboard and a guy with a guitar) and a dance floor. As the evening progressed and more people had drunk sufficient alcohol the number of dancers increased to the point that space was at a premium.

All in all we had a wonderful time (I drank quite a bit and I have no recollection how I got home in the end). This was a corporarte thing so drinks and food weren't being payed for individually. But I guess the car we were in was a special purpose car, converted from a surplus revenue car, that would normally sit in storage somewhere and only come out when chartered.

The tour was quite a long one, taking us from Zurich to Brig over the Lotschberg and back.

For a high speed set, the critical question would be, would such a car generate more revenue than a regular seating car? And especially in a fixed consist where it cannot be dropped out easily, it would need to do so on all runs, not just at weekends in the evening.

 

[jis]

Brightline West acquiring land in Rancho Cucamonga for its station...

https://www.trains.com/trn/news-rev...ree-to-sell-land-for-brightline-west-station/