Brightline Trains West!

[jis]

Put "gambling cars" on the train, and open them up when the train crosses into Nevada.

By the time you cross the border into Nevada you are only 45 driving miles from Las Vegas (Primm to LV). 45 minutes at 60 MPH.

This is a complementary project. The High Desert Corridor just getting underway. It is an Interstate Highway with rail ROW built into it. It will terminate between Victorville and Palmdale. Palmdale is the current northern terminal of Metrolink. In the future, it will be a station for the California HSR. Property acquisition has begun. XpressWest has been in talks with CHSRA about rights and interconnect. Tony Marnell, the developer of XW, made a presentation to the CHSRA Board last January. XW currently has all the FRA, EIR and ROW clearances to be begin construction, so, it they wish, they can get a running start rightaway.

Isn’t Lancaster the terminal for Metrolink, one stop beyond Palmdale? Or am I remembering wrong?

 

[brianpmcdonnell17]

Put "gambling cars" on the train, and open them up when the train crosses into Nevada.

By the time you cross the border into Nevada you are only 45 driving miles from Las Vegas (Primm to LV). 45 minutes at 60 MPH.

This is a complementary project. The High Desert Corridor just getting underway. It is an Interstate Highway with rail ROW built into it. It will terminate between Victorville and Palmdale. Palmdale is the current northern terminal of Metrolink. In the future, it will be a station for the California HSR. Property acquisition has begun. XpressWest has been in talks with CHSRA about rights and interconnect. Tony Marnell, the developer of XW, made a presentation to the CHSRA Board last January. XW currently has all the FRA, EIR and ROW clearances to be begin construction, so, it they wish, they can get a running start rightaway.

Isnt Lancaster the terminal for Metrolink, one stop beyond Palmdale? Or am I remembering wrong?

Yes, the terminus is Lancaster.

 

[Woodcut60]

Well, if this is ever to materialize, I'd be the first to buy a ticket... I'd love to be able to take a train to Las Vegas.

 

[neroden]

This is bizarre, but Brightline hasn't really committed to anything. Buying the carcass of XpressWest -- the bits of land and government permits they'd accumulated -- was probably pretty cheap. Best thought of as taking out an option.

I agree with everyone else that they'll go via Palmdale and the Metrolink route to LA. The High Desert Corridor is therefore critical. I expect Brightline to put in the corporate input, and the money, to make sure that the railway corridor is preserved from Palmdale to Victorville, including the necessary tunnels, and isn't "cut for costs". This isn't a large investment of money to save the space.

 

[TinCan782]

This is bizarre, but Brightline hasn't really committed to anything. Buying the carcass of XpressWest -- the bits of land and government permits they'd accumulated -- was probably pretty cheap. Best thought of as taking out an option.

I agree with everyone else that they'll go via Palmdale and the Metrolink route to LA. The High Desert Corridor is therefore critical. I expect Brightline to put in the corporate input, and the money, to make sure that the railway corridor is preserved from Palmdale to Victorville, including the necessary tunnels, and isn't "cut for costs". This isn't a large investment of money to save the space.

AFAIK, no tunnels would be required between Victorville and Lancaster/Palmdale. There are none on State Routes 138 and 188 across that stretch.

 

[leemell]

This is bizarre, but Brightline hasn't really committed to anything. Buying the carcass of XpressWest -- the bits of land and government permits they'd accumulated -- was probably pretty cheap. Best thought of as taking out an option.

I agree with everyone else that they'll go via Palmdale and the Metrolink route to LA. The High Desert Corridor is therefore critical. I expect Brightline to put in the corporate input, and the money, to make sure that the railway corridor is preserved from Palmdale to Victorville, including the necessary tunnels, and isn't "cut for costs". This isn't a large investment of money to save the space.

I don't know if they got it for cheap, but the EIR and FRA ROD required hundreds of millions of dollars to process and get through the process, that includes the preliminary engineering of the whole route and design.

 

[cirdan]

There's also the fact that even if time isn't an absolute consideration, it is still a relative one. Think of it this way: If you head out after work on Friday and board a 5:30 PM train, a four-and-a-half hour trip doesn't get you to Las Vegas until 10:00 PM (and probably to your hotel room until about 10:30). Yes, that can be part of the experience, but that doesn't mean that you'll be able to generate the ridership needed to cover the capex on this project. It isn't the running costs that worry me (I suspect those can probably be covered). Over $100m/yr in interest payments are the concern...though if it can, boy would that make the project massively profitable once the bonds are paid off.

That traffic is pretty much tidal. You may see great pressure as everybody tries to get a seat on after work trains on Friday heading for Vegas, and then a comparable return flow on Sunday evening. At other times demad will be much lower. How many people want to trave to Vegas mid-day on Wednesday? A handful of overseas tourists maybe.This is not really comparable to South Florida where you are tapping into daily commuter flow potential (especially at the intermediate stops) at the same time as all-week, but potentially seasonal, tourist flows (more liklely end to end), You can then basicaly use pricing mechanisms to encourage toursits to travel at times that there aren't many commuters and so spread demand over all services.

The Vegas to LA line doesn't have many intermediate centers of population, except commuters at the LA end. And if you're ending the service at Palmdale, you miss that opportunity too. Can a twice a week peak make a capex-heavy project like that pay?

 

[crescent-zephyr]

If you actually run into LA then you're linking the 28th largest city in the US, with the 2nd largest city in the US. Gotta be more than a few tourists wanting to ride that train.

 

[leemell]

If you actually run into LA then you're linking the 28th largest city in the US, with the 2nd largest city in the US. Gotta be more than a few tourists wanting to ride that train.

Not just tourists, gamblers and show goers and partiers (sp). I15 is very frequently jammed on Friday and Sunday nights.

 

[Anderson]

(1) As a handy example, LAX-LAS shows 25 flights on next Tuesday (2 Oct) and Wednesday (3 Oct) (each) and 24 on Saturday (6 Oct). So while there's an additional "pulse" of flights on Friday, that isn't a massive tide. As noted before, Vegas can attract a decent slug of convention business and the like.

(2) How tidal is the traffic to/from Orlando?

(3) Presuming stops at LA, Burbank, Palmdale, Victorville, and Las Vegas (basically a stop every 60-90 minutes), how much intermediate traffic will they get LAX/Burbank-Palmdale? I agree that the loads and yields probably won't be on par with South Florida, but this also won't be a non-zero figure. I don't see LA-Victorville as being a major factor, and LA-Vegas and Victorville-Vegas are pretty well tied to one another (they just catch different chunks of the LA basin).

Now, with all of this being said, I agree that the model will have to be different LA-Vegas. Laying on an extra $50-100m in capex for trainsets to accommodate the weekend "surge" is going to be a dubious decision if they want to add capacity then (though of course, it is always plausible to at least use those sets to do a "short run" of some sort on other days)...each set, even sold out at $150/ticket, would only be generating $5.3m in revenue per year for that round trip (against any operating costs). Competing with (for example) an Alaska Air flight that's selling at $41 a week out LAX-LAS is going to be tricky...but to Brightline's advantage, Burbank-Vegas flights are much rarer (3x-7x/day) and much more expensive (JetBlue's cheapest flights surrounding the weekend of the 6th are in the $160-180 range, and nobody else flies the route direct).

 

[MikefromCrete]

If you actually run into LA then you're linking the 28th largest city in the US, with the 2nd largest city in the US. Gotta be more than a few tourists wanting to ride that train.

It seems to me that a first class train service between Los Angeles and Las Vegas is a slam dunk, and not just for tourists and gamblers. Outside of the tourist/entertainment industry, Las Vegas is a large city and I imagine its residents have many ties to the L.A. area. All corridor services -- as well as commuter lines -- have their picks and valleys. If Fortress wants to spend their money, let's get going. I can't believe there's all this hang-wringing over filling an important gap in the passenger train network. It's about a thousand times more useful than a New Orleans-Jacksonville train that everybody here seems to think is important.

 

[jis]

I think New Orleans - Jacksonville has more to do with connecting the dots to complete the national network. The folks who find that important will find an LA - Las Vegas - Salt Lake City more exciting than just LA Las Vegas, whereas the important multi-frequency corridor focused crowd would find the LA - Las Vegas service more exciting. It just depends on ones perspective.

It also turns out that Brightline is firmly a multi-frequency corridor camper. They, for example, will not touch either the New Orleans - Jacksonville or the Las Vegas - Salt Lake City segments with a ten foot barge pole. Whereas Los Angeles - Las Vegas is in the middle of their sweet spot.

It all depends on ones perspective.

 

[cpotisch]

It's about a thousand times more useful than a New Orleans-Jacksonville train that everybody here seems to think is important.

I wouldn't say that. Florida is incredibly isolated when it comes to rail service, and a direct link to New Orleans would cut travel times west literally by days.

 

[frequentflyer]

Looking at Google maps who owns the line between Victorville and Palmdale?

 

[jis]

Looking at Google maps who owns the line between Victorville and Palmdale?

Hard to tell from Google maps, but from the more authoritative SPV Railroad Atlas of California, no one, since there is no direct route from Victorville to Palmdale at present. At least not one that does not involve a backup move or two.

If routes involving backup moves or Wyeing are included then it is a combination of BNSF and UP.

 

[frequentflyer]

Looking at Google maps who owns the line between Victorville and Palmdale?

Hard to tell from Google maps, but from the more authoritative SPV Railroad Atlas of California, no one, since there is no direct route from Victorville to Palmdale at present. At least not one that does not involve a backup move or two.

If routes involving backup moves or Wyeing are included then it is a combination of BNSF and UP.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Palmdale,+CA/@34.5672242,-118.1187362,2321m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x80c25784ec70ddb5:0x6a6c792dad12e03a!8m2!3d34.5794343!4d-118.1164613

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Palmdale,+CA/@34.3800924,-117.4007535,864m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x80c25784ec70ddb5:0x6a6c792dad12e03a!8m2!3d34.5794343!4d-118.1164613

You scroll out and see the where the line between Palmdale and Victorville connect to the main lines from Metrolink and UP/BNSF

 

[Anderson]

I think New Orleans - Jacksonville has more to do with connecting the dots to complete the national network. The folks who find that important will find an LA - Las Vegas - Salt Lake City more exciting than just LA Las Vegas, whereas the important multi-frequency corridor focused crowd would find the LA - Las Vegas service more exciting. It just depends on ones perspective.

It also turns out that Brightline is firmly a multi-frequency corridor camper. They, for example, will not touch either the New Orleans - Jacksonville or the Las Vegas - Salt Lake City segments with a ten foot barge pole. Whereas Los Angeles - Las Vegas is in the middle of their sweet spot.

It all depends on ones perspective.

This is not a surprise...you don't build a corridor (which at this stage is generally going to involve over $1bn in capex if you don't already own the line, and several hundred million dollars even if you do) for a small number of trains per day. There's just no way to make the numbers work, and in some respects there's no way to make the ridership work with a big enough distance involved in your major markets.

Taking Miami-Orlando, Brightline is (depending on how you interpret the bond issue numbers) basically paying about $125-150m per round-trip to put such a corridor together and have at least joint control over operations. This is helped by the pre-existence of a good chunk of the infrastructure, but even then a good bit of work was needed WPB-MIA.

I think it is also worth noting, for example, that SLC-Las Vegas has bupkis in the middle. If there were a string of midsized cities (think Des Moines or Omaha) along the interstate between the two that would be one thing, but you're basically looking at a route that cannot support ridership, which is too long for a viable multiple-frequency daylight service (under the best of conditions that's a five-hour run) that would probably cost $5bn+ to set up (and that's presuming no engineering nightmares blow up the cost). Moreover, the market isn't even "that" big...Las Vegas is at around 2.25m, but SLC is only about 1.15m.

This isn't to say (for example) that there might not be room to negotiate an externally-subsidized service which involves running one or two trains per day through (if you could guarantee priority, etc.)...it just isn't going to be Brightline's model.

New Orleans-Jacksonville is a bit better in terms of intermediate markets (Biloxi, Mobile, Pensacola, and Tallahassee are along the line), but even if you magically "fix" the Mobile Bay issue (not cheap), the run to Pensacola (357 miles) is a killer (probably four hours under the best of conditions) and only Tallahassee is of any size along the way.

 

[leemell]

Looking at Google maps who owns the line between Victorville and Palmdale?

Hard to tell from Google maps, but from the more authoritative SPV Railroad Atlas of California, no one, since there is no direct route from Victorville to Palmdale at present. At least not one that does not involve a backup move or two.

If routes involving backup moves or Wyeing are included then it is a combination of BNSF and UP.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Palmdale,+CA/@34.5672242,-118.1187362,2321m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x80c25784ec70ddb5:0x6a6c792dad12e03a!8m2!3d34.5794343!4d-118.1164613

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Palmdale,+CA/@34.3800924,-117.4007535,864m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x80c25784ec70ddb5:0x6a6c792dad12e03a!8m2!3d34.5794343!4d-118.1164613

You scroll out and see the where the line between Palmdale and Victorville connect to the main lines from Metrolink and UP/BNSF

The High Desert Corridor is an entirely new route and ROW. Land acquisition began in June. It is/will be owned by CalTrans.

 

[TinCan782]

Looking at Google maps who owns the line between Victorville and Palmdale?

Union Pacific (ex-SP)

http://cs.trains.com/ctr/b/mileposts/archive/2017/10/30/fifty-years-of-the-palmdale-cutoff.aspx

http://www.donwinter.com/Railroad%20Infrastructure%20and%20Traffic%20Data/Regions/Southern%20California/Route%20Descriptions/Colton-Palmdale%20Cutoff.htm

 

[leemell]

I think New Orleans - Jacksonville has more to do with connecting the dots to complete the national network. The folks who find that important will find an LA - Las Vegas - Salt Lake City more exciting than just LA Las Vegas, whereas the important multi-frequency corridor focused crowd would find the LA - Las Vegas service more exciting. It just depends on ones perspective.

It also turns out that Brightline is firmly a multi-frequency corridor camper. They, for example, will not touch either the New Orleans - Jacksonville or the Las Vegas - Salt Lake City segments with a ten foot barge pole. Whereas Los Angeles - Las Vegas is in the middle of their sweet spot.

It all depends on ones perspective.

This is not a surprise...you don't build a corridor (which at this stage is generally going to involve over $1bn in capex if you don't already own the line, and several hundred million dollars even if you do) for a small number of trains per day. There's just no way to make the numbers work, and in some respects there's no way to make the ridership work with a big enough distance involved in your major markets.

[snip]

The majority of the XW ROW is on BLM property for which they already negotiated and have the signed rights to build the tracks on.

 

[Anderson]

I think New Orleans - Jacksonville has more to do with connecting the dots to complete the national network. The folks who find that important will find an LA - Las Vegas - Salt Lake City more exciting than just LA Las Vegas, whereas the important multi-frequency corridor focused crowd would find the LA - Las Vegas service more exciting. It just depends on ones perspective.

It also turns out that Brightline is firmly a multi-frequency corridor camper. They, for example, will not touch either the New Orleans - Jacksonville or the Las Vegas - Salt Lake City segments with a ten foot barge pole. Whereas Los Angeles - Las Vegas is in the middle of their sweet spot.

It all depends on ones perspective.

This is not a surprise...you don't build a corridor (which at this stage is generally going to involve over $1bn in capex if you don't already own the line, and several hundred million dollars even if you do) for a small number of trains per day. There's just no way to make the numbers work, and in some respects there's no way to make the ridership work with a big enough distance involved in your major markets.

[snip]

The majority of the XW ROW is on BLM property for which they already negotiated and have the signed rights to build the tracks on.

Even if land acquisition is a non-expense, the cost-per-mile of construction of 125 MPH track is still, IIRC, somewhere in the range of $5-10m/mile just to "drop the rails" (depending, of course, on variables such as how much grading you need to do, bridge construction, and whether you're single-track-with-sidings or double-track). Stations are on top of this, as are storage yards/maintenance facilities and equipment.

 

[brianpmcdonnell17]

It's about a thousand times more useful than a New Orleans-Jacksonville train that everybody here seems to think is important.

I wouldn't say that. Florida is incredibly isolated when it comes to rail service, and a direct link to New Orleans would cut travel times west literally by days.

I am a supporter of the Gulf Coast train project, but in it's current iteration it will do relatively little to improve connectivity. Connections to the Crescent and SL would both be overnight. Even travelling Los Angeles to Jacksonville would be a less than 3 hours faster via the SL and Gulf Coast route when compared to the current routing of SWC-CL-SS. If traveling Chicago to Florida, a CONO extension would actually be slightly slower than the CL and SS (it would be faster in the opposite direction, but only because of the long connection in Washington). The best way to improve connectivity to Florida would be a more direct route to Chicago on upgraded tracks (with intermediate connections to the Crescent and Cardinal), or at the very least a timed connection to the SL at New Orleans.

 

[leemell]

I think New Orleans - Jacksonville has more to do with connecting the dots to complete the national network. The folks who find that important will find an LA - Las Vegas - Salt Lake City more exciting than just LA Las Vegas, whereas the important multi-frequency corridor focused crowd would find the LA - Las Vegas service more exciting. It just depends on ones perspective.

It also turns out that Brightline is firmly a multi-frequency corridor camper. They, for example, will not touch either the New Orleans - Jacksonville or the Las Vegas - Salt Lake City segments with a ten foot barge pole. Whereas Los Angeles - Las Vegas is in the middle of their sweet spot.

It all depends on ones perspective.

This is not a surprise...you don't build a corridor (which at this stage is generally going to involve over $1bn in capex if you don't already own the line, and several hundred million dollars even if you do) for a small number of trains per day. There's just no way to make the numbers work, and in some respects there's no way to make the ridership work with a big enough distance involved in your major markets.

[snip]

The majority of the XW ROW is on BLM property for which they already negotiated and have the signed rights to build the tracks on.

Even if land acquisition is a non-expense, the cost-per-mile of construction of 125 MPH track is still, IIRC, somewhere in the range of $5-10m/mile just to "drop the rails" (depending, of course, on variables such as how much grading you need to do, bridge construction, and whether you're single-track-with-sidings or double-track). Stations are on top of this, as are storage yards/maintenance facilities and equipment.

With passenger loads to be about 15,800 a day at the start, that would be 39 Round Trips trains a day LV to Victorville, more than just a small number of trains. Brightline did say they expected to lay out somewhere around $3.5B. By your estimate that would be about $1.85B at most to "drop the rails". Leaves $1.85B for rest. Mind you, Brightline did say for "about half" the cost. BTW, last estimate for the XW line was $8B.

 

[Anderson]

(1) The "small number of trains" was in the context of not wanting to extend to Las Vegas (which I don't think we can see supporting anywhere near that many trains).

(2) Well, let's presume that number is about right in terms of frequencies, and that those 39 departures would have about a 2:15 runtime (80 MPH average speed; getting up to 90 MPH average speed doesn't get you under 2:00, so this seems reasonable). 39 departures spread over 16 hours means that you're going to have a peak rate of 3x trains per hour in each direction, so you're probably looking at needing about 15-20 trainsets. To get 200 pax/train on average (which is about what 15,800/day comes to) you'd probably need closer to 400 seats per train...so you're probably looking at about a 7-8 car set, plus two locomotives, for the service. If each set is about $40m, this would come to $600-800m for equipment. This would leave about $1bn for the rest of the project...

(3) ...which would probably go to some mixture of the two stations (likely with about a half-dozen tracks given those frequency levels), an equipment yard capable of storing those sets, plus the cost of getting through the mountains heading into Vegas. I stand by the $10m/mile estimate for the desert run, but there will be additional costs when dealing with a mountain range.

I write this presuming, of course, that Palmdale-Victorville isn't included. If it is, that's probably another $400-600m for the tracks, plus a slew of additional trainsets (since runtime increases).

 

[frequentflyer]

@Leemell, you seem very knowledgeable on this, the Victorville to Palmdale is key, what is the timeline that Caltrans has for this project?

The Brightline guys are pretty sharp, and I am sure their business plan includes downtown LA ASAP.