Do we really need HSR for LD?

[frequentflyer]

The problem with HSR are the costs, any number thrown would be liked at with suspicions and rightfully so looking at the California debacle. Make iron clad contracts so that someone other than the tax payer will pay for cost over runs (like the Defense Dept finally started to do on some projects) and HSR will be an easier sell.

President Biden wants future tax money spent on American made products, ok but again, we have the California example when it comes to HSR. Might be better though politically tricky to have Japan Rail or European Consortium come and build and run the system. Where would the California system be if they would have taken up Japan's or China's offer to do just that. But what does Brightline teach us? Private corporations do a better job completing jobs closer to budget and on time? Or as some have stated, aiming for 200 mph trains is unnecessary and expensive.

 

[jis]

The problem with HSR are the costs, any number thrown would be liked at with suspicions and rightfully so looking at the California debacle. Make iron clad contracts so that someone other than the tax payer will pay for cost over runs (like the Defense Dept finally started to do on some projects) and HSR will be an easier sell.

President Biden wants future tax money spent on American made products, ok but again, we have the California example when it comes to HSR. Might be better though politically tricky to have Japan Rail or European Consortium come and build and run the system. Where would the California system be if they would have taken up Japan's or China's offer to do just that. But what does Brightline teach us? Private corporations do a better job completing jobs closer to budget and on time? Or as some have stated, aiming for 200 mph trains is unnecessary and expensive.

I would wait on counting the Brightline chicken until after the eggs actually hatch. I do like them but I am also a “show me” kinda guy

 

[crescent-zephyr]

I would wait on counting the Brightline chicken until after the eggs actually hatch. I do like them but I am also a “show me” kinda guy

What do you want to see?

 

[Qapla]

What do you want to see?

Brightline connecting Miami, Orlando, Tampa, Jacksonville and Tallahassee with at least 6 trains daily ... hey, you did say "want"

 

[railiner]

Brightline connecting Miami, Orlando, Tampa, Jacksonville and Tallahassee with at least 6 trains daily ... hey, you did say "want"

Tallahassee?

 

[jis]

What do you want to see?

I am not very demanding. Just delivering what has been promised.

However this thread is about LD and HSR and not about Brightline and Regional service. I am sorry that one of my posts provided the sliver of an opening to try to convert yet another thread into a Brightline one I apologize.

 

[crescent-zephyr]

I am not very demanding. Just delivering what has been promised.

So far they are doing that. When’s the last time you rode the Crescent Star? (An Amtrak train that was announced and advertised but never operated).

 

[MARC Rider]

Might be better though politically tricky to have Japan Rail or European Consortium come and build and run the system.

What's so politically tricky? Nearly every new passenger railcar acquired for use in the US today is built by a "foreign company," even if the cars themselves are built in the USA. So Japan Rail sets up "Japanrail USA" or whatever they want to call it and applies their expertise to the task at hand. They'll be hiring American workers to build and run the system, so who cares if some profits go back to Japan. (Even some of those profits could well be invested in the US in any event.)

 

[Exvalley]

Too many people think of high speed rail as a binary option. We either lay 200 mph track or have 79 mph track.

125 miles per hour works just fine between New York and Washington DC. As much as I'd like to see 200 miles per hour on that route, it really isn't needed - especially at the price it would cost. At 125 mph the route is already competitive with air travel.

Does 125 mph work for New York to Chicago? Not really - at least as far as competing with the airlines is concerned. 200 mph would make a much bigger difference.

It gets a little complicated when you combine different city pairs along a route (e.g. Boston - Washington, DC), but my overall point is that we should tailor speeds to the needs of the route itself.

 

[Exvalley]

So Japan Rail sets up "Japanrail USA" or whatever they want to call it and applies their expertise to the task at hand. They'll be hiring American workers to build and run the system,

Sounds like the plot of a 1980s sitcom. LOL

 

[jis]

Too many people think of high speed rail as a binary option. We either lay 200 mph track or have 79 mph track.

125 miles per hour works just fine between New York and Washington DC. As much as I'd like to see 200 miles per hour on that route, it really isn't needed - especially at the price it would cost. At 125 mph the route is already competitive with air travel.

I agree in principle. But we need to take into account some ground realities of cost of doing things. In the US there are significant cost break points at different max speeds. Roughly speaking it goes as follows:

1. 79mph - this is probably not as significant a break point as before given that PTC addresses the cab signal/ATC requirement to go above this. Maybe 90mph is what replaces this, roughly because in all likelihood things like quad gates and intrusion detection will probably be required at grade crossings above 90.

2. 110mph - For all practical purposes no grade crossing above this speed.

3. 125mph - practical limit of diesel operation. Needs electrification beyond this. Also Tier I ends at this speed, though with the new FRA standards this may be a less important constraint if simply anything to travel LD is required to be Tier III compliant. But we are not there at present.

And then of course there are the well known cost brackets determined by the FRA track standard that superposes on this.

I think it is practically possible to shoot for uniform 110mph national LD network. That will already take a deacde or two to achieve. Many other countries in the world that are larger than France or Germany are shooting for such, with select routes designated for higher speeds in steps upto 200mph. This even includes China, though all we hear about it is its HSR network. China actually has a huge passenger network which is not HSR that serves the Mom and Pop population more than the well heeled.

Things start getting more expensive above that and quite a bit more so above 125mph. Selectively targeting more traveled routes for higher speeds based on willingness to pay for the upfront work (which pays off handsomely later, one might add) is an useful exercise and indeed NY-Chicago in my mind would be a candidate route for such. Of course, the fact that the necessary real estate at present is owned by private parties who may have other interests complicates matters a bit more in the US.

Also IMHO, the primary goal of LD service should not be competing with air transport. It should be effectively competing with road transport, which carries an order of magnitude more people than air transport, and also matches the usage pattern better with ground based rail transport than air transport.

 

[crescent-zephyr]

They'll be hiring American workers to build and run the system, so who cares if some profits go back to Japan. (Even some of those profits could well be invested in the US in any event.)

What profits?

 

[MARC Rider]

Sounds like the plot of a 1980s sitcom. LOL

Hey, it's no different than Siemens, Alstom, etc. building railcars in the USA.

 

[MARC Rider]

What profits?

Well, Credit Mobilier was very profitable. And despite the scam, the transcontinental railroad they built was eventually profitable for someone, and benefited the country as a whole.

Seriously, nobody is going to build anything if they don't expect to make a profit, unless they're running some kind of crooked tax-cheat scam. The contractors building the California HSR certainly expected to make a profit, even if the State of California didn't. That's why contractors attempt to bill for cost overruns if they miscalculate and unexpected things come up. Same thong happened with the Purple Line in Maryland. If the State of California (or Amtrak or whoever wants to build these thins) doesn't have the expertise to build and operate a project, why not hire someone who does?

 

[crescent-zephyr]

Well, Credit Mobilier was very profitable. And despite the scam, the transcontinental railroad they built was eventually profitable for someone, and benefited the country as a whole.

Seriously, nobody is going to build anything if they don't expect to make a profit, unless they're running some kind of crooked tax-cheat scam. The contractors building the California HSR certainly expected to make a profit, even if the State of California didn't. That's why contractors attempt to bill for cost overruns if they miscalculate and unexpected things come up. Same thong happened with the Purple Line in Maryland. If the State of California (or Amtrak or whoever wants to build these thins) doesn't have the expertise to build and operate a project, why not hire someone who does?

Oh so you’re saying rail Japan would make a profit from operating the line, but the operation itself would still be losing money and covered by taxes?

That makes sense. I didn’t make that connection in your post.

 

[dlagrua]

I doubt if national HSR will ever come. The freight railroads own all of the important ROW's and land so where do the HSR systems fit in? What maybe practical are 90 mph national LD routes and working with the freight railroads on projects for track upgrades. On some LD routes like the Cardinal speed improvements may not be possible.

 

[sttom]

Buying the ROWs of the Class 1s wouldn't be horribly expensive. Looking over their balance sheets, they own about $193 billion collectively in "property" that I am mostly sure is in the US and isn't their rolling stock. The math gets dodgy with KCS, CN and CP since they don't separate US holdings (or even land vs rolling stock some of the time) vs all their other potentially real estate holdings. UP is the only railroad that actually lists how much real estate it owns in a very obvious manner. Throw in $40 billion of debt being transferred from the railroads to the agencies that will own the ROWs and we have a total of $243 billion. Assuming they only want cash and not something else of value.

Upgrading the 93,000 or so miles of track would be next. Assuming we'd modernize every mile (I know we wouldn't, branch lines wouldn't be a high priority) we'd have to budget $2.6 million per mile on average for double tracking and $400,000 per mile for traffic control. So $3 million per mile or $279 billion total. I know bridges, tunnels and mountains complicate things, but I'm just doing rough numbers.

Running total: $522 billion

Amtrak is a different story, but this is what my ask would be. $180 billion. $50 to keep the NEC projects going and the remaining $130 billion for the rest of the country. What I would ask that be spent on is 32,000 miles of triple tracking in areas where hourly or better passenger service would make sense, 1200 or so stations, 10,000 new cars, 2,000 new engines, 3 new Beech Groves, expanding the existing Beech Grove and a margin of $12 billion for unexpected expenses.

Total: $702 Billion

How you gonna pay for it? US corporations earn about $8 Trillion per year in profits, if we fund this over 5 years, that's 1.8% of their profits towards rail. I think we can swing it. Kick it up to 2% and make it permanent and use it to continue to fund capital funds for the ROWs, Amtrak, Regional Rail and public transit in general.

I know we'd also have to change the legislation that Amtrak operates under, but that is a different story.

 

[crescent-zephyr]

Buying the ROWs of the Class 1s wouldn't be horribly expensive. Looking over their balance sheets, they own about $193 billion collectively in "property" that I am mostly sure is in the US and isn't their rolling stock. The math gets dodgy with KCS, CN and CP since they don't separate US holdings (or even land vs rolling stock some of the time) vs all their other potentially real estate holdings. UP is the only railroad that actually lists how much real estate it owns in a very obvious manner. Throw in $40 billion of debt being transferred from the railroads to the agencies that will own the ROWs and we have a total of $243 billion. Assuming they only want cash and not something else of value.

Upgrading the 93,000 or so miles of track would be next. Assuming we'd modernize every mile (I know we wouldn't, branch lines wouldn't be a high priority) we'd have to budget $2.6 million per mile on average for double tracking and $400,000 per mile for traffic control. So $3 million per mile or $279 billion total. I know bridges, tunnels and mountains complicate things, but I'm just doing rough numbers.

Running total: $522 billion

Amtrak is a different story, but this is what my ask would be. $180 billion. $50 to keep the NEC projects going and the remaining $130 billion for the rest of the country. What I would ask that be spent on is 32,000 miles of triple tracking in areas where hourly or better passenger service would make sense, 1200 or so stations, 10,000 new cars, 2,000 new engines, 3 new Beech Groves, expanding the existing Beech Grove and a margin of $12 billion for unexpected expenses.

Total: $702 Billion

How you gonna pay for it? US corporations earn about $8 Trillion per year in profits, if we fund this over 5 years, that's 1.8% of their profits towards rail. I think we can swing it. Kick it up to 2% and make it permanent and use it to continue to fund capital funds for the ROWs, Amtrak, Regional Rail and public transit in general.

I know we'd also have to change the legislation that Amtrak operates under, but that is a different story.

You could start with purchasing the Chicago - NYC Mainline and Chicago to New Orleans Main.

Get those 2 up and running with true passenger mains... ya know the way they used to run!

 

[jiml]

Buying the ROWs of the Class 1s wouldn't be horribly expensive. Looking over their balance sheets, they own about $193 billion collectively in "property" that I am mostly sure is in the US and isn't their rolling stock. The math gets dodgy with KCS, CN and CP since they don't separate US holdings (or even land vs rolling stock some of the time) vs all their other potentially real estate holdings. UP is the only railroad that actually lists how much real estate it owns in a very obvious manner. Throw in $40 billion of debt being transferred from the railroads to the agencies that will own the ROWs and we have a total of $243 billion. Assuming they only want cash and not something else of value.

Upgrading the 93,000 or so miles of track would be next. Assuming we'd modernize every mile (I know we wouldn't, branch lines wouldn't be a high priority) we'd have to budget $2.6 million per mile on average for double tracking and $400,000 per mile for traffic control. So $3 million per mile or $279 billion total. I know bridges, tunnels and mountains complicate things, but I'm just doing rough numbers.

Running total: $522 billion

You wouldn't even need to acquire every track - just the ones that support or eventually could support passenger traffic. Once you deduct all the yards, industrial trackage, spurs to nowhere, your total cost could shrink considerably. You already pointed out some examples of tracks that might not need upgrading.

 

[jiml]

You could start with purchasing the Chicago - NYC Mainline and Chicago to New Orleans Main.

Get those 2 up and running with true passenger mains... ya know the way they used to run!

Great place to start.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

In reality, the number one thing Amtrak needs for speed improvement in LD is getting priority on the tracks.

Amtrak has already been granted priority status; there's just no practical method for enforcing compliance and US courts have invalidated prior attempts as being unfair to the hosts, which is par for the course in a system this broken. There is another attempt to measure and correct non-compliance already in progress but I'm not holding my breath.

Number 2 is getting the RRs to stop using slow orders to avoid keeping their tracks up to snuff.

The hosts would respond saying minimum speed thresholds require a new usage contract at much higher prices and the current SCOTUS is virtually guaranteed to support that view.

Number 3 is improving station wait times - electronic signs indicating where people should stand before the train comes in, disembarking through different doors than embarkation, high level stations with long enough platforms so multi-stopping is not necessary, improved overcrowded stations (like Atlanta)

Most stations probably don't need electronic message updates or full length platforms for only a couple trains per day, but improved conventional signage with marked boarding locations would be helpful and practical IMO.

Number 4 is the new engines and cars coming and those that should come (superliners) to avoid delays caused by broken equipment.

New engines are an issue that is being addressed but I'm unaware of Superliners being a bigger delay problem than other designs in the rolling stock fleet. The primary failure mode seems to be impact/derailing at a grade crossing in relation to a commercial vehicle use and every car in the fleet is susceptible to that.

 

[sttom]

You wouldn't even need to acquire every track - just the ones that support or eventually could support passenger traffic. Once you deduct all the yards, industrial trackage, spurs to nowhere, your total cost could shrink considerably. You already pointed out some examples of tracks that might not need upgrading.

I would say do it all in one go for more than just expanding passenger service. Getting freight off the highways is needed given how much damage 1 semi does to a highway compared to 1 car...well ~400 cars. Nationalizing the ROWs, upgrading and managing them as a public good would enable this since a public entity has more of an incentive to run more trains, where as a private company has to worry about the margin between making money and using/maintaining a depreciating asset they pay taxes on. Not to mention if the ROWs are nationalized, segregating freight and passenger trains becomes easier since the entity the controls the traffic would effectively have all the necessary information to make the decisions as to where to send the trains. It would also put them all on the same footing. Not to mention having a rolling plan to modernize the whole network would enable better economies of scale and better planning than if only a few hundred miles gets done every so often.

 

[Qapla]

Too many people think of high speed rail as a binary option. We either lay 200 mph track or have 79 mph track. 125 miles per hour works just fine ...

That was the thrust of this thread. That efficient, workable, a useful LD passenger train network does not "require" HSR. The LD network does not "need" to compete with the airlines to work. The goal does not have to be to replace planes ... when significantly reducing the number of cars on the roads and cutting down on expensive highway expansions would be just as desirable - or even more desired than trying to compete one-on-one with the airlines.

 

[railiner]

As far as acquiring rights of way....how about taking a page out of the old Chicago Transit Authorities book, and erect new trackage adjacent, or over interstate highways? AFAIK, many, if not most of them, except perhaps in some urban area's have sufficient room for that...

 

[MARC Rider]

How did the British compensate the private railroads when they natio9nalized back in the 1940s?