Boehner Slams Mythical Vegas HSR Project, Ignores Ohio Rail Opportunity
The madness continues on the right-wing’s crusade against a mythical high-speed rail to Las Vegas project that Harry Reid is alleged to have snuck into the stimulus bill. “Tell me how spending $8 billion,” asked House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) on the floor, “in this bill to have a high-speed rail line between Los Angeles and Las Vegas is going to help the construction worker in my district.”
For one thing, if we stuck by the standard that members of congress should only agree to fund infrastructure projects located in their own districts, then obviously we’d have no infrastructure at all. This is a debate that I thought we settled in the days of Henry Clay. But beyond that there is no such provision in the bill. This, by contrast, is an accurate description of the high-speed rail provisions of the Recovery Act:
The Stimulus Plan includes two provisions modeled after the Act that finance high-speed rail development. First, the Stimulus Plan provides a $2 billion grant for high-speed rail projects that will remain available until September 30, 2011. The grant will be distributed among applicant states, interstate compacts, public agencies having responsibility for providing high-speed rail service and Amtrak for capital projects associated with inter-city passenger rail services reasonably expected to reach speeds of at least 110 miles per hour. The Secretary of Transportation will have discretion to award grants based on an extensive set of criteria, including the legal, financial and technical capacity of the applicant to carry out the project; compatibility with relevant national plans; and anticipated economic, environmental and transportation effects.
In a last-minute change, the total quantity of funds available was increased. But there’s no special plan for Las Vegas. The money will be spread all across the country. As it happens, I think an LA-Vegas HSR line is a perfectly reasonable project. But in practice the areas that will get a leg up should be the Federal Railroad Administration’s officially designated high-speed rail corridors. As it happens, LA-Vegas doesn’t make the cut. But guess who does have such a corridor? Ohio!
Indeed, the existing plan is a bit freakishly Ohio-centric, offering both a Cleveland-Toledo-Chicago line and a Cleveland-Columbus-Cincinnati-Indianapolis corridor while leaving things like Houston-Dallas and Orlando-Jacksonville (and, indeed, LA-Vegas) off the list. Long story short, John Boehner doesn’t know what he’s talking about and his position on this issue would imperil both short term jobs for Ohioans and an opportunity to substantially improve Ohio’s long-run capacity for economic growth.
93 Responses to “Boehner Slams Mythical Vegas HSR Project, Ignores Ohio Rail Opportunity”
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February 13th, 2009 at 4:30 pm
Great post except I think you are wrong about this:
“John Boehner doesn’t know what he’s talking about”
I think he knows exactly what he is talking about and he is counting on the fact that his constituents don’t know the details
February 13th, 2009 at 4:31 pm
How the crap can they skip Houston-Dallas. We have short flights between both cities all day long, from multiple airport, as well as heavy traffic on I-45, again, all day long.
Its just silly, how hard they work to skip the obvious corridors at times.
February 13th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
What I want to know is why the people of Ohio keep re-electing a clown like Boehner.
February 13th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
I miss Mixner.
Now, I don’t have a citation to prove that I miss Mixner.
But take my word for it; I miss Mixner.
February 13th, 2009 at 4:38 pm
The Chicago-St. Louis line sounds great, although there is already pretty good rail service between those cities (it’s not remotely high-speed though). A new high-speed line should cut between Peoria and Bloomington and include a station convenient to both of those cities. However one of the tradeoffs with high-speed rail is that to achieve high speeds it needs to have few stops. Arguably there should be no stops between Chicago and St. Louis. I think you could probably do both, though – a local and an express.
February 13th, 2009 at 4:39 pm
Gosh, I’m shocked that a political conservative appears to be a total ignoramus and/or a deceitful hack.
Would never have expected that.
Conservatives should receive nothing but mockery. They are an utterly destructive and unserious crew hellbent on achieving their own destructive agenda, which is founded upon outright ignorance or a naked desire for power and to oppress those different from them.
February 13th, 2009 at 4:41 pm
And actually, a Minneapolis-Milwaukee-Chicago-St. Louis-Kansas City line sounds great too. Then you would want a branch going from St. Louis to Memphis, through Little Rock to Dallas/Houston.
February 13th, 2009 at 4:43 pm
The Florida HSR plan was something that Jeb Bush pushed (and he pushed hard enough to get it into the Constitution). One thing I’d like for Matt to discuss is something that was obvious in the case of a Miami-Orlando-Tampa line which is…what is the point of moving forward with HSR projects if you don’t have a proper land uses (in this case densities) to support their usage?
Here is an example. If I rent a car in Miami and drive to Orlando, it will take me about 3.5/4 hours. Lets just say that an HSR can reduce that time to, say, one hour. Woohoo, up to 3 hours saved. But here is the catch, once I get to Orlando, I still have to rent a car because even if you put the HSR station in the perfect place, the perfect place in insanely-spread out Orlando is still probably not where you want to be.
HSR makes sense in places that have a proper land use mix. In places that don’t, I fear it is a boondoggle.
-g
PS What about a nice light-rail on the FEC line that would connect all of the coastal downtowns from Stuart, FL to Miami, FL? Altering those downtown areas would be alot easier than infilling Miami, Orlando, and Tampa.
February 13th, 2009 at 4:43 pm
I don’t understand the gaps. Portland, ME through Boston all the way to Jacksonville and then…stop?
February 13th, 2009 at 4:50 pm
-g,
Property owners and developers are much more willing to build in a transit-supportive, dense-walkable-varied manner when there is transit to build around.
Miami has a very dense downtown. The other cities are still growing, so there’s plenty of opportunity for infill.
February 13th, 2009 at 4:56 pm
“…but here is the catch, once I get to Orlando, I still have to rent a car…”
Three quarters of the miles people travel is intra (not inter) city. And HSR won’t appeal to people traveling to destinations that don’t have good mass transit. Both good reasons we need to build good the intracity mass transits systems (light rail and/or bus) first.
February 13th, 2009 at 5:03 pm
Nice to note that Washington State can probably pick up some of these funds and add 110-mph running. Also nice to note that this kind of development won’t attract the idiots who don’t like trains, although some of them are happy enough to come for the the prosperity trains bring.
It’s becoming pretty obvious that the Federal Rail Administration is not in the business of promoting passenger trains, especially after eight years of Bush. This agency could really use a shakeup and a makeover to get them at least neutral about, or even supportive of, passenger rail.
This is especially true in the matter of transit, where regulations have been proposed or adopted that essentially prohibit the kind of transit and rail used in Germany, the Netherlands, and France. We’ve become an oligarchic empire binding our own feet.
February 13th, 2009 at 5:06 pm
Indeed, that Columbus to Cincinnati corridor runs right the fuck through Boehner’s own district.
February 13th, 2009 at 5:06 pm
Joe,
You are right, downtown Miami is dense but it isn’t partcularly big. And I agree that “Property owners and developers are much more willing to build in a transit-supportive, dense-walkable-varied manner when there is transit to build around.” I think the Miami 21 plan supports this contention.
But infilling downtown is different than infilling metro areas. One of the reasons why transit works in the northeast is the population of Greater New York (which is more than all of Florida). This is why I am all for light rail (which I think would accomplish what you describe, but in a much smaller area).
All of this is to say, Florida needs a more robust mass transit system at a smaller level before the big guns of HSR are rolled out(let me put it to you this way, none of the three airports in Southeast Florida has a dedicated train stop inside of them, a la Portland, OR).
-g
February 13th, 2009 at 5:09 pm
As someone who was relatively close to Boehner’s political apparatus before he took the leader spot (and I jumped parties), let me say that the dude really needs to get better blurb writers.
February 13th, 2009 at 5:16 pm
But beyond that there is no such provision in the bill. This, by contrast, is an accurate description of the high-speed rail provisions of the Recovery Act
Where is the text of the Act? The final, final, FINAL, I-swear-to-God-this-is-it version of the document that will actually be presented to Obama for his signature? Until someone can provide that, we don’t know what it says exactly. Statements to the effect of “I am assured by so-and-so that such-and-such will/will not be in the final version of the bill” are worthless.
February 13th, 2009 at 5:37 pm
Re: What about a nice light-rail on the FEC line that would connect all of the coastal downtowns from Stuart, FL to Miami, FL?
There’s already a commuter rail line that connects Miami to West Palm.
Re: none of the three airports in Southeast Florida has a dedicated train stop inside them
All are served by the Trail commuter line, with shuttle bus service to the terminals.
Oh, and another obvious HSR corridor left off the plan: Cleveland to Pittsburg.
February 13th, 2009 at 5:38 pm
this what they’re talking about:
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2008/dec/22/governors-agree-back-fast-train/
February 13th, 2009 at 5:42 pm
…his position on this issue would imperil both short term jobs for Ohioans and an opportunity to substantially improve Ohio’s long-run capacity for economic growth.
No, it won’t. Boner’s district will still get their fair share of stimulus funds. The package will pass whether GOPers support it or not. And do you expect that districts whose congresscritters voted against the bill will lose funding? Don’t think so.
February 13th, 2009 at 5:46 pm
Oh, and another obvious HSR corridor left off the plan: Cleveland to Pittsburg.
Yeah, that route really makes sense. One dying city to another. The whole proposed midwest-rustbelt network is ridiculous.
Bad news, railfans. Amtrak ridership is going down again. And HSR ridership fell more than the rest of the system. The number of Acela passengers was down 9% from the same quarter in 2007, and down 14% from Amtrak’s projection.
February 13th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
I like how they leave GAPS in the high speed rail corridors so that the engineers can do Evel Kneval JUMPs from one rail terminus to the next.
February 13th, 2009 at 5:51 pm
Where is the text of the Act?
thomas.loc.gov
I’ve noticed that the latest talking-points flood-the-zone from the right wingers is “we don’t know what’s in the act!” Presumably this being released as a talking-point-of-the-day so that people will have a reply when senators are attacked for making stuff up when they criticize the bill.
E.g., when Senator Dipshit says, “Ah do decla-ah that ah find is unacceptable that this bill research on the use of condoms on endangered mice in the liberal district of massachusetts!” and gets the predicted “that claim is made up out of whole cloth. Sen Dipshit, like many Republicans, is a dipshit, as are the people repeating Sen. Dipshit’s claims,” a Republican put to shame like that can THEN reply with, “Oh… show me the bill! no one knows what’s in it! You can’t prove that it ISN’T in there!” to defend themselves.
February 13th, 2009 at 6:07 pm
thomas.loc.gov
Where @ thomas.loc.gov?
Give us a link.
February 13th, 2009 at 6:08 pm
JonF,
It’s true that there is an existing commuter rail line. The problem is that it is predominately west of the major thoroughfare (I-95). What this means is that it is miles away from the downtown areas that would benefit from infill efforts. There is some density around the Tri-Rail some stations, but it isn’t mixed use and it is mostly auto- dominated subdivision-style residential.
And you are correct about the train to bus connection for airports, but this is unwieldy because of the number of stops and the fact that long distance airport travelers would need to change lines then change modes (train to bus). In other words, it isn’t optimal.
Tri-Rail should still be used, but as a support (think express trips – high mobility/low accessibility) coordination with a robust downtown-oriented service.
-g
February 13th, 2009 at 7:41 pm
Again, I’ll have to disagree with Matt. As a former Angelino, I think I can speak for most of my former neighbors to say that between lines to San Diego, the Bay, the Central Valley, Phoenix, and Vegas, Las Vegas is at the bottom of the list for utility.
The ONLY reason to construct a Vegas line is as a money transfer to the Strip. If the casinos want one, they can pay for it themselves. The good transcontinental routes from CA all go through AZ.
February 13th, 2009 at 7:48 pm
Looking at that map, I foresee a problem with the Mountain/Plains state Senators.
February 13th, 2009 at 7:48 pm
The HS rail lines in Texas are odd. There are two many gaps for a state of that size.
February 13th, 2009 at 8:26 pm
From ABC7 News-
“Amtrak carried a record 28.7 million people last year, with each of its routes seeing gains – an 11 percent increase over the 25.8 million trips taken in fiscal year 2007.”
Ridership in the first Q of fiscal 2009 is down “slightly”- less than 5%- from this quarter last year. But guess what else is down? Everything. That’s why we call it a recession.
February 13th, 2009 at 9:12 pm
Leaving Houston-Dallas and Cleveland-Buffalo out of that plan is nonsense — putting them in connects all of the eastern half routes outside of Florida.
February 13th, 2009 at 9:56 pm
“How the crap can they skip Houston-Dallas.”
Easily, nobody from Houston or Dallas would ever take the train unless they can put their pickup on it. I used to live in Texas, and the residents of Austin and San Antonio will take trains. Houston and Dallas? Unlikely. But it would connect the system, so it should be done anyway. Maybe we could make a compromise. If we added a car that had competing heating and air conditioning systems such that it did nothing but burn oil, the people of Houston and Dallas might accept it. They’re willing to compromise as long as oil is wasted.
February 13th, 2009 at 10:54 pm
Fostert, Dallas and Houston both have light rail systems with high ridership. Neither Austin nor San Antonio have rail lines. Our Austin rail line opens at the end of March but it’s really a joke of a line that went cheap instead of good. Houston and Dallas are really the business centers of the state. As to Micheline’s complaint, the proposed line would serve about 75 percent of the state’s population.
February 13th, 2009 at 11:10 pm
Toronto-Buffalo-Pittsburgh
Leafs-Habs at noon
Beef on Weck from Charlie the Butcher
Pens-Flyers at 7:30
February 13th, 2009 at 11:47 pm
Dallas and Houston both have light rail systems with high ridership.
No, they have pathetically low ridership, just like all other light rail systems. In 2007, Houston’s light rail service spent $4.56 to move each passenger 1 mile. $11 per trip. Each light rail vehicle, with a capacity of 220 passengers, carried on average just 30.
It would have been cheaper to use taxis.
February 14th, 2009 at 12:10 am
Beef on Weck from Charlie the Butcher
Mmm… Beef on weck.
The one time I visited Buffalo, I made a point to eat at Schwabl’s. Good stuff.
February 14th, 2009 at 1:46 am
Re: The problem is that it is predominately west of the major thoroughfare (I-95).
It runs right next to I-95, for most of its route. I used to ride that train to work, from Fort Lauderdale to Boca Raton. I lived a mile from the Broward station (and drove to the free parking there), and my office in Boca was walking distance from the Yamato Rd station– it was a huge office park and lots of people took the train there. It makes a lot more sense to have a train working people can use than one mainly for tourists. There really isn’t a lot in most of “downtowns” among the way. The jobs are mainly along the I-95 corridor. As are the airports.
Re: And you are correct about the train to bus connection for airports, but this is unwieldy because of the number of stops
At the Fort Lauderdale airport, there are no intermediate bus stops: the shuttle goes direct from train station to terminal (about a half mile). The main peril of taking the train to the airport is that the train might be delayed. The bus shuttle was never a problem.
February 14th, 2009 at 2:00 am
No route thru Colorado? WTF?
February 14th, 2009 at 2:47 am
So if I’m going from New York to Chicago, am I supposed to get off at Buffalo and walk to Cleveland and then get back on the train?
P.S. Looking at this, it really makes Amtrak look like we’re some sort of third world country:
http://www.bahn.co.uk/db_uk/view/trains/trains.shtml
February 14th, 2009 at 8:28 am
Yeah, that route really makes sense. One dying city to another. The whole proposed midwest-rustbelt network is ridiculous.
Lets see numbers before we call it ridiculous. Anyway, Boehner is a moron. The Cincy-Columbus-Cleveland route is essential with metro populations of 6.5 million in these 3 cities. There is a lot of incoming traffic from Cincy to Columbus and from Cleveland to Columbus as Columbus is the state capital and a lot of government agencies are in Columbus. I practice law in Columbus and I go to Cleveland around 5-6 times a month and another 1-2 times to Cincinnati. It takes around 2 1/2 hours to go from Columbus to Cleveland. A high speed rail will make it in an hour. A high speed rail will connect this 6.5 million metro area and might be the only hope for an otherwise dying state with people leaving the state in high enough numbers to create a severe shortage of professional workers.
February 14th, 2009 at 9:12 am
DTM, That explanation makes sense, but it does seem insufficient nonetheless. Why not leave room for future growth?
Out of the top 50 “fastest growing cities,” 11 of them are located in AZ, NV, CO, KS, and NM, states completely unserved (not underserved…unserved completely) by this high-speed rail plan.
Seems this plan would be great…for the 20th Century.
February 14th, 2009 at 9:19 am
Boehner’s district is west of Dayton and north of Cincinnati–none of these routes would actually go through it. His constituents were the kind who, back in the day, made SURE that no interstate would go through their towns. He keeps getting reelected because Ohio is horrifically gerrymandered.
Now, we really NEED HSR from Dayton to Cincinnati. The MSAs touch at this point, meaning a lot of Cincy workers live in Dayton suburbs (and vice versa). Car traffic between the two cities is slow and dirty (4 lanes in either direction the whole way). With a Dem majority, the State can maybe arrange the HSR, but it still cuts through 4 counties and a billion municipalities–the feds can probably do it best.
If this were to happen, Boehner’s constituents really would benefit–by moving to Dayton or Cincinnati and finding work for the first time in 2 generations.
February 14th, 2009 at 1:29 pm
A note that people should look at the Ohio Hub maps from the Ohio Rail Development Corporation if they want to better understand how the “gaps” in the HSR corridors will be filled in.
One thing that should be stressed … the Ohio Hub, the Midwest Hub, the Empire Corridor and the Keystone Corridor and all the other corridors other than CAHSR, the NEC are all Rapid Rail systems … 110mph, not 220mph systems like the California HSR. That allows them to run on upgraded track with upgraded grade separations on existing rail rights of way.
The Triple C corridor that was given Federal DoT designation is just part of the Ohio Hub, which in addition to the DoT designative Triple C and Lakefront corridors also includes Buffalo to Cleveland, Pittsburgh to Columbus, Toledo to Detroit, Columbus to Toledo and Columbus to Fort Wayne, and Pittsburgh to Cleveland (though whether using the existing Amtrak alignment or a Youngstown/Warren alignment is not yet settled).
Essentially, the Triple C corridor is the trunk and Stage 1 of the Ohio Hub. No reason to push for designation of further corridors until the Triple C is funded.
February 14th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
It would seem that the reason that there is no designation west of Houston is also a matter of alignment choice, between a single route to San Antonio and connection San Antonia / Dallas (the current Amtrak alignment), a triangle alignment, Houston / Dallas, Houston / San Antonio, San Antonio / Dallas, and a T-Bone alignment, with the route from Houston heading toward the San Antonio / Dallas corridors, with San Antonio bound trains heading one way and Dallas-bound trains heading the other from the junction.
Also, while it looks like the Mountain States miss out, Colorado is currently doing feasibility studies for a Front Range corridor from Cheyenne to the New Mexico border, as well as one into the mountains from Denver general along an Interstate alignment, so in terms of project development, its not as empty in the middle of the country as the officially designated corridor map might suggest.
February 14th, 2009 at 1:45 pm
DTM: Depends on what you want to do with the high speed rail. The non-Pacific west does not have densely populated corridors of people in the same way the East does, but the ability to go from Chicago from Denver in five hours by rail (and onwards to California in ten) would still be pretty neat even if there’s not much else to stop at on the way.
February 14th, 2009 at 2:26 pm
UserGoogol, February 14th, 2009 at 1:45 pm
What you want to do with HSR is, first and foremost, cater to trips of under two and under three hours. That’s cracks big chunks of air transport markets. Which means, for Colorado, a north-south route focused on Denver and Colorado Springs, and then extending out north and south from there.
Of course, trips of one to three hours does not mean “shuttle” routes of three hours or less, since an eight hour route with five cities on it has more two and three hour trips combinations available than individual “shuttles” would support.
How far apart the cities are determines whether you can start with Rapid Rail, as for the metro areas with more than half the nation’s population, or whether you have to start with bullet trains, as in California.
What makes sense for transcontinental routes is electrification of the DoD STRACNET for transcontinental freight rail, with upgrades to allow Rapid Freight Rail paths, to grab a big chunk of the current long haul truck freight market. If that was established, a substantially accelerated Amtrak route system could be provided as an adjunct, but the primary justification would be saving 10% of current petroleum imports through the 94%+ energy savings of moving freight from long haul diesel road freight to electric rail freight.
February 15th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
ha ha! I just love that Houston is not connected to anywhere else in Texas! Not that I recommend anyone ever go to Houston. At least being in Austin, I could go to San Antonio and Dallas. Houston-San Antonio and Houston-Dallas would make sense, and it would make a nice triangle!
February 18th, 2009 at 11:37 am
The plan may be a bit Ohio-centric because high-speed rail corridors have been discussed in the state for a decade or more. Needless to say, Boehner has never been a proponent; high-speed rail represents everything he opposes: conservation, government acting on behalf of all citizens, job-creation, etc.
February 18th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
As it happens, I think an LA-Vegas HSR line is a perfectly reasonable project.
Based on what metric?
Black Jack Rail.
February 18th, 2009 at 3:15 pm
Where are the feasibility studies for these rail lines? As it happens, Asia has been in a building frenzy for HSR in recent years, with Taiwan and China adding impressive services that have changed lifestyles and done wonders for economic efficiency. What if state governments in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic created a commission chartered by Congress to begin exploring the feasibility of HSR that aimed to reduce congestion on highways and air routes and link the major cities from Boston to Richmond with frequent daily service? We need to think big and do it now while there is a sympathetic federal government, since these projects require a heavy commitment of public investment, at least to cover the capital costs. Conservatives will kick and scream, but the long-term benefits are overwhelmingly in favor of such a project.
February 18th, 2009 at 4:06 pm
I will see leo and raise him/her one. Calling Amtrak “Third World” is being VERY charitable. In fact, Deutsche Bahn is quite primitive compared to the TGV’s in France and the Shinkansen’s in Japan. The latter is at least 45 years old!! The former literally killed the air service between Paris and Lyon the week it started running. One could get to Lyon from Paris in the same time it took to get to one of the area airports!
We can and should do better.
February 18th, 2009 at 4:08 pm
I read somewhere that a California route from San Francisco to LA to San Diego was priced at about $42B … So I can’t imagine that $8B will go very far; even if focused on a single segment. So I’m just curious how states plan to leverage these very limited funds to actually build something meaningful. I’ve heard that the president will be asking for about $1B a year for HSR in each of his annual budget requests … and that’s about 4 X what the previous admin was proposing, but I still think it’s all a drop in the bucket if we want to actually get something built.
February 18th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
110 mph? You’ve got to be joking me. The Acela corridor in NE goes about that speed and it is not high-speed. Latest generation of HSR can go in excess of 200 mph. If we’re truly interested in building the rail of the future and not subsidizing lazy Amtrak, then any project that is funded should be required to go 200+
February 18th, 2009 at 5:06 pm
It takes 12 hours to get from Cincinnati to Chicago by rail. And airfare between the two is ridiculously expensive.
That’s absolutely ludicrous for a trip that’s 300 miles. A high speed rail line to connect Cincinnati, Columbus, Indy and Chicago would be absolutely huge for promoting partnerships between businesses in those cities.
February 18th, 2009 at 7:33 pm
Please, Please build a high speed rail line to parallel the entire I-75 route! It would be much more helpful than adding yet more lanes to this crowded highway – the heavily laden semi-trucks could then continue moving at their current speeds of 85+ miles down the mountains without endangering so many lives.
February 18th, 2009 at 8:00 pm
I love the fact the California voters are through talking about it and approved it high-speed rail in the state.
February 18th, 2009 at 10:39 pm
The Pittsburgh, Harrisburg and Philadelpha,run looks good. Mabe in time we could add Wheeling, Columbus, Indy, Peoria and even Bloomington. Go east and west
February 18th, 2009 at 10:59 pm
Keep in mind that high-speed rail is targeted at serving many of the same routes that have high congestion air travel today. The Boston-Washington corridor will turn into only large megalopolis in the fairly near future. Cleveland-Chicago and Cleveland-Indianapolis will expand the same way. San Francisco/San Jose (Silicon Valley) to L.A. is facing a mess in air traffic right now. High-speed rail will result in downtown to downtown travel times that are not much longer than taking a plane today.
Boehner is pulling a boner with his usual rants about things he has no understanding about. I think he is using so much tanning solution it is effecting his thinking.
February 19th, 2009 at 3:42 am
Not all light rail lines have pathetic ridership by the way..
Hiawatha is operated by Metro Transit, which is also the primary operator of buses in the Twin Cities. It carried 9.4 million passengers in 2006,[1] meaning this single light rail line carries approximately 12% of the passengers on the entire Metro Transit system. In less than two years after opening, the line had already reached (and far exceeded) its 2020 ridership goals. As of December 2008, the line carried an average weekday passenger count of 37,000 people.
February 19th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
Not having the Houston-Dallas run IS quite the oversight (as well as connecting Houston to Austin and San Antonio.)
My hope is that they are holding back in order to have maglev in the future between DFW and Houston.
February 19th, 2009 at 1:43 pm
Why is the corridor between Pittsburgh and Cleveland left out of this plan? This is a key corridor that would link the entire eastern seaboard with the Chicago hub. Without it, I guess travelers just transfer to Greyhound or hitchhike between Cleveland and Pittsburgh. It is absolutely inconceivable that this critical linking corridor could be left out of this plan.
Maybe, if Bonehead Boehner would start standing up for our country and the hard-hit citizens of northeast Ohio instead of blindly following the same old failed fossilized Republican dogmatism that he clings to like an avaricious addict–maybe, if he could see the light, such glaringly important oversights as the Cleveland/Pittsburgh link would be emphasized instead of imaginary misleading distractions. If he would open his big bazzoo as loudly about important issues as he has about the imaginary “Las Vegas High Roller Train,” the shovels would be in the ground in Ohio right now. Ohio and our country would be much better served–to say nothing of truth and progress–if Boehner was guided by concern for his country more than he is guided and controlled by his loyalty to an obstructive and increasingly obsolete Republican Party. Wake up and smell the progress already.
February 19th, 2009 at 3:04 pm
I do not see Birmingham, Alabama to Tupelo, Mississippi on the map, that is the direction of X-Corridor, what is suppose to be the Federal Interstate Emergency City Evacuation route from Birmingham, Alabama. If The Stimulus is to leave out this abandoned federal Highway Project I feel it a shame that a Stimulus was ever considered. What I see is a popular gambling route from Birmingham, Alabama to Meridian, Mississippi. Most of the routing is popular gambling routes, but the Grapevine route in California may be a real problem route. I would rather see Air Ships conquer California See This Video Here its a Humungas Airship. Much better than High-Speed Rail Travel and NO SNOW PROBLEMS! Contact Gov Arnold Schwarzenegger, please.
February 19th, 2009 at 3:11 pm
50% of the US population lives within 500 miles of Columbus Ohio although you’d never know it from the media.
I’d like to mention the InducTrack maglev technology developed in the US at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories that makes cheap and effective levitation possible without superconductors. It’s a chance to jump ahead of everyone else instead of buying 30 year old wheeled train technology from other countries.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inductrack
February 19th, 2009 at 9:14 pm
Have you ever tried to drive through Ohio? Zzzzz. I’m surprised Kansas and Nebraska didn’t get one as well.
February 19th, 2009 at 11:37 pm
Looks interesting.
BUT we really need a connection from Detroit, Michigan to Toledo, Ohio. For this system and the Amtrak system.
Right now exiting MI is via Chicago, so 10 hours out of the way to go to the East (or south).
February 20th, 2009 at 2:25 am
Did anyone else notice that one line goes to British Columbia and the other to Canada? Our tax dollars building rail lines in other countries! The map is a little hard to read, but I don’t like what I see. Let them pay for an extension if it is needed.
February 20th, 2009 at 11:53 am
Anyone against high speed rail is an idiot, or a hipocrite. It saves money, advances our technological abilities, makes us more competitive, creates jobs, cleans up the Earth a bit, and allows Americans to know their country better. Complain about cost all you want. Jst dont have the hipocrisy to complain about that, and then ignore the truly senseless cost overruns and hidden budgeting of the Iraq Disaster. You republicans and libertarians can justify a trillion dollars on corrupt, no-bid contracts for Iraq War profiteers. But you can’t spare $8 billion (the cost of a month in Iraq) for a NATIONAL HIGH SPEED RAIL INFRASTRUCTURE? No wonder you guys can win elections any more.
By the way, I’m amazed there is no hub in Nashville. The city itself is nothing special in terms of freight tonnage, but it is EASILY the best connector between Chicago and Atlanta-Miami. If you wanna see where rail is needed the worst, just look for hypertrophied airports. Its amazing that a rail triangle between Houston, Atlanta, and Chicago, isn’t envisioned here. High speed tourism is nice, but it isn’t as important as high speed freight between the cities serviced by O’hare, Fulton County, and Bush airports. Can something like eminent domain be used to force rail companies to lead, follow, or get out of the way on this stuff?
February 20th, 2009 at 2:06 pm
Bohner is a bald-faced lier. News reporters should hold him accountable. He needs to be roundly ridiculed. Call his office and tell his staff you don’t appreciate him spreading misinformation. 1-800-828-0498.
February 20th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
What most of the previous folks talking about HSR seem to miss it that one can’t just “parallel” an interstate highway… Railroads are a form of technology dependent on LOW GRADES and wide curves, HSR doubly so. Part of the reason that California’s HSR proposal is so expensive is that it requires crossing THREE major mountain ranges, one of which is at a crossing that was considered too steep and remote to ever be economically feasible in the 19th and early 20th century.
Chicago-Ohio and the NE Corridor (BOS to WAS), besides having a population density and number of on-line cities sufficient to support HSR short-hop trips, ALSO are blessed with flat & open topography which is easy to build upon. Discussions of HSR in Colorado, Texas, and the inland South seems to miss the fact that these are places with hills and mountians that drive the cost of HSR into the stratisphere….and without the requisite population base to PAY for the expensive infrastructure development.
February 20th, 2009 at 4:22 pm
Going to Vancouver from Portland would be nice, considering it’s pretty densely populated the whole way. That said, the Montreal line is a long way to go for an area without many people in it.
Are there going to be stops between the named cities, or is what’s on the map the only place they stop.
February 20th, 2009 at 5:01 pm
Wait! Do I see something stupid? Is the rail line actually interrupted halfway down the coast of Florida? How about all those Baby Boomers who will be wanting to winter in Florida and summer in Maine? Guess they’ll have to walk part way.
February 21st, 2009 at 4:36 am
Look, this is really easy, you do it the Japanese way, you farm out areas to private companies, offer tax breaks and let them build the lines and slap a grocery store at every station. It’s not like this shit hasn’t been done before.
February 21st, 2009 at 3:57 pm
Almost 80 posts. And maybe 8 that actually seem to know what they’re talking about.
Gaps in the high-speed rail network are not gaps in the rail network. How do you think the Interstate got built? All at once, or one section at a time? The French routinely run their electric high-speed TGVs to cities that do not have electrified high-speed service. Do they fly them across the gaps or make the passengers walk? No, they couple a diesel locomotive to the trainset, and off it goes on non-electrified low-speed tracks.
The comment about the line to British Columbia is wrong, but it’s also very appropriate. It’s pulled from thin air, just like Boehner pulled the Las Vegas train out of thin air. Who do you think paid for the route between Paris and London? The French? The British? Try both. Nobody ever said Canada shouldn’t pay its fair share of costs for a line in British Columbia. This is a map of corridors, and the corridor extends to Vancouver.
February 21st, 2009 at 6:18 pm
Thank goodness this is a High-Speed Train (HST) steel-wheel-on-steel-rail project and not a proprietary Maglev project. Thank goodness too that our nation’s existing passenger rail network was preserved during the Nixon administration and survived the last two republican administrations.
I think it is also important to note that because there have been no HST systems constructed from scratch in the United States, there are virtually no existing domestic construction standards or procurement specifications. Once California’s initial Bay Area to the Central Valley section is running over Pacheco Pass, other HST corridors should be able to use and refine these same standards and proceed at a faster pace. There are advantages to starting slow and refining the process as the nation-wide HST effort proceeds.
February 23rd, 2009 at 2:57 pm
I think this might backfire if you’re not careful…
February 26th, 2009 at 2:17 am
Las Vegas-Anaheim Maglev Project
“Intensive pre-construction planning for this project was initiated in 1999 by a public/private partnership formed for the purpose of building a 269.1 mile Maglev system between Las Vegas, Nevada and Anaheim, California…The termini at Las Vegas and Anaheim represent two of the most active tourist destinations in the United States (gaming casinos and entertainment attractions in Las Vegas, and Disneyland in Anaheim)”
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