Phoenix-Tucson High Speed Bullet Train/Monorail (Casa Grande, Douglas: rental car, rental, home)

[youthinkso]

Nope..absolute waste of money. There will never be that many more people traveling between Tucson and Phoenix. Widen the highway first for a fraction of the price , high speed trains are only efficient in highly populated Asia or Europe and possibly some east coast US cities.

[CodyW]

The Phoenix-Tucson corridor is a developing mega-region. The traffic between the two cities WILL grow. We could address it with roads, which would be an unsustainable "easy" way out. Long term solutions are needed in situations like this. Observer53 holds onto the idea that there will never be "hundreds of thousands" more people living between Phoenix and Tucson, but the fact of the matter is.. There will be. It may not be 50 years from now. Or 100 years from now. But eventually, the gap between the cities will fill in. That's what planning organizations are promoting, it's what the economic studies are saying, and it will happen, one way or another - the only question is when.

Honestly, I would RATHER see a heavily populated Phoenix-Tucson corridor rather than Phoenix spilling out into the western deserts, reaching ever closer to the California border. That's an even scarier possibility.


So, assuming that the "Arizona Sun Corridor" will come to be, eventually, we must plan for it in the most sustainable and well rounded way possible. A train link between the two cities will play a vital role in this.

[observer53]

CodyW,

Come on. There is not water to "fill in" that space, and there's Indian land besides. When I was a small child,people used to say it would be filled in by now. I don't know what they were smoking then, and it's no more feasible now.

[visitor21]

The Transcontinental Railroad did a lot of good including building cities in Arizona such as Phoenix and Tucson. Abe Lincoln was overwhelmed with the price tag and doesn't even know where to get the money to pay for it. I like Lincoln's optimism. Rail ridership keeps increasing. Laying down new tracks creates investments along with it. Gas prices are high. Solar powered trains are the way to go in Az after all, the power source of solar energy is free. Solar technology keeps improving where you can get more energy per square inch of solar panel.

The world economy is more competitive and there needs to be more jobs that is less likely to be outsourced such as building infrastructure including bullet trains. Taxes, tolls, fees etc... are sources of revenue to pay for infrastructure. 'Kicking the can down the road' won't help, it needs to be implemented now otherwise it might be difficult to catch up.

[Potential_Landlord]

There are no "solar powered trains" in Europe. Actually, the country with the oldest bullet-train system in Europe, France, generates almost all power nuclear. So in a sense, they are "nuclear powered trains". Trains use a lot of power and you would have to cover a good portion of Europe with solar panels to feed them. Additionally, the trains cannot stop when it rains or at night, so you would have to build up a humongous battery power storage system if they were solar powered.
That said, I agree we need a gigantic infrastructure build up in the US now. We stopped building out our infrastructure in the 1960s (last dams, last nuclear power plants, electric grid, interstate system, sewage system etc. - you name it). Let's just be careful to build the right things, and solar is nonsense IMO. If you look back, starting with the New Deal and ending in the early 1960s the infrastructure that was build then truly transformed the US and enabled our modern lifestyle. IMO it is time for another transformation to leap us ahead in a similar way again.

[azdr0710]

Originally Posted by visitor21

The Transcontinental Railroad did a lot of good including building cities in Arizona such as Phoenix and Tucson.

well, actually, the transcon. RR didn't come anywhere near Arizona, but I can guess what you mean by the sentiment.....

the most expensive domestic project the fed. govt. has ever undertaken has been the building of the interstate highways, funded in 1955 originally by a controversial (!) one-cent sales tax on gas.....few can deny the lives saved, fuel saved, and increased productivity that has resulted....and linking it to defense certainly helped grease the wheels!

but I don't think a Phx-Tuc high-speed RR will work....we are an independent bunch and still love our cars too much....this only works in a high population density area.....as obs53 says, a regular-speed line using existing track may be what first appears....and even that is years away....just not practical.....it may occur decades from now only after a majority of the population perceives a crisis in transport.....

[corydon]

They are building new interstates right now.
Solar power for a train... it will never leave the station, it uses an incredible amount of energy to get rolling.

And... they are heavy subsidized, no railway for passenger service in the world makes money.
And something else, people don't live ibn the station.....

[visitor21]

Originally Posted by azdr0710

well, actually, the transcon. RR didn't come anywhere near Arizona, but I can guess what you mean by the sentiment.....

Yep, you are right! It's a 'residual' of the Transcon . As for solar tech being a good alternative energy source, we'll just have to wait . I've read of a solar energy powered plane and a solar energy powered portable station for electric vehicles. I think Toyota (or Honda?) even has a vehicle with a solar powered roof to help recharge an electric vehicle's battery and supplement power for A/C.

Either way, I agree with most folks in this thread, we need another massive infrastructure project (more than one would be nice).

[Potential_Landlord]

BTW- the existing railroad tracks between Phoenix and Tucson belong to a big RR company and they need them for cargo traffic. They are not available for passenger traffic at all. Just a FYI and regardless whether a train connection makes sense or not, but we would have to build new tracks and stations for passenger traffic.

[Columbia Blue]

Originally Posted by Potential_Landlord

BTW- the existing railroad tracks between Phoenix and Tucson belong to a big RR company and they need them for cargo traffic. They are not available for passenger traffic at all. Just a FYI and regardless whether a train connection makes sense or not, but we would have to build new tracks and stations for passenger traffic.

Agreed. I'm thinking that Union Pacific or whoever the railroad co. is would have right of way for cargo anyway. Kind of defeats the purpose of high speed rail if the bullet train had to continually go on sidings to let the freight trains pass by.