Hearings planned on potential Atlanta-Charlotte rail line (Washington, Manchester: high school, to live)

[kferq]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

Why do you say the "Crescent doesn't go through Charlotte" when Amtrak shows the Crescent going through Charlotte?

http://www.amtrak.com/ccurl/680/728/...oute-Guide.pdf

And I don't see what difference it makes whether the trains are direct or not. Most trains running up and down the East Coast are not direct. There are 38 trains leaving Union Station in DC for 30th Street Station in Philadelphia every day. Those aren't direct.

You are right. My response was not clear at all. The Crescent does, in fact, arrive at the main station in Charlotte, but at an impossible hour for travelers. From Atlanta, you arrive in Charlotte at 2:20 AM and from Charlotte, you leave at 1:46 AM for Atlanta. What I should have said is that the Crescent doesn't really serve the Atlanta-Charlotte market, because most people don't want to arrive or leave in the middle of the night.

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by kferq

I think that a major difference in the way you and I look at this problem is that you are looking at the current population, while I am looking at the projected population by the time the project comes to fruition. This is not the Northeast: these areas are growing rapidly. The Northern most route from Atlanta through Gwinett, Gainesville, Anderson, Greenville, Spartenburg, Charlotte and Raleigh contains areas with population growth rates of 3-6% in the two year period 2010-2012. A lot of that population growth is occurring on a thin string of a highway and alternatives to that highway are needed (as you realize from driving down it).

Charlotte, Atlanta and Raleigh will not get anywhere close to the East Coast in terms of raw population or population density within the next 50 years. Take a look at the link below.

Top 50 US Metropolitan Areas (1996) Population from 1950

Between 1950 and 1990, the Philadelphia metro area gained a little less than Atlanta in raw numbers, but gained significantly more than Charlotte. Of course, those cities posted a significantly higher rate of growth than Philadelphia, but that's obviously because those cities started off with much lower base populations. Today Metro Philadelphia is still bigger than Metro Atlanta and Atlanta's growth has slowed quite a bit. There's no reason to believe that Atlanta is going to grow by 307 percent again over the next 40 years.

Even if those cities continued to grow at a decent clip, they'd still be significantly smaller than the East Coast as a whole is today. They are a long way off from achieving that kind of density.

Originally Posted by kferq

Intercity rail is growing rapidly in North Carolina between Raleigh and Charlotte and the connection down to the Greenville/Spartenburg industrial area and on to Atlanta is needed.

Why is it needed?

Originally Posted by kferq

Do we currently need Acela type service? No. Your arguments are exactly right for the current population. But they are not going to be right 10 years from now.

The population in Atlanta, Charlotte and Raleigh won't be able to support high speed rail 20 years from now.

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by jsvh

For comparison: looks like LGA and DCA have 72 flights a day, but with some smaller planes. So, comparable numbers of direct passengers between the two, however there are other airports to consider.

No, it's not comparable. Reagan National Airport is not a hub. Most people flying into National are not schleping over to the next terminal to board a flight to Miami, Geneva or Rio de Janeiro. That's their destination. It's largely the same thing with LaGuardia. And most of the flights between DC and NYC are shuttles that provide service specifically for those cities.

Originally Posted by jsvh

Point is Atlanta is the hub of the southeast and generating less but a similar scale of traffic. All you need to do is look up the busiest airport in the world to see that there is a high demand for transportation in Atlanta.

That means absolutely nothing. Do you have any idea how many times I've flown Delta and had to connect through Atlanta?

Originally Posted by jsvh

A lot of those trips are in the 150-400mi sweet spot that HSR serves well. Of course there is more demand for New York which is the largest city in the country so they don't need to be scared. This is not about taking train routes away from them.

LOL.

[jsvh]

GDOT has a survey on the potential routes for those that want to give input: Atlanta to Charlotte Passenger Rail

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by kferq

You are right. My response was not clear at all. The Crescent does, in fact, arrive at the main station in Charlotte, but at an impossible hour for travelers. From Atlanta, you arrive in Charlotte at 2:20 AM and from Charlotte, you leave at 1:46 AM for Atlanta. What I should have said is that the Crescent doesn't really serve the Atlanta-Charlotte market, because most people don't want to arrive or leave in the middle of the night.

Or you can simply conclude that there's not enough demand for the route. Even looking at the Megabus schedule, it only shows three buses leaving from Atlanta to Charlotte per day. The trip from Washington, DC to New York shows 25 buses per day. That's just significantly more demand in that corridor. That's demand that can justify HSR. One train and three measley buses per day are not sufficient evidence of strong demand along the I-85 corridor.

In my opinion, it makes about as much sense to build HSR in the Southeast as it does to put a professional sports team in Greenville, SC. I mean, if we're going to expect the city to keep growing in population, then why not build a 100,000 seat stadium and wait for the demand to catch up with the supply? Nobody will mind a stadium that's 1/10th of the way full for the next 60 years. It's better to just build it now and get it out of the way so that when the population reaches 3,000,000, the team will be ready to go.

[coolieandre]

This is a great idea, but the first thing came to mind is why rail to connect Charlotte on the drawing boards when we are not connected in Atlanta yet?!?!?

[alco89]

Originally Posted by coolieandre

this is a great idea, but the first thing came to mind is why rail to connect charlotte on the drawing boards when we are not connected in atlanta yet?!?!?

the truth!

[jsvh]

Originally Posted by coolieandre

This is a great idea, but the first thing came to mind is why rail to connect Charlotte on the drawing boards when we are not connected in Atlanta yet?!?!?

To connect to the North East, High Speed Rail in Atlanta would go through the Charlotte. It makes sense as the first connection for Atlanta.

[jsvh]

It is interesting how things come full circle. In the 1920's, when Atlanta's population was just 200k, Terminal Station used to handle 86 passenger trains a day. (And there was also Union Station in Atlanta as well).

[kferq]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

Between 1950 and 1990, the Philadelphia metro area gained a little less than Atlanta in raw numbers, but gained significantly more than Charlotte. Of course, those cities posted a significantly higher rate of growth than Philadelphia, but that's obviously because those cities started off with much lower base populations. Today Metro Philadelphia is still bigger than Metro Atlanta and Atlanta's growth has slowed quite a bit. There's no reason to believe that Atlanta is going to grow by 307 percent again over the next 40 years.


The population in Atlanta, Charlotte and Raleigh won't be able to support high speed rail 20 years from now.

\

First: You are living the past. What's with the 1996 Data looking back to 1950? How about 2012 Data!

Metropolitan and Micropolitan Statistical Areas Totals: Vintage 2012 - U.S Census Bureau

What is Atlanta's growth rate? Of course it has slowed as a percentage, but the raw numbers are still very high.

Atlanta MSA grew 24% in 2000-2010, second highest in the nation for a large MSA (Houston was #1). The Atlanta MSA growth slowed as the recession hit here harder, down to 3.24%from 2010-2012 (18% if spread over 10 years), but growth is picking up again.

Even with 2010-2012 numbers, let's compare Atlanta and Philly in Raw numbers: Atlanta MSA is grew by 157 K 2010-2012, Philly MSA grew by 46K, Atlanta is gaining Philly by 106K a year. Atlanta was behind by 561K in 2012 and so Atlanta is a larger MSA than Philly by 2018.

On the other end of the line, Charlotte MSA is a just a little behind Atlanta in growth rate while Raleigh and Durham MSAs are ahead of it (Washington MSA, on the far end of a potential high speed line line, is growing even faster).

Second: Who says you have to have a population equal to the current population of the NE corridor to support rail! What a crazy assumption! Why is that a requirement? The Northeast corridor had a much lower population when those lines were placed! Atlanta is now bigger than Boston, Washington and Baltimore were combined in 1950! We are not talking about building a new California style high speed line here between Atlanta and Charlotte. We are talking about upgrading service gradually the way it is being done in the Chicago area, so that when high speed rail reaches the Washigton/Charlotte corridor, it can then expand to Atlanta.