Cincy to Chicago HSR - Do you support it? (Columbus: 2014, how much)

[SWOH]

Here's the proposal as a refresher:

Midwest High Speed Rail Association |

Please post thoughts in the thread or the other one already going. Thanks for participating!

[hensleya1]

No, because in 15 years of living and growing up in Cincinnati, I never once went to Chicago nor did I have a reason to go there. Cincinnati and Chicago not only have their own unique and distinct bases of business and culture, but they are also too far apart to get enough intercity traffic to ever make a rail line profitable.

There's only one corridor in the whole country where a high speed rail could make sense, and it's the narrow strip from Boston to NYC to Philly to Washington. The Acela runs that corridor already. It's also the only Amtrak line that's profitable.

***

A more realistic reason to invest in rail is the transport of freight from one city to another, which if it had the proper investment could see semi-trucks used for local deliveries only instead of over-the-road, which would reduce fuel use considerably.

[Wilson513]

Ho hum. A lot of interest in this great train to Chicago. Think of all of those poor folks who will have their lives turned upside down by the appropriation of what? A couple million acres of land that used to belong to people: houses, farms, churches and factories, and would then be a railroad right of way? Yea, 300 billion dollars for what again? A trip to Chicago? And, with stops it will take as long as a bus. This is a really stupid idea. And, the lack of support for it is palpable.

[Señor Slick]

Originally Posted by hensleya1

No, because in 15 years of living and growing up in Cincinnati, I never once went to Chicago nor did I have a reason to go there. Cincinnati and Chicago not only have their own unique and distinct bases of business and culture, but they are also too far apart to get enough intercity traffic to ever make a rail line profitable.

There's only one corridor in the whole country where a high speed rail could make sense, and it's the narrow strip from Boston to NYC to Philly to Washington. The Acela runs that corridor already. It's also the only Amtrak line that's profitable.

***

A more realistic reason to invest in rail is the transport of freight from one city to another, which if it had the proper investment could see semi-trucks used for local deliveries only instead of over-the-road, which would reduce fuel use considerably.

If you are speaking specifically of this city-pair, Chicago-Cincinnati, it will not happen. Rail transit times and costs put it at a big disadvantage to over-the-road trucking in this lane.

[unusualfire]

Originally Posted by Wilson513

Ho hum. A lot of interest in this great train to Chicago. Think of all of those poor folks who will have their lives turned upside down by the appropriation of what? A couple million acres of land that used to belong to people: houses, farms, churches and factories, and would then be a railroad right of way? Yea, 300 billion dollars for what again? A trip to Chicago? And, with stops it will take as long as a bus. This is a really stupid idea. And, the lack of support for it is palpable.

What's 300 billion? The line from Chicago to Detroit is just over 2 billion.

http://www.freep.com/story/news/loca...cago/18088995/

[Wilson513]

Originally Posted by unusualfire

What's 300 billion? The line from Chicago to Detroit is just over 2 billion.

High-speed rail would boost roundtrips between Detroit and Chicago

OK, 100 Billion.

[SWOH]

^$100 Billion for a train? I don't think so.

I've seen idiotic arguments on both sides of the fence, but I can assure you it's not going to cost that much. Even if they acquired land to run a line from Connersville to Bloomington via Columbus it still wouldn't cost anywhere near $100 Billion.

[RustBeltOptimist]

Originally Posted by hensleya1

No, because in 15 years of living and growing up in Cincinnati, I never once went to Chicago nor did I have a reason to go there. Cincinnati and Chicago not only have their own unique and distinct bases of business and culture, but they are also too far apart to get enough intercity traffic to ever make a rail line profitable.

There's only one corridor in the whole country where a high speed rail could make sense, and it's the narrow strip from Boston to NYC to Philly to Washington. The Acela runs that corridor already. It's also the only Amtrak line that's profitable.

***

A more realistic reason to invest in rail is the transport of freight from one city to another, which if it had the proper investment could see semi-trucks used for local deliveries only instead of over-the-road, which would reduce fuel use considerably.

There's very little in this statement that's factually true, except the personal experiences at the very beginning. As for Cincinnati/Chicago having distinct bases of business culture, it's obviously false. You can look at Chicago's top three publicly traded companies and their Cincinnati business counterparts to see the ties.

1. Archer Daniels Midland (food processor) - largest Cincinnati client is Kroger who make as big a chunk of ADM's business as any other company.
2. Boeing - Largest Cincinnati supplier is GE Aviation, which supplies engines for its jets.
3. Walgreen's. Largest Cincinnati supplier is P&G, and obviously they have some presence here.


Other top Chicago companies with close Cincinnati connections include Kraft, Mendelez and Hillshire Farms (also important Kroger suppliers, the list of top privately held Chicago companies is also littered with supermarket food suppliers.)

Going the other direction, since Macy's bought Marshall Fields it now has nearly as many stores in the Chicago area as that city's largest retailer, Sears. Fifth Third has Chicago branches, Great American has Chicago branches, Western and Southern has Chicago branches. As the #3 media market in the US, it's a huge market for Scripps, which has offices there. The business connections between the cities are in pretty much every sector that's important to either city.

As for where high speed rail makes sense, what you're saying doesn't. Research shows it would make sense in several corridors (California from San Diego to San Francisco, Seattle to Portland, much of Florida, Atlanta to Charlotte, and Texas' triangle, even the front range of Colorado) and should support several lines in the Great Lakes, including Cincinnati to Chicago and to Cleveland and/or Pittsburgh through Columbus. It's financially feasible once in place down to concentrated populations of just over a million, and the economic development easily pays for the operation costs in increased tax revenue in nearly every country and every city that rails have been put in place. No country or city of substantial size, regardless of how much financial instability they have, has found it in their best economic interests to abandon high speed rail in the last 20 years. According to anti-rail zealots, it should be a clear choice, and yet case after case shows exactly the opposite. Rational beings make the choice to keep rail and cut spending everywhere else. This is a market that's telling us something if we only choose to listen. As I've said in the other thread, the only question economically with rail that's supported by facts is if the initial capital outlay can be afforded. If the construction costs can be kept down, it's an untapped revenue stream and the business attractant that the region's letting slip by thanks to an anti-infrastructure mindset.

[WILWRadio]

Dust Belt. Just because cities have reciprocal offices does not mean they are going to have a lot of employees commuting on a daily or weekly basis between these cities. Unfortunately I cannot find a single shred of data on the internet showing any information on the number of people that commute to Chicago from Cincinnati and vice versa. Nothing. Until I can see that and how often they commute I will continue to assert that a HSR train is not cost effective based solely upon casual passenger traffic.

Wouldn't it be easier to move to a place that has the rail you desire? Most intelligent people choose a place to live based upon the amenities it has. I've weighed the mass transit option myself recently in light of the trouble I've had with bad drivers and car accidents that were not my fault. Thus, I bought a home on a bus line that runs frequently. And if worse comes to worse, I will relocate to a place like Pittsburgh that is still affordable yet also has a better mass transit service including rail. That makes infinite more sense than trying to force an agenda down the throats of a region that may not have the need or means to support rail. Get it?

[GearHeadDave]

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