High speed train Dallas to Houston (Austin, Fort Worth: association, suburban, stations)

[2nd trick op]

Originally Posted by d from birmingham

Actually all high speed rail systems pay for themselves in a decade after becoming operational.

The US does have a high speed rail system which generates 25% of Amtrak's revenue. The Acela Express which cost 1.2 billion dollars generates in excess of 400 million dollars in revenue each year and serves 3 million passengers each year. The operating speed is 150 miles per hour with the top speed being 165. Due to the Acela Express a number of airlines have canceled services in the area and highway traffic congestion has drastically reduced.

The other major source which is another 25% is the Northeast Regional which is a higher speed rail which has a max speed of 125 miles per hour and serves 8 million people a year. This rail also gets over 400 million in revenue each year.

Also highways per mile tend to cost more per high speed rail not only in construction costs but maintenance and serve far fewer people. Also no highway has ever paid for itself or generated a profit while high speed railways tend to break even in a decade and start generating a profit.

A grain or two of truth, a whole lot of optimism, and some hard choices and long time horizons.

Amtrak's newest equipment is capable of 165 MPH (and theoretically, more than that) but the physical and safety constraints inherent in the territory over which it operates won't allow it.

The current top speed for Amtrak anywhere along the Northeast Corridor is 150 MPH. and that is allowed only along a 24-mile segment between Boston and Providence. Another segment in New Jersey, between New Brunswick and Trenton, allows 135 MPH. There may be a few recent improvements south of Philadelphia of which I'm not aware, but most of the rest of the system is good for 110 MPH, and no more.

And that doesn't include the obstacles like drawbridges, tunnels and densely-settled urban areas which mandate even slower speeds.

Amtrak tested new equipment on these segments last fall, and the prospects for immediate improvements In schedules aren't much -- about two minutes for a New York-Philadelphia trip. Major gains would require new catenary (electrical wiring -- most of the present stuff dates from the Thirties) and the drawbridge issues along the Connecticut shoreline would require either some give-and-take with what a friend of mine calls the "Connecticut Navy" (leisure watercraft owners -- many of them politically-influential) or some very expensive technology.

The above are all examples of what the people who ballyhoo High speed Rail as a solution to urban transit issues don't talk about. There is a place for it, but progress comes in fits and starts, and the price tag is very high.

To date, any project in Texas is merely a proposal. even the use of the grading of no-longer-needed conventional freight railroads is far from a sure thing. And I doubt that any venture capital would seek a project with so much expensive (and immovable) physical plant with few alternative uses. Financial issues are also hard to define because almost all such projects share facilities and their costs with other segments of rail operations.

The game will go on, but the biggest winners will be the politicians, and the engineers, consultants and similar functionaries feeding at the public trough.

[d from birmingham]

and the price tag is very high.

Yet the price tag for highways and airlines to do the same task is often much higher not only in the short run but in the long run as well.

[Spade]

Originally Posted by Nairobi

Since when do Houstonians take leisure trips to Dallas for the arts and...food? Hell, since when do Houstonians go to Austin?

A rail to New Orleans would make plenty of sense. Houston has a large ex-New Orleanian population and the city is one of the top domestic destinations on Southwest. They have many more festivals and events year-round that I personally would love easier access to; more so than anything going on in Dallas or Austin.

Yeah but does not make economical sense IMO. A Dallas-Houston route would gain far more ridership than a Houston-New Orleans line. What should happen? Dallas should only build a line down 35 to San Antonio and Houston should build a line only going to New Orleans down I-10 ignoring the rest of the state that it is actually in? Or hell, should Dallas even worry about the state themselves and build a line through OKC on its way to Kansas City?

While you probably would love to go to NO more personally yourself, I think others would love Austin more as well. Houston-Dallas line makes more sense. New Orleans line would have to wait.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by d from birmingham

Acela run expected to match U.S. rail speed record of 165 mph - Baltimore Sun

"Given the competition, low-cost carrier Southwest Airlines is eliminating service between Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport and two New York metropolitan airports, LaGuardia and Newark."

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/16/bu...f=general&_r=0

"Between New York and Washington, Amtrak said, 75 percent of travelers go by train, a huge share that has been building steadily since the Acela was introduced in 2000 and airport security was tightened after 2001. Before that, Amtrak had just over a third of the business between New York and Washington.

In the same period, Amtrak said, its market share between New York and Boston grew to 54 percent from 20 percent.

Nationally, Amtrak ridership is at a record 30 million people; the Northeast accounts for more than a third of that and is virtually the only portion of Amtrak’s system that makes money."

"The Acela has played a big role in attracting passengers in the Northeast. The trains averaged about 80 percent full and earned an operating profit of more than $200 million last year on nearly $500 million in revenue."

U.S. high-speed rail 'myths' debunked - CNN.com

""For long distance travel, Americans rely on their cars and the airlines."

"This reliance has led to massive congestion along major transportation corridors like I-95 in the Northeast Corridor. Today, businesses and commuters lose $115 million each year in wasted time and fuel and spend four billion hours per year stuck in traffic. 60 percent of the urban road miles of Interstate 95 are heavily congested. 70 percent of our nation's chronically delayed flights originate in the New York-New Jersey airspace. There is simply no more effective way to alleviate congestion of our roads and airways and get people to their destinations than rail.""

So I would say more people using the Acela Express and Northeast Regional has eased Highway congestion in that part of the country since each year those lines see more and more people use them. There is plans to add more cars and trains to the Acela Express.

So you've got good support for the first half of your claim (flights cancelled), but no basis for the 2nd half (dramatic decrease in traffic congestion).

[d from birmingham]

""Between New York and Washington, Amtrak said, 75 percent of travelers go by train, a huge share that has been building steadily since the Acela was introduced in 2000 and airport security was tightened after 2001. Before that, Amtrak had just over a third of the business between New York and Washington."

That increase in travelers going by train would not only lead to decreases in airline travel but also highway traffic.

While not high speed rail a study on light rail showed it slowed the rise in highway congestion.

Does Light Rail Really Alleviate Highway Congestion? - Eric Jaffe - The Atlantic Cities

Fleeing danger by high-speed rail | Dallas Morning News

"
By some accounts, high-speed rail every two hours reduces the need for more than 1,000 cars to be on the road during the same period. That could reduce the impact of additional automobiles in the cities where congestion is already insufferable. The impact during an emergency is even greater: High-speed rail can reduce the resources needed for 1 million cars set on the road for evacuation."

[Dopo]

Originally Posted by d from birmingham

The US does have a high speed rail system which generates 25% of Amtrak's revenue. The Acela Express which cost 1.2 billion dollars generates in excess of 400 million dollars in revenue each year and serves 3 million passengers each year.

Wow, that sounds very communist... I'm talking about the fact that the airline industry doesn't make any money.

[Jimmy1953]

Originally Posted by Nairobi

Since when do Houstonians take leisure trips to Dallas for the arts and...food? Hell, since when do Houstonians go to Austin?

A rail to New Orleans would make plenty of sense. Houston has a large ex-New Orleanian population and the city is one of the top domestic destinations on Southwest. They have many more festivals and events year-round that I personally would love easier access to; more so than anything going on in Dallas or Austin.

I have to agree with you from the Dallas end. There is 0 desire for people in DFW to travel to Houston unless required by business demands. New Orleans would be our choice as well. Is it too late to make the change? I personally much prefer New Orleans, Austin, Sante Fe, Denver, San Antonio, El Paso, Atlanta, to Houston.

[RonnieinDallas]

Wow there's some really good information posted here, but lots of other stuff being thrown around also. The Dallas news stations have been covering the Dallas-Houston line a lot. A few days ago Dallas Morning news posted a map from the the U.S. high Speed Rail Association showing thousands of miles of planned rail to be developed Over the next 15 years, pretty interesting:

Dallas, Fort Worth and Houston mayors back private high-speed rail | Dallas Morning News

[diablo234]

Originally Posted by Jimmy1953

I have to agree with you from the Dallas end. There is 0 desire for people in DFW to travel to Houston unless required by business demands. New Orleans would be our choice as well. Is it too late to make the change? I personally much prefer New Orleans, Austin, Sante Fe, Denver, San Antonio, El Paso, Atlanta, to Houston.

With all due respect the fact that you or Nairobi won't use the HSR line to go back and forth between the two cities is pretty irrelevant for this discussion. The Dallas-Houston HSR line is targeted more towards business travelers who tend to be very time conscious with money having little to no bearing on the mode of travel as opposed to leisure travelers who tend to be way more cost conscious. If you look at the Northeast Corridor for example most of the people traveling on the high speed Acela trains between Boston-NYC-Philadelphia-DC tend to be business travelers who are very pressed for time while your ordinary tourist traveling between the two cities will more likely either take the bus or drive themselves to their destination since those methods tend to be cheaper.

That being said though I would expect that if the initial Dallas-Houston line does become a success that other branches to Austin, San Antonio, or New Orleans would follow along with airport stops at DFW and IAH so people throughout the region should be supporting this irregardless since it will make traveling between various cities in the region easier for everyone.

[Nairobi]

Originally Posted by Spade

Yeah but does not make economical sense IMO. A Dallas-Houston route would gain far more ridership than a Houston-New Orleans line. What should happen? Dallas should only build a line down 35 to San Antonio and Houston should build a line only going to New Orleans down I-10 ignoring the rest of the state that it is actually in? Or hell, should Dallas even worry about the state themselves and build a line through OKC on its way to Kansas City?

While you probably would love to go to NO more personally yourself, I think others would love Austin more as well. Houston-Dallas line makes more sense. New Orleans line would have to wait.

I never said anything about having a line to New Orleans in lieu of the one to Dallas.