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The T and the new authority are/will be creatures of the state, with all their powers and obligations created by state law. The General Court could say that the MBTA must allow x slots at z times at y speeds to trains from the west. It could require the T and the new authority to cooperate on fares...

The thing about local good is the need for resources to make it happen. Given the low density and strength of the opposition, adding a few stations along the way would be both burdensome on the RRs budget and useless to most of the few people living there. Now NIMBYs have changed their mind in the c...

I think it is able to be replicated, but WHERE is the caveat. Brightline has a good deal invested in the real estate side of things as well. If they are not able to leverage a good amount of development opportunities along a proposed route then the route may not be viable and they won't take the cha...

Yeah, that's not the roadblock. It's more about the money right now. “FRA does not grant any kind of construction approval or permit. Neither does this final rule, by itself, grant any permission or authority for TCRR [Texas Central] to operate.” – excerpt from FRA’s pre-published final RPA and ROD...

Not just the landowner, Ron. The first trial court also came to the conclusion the landowner did. A few of those trial courts have put out some... particularly biased rulings regarding the railroad. For instance, the Grimes County case alleged that the railroad damaged a road during a survey and so...

No way it was ever going to pass under this congress anyway. Putting it out now allows other members to be informed of its existence, and a chance to suggest changes before it's real introduction under a Biden administration and possible split congress (Georgia pending). No point in voting on it unt...

The hurdle of the Surface Transportation Board is now a very large one, of the fly or die variety. By asking for jurisdiction and getting it but not being exempt from an application, the railroad has put itself on some ice. Sure this insulates them from some local BS that rural politicians have been...

Good chance for public-private-partnership. Caltrans and Virgin could together make something work. Food for thought.

On Texas Central's Twitter, they recently answered a tweet by the new mayor of Houston, stating construction to start Q3 of 2020. That certainly is not an official press release, but should we acknowledge the informal tweet? https://twitter.com/TexasCentral/status/1212791926170247171 In my opinion,...

A decent single level "lounge" car with overhead windows much like Superliner Lounge car. If memory serves Colorado Railcar made something just like that. The Rocky Mountaineer runs a few cars. Doubtful they are good for over 90 let alone 125mph though, but who knows. A cab car that would...

Bingo. This isn’t the 1940s. Most people know what Local and Express mean (I maintain that Limited now refers to contracts first, transport much later) but they don’t associate Express with luxury necessarily. Besides, Amtrak already marketed their high speed service as Acela Express - they can’t v...

it would move the switchover point to close to probably busiest interlocking in US , giving no time to trains to get up to speed or fail within that interlocking. Why not move the phase-break into, say... New Jersey? Between the tunnel portals and Secaucus? NJT equipment is able to run both systems...

BuddCar711 wrote: Looks like RTD may be leasing MARC cars soon.

Yes, last mile is exactly what I am talking about here. Think about the Mini-Shinkansen concept already in use in Japan, where conventional lines are outfitted for the Shinkansen to use at conventional speeds, in our case likely 80mph.

The problem with Dallas/Ft. Worth is that that territory has double stacks running on it, making any electrification a literal tall order. There is also the fact that the N700, while in the single level height range, is a good 6 inches wider than the average American train. If they wanted extra-leng...