The Economist: "High-speed trains: Going nowhere fast"

[ExCon90]

I keep reading that in the U. S., gas taxes cover about 60% of the cost of building and maintaining highways. Where does the other 40% come from? If it comes from the treasury, does that not mean that the taxpayer is "subsidizing" highways he doesn't use?

[amtrakowitz]

Can you find me a profitable road

Yes, I can. Turnpikes have not only paid off their bonds required to build, but also rebuild them. Check out the Turner Turnpike or Will Rogers Turnpike in Oklahoma for examples.
The tolls for the Golden Gate bridge have not only paid off bonds for its initial reconstruction and to repave and repaint the bridge on a continuous basis, they also have been used to subsidize bus transit across it as well.
In either case, only the people actually using the roads or bridges eventually pay for them....

So why are many of these toll roads being sold off, often to foreign companies...?

[lpetrich]

As to Obama and his friends supposedly being condescending or whatever with their HSR plans, they are only pushing plans that have been proposed for years, sometimes since the 1990's. The big difference is that Obama has been proposing to finance them rather heavily. Most of them are rather modest by the standards of Eurasian high-speed lines; only the California and Nevada ones and some proposed NEC upgrades compare.

I think that HSR plans can suffer from two problems: if they are cheap, then they get criticized as too slow, like in Ohio, and if they are fast, then they get criticized as too expensive, like in California. I'm including Ohio because its "3C corridor" was intended as the beginning of an incremental effort.

As to opposition to HSR projects, it seems to me mainly Republicans who want to deny Obama a triumph and Republicans who look at which places are getting the money and concluding that HSR is Democratic pork. In fairness, some Republicans have been supportive of HSR plans, like Michigan Gov. Snyder.

[electricron]

Even Democrat governors find fault with several HSR corridor plans. Gov. Brown has stirred up the business as usual CHSR board, stating CHSR must be cheaper and quicker to build, and must cooperate with existing commuter rail agencies. The business as usual attitude that California will pay any price for HSR died. It's not just a Democrat and Republican ideology split at play, there's serious issues on what type of train corridors to build where. I believe the idealistic view of building a completely separate HSR corridor all the way from downtown San Francisco to downtown San Diego also died this month.
The "bookend" approach, with the CHSR train sharing tracks in northern and southern California, recognizes the financial limitations and political practically to finish this HSR project quickly.

[2nd trick op]

It has already been demonstrated within the major urban markets the the public will opt for mass transit when factos such as congestion, accessabilty and the price of fuel inveigh sufficiently in that direction. What we won't stand for is "secondary coercion" by a group of New Puritans, environmental zealots, and the Very Politically correct. It would therefore make more sens to educate people on the advantages -- many drive all the way into a city, never recognizing that a lower-cost, lower-stress approach might exist a fair distance out. This would make better use of exisitant alternatives -- "more bang for the buck" -- and set the stage for futher expansion, barring major advances in the private-vehicle/alternative-fuels option, for which any rational person holds a natural preference.

[neroden]

Of course , in countries such as the USA and NZ , we dont have that freedom (Choice ) , we can take our car , but we cant take HSR . Basically our Governments have said , we are not givng you the choice to take HSR , you must drive . Yet somehow , many people see the provision of HSR as the government forcing that form of transportation on them .

If HSR was self supporting, you'll have a valid point. But it isn't. Taxes, which everyone must pay whether you ride the train or not, to subsidize building and operating HSR means everyone is being forced to pay for that form of transportation. Just because HSR breaks even (or not) in a few locales in the world doesn't mean it'll break even everywhere. Taxpayers cry foul when planners wish to build bridges and highways to nowhere too.

If highways were self-supporting, you might have a valid point. But they aren't. Taxes, which everyone must pay whether you use the roads or not, to subsidize building and maintaining highways means everyone is being forced to pay for that form of transportation.

This is literally true, especially at the state and local level, where no state funds its roads from the gas tax alone. Not one. Most never came close.

Just because toll roads break even in a few locales, doesn't mean that they'll break even everywhere.

This concludes the "look, you can say all the same things about roads" essay.

Since nobody is seriously proposing "HSR to nowhere", the final comment you make is a strawman.

[neroden]

I believe the idealistic view of building a completely separate HSR corridor all the way from downtown San Francisco to downtown San Diego also died this month.

This wasn't actually idealism, this was dealing with FRA unwillingness to allow viable HSR trains to share tracks with freight trains.

And I'm very glad it died. Apparently it died because the FRA is actually reforming its crash safety standards, which is even better news.

[2nd trick op]

If highways were self-supporting, you might have a valid point. But they aren't. Taxes, which everyone must pay whether you use the roads or not, to subsidize building and maintaining highways means everyone is being forced to pay for that form of transportation.

The dreams of some of the most-doctrinal of my Libertarian friends aside, the highway system is the single strongest argument that some sectors of a modern industrial so0ciety can't be sustained by laissez-faire. The fact that the latest toll-road experiments are clustered in some of the mot upscale areas, while larger highway trailers continue to damage our major Interstates and contribute to a disproportionate share of traffic fatalities is further, painful proof that our current polarization is hurting us all, but neither in equal severity, nor via the same mechanism

All this strikes me as further proof that we have tu upgrade our present passenger rail network, concentrating on the short-to-intermediate-distance that were rail sustainable --- in other words, remake our suburban systems into sustainable suburban/exurban systems --- before (with the possible exception of a few places like California) any major pitch for developement of true HSR can be made.

[amtrakowitz]

I believe the idealistic view of building a completely separate HSR corridor all the way from downtown San Francisco to downtown San Diego also died this month.

This wasn't actually idealism, this was dealing with FRA unwillingness to allow viable HSR trains to share tracks with freight trains.

And I'm very glad it died. Apparently it died because the FRA is actually reforming its crash safety standards, which is even better news.

The FRA is studying alternate compliance. The standards remain the same. Don't expect Tier II crashworthiness standards to go away. Not that SF to SJ would ever host Class 9 tracks or 200-mph operation; the fastest would most likely be 125 mph or (if Tier II specs are met and Class 8 tracks are used, which seems unlikely) 160 mph.

[electricron]

The FRA is studying alternate compliance. The standards remain the same. Don't expect Tier II crashworthiness standards to go away. Not that SF to SJ would ever host Class 9 tracks or 200-mph operation; the fastest would most likely be 125 mph or (if Tier II specs are met and Class 8 tracks are used, which seems unlikely) 160 mph.

I'll agree. Future CHSR train sets engineering will be complicated. They're going to have to meet 110-125 mph mix use FRA crashworthiness standards and meet exclusive use FRA crashworthiness standards above 125 mph.
With the new "Bookends" approach, the CHSR train sets will have to comply with FRA standards on both ends, Caltrains and Metrolink. While Caltrains is considering buying new light weight commuter trains and eliminating freight trains over its corridor so CHSR trains could be lighter in weight, Metrolink isn't considering doing that yet. And with Metrolink's history of train crashes, I don't think they will for a long, long time.
So, it's irrelevant what Caltrains does, CHSR train sets will have to be able to operate with Metrolink's heavier built trains, if they're going to be sharing tracks in Southern California. The hope for off-the-shelf foreign made HSR train sets is fading. With "Bookends" it's likely that CHSR will have to use modified HSR train sets meeting 110-125 mph FRA standards.

[MattW]

Wait a minute, I thought the Tier-III standards would allow mixed operation below 125mph while disallowing all mixed operation above that. So that something that meets Tier-III could run up to 125 on more conventional trackage while dodging standard commuter trains and maybe freight (i.e. the NEC) while it'd have to switch onto an "LGV" to get above that where nothing but Tier-III equipment would be allowed.

[electricron]

Wait a minute, I thought the Tier-III standards would allow mixed operation below 125mph while disallowing all mixed operation above that. So that something that meets Tier-III could run up to 125 on more conventional trackage while dodging standard commuter trains and maybe freight (i.e. the NEC) while it'd have to switch onto an "LGV" to get above that where nothing but Tier-III equipment would be allowed.

You're probably right, but CHSR really didn't want to buy very rare American Tier III train sets. They want to buy common off-the-shelf European or Asian train sets. That's why CalTrain wants to buy off-the-shelf European or Asian EMUs for use on their corridor, and why CHSR was planning on using dedicated tracks exclusively in Southern California. I don't think the FRA would object if every train using a corridor met the same standards. But now that the CHSR trains will be sharing tracks in Southern California with Metrolink because of the new "Bookends" approach, CHSR will have to buy heavier American Tier III
train sets. Which should mess up CalTrains plans because they will have to meet FRA standards too.

[miamicanes]

Compatibility with off-the-shelf European & Asian designs is a good long-term goal, but pursuing it at all costs from day one -- even if it means having no service at all to areas where brand new separate tracks don't exist -- is financial insanity. By all means, build any new track to HSR standards, and build towards the goal of a totally separate network 25-40 years from now. But don't throw the baby out with the bath water, and build an initially-useless HSR line to use as a metaphorical gun to the head so you can use it to threaten financial suicide if it's not completed down the line.

The madness and insanity of the original California plan was the fact that for the first decade or so of the system's existence, it would have had direct service to NOWHERE besides cities in the Central Valley. Somebody riding from LA to San Francisco (the primary market driving it) would have had to change trains twice. At that point, it's not even worth BOTHERING with separate HSR trains in the middle, because any time savings would get completely nuked changing trains at both ends.

It makes *infinitely* more sense to build HSR-grade tracks in the middle, connected DIRECTLY to the existing rail networks at both ends, and run Acela-type trains that can run everywhere along the line... slowly in LA and SF, quickly through the central valley. Then, as funds permit, the new tracks can get built to replace the shared ones, until the glorious day when the FRA-compliant trains can be sold off and replaced with EuroHSR trains. In the meantime, passengers have 40 years of coherent service from San Diego to San Francisco & Sacramento that starts out as "good", and gets better and better every year.

If funding dries up, at least there will still be a good, viable, working rail network in place to use until funds are available again. That's *infinitely* better than a scenario where you end up with abandoned, never-used infrastructure (or worse, borderline-useless infrastructure with high ongoing maintenance costs, like a HSR line that literally runs only between Bakersfield and Corcoran).

[franz]

It makes *infinitely* more sense to build HSR-grade tracks in the middle, connected DIRECTLY to the existing rail networks at both ends....In the meantime, passengers have 40 years of coherent service from San Diego to San Francisco & Sacramento that starts out as "good", and gets better and better every year..

You guys give me a headache....

So for 40 years, high speed rail in California becomes known as that piece of crap system that doesn't really run fast, it's just called high speed rail. And then maybe it runs fast where nobody lives and nobody cares that it runs fast. And by the time it really becomes high speed from end to end, it has such a bad reputation it withers and dies.

Sounds like a plan...

I can just see Amtrak running ads in LA and San Francisco, inviting everyone to come up (or down...) to try out the brand new, high tech, high speed rail system running between Visalia and Delano. Just hop on the Coast Starlight for a nice slow trip to Visalia, then hop on the high speed train to Delano !!!

[MattW]

It makes *infinitely* more sense to build HSR-grade tracks in the middle, connected DIRECTLY to the existing rail networks at both ends....In the meantime, passengers have 40 years of coherent service from San Diego to San Francisco & Sacramento that starts out as "good", and gets better and better every year..

You guys give me a headache....

So for 40 years, high speed rail in California becomes known as that piece of crap system that doesn't really run fast, it's just called high speed rail. And then maybe it runs fast where nobody lives and nobody cares that it runs fast. And by the time it really becomes high speed from end to end, it has such a bad reputation it withers and dies.

Sounds like a plan...

I can just see Amtrak running ads in LA and San Francisco, inviting everyone to come up (or down...) to try out the brand new, high tech, high speed rail system running between Visalia and Delano. Just hop on the Coast Starlight for a nice slow trip to Visalia, then hop on the high speed train to Delano !!!

125mph is not slow, it may not be 200mph bullet trains, but it's far from "doesn't really run fast." We've gone over this in your topic, the end points could use the existing, conventional infrastructure to reduce the cost of building completely separated right of way in high density downtown areas with the bullet trains traveling at conventional speeds until they reach the high speed line a few miles outside of town. This is how most other high speed rail systems do it.
Reaching the high speed segment should not require a change of trains at all. Unless I'm badly misinterpreting the FRA's pending Tier-III crash standards, the plan is to allow Tier-III equipment to operate below 125mph in mixed traffic, then be able to go faster once they're on dedicated lines with nothing but other Tier-III equipment on the line. This way, bullet trains could operate right into downtown, then leave downtown at up to 125mph, then switch onto the high speed line and go as fast as they can.