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

[franz]

I don't think that was the point he was making. I believe he was saying to gradually upgrade the "out of town" sections, and while you're doing that (he said 40 years?) run high speed trains the whole way. And when it hits an upgraded section you step on the gas.

My point was that it takes many, many years to get the entire length (500 miles or whatever) upgraded, which means that for the interim you might, for example, be running 90% of the distance low speed, and 10% high speed. Then in a few more years, it's 80-20%, and so on.

From a publicity aspect, that sucks. For many, many years (decades?) the public sees a "crippled" system that, from big city to big city, is not much better than the existing 11 hour trip.

[franz]

Back to the DesertXpress that someone mentioned...

I'm kinda sad that it's pretty much dead. The general concept seemed like a good idea. Well, except for the insanity of driving to Victorville to get on the train...

But you could really make that train into a fun train that people would want to ride. Have a bar car where you can start the party early, maybe a gambling car, maybe a strip club car. Man, that would be a lot more fun than making that boring drive. And coming back Sunday night? Are you kidding? Zipping along in a 200 mph train would be wonderful instead of the 6 hour bumper to bumper insanity.

But I guess now ain't the time to even consider anything related to Vegas, it's pretty much DOA. And when you get there, Vegas is so poorly designed for people without cars it's incredible. That ridiculous, overpriced aerial tram or whatever it's called. They should just close down the strip to vehicles, turn it into a beautiful pedestrian mall the whole length of the strip, with outdoor restaurants, and live bands, and shops. And have a free, or almost free tram to take you to anywhere. Kinda like the airport concourse train in Atlanta and other places. Easy on, easy off, boom you're there.

But I guess they want you to stay in the casinos, not out on the strip.

I guess to do it right you'd have to run high speed from Union Station all the way, but then you're back to the same problem of people getting to Union Station. I still don't understand why it would be so expensive to run high speed thru Cajon Pass. No more room on the right of way after they added the third track? They should add an aerial track right down the middle of the I-15 so everyone sitting in traffic could see the train whiz by with everyone having fun.

[mtuandrew]

Back to the DesertXpress that someone mentioned...

I'm kinda sad that it's pretty much dead. The general concept seemed like a good idea. Well, except for the insanity of driving to Victorville to get on the train...

But you could really make that train into a fun train that people would want to ride. Have a bar car where you can start the party early, maybe a gambling car, maybe a strip club car. Man, that would be a lot more fun than making that boring drive. And coming back Sunday night? Are you kidding? Zipping along in a 200 mph train would be wonderful instead of the 6 hour bumper to bumper insanity.

But I guess now ain't the time to even consider anything related to Vegas, it's pretty much DOA. And when you get there, Vegas is so poorly designed for people without cars it's incredible. That ridiculous, overpriced aerial tram or whatever it's called. They should just close down the strip to vehicles, turn it into a beautiful pedestrian mall the whole length of the strip, with outdoor restaurants, and live bands, and shops. And have a free, or almost free tram to take you to anywhere. Kinda like the airport concourse train in Atlanta and other places. Easy on, easy off, boom you're there.

But I guess they want you to stay in the casinos, not out on the strip.

I guess to do it right you'd have to run high speed from Union Station all the way, but then you're back to the same problem of people getting to Union Station. I still don't understand why it would be so expensive to run high speed thru Cajon Pass. No more room on the right of way after they added the third track? They should add an aerial track right down the middle of the I-15 so everyone sitting in traffic could see the train whiz by with everyone having fun.

This isn't high-speed rail, only rather higher speed than the dearly departed Desert Wind, but another proposed competitor to DesertXpress is this luxo-liner: http://www.vegasxtrain.com/

[franz]

This isn't high-speed rail, only rather higher speed than the dearly departed Desert Wind, but another proposed competitor to DesertXpress is this luxo-liner: http://www.vegasxtrain.com/

HEY, THEY STOLE MY IDEAS !!! And I just posted them today. Damn, they're fast...

Sounds like they've got a good plan, just not at the right time. They couldn't have chosen a worse time to bet on Vegas. I'm surprised they actually bought and modified a train, though. Unless that's all computer-generated conceptual images.

[mtuandrew]

This isn't high-speed rail, only rather higher speed than the dearly departed Desert Wind, but another proposed competitor to DesertXpress is this luxo-liner: http://www.vegasxtrain.com/

HEY, THEY STOLE MY IDEAS !!! And I just posted them today. Damn, they're fast...

Sounds like they've got a good plan, just not at the right time. They couldn't have chosen a worse time to bet on Vegas. I'm surprised they actually bought and modified a train, though. Unless that's all computer-generated conceptual images.

Pretty sure that's all just computer-generated stuff. Website's a little flashy and a fair bit behind the times HTML-wise, but looking at their leadership team they do have a bit of real railroading experience and a lot of real estate experience. And interestingly, someone is still updating the blog, even if it's about silly things like "where I like to smoke my cigars" and "wouldn't you like some vodka on your train ride?" - guess that means they are still trying to get the project moving.

[electricron]

Pretty sure that's all just computer-generated stuff. Website's a little flashy and a fair bit behind the times HTML-wise, but looking at their leadership team they do have a bit of real railroading experience and a lot of real estate experience. And interestingly, someone is still updating the blog, even if it's about silly things like "where I like to smoke my cigars" and "wouldn't you like some vodka on your train ride?" - guess that means they are still trying to get the project moving.

I believe they're sitting and waiting to see how successful DesertXpress is. If DesertXpress fails, they'll be around to pick up the pieces. UP is very protective of this rail corridor, will not even allow Amtrak on it, so I'm highly suspicious of this other proposal. At least DesertXpress realizes UP's distaste of passenger rail.

[miamicanes]

> And then maybe it runs fast where nobody lives and nobody cares that it runs fast.

Well, look at it this way. When a plane flies from DFW to MIA, it spends 20-30 minutes taxiing along the runway at 10-20mph, then spends 3 hours in the air flying 550mph, then lands and spends another 20-30 minutes taxiing along the runway into the terminal at 10-20mph. HSR through the valley that uses existing tracks at both ends would be the same idea... "taxi" out of LA to the central valley HSR "runway" at 125mph, crank up to max speed for the bulk of the trip, then "taxi" into San Francisco at the other end. In all likelihood, the slow parts would be about 30-40 minutes apiece... not much longer than an average jet spends rolling from the terminal to the runway at DFW. And I'm not kidding about DFW runway taxi times. The first time I flew into DFW, I was thrilled when we landed about 20 minutes "early", and didn't understand the lack of enthusiasm by everyone around me. 25 minutes (and probably a good 4 or 5 miles later), we finally pulled up to the jetbridge.

Or, put another way... when I drive from Miami to Orlando, I usually spend my first 20 minutes crawling 2 miles to the onramp, then spend 40-60 minutes crawling through 20 miles of gridlock before finally seeing something that looks like open road. If I'm going to International Drive, it can easily take 10-20 minutes from the moment the wheels cross the dashed line onto the offramp until I make it to the hotel a half mile away. In the real world, travel is almost NEVER max-speed from door to door. You start out slowly, do the bulk of your travel at relatively high speed, then crawl the last few miles.

As a practical matter, the slow segments will add maybe an hour to the LA-SF travel time on day one. Within 5 years, it could easily be down to 40 minutes. After 10 years, it might add 20 minutes. Eventually, you get to the point where sensible people start to ask, "is it really worth spending another $7 billion to move a chunk of freeway so we can take this corner at Colma or San Bruno a little faster and arrive 6 minutes sooner?" The people riding from San Jose might say 'yes', because reducing a 30 minute trip to 24 minutes is a big improvement. The people riding from LA would probably yawn and ask whether you were crazy, because in the context of ~3 hours, 6 minutes is one last trip to the restroom before the train arrives. Everything is relative.