A long storied boondogle. As both a SoCal and NorCal resident for my whole life, this initiative has gotten more interesting as the years have passed. There are so many deeply embeded issues with this infratructure project that I dont feel confident it'll ever come to fruition. Land fights, local and regional politics..
Reports of the death of California High-Speed Rail have been greatly exaggerated
421–430 of 476 posts
Re: Reports of the death of California High-Speed Rail have been greatly exaggerated
#422Earlier quoted context omitted.
The fact is that politicians are insanely car-brained and nobody has any enthusiasm for improving rail infrastructure. Via Rail is trapped in this insane spiral of service cuts where it's miserable for staff and riders, and the solution is to cut more to make up for declining ridership. The new HSR is only happening because with the innovation of P3 deals the government can pay for the project but give all the profit…
A lot of being "car brained" is because even the best transit sucks compared to a Taxi. People objectively don't want to share space with the masses. Even in Singapore or Japan, the stress of being in crowds is simply not worth it. Its slower, requires far more mental energy to plan your route, and requires a lot of physical movement which is hard for fatass americans. Especially when America has quite cheap, awesome…
How does 'stress of being in crowds' in big cities indicate all those people would prefer to drive? Is stuck in traffic not the 'stress of being in crowds'?
The stress of 2 ton machines flying around at 120 km/hr and operated by the angry and impatient-- that is simply not worth it. You think automated trains with 2 minute headways in a network covering 85% of local journeys at $3/ride would be worse than a Taxi at $1/minute with traffic?!!
A lot of being "car brained" is not realizing that even decent transit by global standards would be far far better than the subsidized freeway only-if-you-can-drive $8,000/year horrorshow of the US/Canada. No one's going to take away your fun cars, but a system maximizing freedom needs to account for the young, old, disabled, drunk, poor, and motivated to read instead of drive. Mass transit is freedom. Cars are consumption-politics/corporate-power.
Re: Reports of the death of California High-Speed Rail have been greatly exaggerated
#423Earlier quoted context omitted.
Unfortunately there simply isn't enough demand between SF and LA alone to justify the insanely long stretches of a direct rail project. A better way would have been to build it out from the city into the suburbs first as a commuter rail project. There isn't a ton of intercity demand for this rail, but there is tons of traffic in and out of each singular city to justify even medium speed rail.
"Unfortunately there simply isn't enough demand between SF and LA alone to justify the insanely long stretches of a direct rail project." I will stipulate that that is correct at this very moment . However, it is my contention that a truly high speed rail link (sub two hour) between SF and LA would have manufactured demand as an entirely new set of trips, activities and lifestyles would have been enabled by the abili…
It's not just speed that's critical, it's frequency. I believe that they're only proposing one train per hour, or 18 per day? Feels low for such a long piece of dedicated track.
In the UK the existing West Coast mainline has about 170 trains a day on the fast lines (between Milton Keynes and Rugby avoiding Northampton), the longest of which run about the same distance (London-Glasgow) as LA to San Francisco - albeit a 4.5 hour journey.
The original plans for HS2 were I think 18 per hour between London and Birmingham.
Fresno has a population of 500k, and is about 180 miles from LA from and 180 miles from San Francisco.
Liverpool has a similar population and is a similar distance from London and currently gets an hourly train, with arguments for 2 trains per hour. that's in addition to the more local services (Liverpool-Birmingham for example).
London frequencies on the fast non-stop trains are currently
Birmingham: 3tph
Manchester: 3tph
Glasgow: 1tph
Liverpool: 1tph
Trent Valley: 1tph (fast for the first 80 miles then local stopper at towns of upto 100k, like Tamworth, Lichfield, Rugeley
And typically
Lancashire (Blackpool): 1tph
North Wales: 1tph
Looking at cities like San Francisco an environms, Sacremento, Bakersfield, Fresno etc I don't see why you wouldn't send 2tph from LA to SF, and another 1tph to each of those locations, meaning 6-10tph heading north out of LA, and probably 3tph out of San Francisco, based on the population and distances. Not all services would stop at every station (you don't need a 3tph service from Bakersfield to Fresno, just 1tph would be fine)
I guess the lack of local public transport limits the benefit though, if you need a car to get to/from the station (especially if it's at both ends) then you might as well drive the whole way.
Re: Reports of the death of California High-Speed Rail have been greatly exaggerated
#424Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem is that they have the option to own a house to begin with. Cali cities need to be all high rise apartment buildings. Once the government starts raising property taxes, people will start selling off their homes, and then developers can buy the land and build apartments.
California can't raise property taxes unless Prop 13 is repealed and that's a very high bar to pass.
I mean, majority vote for a certain candidates should do it. If enough people bothered to vote, it could happen.
Re: Reports of the death of California High-Speed Rail have been greatly exaggerated
#425Earlier quoted context omitted.
This could be absolutely true if people adapt to it, but that wouldn't happen overnight. I would also strongly doubt that even after full adoption, Bakersfield to LA in 30 minutes is going to be much more useful and heavily trafficked on a daily basis than SF to LA in 2 hours would. Even in Europe, their marquee city-to-city rail routes contribute a small share of overall rail traffic compared to their daily commuter…
Nothing happens overnight. Except governmental upheaval, I suppose. And yes, SF to LA would be in much more demand. Not as a commuting option, but it'd make for some great weekend commerce. In a world of increasing work from home, I don't think many people would care for commuting to LA from Bakersfield.
LA to Bakersfield is 110 miles. That's about an hour, certainly plenty of people do that journey in the UK multiple times a week. Tamworth for example is exactly 110 miles from Euston. In peak times the fast trains stop there for the commuter traffic and it takes 67 minutes. Peterborough, Gratham, Newark (100-140 miles) are all common commuter places,
Re: Reports of the death of California High-Speed Rail have been greatly exaggerated
#426Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sounds like you've never taken a train. Time through security? There's basically no security in American train stations (or French TGV stations). I've only experienced Chinese train stations with security but with wait times far less than American airports. Time to the airport? Well yes because the airports are inconveniently located. Train stations are right there in the downtown.
International HSTs with passport required border crossings (ie Schengen-UK) have passport control and security - I think the security checks are to minimise the risk of terror attacks in the channel tunnel though. But yeah, for intra-Schengen you just go to the platform a few minutes before departure, find where your carriage will be, and step in once the train comes to a stop. So much less faff than air travel, and…
Security theatre. What's the point of metal detecting you on eurostar? You going to hijack the train with your knife?
Cars and vans in the tunnel don't go through metal detecters, and you can smuggle a far larger bomb that you can in a suitcase.
But eurostar is the exception to the rule with security. I tend to aim to arrive at my mainline station about 5 minutes before the train leaves incase I get delayed on-route, but that's because I live in a small town which only has 1 train per hour. When I take a route with 3tph I don't bother looking at the times, just go when I'm ready and accept on average I have to wait for 10 minutes.
Re: Reports of the death of California High-Speed Rail have been greatly exaggerated
#427Earlier quoted context omitted.
SNCF was one of the early bidders for this project, proposing the I5 route. They later pulled out from the politics of the Central Valley line in 2011, and went on to successfully implement high speed rail in Morocco instead - which went live in 2018. Here we are 8 years after they finished a different project with nothing. American infrastructure at its finest. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SNCF#Modern_era
This is discussed in the article.
I had a chuckle at these two subsequent paragraphs.
> One regular snipe is that it’s “easier to build rail in Morocco than in California.”
> Al Boraq had full funding lined up before the project began. CAHSR did not. This led to delays that reduced support and encouraged critics, which starved it of funding commitments and thus led to further delays. California undermined CAHSR from the start.
So, uh... it is easier to build rail in Morocco than in California. And California is part of the cause. It's not even a "snipe", it's just the truth.
Re: Reports of the death of California High-Speed Rail have been greatly exaggerated
#428Earlier quoted context omitted.
If gasoline was sold for a fair price, cars would be reduced to a novelty within a generation
Is it so wrong that we elect politicians to preserve our desired lifestyle?
The amount of conversation around this is testament it's not everyone's desired lifestyle.
Re: Reports of the death of California High-Speed Rail have been greatly exaggerated
#429Earlier quoted context omitted.
Exactly. A huge part of these projects is proving to the public the value. So even a short, direct line is useful - as some will start to use it and then extending it becomes a simple "this thing we have is good, it should be good more."
But the short direct line might also not get built, if the projections show passenger volume will not be high enough to justify the costs. Passenger rail has high fixed costs and low marginal costs. Even with high-speed rail, you generally want to maximize the number of passengers rather than speed. Making detours to nearby major cities often makes sense, while stopping at smaller cities the route already passes thro…
> passenger volume will not be high enough to justify the costs.
Roads generally don't pay for themselves
Re: Reports of the death of California High-Speed Rail have been greatly exaggerated
#430Earlier quoted context omitted.
Depends on how steep. 4% is no problem for modern traction. Just look at this https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datei:Wiedtalbrücke_Blickricht... which is used at 300kph by electric multiple units like the german Inter City Expres. I've rode over this at about 330kph shortly after opening, it's slightly noticable, but not like a roller-coaster at all, as one might think. Meanwhile this is also used by more conventional e…
Okay, but the I-5 doesn't bother with loops and tunnels. It just barrels right over the top of the mountains, including a 5-mile section of 6% grade according to the sign ( https://www.crashforensics.com/tejonpass.cfm ). Trucks struggle to crawl over the top at like 30 mph, with tires. It's not exactly a roller coaster hill to be overcome with inertia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siemens_Velaro#Velaro_Novo
They have distributed traction, meaning powered bogies in every second wagon for the current variants. There is no 'engine/locomotive' in the classical sense. All of these also have electronic anti-slip/traction control.
Edit: Even if a quarter of the powered bogies are defect for whichever reason, the remaining ones still suffice to accelerate from full stop at 4% grade. By design. For current variants. It's a variable platform. They could use more powered bogies. Stronger motors. Whatever.