Gotta love how Dallas City council thinks that building a rail line 7 stories above level would be unsightly, when Dallas highway interchanges looks like dropped spaghetti.
I believe the two main concerns are the Hyatt and the developer that doesn't want to spend $5 billion next door only to have a 80-foot viaduct between the development and the city. The amount of freeway infrastructure supporting a mile and a quarter of I-35 on the southwest side of downtown is pretty nutty, though.
@@LucidStew The whole mess between downtown and the river bend is unsightly. They should put the HSR station on the west side of the river and instead extend a light rail connection to the hub.
@@joeblow5214 both repubs and dems are equally incompetent at building anything other than highways. The auto lobby owns both parties. I say we need a parliamentary system like European countries and Japan get to enjoy along with their bullet trains.
3:29 Not sure if you want to call it a boo-boo, but some additional context is needed. That particular bill was never going to be passed because it was the House proposal for FY 2024 appropriations (federal FY started October 1), which is partisan and never stood a chance in the Senate. FY 2024 bipartisan appropriations were enacted in March through unrelated legislative vehicles. The FY 2025 House "markup" for the T-HUD bill is later this week, but I'd expect a similar provision for FY 2025. Bicameral appropriations talks will probably be delayed until after the November election, with "continuing resolutions" in the meantime to keep the government running. It's conceivable that such a provision could make it into final FY 2025 appropriations if there's a Republican sweep.
It took a while to work through it, but what you have here is an error of omission. Specifically, not mentioning that appropriations passed in another bill without the partisan language. There is precedent for this. The first boo boo I made in all of Stew's Newsdom was failing to identify the trainset in the video thumbnail as an Alstom Avelia. In order for this type of boo boo to be valid, it should be slightly more relevant than an explicit error, and I think this is. The context that the appropriation has passed and that Congress is not still working on passing H.R. 4820 is important even though the language of H.R. 4820 is the gist of the point. You have yourself a boo boo! Prepare yourself. I can do nothing to hold back the incoming tide of fame.
Our best hope for HSR is if CA senators Padilla & Butler and TX senators Cruz & Cornyn get stuck in an elevator together for 12 hours and need something in common to talk about.
Stew I don’t remember if you had this last month but some good news from Brightline East. They have enough passengers that they have ordered an extra car for each of their train sets.
They actually have 30 on order. They're supposed to get them in batches of 10 over the next 18 months and will eventually run 7 passenger cars per train compared to the current 4. I generally don't report on Brightline Florida since its not HSR. I'll probably mention it once they get the first set of 10, and then the following month to see what the impact was on ridership.
@@LucidStew Brightline East may not be HSR but they may be a good example to places thinking about building it. They have shown there can be enough passengers to offer the possibility of profit. And they have shown with a little help in land acquisition a passenger railroad can be built for a reasonable amount of money.
They won't necessarily have to build a structure for each one of those(under the I15/SR210 intersection), and in some places the same structure will go over more than 1(8th St. viaduct, and transition to the I-15 median @ Foothill Blvd.)
@@LucidStew the Olympics are in 4 years. Even if it’s done in 2027 which it won’t be, the testing after that still wouldn’t be enough time. They have claimed to be shovel ready for years now. But no construction this year. So they will start in 2025 and be open by 2028. 4-5 months of each year will have triple digit heat for most of the track. This is going to be another clown show. Grab your popcorn folks. They only want to start so they can beg for more money. Then still claim to be private. And with how much those Florida ticket prices are. It’s cheaper and faster to fly most of the time.
@@ChrisJones-gx7fc To my knowledge they won't do much of that. Off hand I can think of four examples where they will: the SR138 interchange in Cajon Pass, Joshua St. at the Hesperia station, and D St. in Victorville, Dale Evans Pkwy just north of the Victor Valley station. It will mostly be new structures or widening the freeway where the median isn't currently wide enough to accommodate the tracks. Otherwise they plan to go around existing structures.
I love love the monthly cahsr expenditure numbers. In germany we do have lots of passenger rail infrastructure, but it's old and crumbling. So the big thing Deutsche Bahn is working on right now is a major overhaul of the most important corridors. The first overhaul is set to start next month on Riedbahn. Many contruction companies deem this impossible, but Deutsche Bahn wants to expend 1.3 billion € in 5 months (which are about 290 milllion US$ per month). We'll see wether this will work out. I think this number is an nice perspective on the 200 million US$ monthly expenditures. Some more numbers about riedbahn corridor: 70km/43mi, max speed: 200km/h, 125 mi/h
I think at some point it boils down to experience and organizational capacity. Most things are possible. Large projects with seemingly improbable logistics have been pulled off consistently since the early 20th century. It'll probably come in a little over budget and finish a little late, but I think in regards to large projects an ambitious schedule is probably better than a cautious one.
Measuring progress on CAHSR in months is interesting, since decades might be more appropriate. These endless delays with EIRs like at Union Station are a direct result of paranoid regulatory mindset.
@@mattc3696 Plus in both cases the costs have gotten out of control. Link US not quite as bad, but it has inflated about 3X. In the case of both, original cost is probably doable.
I’d love to see you make a map of all the high speed rail routes you would want built (if there was suddenly a massive amount of funding given for HSR projects)
I'm working through the FRA's high speed corridors. Once I'm done with that series, I will make a video for what I think is good and practical on a national scale. I have South Central(Texas/Oklahoma/Arkansas) and Southeast(Virginia to Georgia) left. I might have that done by end September(SEHSR will likely be 2 videos since its a big subject), but I might save the national video for December, since its a big month for RUclips.
Siemens’ proposal to Nevada DOT/BLW to be chosen as the preferred train manufacturer included them building their plant in Nevada, according to the December 2023 Railway Age article about NVDOT’s request to the FRA for BLW’s exemption from “Buy America” for certain HSR components currently not able to be made in the US, which I would figure would cement that as the location where the plant will be. I also figure that Siemens saying their new plant would be in Nevada was to help coax NVDOT to choose them as that would mean Nevada jobs, since Alstom would be in NY. If it were up to me though, I’d place the plant in like Victor Valley area, so it’d be in California but alongside the BLW tracks, which could be the best compromise between BLW and California HSR, should in fact CAHSR also choose Siemens which is most likely.
On the subject of Texas Central, it's also worth mentioning that the Texas GOP's platform, which came out the end of last month, explicitly comes out against government funding and eminent domain for HSR. The political hurdles for Texas Central are steep.
@tonywalters7298 because rail has a bone to pick with oil if it's electrified. I see Southwest Airlines, and the Texas based portion of the U.S. oil industries hands all over this sudden turn.
Well the state supreme court already ruled Texas Central can use imminent domain, so, I'm not sure what hurdle there is left, unless they plan on changing the current laws.
I do not believe for one second Brightline West is going to be done by mid 2028. I know in theory since they are somewhat following the interstate it should be easier but looking at the route I don't feel this is true. It is not easier to work in a small space between east and west bound interstate roadways. It actually has to be harder than a lot of CAHSR that can access the right of way from many places and has a large prep work area in most places. Brightline West has to alter and level, build up or wall so much of the route. Then build all those above grade crossings, which we know takes years to get a strong enough viaduct for high speed rail. I actually think the preliminary Merced to Bakersfield CAHSR route might finish before Brightline West.
I'm willing to wait until they start, to see if they're able to generate a pace that makes that possible. I'm not yet ready to say they won't, but I too have serious doubts. The volume of work necessary is quite large. I think few things are impossible, but they will have to get out of the gate extremely quickly and make tremendous progress all the way through completion. There is definitely no room for making up deficits. I think we'll have a pretty good idea by this time next year. I'm planning on covering it, I'll have my drone with me and I probably won't be the only person doing that either. The one thing they have in their favor at the moment is that their progress has been consistent and they've been ticking the boxes they need to tick since the beginning of last year. So, for me, they don't currently have the performance baggage of CAHSR where my first inclination is to not give them the benefit of the doubt.
I believe that's a Velaro. If I remember correctly I got that from Siemens media assets looking specifically for Velaro stuff, of which they have surprisingly little video available.
I keep looking forward to news on New York's Empire HSR project. But as with any rail improvements in NY, we do a LOT of talking, but end up doing just about nothing. With our buddy Schumer in there, I would expect to see more progress on the Empire State's HSR. Yes, although the NEC does pass through NY State, its only for about 10 miles :-). Another rail route links the largest 7 cities in NY State, along with Toronto, Montreal, Boston and Cincinnati. And although the NEC is and should be a priority, we in Upstate need HSR also... what are we?... chopped beef??
They're going off of what TCR was approved for 4 years ago. The TCR station is next to land that one of the principle TCR investors owns. I'm sure you're sensing a theme here. It's essentially devolving into who can throw their weight around the most. I'm sure Amtrak would be fine with Dallas Union, but then they'd need a new EIS, and that would be a very real avenue into obstructing TCR another decade or two. This is American politics at its finest before our eyes.
Hey you can't put a train on the big, beautiful freeway. FRA Rules require a forty-foot steel wall that's 10 feet wide at the bottom. Better to be safe.
I haven't even watch the video yet. But I've been in Texas for nearly three months for work… Please build the damn train. The hours of my life I wasted away sitting in traffic going to Dallas and Austin from San Antonio I will never get back. It is nearly all urban/suburban from SA to DFW. Serving what has to be nearly 8 million people? This is just a no brainer… Rant over…
Might be a really long time before they get down to S.A., although I think if they build Houston-Fort Worth and it does well, they will almost certainly complete the Triangle or the T-Bone.
Re. LA Union Station those curves are real screechers. It's little faster than to just start out going north. Alemeda St. makes it simple, to get to both the bolt-straight SP lines to Santa Ana - and the existing Shore Line, like Balboa seeing the Pacific for the 1st time. The highway that crosses under Alemeda is sort of obstructive, but they could produce a beautiful addition (like they have with other additions to the station, with natural light, etc.) to reach Alemeda St. underground, maybe a few feet lower than optimum on the south, and maybe with the station a few feet north of where you would expect.
One thing I find interesting is that all of this is in aid of a massive expansion of arrivals and departures that the current configuration apparently can't support. For the most part this will be the case due to Metrolink expanding to half hour headways for the Olympics. At least with New York City the argument for congestion pricing is that it will allow further expansion of transit. Here we're going to expand transit despite lack of demand to justify congestion pricing, in theory creating demand for the thing we built. No mention of what happens if the demand still doesn't show up.
@@LucidStew Seems with all the trackwork properly hooked up to the north the station would have a lot more capacity than current needs. 16 or 17 tracks (I just looked) and notice they left room for center tracks to allow shorter trains to double up on the platforms. (never seen that before) though I understand there's a lot of transit entities using Union Station, along with doubling the schedule of every train eventually. I'm mostly afraid they will find a way to get rid of Madison Square Garden on top of Penn Station, and then they'll rip it all out and replace it with something having like half the train capacity. This kind of stuff is already ongoing with the LIRR - they are REDUCING the capacity while saying they're expanding it. (They put a giant new platform (with grade issues at their like-40-degree crossover 'cause one leg goes over a flyover that's too close. It's ludicrous. The new platform blocks all three thru tracks completely, So as a result their claiming they can no longer to cross-platform transfers at Jamaica, which is like cross-platform capitol of the world. Or was. They want to do them, quote: "On the Fly". Jamaica Capacity "Improvements" There is no way to put any more train capacity in the existing Penn Station footprint - can't be done - It has a v-shaped set of double ladders where the platform tracks originate on the far track of the ladder, then cross the near track with a slip switch on their way to the platforms, to make for more-or-less directional double ladders when no direction is particularly emphasized. Then the ladders run together in the giant cluster #$% that is Interlocking A, under 9th Avenue, which resolves right at the interlocking to six E--W tracks all spaced 12 feet apart (You never see that) that run to 10th Avenue 1000 feet west. (Cross town blocks are long.) The reason for the close spacing is it make it so there's no jog running through the switches at Interlocking A. Fly through there at 30 or 35. Once they're allowed to get rid of it they'll certainly replace it with something inferior, while complaining about capacity problems the whole time.
@@brucehain I ran across a document for LA Union, and now I don't recall where it was, but it shows "current" I think was 2018 amount of arrivals/departures, projected 2026, and then projected 2040(for CAHSR arrival). Of course this was before COVID, which essentially invalidated the entire idea for the time being. But current 2024 is now less than 2018, and something like 20% less than 2026 projected. And of course you're more likely to win the lottery than make any money betting that CAHSR will be at LA Union by 2040, where(get this) arrivals/departures were supposed to TRIPLE. There's a steady transit comeback the last couple of years, but transit usage in the L.A. is way down from its peak in something like 2013. It seems, though, that to justify all this they will do their best to triple arrivals/departures anyway. It's decoupled from reality and starting to become an offering to the climate deity. We're simultaneously bailing out transit agencies due to lack of ridership WHILE expanding their capacity.
The real justification has very little to do with climate, LA county is already losing / stagnating in population due to other transit options (cars on freeways) being at capacity. The only viable option is investing in a capable transit network that can support current demand and future growth. Given the sprawling nature of so-cal HSR is needed to bridge large distances quickly vs the current slow light rail system which is only practical for short trips less than 10 miles
@@boxemshipem1142 This doesn't really jibe with the geographic realities of the L.A. area. It's out of space except for in the desert. The only place for L.A.(and even L.A. County) to grow at this point is up, which would point to local transit, not intercity. CAHSR will be a drop in the bucket when it comes to the regional solution. Ok, so you're going to be able to ship another 10-20,000 people out to Lancaster. Not exactly a solution to a 10 million person problem.
Personally, I think it would be foolish for Siemens NOT to construct the BLW HSTs in CA/NV as it would be seen favourably by State Politicians, whom love to be able to present “Job Creation” to the voter
There was some sort of informal meeting, but nothing of substance that I ran across. Brightline organizes these projects as separate companies. It isn't necessarily one waiting on the other, but I think BLW about to begin construction and Brightline Miami-Orlando trying to ramp up capacity puts that on the back burner for the next couple of years.
Personaly ,for Dallas center,rather than building a lost station near cadiz st....i would build the HSL station, and also for additional local traffic, literally above the tracks at Union station. Basically build 2 more levels. One for the mezzanine and the exchange room ("salle des pas perdus/hall of lost steps" as we say in France), and above, the platforms and tracks (totally covered by a glass roof or a roof with glass sections (to be seen) of the HSL and possibly tracks for additional local traffic. Advantages: no need for additional land Quicker to build than an underground station We do not touch the historic building We drown out the noise of the freight trains at the Hyatt (they are enclosed in a concrete structure). disadvantages: requires a viaduct before and after Nimbys will cry because it blocks their view work on the current station (plant the pillars, and install the roof of level 0/floor level 1) If you see others, don't hesitate.
Two reasons that's not happening. Dallas City Council voted 16-0 against elevated tracks through downtown, and Amtrak will not be abandoning the Cadiz St. station because it is already environmentally approved. Restarting that process could take 4-5 years and would open a door to shutting the whole project down.
@@LucidStew it's a shame, a station raised above another is the guarantee of short (vertical) connections and with a minimal environmental impact (which seems to be close to their hearts) because we don't use additional land. we end up with 2 stations separated by 500m which will not attract anyone. Europe and Asia are setting the example, we simply have to follow. As for the municipal council's refusal, I suppose it's because of the nimbies who are putting pressure.
Nice for Hanford I guess that the giant viaduct is being built, although Kings/Tulare is definitely going to be the most wasteful station for CAHSR. The old bridge thing fir NEC is obstruction regardless of historical merit, fast trains are an environmental priority. Good to see funding for more needed projects. And good to see Brightline West progress.
The gangly Dallas viaduct is just not necessary - not significantly shorter or faster so as to ever make any appreciable difference - though probably has an appreciable price tag. (I wonder how it would come out if you calculated the amount they get for each one of those squiggly colored lines on the front of the Study Document, and what percent of them would be usable at all.) What they really need is to combine the High Speed, Amtrak and DART all at Union Station, and make more room by opening an upper level of platforms - since the orig. main waiting room was on a high 2nd floor level. (The more-or-less current alignment from the Trinity River Bridge - with a new parallel bridge - would afford a nice gradual grade, not gangly but smart looking.) The Waiting Room is a gorgeous one now used as a believed not-much-frequented banquet hall. In olden days there were complaints because there wasn't any escalator. There should be several. I think they did eventually have two at one point. You can have plenty of air and light in an even slightly lower DART terminal, but the higher tracks for high-speed/Amtrak would be a major improvement over the original config. (I think they must have been cost cutting at the time it was built, though it may be no one ever foresaw the second level, I think they did.) Also, the station at the expanded and rebuilt convention center (if they're gonna do that) should get built at or near TC's planned location - but it oughtta have two express and two platform tracks. I dislike the way they mistreat these old stations from the golden era. Often they're located better that the resulting re-arrangements. (I have a list somewhere of 56 or maybe 60 of them that Amtrak took a leading role in ruining.) They built something super-tall and obstructive right in from of the one in Dallas, obscuring the facade, in a place where no one would've ever thought anything would get built: supposed to be a park or plaza - square in front of the train station. Developers are all the same! Trump, whoever, they all have some kind of gigantism pathology. Probably effectively bribed the city to get the desired property on the cheap. Desired because they're all into berating old train stations, which would be better if used than any new-build expected to get built anytime soon. (Don't tell me Brightline Florida - most of them have the platforms arranged so it would be very expensive to do the (thought necessary by me only) grade separation. and then Miami Central is inexplicably 55' in the air at top-of-rail, descending abruptly on the north to land under a 12-lane H'way bridge with an 8-lane grade crossing right next to it. Don't tell me this stuff isn't intentional. It's just astonishing how all the people in the the rail industry - public/private, passenger/freight - are so much all of them off on the same diverging tangent of doom.) well I'm starting in again
I'm just amazed that at some point they managed to find 600' of right of way for the crazed I-intersection of I-30 and I-35, but 60ft for two tracks is a non-starter. On the conspiracy end, I see no good reason for the TCR Dallas station to be 7 stories up other than for it to end up passing 50' over two streets on its far north when it appears there is room to stop short entirely. Unless... this viaduct through downtown was the long-term plan all along.
@@LucidStew Ha-ha. Really can't say. Do they plan it ahead, intentionally to get a ridiculous looking bridge that's super expensive and subject to lawsuits by the neighbors? I think there's a level somewhere on which it's intentional. Look, they're even doing to England now. The freight carriers have just developed a way of doing things, for 90 years now. That is, it's the trick where you run the property down and give bad service while profiting form it. They did that with a lot of chain restaurants in NYC. Luchow's, Schrafft's, Chock Full 'O Nuts, Longchamp's - turns out they made more from the real estate than the restaurants, so they just geared it to operate that way. Schrafft's and Chock Full 'O Nuts were big operations with a lot of real estate. Schrafft's had branched into the luxury motor lodge business a decade or so prior to dissolution.
@@brucehain In the case of Dallas this conflict is quite nakedly about real estate and developing it. I find the whole thing just fascinating. I don't really have any skin in Texas doing anything, so my plan is to break out the popcorn and hope for some good fireworks.
In my opinion California has seen what has happened with brightline west how to plan a hsr at a reasonable cost but by just continuing forward at this unreasonable cost instead of taking what they have seen from brightline west and adjusting their plans is just pure ridiculousness
Yeah americans never getting proper trains soon the way these politicians hinders everything really tells that they dgaf for the betterment of the citizens just their interest😂
$202 million in CRISI is to grade separate CAHSR AND BNSF through Shafter, so that freight and a 220mph passenger train can both move through there safely. The $3.07B will pay for most of the extension into Bakersfield. Does this type of information necessitate wasting the time of upper management? It's seriously an email.
2032 is the target Dat for cahsr to open merced to bskersfield? Who in merced wants to go to bakersfield? Vice a versa. It is a money pit that is hated in californa.
They're 160 road miles apart, 100k and 400k population with a 500k city in between. Plenty of people will use it, and the entire central valley is slated to continue having significant population growth. And obviously it's the first phase of a larger system. Hated by you, maybe, but it's not gonna get canceled or anything.
They have an interesting situation there because they want to do something, but Arlington wants it to benefit them, too, while Dallas doesn't seem all that concerned about that aspect. :D Upgrading the TRE to 125mph would probably be worth the investment, but then Arlington is left out.
@@LucidStew Arlington doesn't deserve to have it benefit them when they don't even have a bus network. They haven't even done the bare minimum in terms of serving their people and they want a piece of the pie?
Gotta love how Dallas City council thinks that building a rail line 7 stories above level would be unsightly, when Dallas highway interchanges looks like dropped spaghetti.
It's more big city hypocrisy. City council need to appear to pretend to care.
I believe the two main concerns are the Hyatt and the developer that doesn't want to spend $5 billion next door only to have a 80-foot viaduct between the development and the city. The amount of freeway infrastructure supporting a mile and a quarter of I-35 on the southwest side of downtown is pretty nutty, though.
Cara Mendelsohn is an evil car-addicted suburbanite NIMBY who takes bribes from Big Oil.
Bro fr, every time I visit Dallas it looks like the city is being choked by the freeway, but no the train line is the true eyesore.
@@LucidStew The whole mess between downtown and the river bend is unsightly. They should put the HSR station on the west side of the river and instead extend a light rail connection to the hub.
"We want freeways above ground. But trains?? Nooooooo" 🙄🙄
I think they're jealous because both the Fort Worth and Arlington stations are supposed to be underground.
Cara Mendelsohn is an evil car-addicted suburbanite NIMBY who takes bribes from Big Oil. I hate her so much!
those were built decades ago and were an eyesore. We dont need another eyesore
Cara Mendelsohn is pure evil. I hate her so much!!
I'm sure Ted Cruz would support funding high speed rail if it ran from Texas to Cancun.
Cara Mendelsohn is pure evil. I hate her and her NIMBYism. I bet she would support HSR if it went across the world to Israel though.
More, like if California could hurry up and get out of its own way. lol. But great job parroting a lame DNC talking point.
@@joeblow5214 both repubs and dems are equally incompetent at building anything other than highways. The auto lobby owns both parties. I say we need a parliamentary system like European countries and Japan get to enjoy along with their bullet trains.
Him going to Cancún is probably the best thing he has done in office.
@@tonywalters7298Should have stayed there though
Life comes at your fast, Stew's News about HSR comes at you faster. 220 mph, in fact!
Me when Lucid Stew drops his monthly series of month in review 😎
3:29 Not sure if you want to call it a boo-boo, but some additional context is needed. That particular bill was never going to be passed because it was the House proposal for FY 2024 appropriations (federal FY started October 1), which is partisan and never stood a chance in the Senate. FY 2024 bipartisan appropriations were enacted in March through unrelated legislative vehicles. The FY 2025 House "markup" for the T-HUD bill is later this week, but I'd expect a similar provision for FY 2025. Bicameral appropriations talks will probably be delayed until after the November election, with "continuing resolutions" in the meantime to keep the government running. It's conceivable that such a provision could make it into final FY 2025 appropriations if there's a Republican sweep.
It took a while to work through it, but what you have here is an error of omission. Specifically, not mentioning that appropriations passed in another bill without the partisan language. There is precedent for this. The first boo boo I made in all of Stew's Newsdom was failing to identify the trainset in the video thumbnail as an Alstom Avelia. In order for this type of boo boo to be valid, it should be slightly more relevant than an explicit error, and I think this is. The context that the appropriation has passed and that Congress is not still working on passing H.R. 4820 is important even though the language of H.R. 4820 is the gist of the point.
You have yourself a boo boo! Prepare yourself. I can do nothing to hold back the incoming tide of fame.
Man... I'm addicted to these vidoes. Love em!
Our best hope for HSR is if CA senators Padilla & Butler and TX senators Cruz & Cornyn get stuck in an elevator together for 12 hours and need something in common to talk about.
How about HSR stop stealing the money and GET ON WITH IT!
Stew I don’t remember if you had this last month but some good news from Brightline East. They have enough passengers that they have ordered an extra car for each of their train sets.
They actually have 30 on order. They're supposed to get them in batches of 10 over the next 18 months and will eventually run 7 passenger cars per train compared to the current 4. I generally don't report on Brightline Florida since its not HSR. I'll probably mention it once they get the first set of 10, and then the following month to see what the impact was on ridership.
@@LucidStew Brightline East may not be HSR but they may be a good example to places thinking about building it. They have shown there can be enough passengers to offer the possibility of profit. And they have shown with a little help in land acquisition a passenger railroad can be built for a reasonable amount of money.
Really looking forward to Brightline west working well. Hopefully that will open up budgets for more interstate aligned HSR projects.
110 grade separations seem like a ton for their timeline
Yea. And not like they are going to hire 110 different crews. This is going to be bad
They won't necessarily have to build a structure for each one of those(under the I15/SR210 intersection), and in some places the same structure will go over more than 1(8th St. viaduct, and transition to the I-15 median @ Foothill Blvd.)
@@LucidStew the Olympics are in 4 years. Even if it’s done in 2027 which it won’t be, the testing after that still wouldn’t be enough time. They have claimed to be shovel ready for years now. But no construction this year. So they will start in 2025 and be open by 2028. 4-5 months of each year will have triple digit heat for most of the track. This is going to be another clown show. Grab your popcorn folks. They only want to start so they can beg for more money. Then still claim to be private. And with how much those Florida ticket prices are. It’s cheaper and faster to fly most of the time.
@@LucidSteware most of those just rebuilding existing overpasses to accommodate the BLW tracks?
@@ChrisJones-gx7fc To my knowledge they won't do much of that. Off hand I can think of four examples where they will: the SR138 interchange in Cajon Pass, Joshua St. at the Hesperia station, and D St. in Victorville, Dale Evans Pkwy just north of the Victor Valley station. It will mostly be new structures or widening the freeway where the median isn't currently wide enough to accommodate the tracks. Otherwise they plan to go around existing structures.
I love love the monthly cahsr expenditure numbers. In germany we do have lots of passenger rail infrastructure, but it's old and crumbling. So the big thing Deutsche Bahn is working on right now is a major overhaul of the most important corridors. The first overhaul is set to start next month on Riedbahn. Many contruction companies deem this impossible, but Deutsche Bahn wants to expend 1.3 billion € in 5 months (which are about 290 milllion US$ per month).
We'll see wether this will work out. I think this number is an nice perspective on the 200 million US$ monthly expenditures. Some more numbers about riedbahn corridor: 70km/43mi, max speed: 200km/h, 125 mi/h
I think at some point it boils down to experience and organizational capacity. Most things are possible. Large projects with seemingly improbable logistics have been pulled off consistently since the early 20th century. It'll probably come in a little over budget and finish a little late, but I think in regards to large projects an ambitious schedule is probably better than a cautious one.
Measuring progress on CAHSR in months is interesting, since decades might be more appropriate. These endless delays with EIRs like at Union Station are a direct result of paranoid regulatory mindset.
Plus they don't have the funding. In both cases.
@@LucidStew Exactly. No one has wanted to pay for this from the start.
@@mattc3696 Plus in both cases the costs have gotten out of control. Link US not quite as bad, but it has inflated about 3X. In the case of both, original cost is probably doable.
I’d love to see you make a map of all the high speed rail routes you would want built (if there was suddenly a massive amount of funding given for HSR projects)
I'm working through the FRA's high speed corridors. Once I'm done with that series, I will make a video for what I think is good and practical on a national scale. I have South Central(Texas/Oklahoma/Arkansas) and Southeast(Virginia to Georgia) left. I might have that done by end September(SEHSR will likely be 2 videos since its a big subject), but I might save the national video for December, since its a big month for RUclips.
Siemens’ proposal to Nevada DOT/BLW to be chosen as the preferred train manufacturer included them building their plant in Nevada, according to the December 2023 Railway Age article about NVDOT’s request to the FRA for BLW’s exemption from “Buy America” for certain HSR components currently not able to be made in the US, which I would figure would cement that as the location where the plant will be.
I also figure that Siemens saying their new plant would be in Nevada was to help coax NVDOT to choose them as that would mean Nevada jobs, since Alstom would be in NY. If it were up to me though, I’d place the plant in like Victor Valley area, so it’d be in California but alongside the BLW tracks, which could be the best compromise between BLW and California HSR, should in fact CAHSR also choose Siemens which is most likely.
I just resigned to get your articles on trains . I find them very interesting.
I shall try to continue to create interesting content!
On the subject of Texas Central, it's also worth mentioning that the Texas GOP's platform, which came out the end of last month, explicitly comes out against government funding and eminent domain for HSR. The political hurdles for Texas Central are steep.
The GOP seems to have a bone to pick with rail.
@tonywalters7298 because rail has a bone to pick with oil if it's electrified. I see Southwest Airlines, and the Texas based portion of the U.S. oil industries hands all over this sudden turn.
Well the state supreme court already ruled Texas Central can use imminent domain, so, I'm not sure what hurdle there is left, unless they plan on changing the current laws.
and if that's what most texans want, fine. Stop dictating what other states should do
and if that's what most texas want, then they should respect it.
Hi Stew I live for this update monthly thank you
You're welcome. Thank you for watching!
Woo, new upload
I do not believe for one second Brightline West is going to be done by mid 2028. I know in theory since they are somewhat following the interstate it should be easier but looking at the route I don't feel this is true. It is not easier to work in a small space between east and west bound interstate roadways. It actually has to be harder than a lot of CAHSR that can access the right of way from many places and has a large prep work area in most places. Brightline West has to alter and level, build up or wall so much of the route. Then build all those above grade crossings, which we know takes years to get a strong enough viaduct for high speed rail. I actually think the preliminary Merced to Bakersfield CAHSR route might finish before Brightline West.
I'm willing to wait until they start, to see if they're able to generate a pace that makes that possible. I'm not yet ready to say they won't, but I too have serious doubts. The volume of work necessary is quite large. I think few things are impossible, but they will have to get out of the gate extremely quickly and make tremendous progress all the way through completion. There is definitely no room for making up deficits. I think we'll have a pretty good idea by this time next year. I'm planning on covering it, I'll have my drone with me and I probably won't be the only person doing that either.
The one thing they have in their favor at the moment is that their progress has been consistent and they've been ticking the boxes they need to tick since the beginning of last year. So, for me, they don't currently have the performance baggage of CAHSR where my first inclination is to not give them the benefit of the doubt.
@@LucidStew I hope I eat my words and they get it done.
9:58 Is this the AP220? The higher roof section is as high as in the renders and the window frames look the same.
I believe that's a Velaro. If I remember correctly I got that from Siemens media assets looking specifically for Velaro stuff, of which they have surprisingly little video available.
I keep looking forward to news on New York's Empire HSR project. But as with any rail improvements in NY, we do a LOT of talking, but end up doing just about nothing. With our buddy Schumer in there, I would expect to see more progress on the Empire State's HSR. Yes, although the NEC does pass through NY State, its only for about 10 miles :-). Another rail route links the largest 7 cities in NY State, along with Toronto, Montreal, Boston and Cincinnati. And although the NEC is and should be a priority, we in Upstate need HSR also... what are we?... chopped beef??
New York chose a 90mph option from NYC to Buffalo. Its supposed to be implemented over 25 years.
Happy cows 🐄
Great content!
thank you!
Why couldn’t they use the Dallas Union Station?
They're going off of what TCR was approved for 4 years ago. The TCR station is next to land that one of the principle TCR investors owns. I'm sure you're sensing a theme here. It's essentially devolving into who can throw their weight around the most. I'm sure Amtrak would be fine with Dallas Union, but then they'd need a new EIS, and that would be a very real avenue into obstructing TCR another decade or two. This is American politics at its finest before our eyes.
Because the evil NIMBY Cara Mendelsohn said so.
Dallas wants a study. Olympic gold medal level dithering.
Cara Mendelsohn is an evil car-addicted suburbanite NIMBY who takes bribes from Big Oil. I hate her so much!
CAHSR bomb damage.
Cara Mendelsohn is pure evil. I hate her so much!!
I would improve the California High Speed Rail by reversing its existence !
Hilarious that you thought Dallas-FW constructing high speed rail would be competitive with CAHSR and would open sooner or even the same time LMAO
Before this wrinkle they were planning to have the EIS done middle of next year. It's only 30 miles of track.
Cara Mendelsohn is pure evil. I hate her so much!!
Hey you can't put a train on the big, beautiful freeway. FRA Rules require a forty-foot steel wall that's 10 feet wide at the bottom. Better to be safe.
There's a lot of spare room on that side of the freeway! 😁
I haven't even watch the video yet. But I've been in Texas for nearly three months for work…
Please build the damn train.
The hours of my life I wasted away sitting in traffic going to Dallas and Austin from San Antonio I will never get back.
It is nearly all urban/suburban from SA to DFW. Serving what has to be nearly 8 million people? This is just a no brainer…
Rant over…
Might be a really long time before they get down to S.A., although I think if they build Houston-Fort Worth and it does well, they will almost certainly complete the Triangle or the T-Bone.
If you want decent passenger rail, you have to elect Democrats instead of Republicans. Both parties are very clear on this.
@Geoptf
No, we need to educate our opponents and convince the GOP to support HSR. Bi-partisan support is what will help most.
It's the evil NIMBY Cara Mendelsohn's fault.
Stew - Will Brightline West have any at-grade crossings?
Sorry for the delay on this one. YT didn't alert me. It will have no at-grade crossings.
Toronto would be nice w/those accelerate trains tbqh.
Re. LA Union Station those curves are real screechers. It's little faster than to just start out going north. Alemeda St. makes it simple, to get to both the bolt-straight SP lines to Santa Ana - and the existing Shore Line, like Balboa seeing the Pacific for the 1st time. The highway that crosses under Alemeda is sort of obstructive, but they could produce a beautiful addition (like they have with other additions to the station, with natural light, etc.) to reach Alemeda St. underground, maybe a few feet lower than optimum on the south, and maybe with the station a few feet north of where you would expect.
One thing I find interesting is that all of this is in aid of a massive expansion of arrivals and departures that the current configuration apparently can't support. For the most part this will be the case due to Metrolink expanding to half hour headways for the Olympics. At least with New York City the argument for congestion pricing is that it will allow further expansion of transit. Here we're going to expand transit despite lack of demand to justify congestion pricing, in theory creating demand for the thing we built. No mention of what happens if the demand still doesn't show up.
@@LucidStew Seems with all the trackwork properly hooked up to the north the station would have a lot more capacity than current needs. 16 or 17 tracks (I just looked) and notice they left room for center tracks to allow shorter trains to double up on the platforms. (never seen that before) though I understand there's a lot of transit entities using Union Station, along with doubling the schedule of every train eventually. I'm mostly afraid they will find a way to get rid of Madison Square Garden on top of Penn Station, and then they'll rip it all out and replace it with something having like half the train capacity. This kind of stuff is already ongoing with the LIRR - they are REDUCING the capacity while saying they're expanding it. (They put a giant new platform (with grade issues at their like-40-degree crossover 'cause one leg goes over a flyover that's too close. It's ludicrous. The new platform blocks all three thru tracks completely, So as a result their claiming they can no longer to cross-platform transfers at Jamaica, which is like cross-platform capitol of the world. Or was. They want to do them, quote: "On the Fly". Jamaica Capacity "Improvements"
There is no way to put any more train capacity in the existing Penn Station footprint - can't be done - It has a v-shaped set of double ladders where the platform tracks originate on the far track of the ladder, then cross the near track with a slip switch on their way to the platforms, to make for more-or-less directional double ladders when no direction is particularly emphasized. Then the ladders run together in the giant cluster #$% that is Interlocking A, under 9th Avenue, which resolves right at the interlocking to six E--W tracks all spaced 12 feet apart (You never see that) that run to 10th Avenue 1000 feet west. (Cross town blocks are long.) The reason for the close spacing is it make it so there's no jog running through the switches at Interlocking A. Fly through there at 30 or 35. Once they're allowed to get rid of it they'll certainly replace it with something inferior, while complaining about capacity problems the whole time.
@@brucehain I ran across a document for LA Union, and now I don't recall where it was, but it shows "current" I think was 2018 amount of arrivals/departures, projected 2026, and then projected 2040(for CAHSR arrival). Of course this was before COVID, which essentially invalidated the entire idea for the time being. But current 2024 is now less than 2018, and something like 20% less than 2026 projected. And of course you're more likely to win the lottery than make any money betting that CAHSR will be at LA Union by 2040, where(get this) arrivals/departures were supposed to TRIPLE. There's a steady transit comeback the last couple of years, but transit usage in the L.A. is way down from its peak in something like 2013. It seems, though, that to justify all this they will do their best to triple arrivals/departures anyway.
It's decoupled from reality and starting to become an offering to the climate deity. We're simultaneously bailing out transit agencies due to lack of ridership WHILE expanding their capacity.
The real justification has very little to do with climate, LA county is already losing / stagnating in population due to other transit options (cars on freeways) being at capacity. The only viable option is investing in a capable transit network that can support current demand and future growth. Given the sprawling nature of so-cal HSR is needed to bridge large distances quickly vs the current slow light rail system which is only practical for short trips less than 10 miles
@@boxemshipem1142 This doesn't really jibe with the geographic realities of the L.A. area. It's out of space except for in the desert. The only place for L.A.(and even L.A. County) to grow at this point is up, which would point to local transit, not intercity. CAHSR will be a drop in the bucket when it comes to the regional solution. Ok, so you're going to be able to ship another 10-20,000 people out to Lancaster. Not exactly a solution to a 10 million person problem.
Personally, I think it would be foolish for Siemens NOT to construct the BLW HSTs in CA/NV as it would be seen favourably by State Politicians, whom love to be able to present “Job Creation” to the voter
No updates on Brightline Tampa extension?
There was some sort of informal meeting, but nothing of substance that I ran across. Brightline organizes these projects as separate companies. It isn't necessarily one waiting on the other, but I think BLW about to begin construction and Brightline Miami-Orlando trying to ramp up capacity puts that on the back burner for the next couple of years.
Shumer doesn't deserve the right to build Siemens equipment. They can't even build Alstom equipment right.
fcan you do a bit about the upgrading of the plattsburg- monyeal line.
For 30 MPH? :D lol...
Phoenix is dead and has no water. Choose CYMPO and Prescott valley area for all your needs. Well BRING WOOD
Personaly ,for Dallas center,rather than building a lost station near cadiz st....i would build the HSL station, and also for additional local traffic, literally above the tracks at Union station.
Basically build 2 more levels. One for the mezzanine and the exchange room ("salle des pas perdus/hall of lost steps" as we say in France), and above, the platforms and tracks (totally covered by a glass roof or a roof with glass sections (to be seen) of the HSL and possibly tracks for additional local traffic.
Advantages:
no need for additional land
Quicker to build than an underground station
We do not touch the historic building
We drown out the noise of the freight trains at the Hyatt (they are enclosed in a concrete structure).
disadvantages:
requires a viaduct before and after
Nimbys will cry because it blocks their view
work on the current station (plant the pillars, and install the roof of level 0/floor level 1)
If you see others, don't hesitate.
I hate Cara Mendelsohn so much!!
Two reasons that's not happening. Dallas City Council voted 16-0 against elevated tracks through downtown, and Amtrak will not be abandoning the Cadiz St. station because it is already environmentally approved. Restarting that process could take 4-5 years and would open a door to shutting the whole project down.
@@LucidStew it's a shame, a station raised above another is the guarantee of short (vertical) connections and with a minimal environmental impact (which seems to be close to their hearts) because we don't use additional land. we end up with 2 stations separated by 500m which will not attract anyone.
Europe and Asia are setting the example, we simply have to follow.
As for the municipal council's refusal, I suppose it's because of the nimbies who are putting pressure.
commenting for the algo!
screw the stupid "algorithm" and everyone's worship of it these days. RUclips was better prior to 2018 before the "algorithm" crap existed.
Nice for Hanford I guess that the giant viaduct is being built, although Kings/Tulare is definitely going to be the most wasteful station for CAHSR. The old bridge thing fir NEC is obstruction regardless of historical merit, fast trains are an environmental priority. Good to see funding for more needed projects. And good to see Brightline West progress.
The gangly Dallas viaduct is just not necessary - not significantly shorter or faster so as to ever make any appreciable difference - though probably has an appreciable price tag. (I wonder how it would come out if you calculated the amount they get for each one of those squiggly colored lines on the front of the Study Document, and what percent of them would be usable at all.) What they really need is to combine the High Speed, Amtrak and DART all at Union Station, and make more room by opening an upper level of platforms - since the orig. main waiting room was on a high 2nd floor level. (The more-or-less current alignment from the Trinity River Bridge - with a new parallel bridge - would afford a nice gradual grade, not gangly but smart looking.)
The Waiting Room is a gorgeous one now used as a believed not-much-frequented banquet hall. In olden days there were complaints because there wasn't any escalator. There should be several. I think they did eventually have two at one point. You can have plenty of air and light in an even slightly lower DART terminal, but the higher tracks for high-speed/Amtrak would be a major improvement over the original config. (I think they must have been cost cutting at the time it was built, though it may be no one ever foresaw the second level, I think they did.)
Also, the station at the expanded and rebuilt convention center (if they're gonna do that) should get built at or near TC's planned location - but it oughtta have two express and two platform tracks. I dislike the way they mistreat these old stations from the golden era. Often they're located better that the resulting re-arrangements. (I have a list somewhere of 56 or maybe 60 of them that Amtrak took a leading role in ruining.) They built something super-tall and obstructive right in from of the one in Dallas, obscuring the facade, in a place where no one would've ever thought anything would get built: supposed to be a park or plaza - square in front of the train station. Developers are all the same! Trump, whoever, they all have some kind of gigantism pathology. Probably effectively bribed the city to get the desired property on the cheap. Desired because they're all into berating old train stations, which would be better if used than any new-build expected to get built anytime soon. (Don't tell me Brightline Florida - most of them have the platforms arranged so it would be very expensive to do the (thought necessary by me only) grade separation. and then Miami Central is inexplicably 55' in the air at top-of-rail, descending abruptly on the north to land under a 12-lane H'way bridge with an 8-lane grade crossing right next to it. Don't tell me this stuff isn't intentional. It's just astonishing how all the people in the the rail industry - public/private, passenger/freight - are so much all of them off on the same diverging tangent of doom.) well I'm starting in again
I'm just amazed that at some point they managed to find 600' of right of way for the crazed I-intersection of I-30 and I-35, but 60ft for two tracks is a non-starter. On the conspiracy end, I see no good reason for the TCR Dallas station to be 7 stories up other than for it to end up passing 50' over two streets on its far north when it appears there is room to stop short entirely. Unless... this viaduct through downtown was the long-term plan all along.
@@LucidStew Ha-ha. Really can't say. Do they plan it ahead, intentionally to get a ridiculous looking bridge that's super expensive and subject to lawsuits by the neighbors? I think there's a level somewhere on which it's intentional. Look, they're even doing to England now. The freight carriers have just developed a way of doing things, for 90 years now. That is, it's the trick where you run the property down and give bad service while profiting form it. They did that with a lot of chain restaurants in NYC. Luchow's, Schrafft's, Chock Full 'O Nuts, Longchamp's - turns out they made more from the real estate than the restaurants, so they just geared it to operate that way. Schrafft's and Chock Full 'O Nuts were big operations with a lot of real estate. Schrafft's had branched into the luxury motor lodge business a decade or so prior to dissolution.
@@brucehain In the case of Dallas this conflict is quite nakedly about real estate and developing it. I find the whole thing just fascinating. I don't really have any skin in Texas doing anything, so my plan is to break out the popcorn and hope for some good fireworks.
Cara Mendelsohn is pure evil.
Cara Mendelsohn is pure evil. I hate her so much!!
In my opinion California has seen what has happened with brightline west how to plan a hsr at a reasonable cost but by just continuing forward at this unreasonable cost instead of taking what they have seen from brightline west and adjusting their plans is just pure ridiculousness
W
Yeah americans never getting proper trains soon the way these politicians hinders everything really tells that they dgaf for the betterment of the citizens just their interest😂
"beloved Chuck Schumer"? Lol nice joke
our hero
I'd rather there be a fishing expedition than no investigation on just were all that money for CHSR is going.
$202 million in CRISI is to grade separate CAHSR AND BNSF through Shafter, so that freight and a 220mph passenger train can both move through there safely. The $3.07B will pay for most of the extension into Bakersfield. Does this type of information necessitate wasting the time of upper management? It's seriously an email.
We don't need high speed rail. we just need passenger services that own their own tracks and go high-ish speed.
Ok. Just so you know this is a channel about high speed rail.
No, we definitely need a high-speed rail
what is the joke about Pete Buttigieg?
I personally don't find anything funny about him. Chuck Schumer on the other hand... happy cows is pretty good.
@@LucidStew buttigieg meme request: cut to his "High Hopes" dance every time his name is mentioned
@@shsd4130 but Pete already has a theme...
2032 is the target Dat for cahsr to open merced to bskersfield? Who in merced wants to go to bakersfield? Vice a versa. It is a money pit that is hated in californa.
Supposed to be 2030-2033. I would count 2030 out at this point. My money personally is on 2032, atm, but if one is optimistic, 2031 is still possible.
They're 160 road miles apart, 100k and 400k population with a 500k city in between. Plenty of people will use it, and the entire central valley is slated to continue having significant population growth. And obviously it's the first phase of a larger system. Hated by you, maybe, but it's not gonna get canceled or anything.
California’s new rail line has become a gigantic mistake. Can Texas avoid that?
They have an interesting situation there because they want to do something, but Arlington wants it to benefit them, too, while Dallas doesn't seem all that concerned about that aspect. :D Upgrading the TRE to 125mph would probably be worth the investment, but then Arlington is left out.
@@LucidStew Arlington doesn't deserve to have it benefit them when they don't even have a bus network. They haven't even done the bare minimum in terms of serving their people and they want a piece of the pie?
Only if the evil NIMBY Cara Mendelsohn is kicked out of office.
Cara Mendelsohn is pure evil. I hate her so much!!
To be fair, Arlington does have a minibus system.
I just went on youtube and got a new video of @LucidStew, it's the best.😁