Quote:
Originally Posted by Hatman
This is a fair point. No, I cannot see a viable way it could happen. If a government were to propose one, VTUSA would complain that the government is now subsidizing their competitor. And it would take some serious government investment for VTUSA to upgrade to a true HSR, which would make a lot of people angry that a government is subsidizing a private company.
Now that we've got a private rail service, we're kind of stuck with it. The only thing we can really do is tend the market forces that would allow the private company to expand their service offerings.
I get why this is so disappointing, since it would have been really cool to have an electrified 160 mph+ train that could really show people what they are missing. Instead we get a diesel powered train that will hit 125 mph for a very brief stretch sometime in 2022. Perhaps the segment to Tampa will be close to what was originally proposed, but even then the 125 mph limit will exist, and if timelines for that project are consistent with what we've seen with the Orlando segment, it probably won't open until 2030.
But here's the thing: It Exists. There is an awesome rail terminus in Miami right now, and people are riding around on a for-profit train service for the first time in ~25 years.
Similarly, corridor service between LA and LV has been proposed for years, from maglevs to 220+mph trains to hyperloops and everything else under the sun - but yet today there is nothing. The current VTUSA proposal seems like the most likely thing to actually get built - so I say "Move over revolution, you've had your chance! Let's give incrementalism a try!"
You could see this as the government failing so badly that the private sector can actually make a profit - sort of like a failure to deliver clean drinking water that allows bottled water makers to mark up their prices. I prefer to see it as the first incremental step into a new transportation paradigm. With the rise of robo-taxis, subsidized roads won't be seen so much as an indisputable public good but rather a government subsidy to car-operating companies. People will become passengers wherever they go, so mode will become less important. The market and corporate competition will shape transportation more than planners and policy-makers, which has the potential to cut down on waste.
But to be less grandiose, my desire for VTUSA to use BNSF tracks to run conventionally into LA stem mostly from my impatience to see anything get done. Relying on governments and revolutionary proposals hasn't worked. If I am ever going to ride a train from LA to LV in my lifetime, some compromises will have to be made, and from the corporate perspective of VTUSA, running on freight tracks at conventional speeds seems like the only solution to this as-yet unsolved problem.
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Even with CHSR, they were not going to have trains running at 200 mph north of San Jose, or south of Santa Clarita. Once most HSR trains reach suburbia, they slow down. So a LV to LA train, HSR or not, reaches the LA basin, they will slow down anyways possibly to as slow as 60-80 mph but at least to 110-125 mph.
Taking this conversation to Florida, the only places HSR could achieve 200 mph speeds is on elevated guideways over swamps. Maybe speeds up to 150 mph could have been reached following the Florida Turnpike closely, within the existing right-of-way, but to reach 200 mph speeds it would have had to leave the existing turnpike right-of-way frequently. This would have placed the all train stations in south Florida 10 miles west of the beaches and destinations passengers would have wanted to go. You would of had HSR, but not a great one!
Brightline or Virgin will actually provide a train service to where the passengers wish to go in Florida. How many passenger will it attract is yet to be seen, it will only go faster than 110 mph once it turns west from the beaches heading towards Orlando, on an elevated guideway over a swamp in an existing tollway right-of-way.
Back to LV to LA Virgin HSR trains, does it need to go faster than 125 mph in the LA basin surrounded by suburbia? I do not think so. But I do not think either the BNSF or UP will allow sharing of their tracks for a multiple trains a day passenger service. So Brightline will probably have to build an elevated guideway from San Bernardino to LA, or Santa Clarita to LA following an existing freeways or other transportation corridors. Here is another reason why CHSR should have built the LA to Bakersfield section first, because with its absence it makes it extremely difficult to build a HSR from LV all the way into LA.
It is far more important to match the trains speeds to what is politically and economically possible than to what is technically possible. It is technically possible to have jet liners travel faster than the speed of sound, but not everywhere politically and economically. Sure, HSR is technically possible, but is it politically and economically everywhere?