Heavy Rail, Commuter Rail, & Intercity Transportation

[Migrant_Coconut]

IF the study comes back a long while from now and says HSR is the way forward - and Biden's still around to pay for it - then of course the smart choice is to fork over our share of it while the ball is rolling.

That hasn't happened yet, and until then, there's decent reasons to argue that it's a little too far ahead of its time. HFR (e.g. a 2WAD Amtrak Cascades) instead of HSR may get us similar results for much less money.

[aberdeen5698]

Originally Posted by Changing City

There's no assumption on my part that if a high-speed rail project were to be built in Cascadia, it would all be public money. It could be a part private project like Brightline has been...

Nah, private equity needs a real business case that shows a return on investment. You won't find that in Cascadia high speed rail, even if a healthy portion is publicly funded.

All these "wouldn't it be neat if..." project ideas are reminiscent of the many white elephant projects in China, which is hemorrhaging money on HSR lines that were built in anticipation of demand that (at least so far) hasn't materialized. On some lines they can't even break even on the operational costs, let alone service the debt incurred actually building the them. The same kind of rampant overbuilding created the forests of empty condo buildings and ghost cities that precipitated their real estate crisis in China. Nobody wants that kind of thing happening here.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by aberdeen5698

Nah, private equity needs a real business case that shows a return on investment. You won't find that in Cascadia high speed rail, even if a healthy portion is publicly funded.

All these "wouldn't it be neat if..." project ideas are reminiscent of the many white elephant projects in China, which is hemorrhaging money on HSR lines that were built in anticipation of demand that (at least so far) hasn't materialized. On some lines they can't even break even on the operational costs, let alone service the debt incurred actually building the them. The same kind of rampant overbuilding created the forests of empty condo buildings and ghost cities that precipitated their real estate crisis in China. Nobody wants that kind of thing happening here.

The relevent population served by Brightline in Florida seems to be much less? It carried 1.2m passengers in 2022 with an hourly service taking 3.5 hours from end to end. (Extra trains have just been announced). There are six stops, Miami has 450,000 population, Aventura 39,000, Fort Lauderdale 183,000, Boca Raton 99,000, West Palm Beach 121,000 and Orlando has 316,000. That seems to be orders of magnitude less than the potential Cascadia population centres, although the Cascadia line would be longer (but also faster, as it doesn't plan to use shared track as the Florida trains currently do).

[Migrant_Coconut]

That's city population; the metro population for those cities and towns is 9.23 million, so roughly the same as us. Florida may have less dense urban areas, but it's also smaller, flatter and more populous overall.

OTOH some of the busiest train lines in the Western Hemisphere run under the Alps, so it's almost like each region is unique and direct comparisons don't always hold up.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

That's city population; the metro population for those cities and towns is 9.23 million, so roughly the same as us. Florida may have less dense urban areas, but it's also smaller, flatter and more populous overall.

OTOH some of the busiest train lines in the Western Hemisphere run under the Alps, so it's almost like each region is unique and direct comparisons don't always hold up.

Thanks, that makes more sense. I thought the city population was too small to justify that sort of investment. And you're right that direct comparisons will always be dodgy, but it's one of the few recent examples of a new line being built.

[SFUVancouver]

I think the paradigm shift for North American high speed rail will come when the separate segments begin being connected. To do that, one has to build the first segments. A Cascadian HSR connecting Portland-Seattle-Metro Vancouver linking up with the California HSR connecting San Francisco to LA and San Diego would create a west coast corridor that would be a compelling alternative to flying and driving. We're talking rebuilding I-5 and all the airports-level capital costs, but if we're serious about decarbonizing transportation and, you know, not giving up on keeping the planet habitable for humans, this is the scale of investment with which we need to come to grips.

[jollyburger]

Originally Posted by SFUVancouver

I think the paradigm shift for North American high speed rail will come when the separate segments begin being connected. To do that, one has to build the first segments. A Cascadian HSR connecting Portland-Seattle-Metro Vancouver linking up with the California HSR connecting San Francisco to LA and San Diego would create a west coast corridor that would be a compelling alternative to flying and driving. We're talking rebuilding I-5 and all the airports-level capital costs, but if we're serious about decarbonizing transportation and, you know, not giving up on keeping the planet habitable for humans, this is the scale of investment with which we need to come to grips.

I-5 is getting rebuilt because it's falling apart. I mean are you going to have cargo cars attached to the HSR to transport goods?

They barely have enough money to build a segment in California and you are going to link up Portland down to California where there isn't any single population base with how many bridges/tunnels? Banning people from travelling outside their home region seems more likely at reducing their carbon footprint than huge HSR links in North America.

[FarmerHaight]

Originally Posted by SFUVancouver

I think the paradigm shift for North American high speed rail will come when the separate segments begin being connected.

There is no need to link up Cascadia HSR with CAHSR. The Pacific Northwest has enough enough cities that are large enough and close enough together with enough car and plane trips between them to justify HSR all on its own.

The claim that Vancouver - Seattle - Portland isn't "Tokyo to Osaka" or Beijing to Shanghai is obvious enough, but claim that Cascadia HSR would have no comps gets harder when you realize Rome (4.4M) and Turin (2.2M), Warsaw (3.5M) and Krakow (1.5M), and Lisbon (3.0M) and Porto (1.8M) are all connected by HSR.

[VancouverOfTheFuture]

Originally Posted by FarmerHaight

but claim that Cascadia HSR would have no comps gets harder when you realize Rome (4.4M) and Turin (2.2M), Warsaw (3.5M) and Krakow (1.5M), and Lisbon (3.0M) and Porto (1.8M) are all connected by HSR.

that crosses 7 countries, where as this would cross 2 countries. the EU HSR is also a mess to use. the countries it crosses in europe have a population of 241 million. the province/states this one would pass through has 56 million.

you cant compare europe to north america. we are much larger and much more spread out. BC alone is 1.7x larger than just france. its not the same formula as europe. and it never will be.

berlin - madird, the 2 largest cities in europe is 2300km. NYC - LA, the 2 largest cities in the usa is 4,500km.

add in the fact its multiple countries paying for it vs just 1. NA is just at a much larger scale than europe. it is why high speed rail will never really work here. not to mention we have the rocky mountains to contend with. while the alps are tall, they take up a much smaller foot print than the rocky's. getting high speed rail through those will be a very expensive endeavour.

[ilikeredheads]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

that crosses 7 countries, where as this would cross 2 countries. the EU HSR is also a mess to use. the countries it crosses in europe have a population of 241 million. the province/states this one would pass through has 56 million.

you cant compare europe to north america. we are much larger and much more spread out. BC alone is 1.7x larger than just france. its not the same formula as europe. and it never will be.

berlin - madird, the 2 largest cities in europe is 2300km. NYC - LA, the 2 largest cities in the usa is 4,500km.

add in the fact its multiple countries paying for it vs just 1. NA is just at a much larger scale than europe. it is why high speed rail will never really work here. not to mention we have the rocky mountains to contend with. while the alps are tall, they take up a much smaller foot print than the rocky's. getting high speed rail through those will be a very expensive endeavour.

pretty much this.

It's why I said "population density" in previous post but people seem to ignore that.


Despite having a vast passenger rail network, HSR in EU still has its share of issues, such as too many administrative red tape, and the amount of time save compared to other modes of transport not justifying the massive cost spent on HSR.
https://op.europa.eu/webpub/eca/special-reports/high-speed-rail-19-2018/en/#chapter4


HSR has its advantages, but it has very niche applications. In order to run at 300km/h, it creates a laundry list of technical challenges to tackle, like track layout, noise, tunnels (and shockwaves when entering them), power delivery (news flash, HSR are power hogs), all of which drives up costs significantly. It defeats its purpose if you don't operate it close to its design speed. And as the above report shows, that's exactly what is happening in EU where most of the lines run at sub 50% its design speed. Vast majority of the time, you are better off upgrading a conventional line to do 160km/h than building a 300km/h line from scratch.

[VancouverOfTheFuture]

Originally Posted by ilikeredheads

pretty much this.

It's why I said "population density" in previous post but people seem to ignore that.

i have found when it comes to rail, people just love to talk about how the EU is an amazing eutopia and north america is the absolute worst. and how we could be just as good as the EU so easily!!!! nope, we cant.

Originally Posted by ilikeredheads

Despite having a vast passenger rail network, HSR in EU still has its share of issues, such as too many administrative red tape, and the amount of time save compared to other modes of transport not justifying the massive cost spent on HSR.
https://op.europa.eu/webpub/eca/special-reports/high-speed-rail-19-2018/en/#chapter4

its funny how that pandemic train to promote the EU train network. it took 3 separate train sets and 55 different locomotives. at least with our slower rail, VIA, Amtrak, we can use 1 train/locomotive for the trip.

Originally Posted by ilikeredheads

HSR has its advantages, but it has very niche applications. In order to run at 300km/h, it creates a laundry list of technical challenges to tackle, like track layout, noise, tunnels (and shockwaves when entering them), power delivery (news flash, HSR are power hogs), all of which drives up costs significantly. It defeats its purpose if you don't operate it close to its design speed. And as the above report shows, that's exactly what is happening in EU where most of the lines run at sub 50% its design speed. Vast majority of the time, you are better off upgrading a conventional line to do 160km/h than building a 300km/h line from scratch.

i didn't realize the operate so slow... eek. really does defeat the purpose. all that $$$ and its a pain in the — to use. i dont think there is any real use case for HSR in north america. maybe on the north east corridor.

geography, population density, distance are major factors that make HSR a waste of resources better spent on things like SkyTrain, SFU Gondola.

[FarmerHaight]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

that crosses 7 countries, where as this would cross 2 countries. the EU HSR is also a mess to use. the countries it crosses in europe have a population of 241 million. the province/states this one would pass through has 56 million.

you cant compare europe to north america. we are much larger and much more spread out. BC alone is 1.7x larger than just france. its not the same formula as europe. and it never will be.

berlin - madird, the 2 largest cities in europe is 2300km. NYC - LA, the 2 largest cities in the usa is 4,500km.

add in the fact its multiple countries paying for it vs just 1. NA is just at a much larger scale than europe. it is why high speed rail will never really work here. not to mention we have the rocky mountains to contend with. while the alps are tall, they take up a much smaller foot print than the rocky's. getting high speed rail through those will be a very expensive endeavour.

Either you didn't comprehend my comment or you know very little about European HSR. Maybe both.
I listed city pairs contained within three separate networks, not one continuous network. So talking about the finances and populations of seven countries is irrelevant. Washington's GDP alone is higher than Portugal's and almost exceeds Poland's, and this is ignoring the fact that the richest Federal government in the world finances the lion's share of most infrastructure projects in the US.

Comparing land masses is silly. Yes, North America as a whole is very spread out but we have regions that are much less so. Vancouver - Seattle - Portland are all optimally spaced for HSR. Any closer and you start to lose the benefits of the higher speeds, because just as you get out of a city and up to speed you are slowing down to enter the next city. British Columbia may be almost twice the size of France, but 53% of our population lives in an area the size of Samoa, and the Metro Vancouver regional district just happens to be directly north of six of Washington's eleven most-populated counties.

I am not sure in what world Berlin or Madrid have larger populations than Moscow or London or Paris, but I'll give you two Wikipedia quotes; one quote is about Chicago and one is about Berlin.

The region covers an area of 30,545 square kilometres (11,793 sq mi) with a total population of about 6.2 million.

Encompassing 28,120 km2, the metropolitan area includes (redacted). The MSA had a 2020 census population of 9,618,502 and the combined statistical area which spans up to 19 counties had a population of nearly 10 million people.

Can you guess which quote is about which city? "Counties" probably gave it away, but that's right: Chicago has more people in a smaller area than Berlin, and is 1,100 kilometres closer to NYC than Berlin is to Madrid. What's your point?

I touched on this above, but most of the HSR networks in Europe have been paid for by one country, all of which were and are much poorer than the USA and several of which have a lower GDP than Canada. France's network started with Paris to Lyon and didn't connect to London for 15 years. Italy still does not have any HSR connections to the rest of Europe largely because of those pesky Alps you brushed aside, but luckily the Rockies aren't a problem for Cascadia HSR. Ditto Portugal and Turkey.

Saying that North America isn't Europe or Asia is both obviously correct and incredibly lazy. Hell, France isn't Tokyo but that didn't stop the French from copying the Japanese Shinkansen.

[FarmerHaight]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

i didn't realize the operate so slow... eek. really does defeat the purpose. all that $$$ and its a pain in the — to use.

Did you even read the report, or at least the Executive Summary? The report doesn't even begin to suggest that the issues with European HSR "defeat the purpose".

For a successful continuation of EU co-funding for high-speed rail infrastructure in the next programming period, we recommend that the Commission should take a number of steps. These include:

(i) carrying out realistic long-term planning; and agreeing with the Member States the key strategic stretches to be implemented first, with close monitoring and enforceable powers to ensure that commitments to complete the core EU high-speed rail network are respected;
(ii) making EU co-funding support linked to earmarked strategic priority projects, effective on-track competition and achievement of results;
(iii) simplifying cross-border constructions with regard to tendering procedures, the use of “one-stop-shops” for the formalities, and the lifting of all remaining barriers;
(iv) actions to improve seamless high-speed rail operations for passengers, such as, for example, e-ticketing, simplification of track access charges and improving the reporting to citizens on punctuality and customer satisfaction data.

You'll note that none of these suggestions include rolling-back the development of new HSR projects. Instead the issues with European HSR are excessive red tape between different operators and governments. Luckily the US and Canada are 2 countries, not a patchwork of 27 countries like the EU, and the vast majority of identified HSR corridors in North America are located in 1 country, if not 1 state. Yes, Canada and the US will need to cooperate on a Cascadia HSR line but that can't be any more difficult than negotiate track sharing with the freight rail lines.

[LeftCoaster]

I think a lot of people are missing the point here.

Yes NA is a sparsely populated continent compared to Europe, but it does have dense sections, not just the eastern seaboard, and those sections are perfectly apt for rail transport. No one (that I can tell) is proposing a link from Vancouver to Kansas City or Winnipeg, this is focused application for intra-city trips within regions. I don't think it makes any sense to link up Cascadia rail with California rail, but individually those systems make sense.

Cascadia is over 12 million in a nice linear ~50,000sq km corridor, and most importantly it's growing quickly both economically and demographically. Just to put in into perspective that is more people than Portugal in a smaller area. Slightly larger than Belgium in both population and area, and most importantly growing much faster and all laid out in a nice easy to serve by rail line.

Another point to make that seems to be not discussed is revenue. While I don't expect this to be a cash cow, it will be taking in significant revenue as I'm sure tickets will be $100+ to Seattle. This is not necessarily the case for alternative investments like skytrain (though I do think skytrain's farebox recovery is quite high), or highway upgrades.

[jollyburger]

Originally Posted by LeftCoaster

I think a lot of people are missing the point here.

...

Another point to make that seems to be not discussed is revenue. While I don't expect this to be a cash cow, it will be taking in significant revenue as I'm sure tickets will be $100+ to Seattle. This is not necessarily the case for alternative investments like skytrain (though I do think skytrain's farebox recovery is quite high), or highway upgrades.

But just because there are cities in a region don't you have to have some kind of demand driven reason to build that connectivity. I mean unless it's a direct measure like adding a mobility tax to reduce passenger car traffic from I-5..

Even after the upgrades for the Amtrack Cascades option they'll go from 2 daily round trips to anywhere from 3-6 trips? Even at 100+ a pop how does that translate to a HSR system that might cost 100+ billion dollars USD.

Why do most people fly down to Seattle? To interconnect on another flight out of Sea-Tac?

https://www.theurbanist.org/2023/10/16/concepts-for-amtrak-cascades-service-growth-have-arrived/

[LeftCoaster]

Why would Amtrac go to 3 or 6? It's a terrible service that offers no value. Its slow, unreliable and costly. Just because there is an existing terrible option, doesn't mean a new better option is not feasible.

I assume most flying to Sea-Tac are connecting, but given the amount of people flying to Seattle, even it only some are flying to Seattle as a destination it's a lot of people. Also keep in mind this line would go to Portland too, that's much more of a flying destination and would be a great distance via train.

Personally, I'd much rather pay a premium and take a train than drive to Seattle or Portland. Parking is expensive and a pain in the — in Seattle (and vice versa in Vancouver), the drive is boring and can be very long with traffic/customs, and once you're in either city a can is most often not needed at all.

I haven't run the numbers but given the likely traffic between PDX-SEA and YVR-SEA the revenue isn't nothing is all I was saying. I don't think the yield is there to justify this, but it isn't for most public transport. I bet from a farebox perspective HSR will do just as well if not better than most rail transit investments, and of course much better than an I5 upgrade....

[jollyburger]

Originally Posted by LeftCoaster

Personally, I'd much rather pay a premium and take a train than drive to Seattle or Portland. Parking is expensive and a pain in the — in Seattle (and vice versa in Vancouver), the drive is boring and can be very long with traffic/customs, and once you're in either city a can is most often not needed at all.

I haven't run the numbers but given the likely traffic between PDX-SEA and YVR-SEA the revenue isn't nothing is all I was saying. I don't think the yield is there to justify this, but it isn't for most public transport. I bet from a farebox perspective HSR will do just as well if not better than most rail transit investments, and of course much better than an I5 upgrade....

I guess all the Amtrak Cascade options still deal with the bottleneck in Vancouver so there's no real solution without improvements.

I-5 is maxed out for lanes in the most congested corridors and it seems like there's zero need for much of it to be upgrade north of Seattle. I mean if it's some kind of commuter train exercise to help their housing affordability with Seattle then you assume they'll do something regardless. Meanwhile Oregon and Washington still can't manage to figure out on a bridge replacement over the Colombia River..

https://wsdot.wa.gov/construction-planni...-5-interstate-bridge-replacement-program

[FarmerHaight]

Originally Posted by LeftCoaster

Cascadia is over 12 million in a nice linear ~50,000sq km corridor, and most importantly it's growing quickly both economically and demographically. Just to put in into perspective that is more people than Portugal in a smaller area. Slightly larger than Belgium in both population and area, and most importantly growing much faster and all laid out in a nice easy to serve by rail line.

Vancouver, Seattle, and Portland also all have fairly strong urban cores. Plenty of people live downtown, a lot of the jobs are in the downtown area, and the cities all have solid transit networks.

Originally Posted by jollyburger

But just because there are cities in a region don't you have to have some kind of demand driven reason to build that connectivity. I mean unless it's a direct measure like adding a mobility tax to reduce passenger car traffic from I-5..

The business case projected that about 10% of ridership would come from induced trips. The rest of the passengers are projected to switch over from existing rail options (Cascades, but also regional rail like Sounder or even Skytrain between Surrey and Vancouver), buses, private vehicles, and planes. This same business case stated that projected farebox revenues could be expected to cover operating costs after a few years of operations.

Now, you can claim the business case figures are poppycock. But the current case for HSR depends very little on driving demand beyond what already exists.

[jollyburger]

Originally Posted by FarmerHaight

The business case projected that about 10% of ridership would come from induced trips. The rest of the passengers are projected to switch over from existing rail options (Cascades, but also regional rail like Sounder or even Skytrain between Surrey and Vancouver), buses, private vehicles, and planes. This same business case stated that projected farebox revenues could be expected to cover operating costs after a few years of operations.

Now, you can claim the business case figures are poppycock. But the current case for HSR depends very little on driving demand beyond what already exists.

I mean commuter rail with higher speeds/frequencies make sense in Washington State because of the real estate prices. But I don't see the cross-border business case since most of it was the type of pie in the sky Innovation Corridor talk. If they want to subsidize trips into Vancouver I mean good for them but just because Canada/BC has a low capital investment into the project I still think you have to be selfish and consider any negatives. (There may be zero negatives to the project from a Canadian perspective..)

[FarmerHaight]

Originally Posted by jollyburger

I mean commuter rail with higher speeds/frequencies make sense in Washington State because of the real estate prices. But I don't see the cross-border business case since most of it was the type of pie in the sky Innovation Corridor talk. If they want to subsidize trips into Vancouver I mean good for them but just because Canada/BC has a low capital investment into the project I still think you have to be selfish and consider any negatives. (There may be zero negatives to the project from a Canadian perspective..)

In 2017 there were an estimated five million trips between Vancouver and cities along the proposed HSR corridor. If you were travelling to attend a Taylor Swift concert why would taking a 30 minute train instead of driving 2 hours and getting stuck at the border for 1 hour not be an attractive option? I really think you're underestimating how much people currently travel to the Seattle area, and how much this would change traveling to Portland.

The regional rail benefits are real for Canada too. I don't see anyway this project could be completed before 2040. At that point, the Expo line will definitely need relief between Surrey and Vancouver given projected growth. Translink could run frequent trains between Surrey Central and PCS, maybe with additional stops at Brentwood and Commercial-Broadway, which could turn what is currently a one hour SkyTrain ride with frequent stops into a 10 minute one. Also, depending on how HSR gets to Surrey Central (Hwy 15 > TCH > 104 Ave?) a regional rail line into the Valley could branch off near Cloverdale to serve Langley, Abbotsford, and beyond.