CALIFORNIA HSR SHAKEUP

[Ocklawaha]

This breaking news just flashed across the transit guys screen...

With admiration, I would like to thank Mr. van Ark for his service to California and the high-speed rail project. The announcement of his resignation will resonate throughout the State," said Umberg. "His energy, passion and dedication to this critically important project are a testament to his character and his professionalism. We are extremely lucky to have his continued counsel and advice as we move to implement high-speed rail in California. I remain grateful for his professionalism and friendship."

As part of the shakeup at the authority, Umberg will also vacate his position and recommend that Dan Richard, who was recently appointed to the board by Gov. Jerry Brown, assume his leadership role. Van Ark said he will leave in two months, while Umberg will step down in February, according to The Los Angeles Times.

The departure of van Ark comes a week after an independent review panel issued a critique of the project and refused to recommend that the state issue billions in  bonds to help fund the first leg of the 520-mile project in the Central Valley.

http://www.metro-magazine.com

California High Speed Rail is in deep trouble and the State is on the edge of a financial cliff, perhaps even falling over it. With the incredible escalating cost of true High Speed Rail, this train is quickly losing its public support. A fact to remember about railroad construction is that the cost rises exponentially with each mile-per-hour increase in speed above a certain point. The max speed window with more conventional costs usually falls around 120 mph, this was why DOT proclaimed HSR as anything above 90 mph (This technical designation locally applies to the FEC RY/AMTRAK JAX-MIAMI route which will travel at 80mph south of Sunbeam Road, and 90 south of King Street in St. Augustine), assigning categories various increasing speed brackets.

My prediction is that this California system is going to end up being built as HrSR (Higher Speed Rail) as opposed to HSR. HrSR has gained steam among industry leaders and was even the subject of a very positive recommending article in the new issue of TRAINS magazine.

The contention that HrSR can't compete with air travel is simply not true as proved by AMTRAK'S Northeast Corridor. The Amtrak Acela trains rarely reach their attainable 150 mph speed and in fact have an average end to end speed closer to 80. Trains that average around 80 mph have shown they can suck the air out from under the airlines as Amtrak now has a commanding share of the total NYC-DC and NYC-BOS market. Amtrak now handles 69% of NY-DC and 58% NY-BOS markets.

So if California HrSR is actually built, it should do the trick of showing what a fast train can do in a long, dense market.

OCKLAWAHA

[JeffreyS]

This insane pursuit of true HSR instead of addressing the real transit needs of this country has seriously set us back.  I get why Obama wanted it but not doing Amtrak and local transit with the money has given talking points to the Republicans and kept real transit improvements from happening.

We use planes to get from airport to airport.  We need light rail, commuter rail streetcar and buses to ditch the addiction to the car.

[tufsu1]

the big problem California has is that the referendum language required a specific travel time between LA and SF...as a result, they have to take a route that is far more expensive and much more impactful than an alternate route that would extend the trip by 15 minutes

[Ocklawaha]

Yeah, as we say in the High Desert, "The Palmdale Bulge is not all San Andres Fault!"

The trouble with this pie in the sky dream is when you go north from Los Angeles, you only have 3 choices:

1. A LONG twisting albeit scenic coastal route.

2. Another LONG circuitous route north through Santa Clarita, east to Palmdale, north through Mojave and Tehachapi, to Bakersfield.

3. A direct route over the torturous San Bernardino  Mountains, a solid 60 miles of 6% grades that takes over an hour on the interstate.

Sadly the language you speak of leaves number 3 as the only choice, but the railroads learned long ago that number 1 and 2 were the logical choices. In fact the Mojave - Bakersfield line which includes one of the worlds most spectacular loops (where to gain altitude the train curves around and actually crosses over itself) is completely shared track operated by competing railroads.

HrSR will allow them to come back down to earth and roll right over that um... bulge. The positive side is we'll only need a couple of HrSR successes to prove this old dog can still hunt.

OCK

[JeffreyS]

Our HSR problem for all of America is like a company that buys cars for the sales staff. If the company buys two Porsche's for a staff of 15 instead of 15 Honda's. 

I just hate that we finally have a president whose heart is in the right place on transit but clearly his head has gotten bad advice about how to achieve it.