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Ardennes posted:I guess the Las Vegas metro area is about 2 million people at this point, enough to probably deserve some type of line along with the usual tourist traffic. I agree, but that doesn't make sense if it's running from Victorville.
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Jul 10, 2013 23:18
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Casual Yogurt posted:CAHSR will be sharing the Caltrain tracks. Christ, I hope not! Surely just the right-of-way? A major killer of cross-country Amtrak is how it can't just blast through, because it has to wait for every goddamn freight train also using the tracks to pass it or get passed by it, and it also has to stop at every podunk stop because there's so few trains. If the high-speed bullet train has to share track with the local-stops trains, it will no longer be high-speed.
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Jul 10, 2013 23:23
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What would be the best way to design a statewide rail system that doesn't just end up benefiting rich people, from a conceptual standpoint?
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Jul 10, 2013 23:27
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Zeitgueist posted:I agree, but that doesn't make sense if it's running from Victorville. Yeah, I think it will just be on hold until the CSHSR looks like it is going to be fully built out but if its connected, you could get people flowing from all over California to dump their life savings into Vegas' hateful maw. quote:What would be the best way to design a statewide rail system that doesn't just end up benefiting rich people, from a conceptual standpoint? I guess build it as cheaply as possible, but to be honest it is going to be expensive whatever you do because it has to make its way through urban areas and our rail system is already too saturated as it is. It might make more sense to have some type of discount ticket program for the least used scheduled times that has an extra discount is you can show need. Ardennes fucked around with this message at 23:30 on Jul 10, 2013 |
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Jul 10, 2013 23:27
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Van5 posted:What would be the best way to design a statewide rail system that doesn't just end up benefiting rich people, from a conceptual standpoint? Build it, subsidize the tickets. The rail system in and of itself isn't elitist, it's going through the right places. It just needs to be affordable.
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Jul 10, 2013 23:45
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Zeitgueist posted:Build it, subsidize the tickets. Gotcha
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Jul 10, 2013 23:48
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The biggest problem with this high-speed rail line is that it isn't running from BC to Tijuana, like it should be.
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Jul 10, 2013 23:50
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I don't think the Night Watch can guarantee the safety of the trains north of Marysville.
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Jul 10, 2013 23:53
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Van5 posted:What would be the best way to design a statewide rail system that doesn't just end up benefiting rich people, from a conceptual standpoint? Your use of the word 'just' is ambiguous here. You either mean: 'What would be the best way to design a statewide rail system that doesn't end up benefiting rich people' or: 'What would be the best way to design a statewide rail system that doesn't only benefit rich people' or possibly: 'What would be the best way to design a statewide rail system that doesn't just end up benefiting rich people more than non-rich people' I'm not going to bother with the second interpretation, because I assume you did not mean something that ridiculous. I think the 1st and 3rd questions each end up being answered in the same way, which is that you probably can't; at least not in any way that is easily measurable. The rich are always the most visible beneficiaries of any investment in the economy. This is simply because (often) their fortune is based in the economy, so an increase in commerce will directly increase their fortunes whereas people not directly invested in the economy will experience less measurable benefits. I think a slightly better question is probably how to make this type of investment in infrastructure best help the non-rich without reference to the rich. I'm still not sure this is really the best way to approach the issue, though. Direct investments in the economy can be a good thing for the economy, placing a lot of requirements on them tends to make them less good for the economy and still doesn't actually end up decreasing income inequality. I think instead you should just focus on making sure that investments in the economy end up actually benefiting the economy. Because that means more tax revenue in general for the government, which is good because then the government has more resources which it can use to fund programs which are not focused on immediate growth. Zeitgueist posted:Build it, subsidize the tickets. And yeah, you can and should do this. I didn't mention it because the question was about the design of the system itself, and I was thinking about this as being separate. But I agree that if the question was about how to let non-rich people ride on a train, you can definitely do vouchers for low income people. (Or as a +employment thing, you can tie the vouchers to low income jobs and unemployment job-seeking programs) Qublai Qhan fucked around with this message at 00:11 on Jul 11, 2013 |
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Jul 11, 2013 00:04
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I think the biggest problem with high-speed rail, is that it is most effective when it makes fewest stops, but it must run through communities that are only possibly benefited by having it there if it has stops in those communities (because the existing rights-of-way follow railroads which were built explicitly to link communities, and many of those communities exist specifically because of the pre-existing rail lines). When you have a strong centralized top-down authority that simply decides "here there will be trains" and doesn't give a poo poo about whether Podunk Valley, CA wants it in their back yard or not, then you can get high-speed long-distance trains that run in a straight line and get from Point A to Point B, 400 miles away, as fast or faster than you'd get by driving to an airport, parking, waiting in lines, boarding, waiting for takeoff, flying, going through more lines, and then boarding transit or renting a car and driving to your final destination. When Podunk Valley can hold the entire loving thing hostage against guarantees that they get a station and that all through trains will stop at that station, so it'd have some chance of benefiting their local economy? You're either going to have to route around Podunk Valley (extra money, slows things down, more complex), accede to their demands (a lot of extra money, slows things down, more complex), or languish in red tape hell for year upon year waiting for their endless lawsuits and challenges and obstructionism to work their way through; and while that time goes by, costs go up a lot, everyone gets impatient, the public loses interest, politicians come in and out of office, and nothing ever loving happens. Add in the complications of having to use federal money, and therefore obey federal restrictions on that money (like, you can't take our federal dollars and then sit on them for 8 years without spending them); the fact that the whole thing is founded on a voter initiative (so if there's something in the legalese that turns out to be bad or needs to be changed the legislature can't just have a quick vote to change it); the fact that the entire thing is only even remotely likely to be worthwhile and useful if it all gets built (having a track from San Francisco to Fresno, and no further, would be utterly worthless)... and yeah, this is kind of a ridiculously difficult project to make happen. I really really want it to happen (and I voted for it), but frankly I'm skeptical. We need some serious eminent domain being exercised up in here, some whiny complainers, obstructionists, and anti-infrastructure conservatives need to be bulldozed without delay, and that's kind of out of character for California. Leperflesh fucked around with this message at 00:11 on Jul 11, 2013 |
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Jul 11, 2013 00:09
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Can they not have express trains that only do the LA-SF-SD stops along with the normal ones? That would seem to be the way to go. Prices should be subsidized enough so that cost is equivalent to plane travel, at least initially. An Amtrak tticket from LA to Emeryville (as close as they get to SF) is around $100. Flying on Southwest is something like $70 or so for the same trip in less travel time and there are light rail links directly to the airport. So to make it feasible they would have to subsidize pretty heavily, and also ensure that there are transit links once you step off the train.
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Jul 11, 2013 00:34
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Glass of Milk posted:Can they not have express trains that only do the LA-SF-SD stops along with the normal ones? That would seem to be the way to go. That seems to be exactly what they are doing. The map I posted earlier shows both local stops and "express" stops which are much more limited.
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Jul 11, 2013 00:46
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I am guessing that people who run transit systems have sorted out how to apportion normal and express stops.
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Jul 11, 2013 00:46
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All Of The Dicks posted:I am guessing that people who run transit systems have sorted out how to apportion normal and express stops. Not always. You can bet local politicians will raise hell if they aren't on the "express" lane.
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Jul 11, 2013 01:02
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Yeah, if you've read up on your Interstate Highway history you'll realize it's partial to the same influence peddling and tug of war as any other civic project. The scale of it just changes due to the amounts of money and influence involved.
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Jul 11, 2013 01:04
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Build tube tracks, run it under the surface of the ocean.
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Jul 11, 2013 01:04
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GD_American posted:Yeah, if you've read up on your Interstate Highway history you'll realize it's partial to the same influence peddling and tug of war as any other civic project. The scale of it just changes due to the amounts of money and influence involved. Everyone here should read The Power Broker by Caro and despair 
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Jul 11, 2013 01:07
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What is the latest news on the construction of it anyway? I thought they were supposed to start building it in the Central Valley soon under the premise that "once we start building it, it will be very hard to stop the project".
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Jul 11, 2013 01:07
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All Of The Dicks posted:I am guessing that people who run transit systems have sorted out how to apportion normal and express stops. Of course, and a lot of smaller communities will be happy with limited service. However, if the high-speed trains share tracks with regular-speed or non-express trains, then you have to have places where trains can pass each other safely; and if a train is not on schedule, a fast-train might have to wait for a slow-train. Anywhere where there is only one track is especially prone to this sort of bottlenecking, but even when there's one (in each direction) you can have this happen a lot.
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Jul 11, 2013 03:21
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Last I heard, there was talk of a Vegas/CA high speed that would basically dump people in the vicinity of Disneyland in Anaheim. They're stopping at Victorville now? Wow. That's impressively bad.
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Jul 11, 2013 07:09
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Leperflesh posted:I really really want it to happen (and I voted for it), but frankly I'm skeptical. We need some serious eminent domain being exercised up in here, some whiny complainers, obstructionists, and anti-infrastructure conservatives need to be bulldozed without delay, and that's kind of out of character for California. ****** It isn't hard to solve the issue of local stops; just build out a sidetrack that goes to the town. Traffic management gets a lot more complicated, though, and with that complication comes expense. ****** The reason that HSR is using the old Union Pacific tracks is that if it had to buy 100% new right-of-way and build 100% new tracks the whole thing would cost about as much as the Apollo Program did.
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Jul 11, 2013 07:13
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Wasn't the Victorville-to-Vegas line a recovery-act gift that Harry Reid gave his state? For some reason, I recall his having a hand in that. eta: Came to SoCal in 2000 to hop on the dotcom train before it derailed; stayed for the weather and the work that fell into my lap. I'm sick of both now, and planning to move out of the state by the end of the year. I'll miss the beach, but that's about it. Willa Rogers fucked around with this message at 07:24 on Jul 11, 2013 |
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Jul 11, 2013 07:20
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I wouldn't even know Victorville existed if it wasn't for all the NSFWCorp stuff about it, and even that just seems to be "we picked a random American dystopian exurban shithole to report indepth on, here it is". What purpose does that line serve?
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Jul 11, 2013 07:57
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GD_American posted:I wouldn't even know Victorville existed if it wasn't for all the NSFWCorp stuff about it, and even that just seems to be "we picked a random American dystopian exurban shithole to report indepth on, here it is". NIMBYism pushed the California end of the line out of anywhere it would be really useful. Essentially, the same fate suffered by every public works project of note in California.
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Jul 11, 2013 08:32
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Leperflesh posted:Christ, I hope not! Surely just the right-of-way? A major killer of cross-country Amtrak is how it can't just blast through, because it has to wait for every goddamn freight train also using the tracks to pass it or get passed by it, and it also has to stop at every podunk stop because there's so few trains. Very little freight is run on the Caltrain tracks. They currently pretty much exclusively operate the regional rail, I think they may operate freight for legacy customers at night. The UP mainline is east of the Bay. Also, there will never be a high speed line past Victorville for the same reasons the BART will never get to San Jose via the Peninsula: Rich Suburban Cities.
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Jul 11, 2013 08:54
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SirPablo posted:Build tube tracks, run it under the surface of the ocean.  
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Jul 11, 2013 10:00
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FRINGE posted:Off the coast of CA? What could go wrong with that? Maybe I should have been more clear, surface of the water.
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Jul 11, 2013 12:44
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Miss-Bomarc posted:Tell me more about how thousands and thousands of people will have their property taken and their lives bent out of shape so that you can ride a train from SF to LA once or twice a year. OK, see, this project that connects millions of people so that SF and LA aren't the only bits of California connected to civilization should happen. If some rich NIMBY whiners in Palo Alto or some conservative obstructionist fuckers in Tehachapi have to get the gently caress over it in the process, that is a bonus! RAHOWA and vive la revolucion, chooo chooooo!
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Jul 11, 2013 21:30
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The real travesty of the train is how slow it is and how long it will take. We had trains that were almost as fast back when we were on steam, and we could build the entire system in less than 10 years but, you know, ~America~.
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Jul 11, 2013 21:42
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All Of The Dicks posted:OK, see, this project that connects millions of people so that SF and LA aren't the only bits of California connected to civilization should happen. If some rich NIMBY whiners in Palo Alto or some conservative obstructionist fuckers in Tehachapi have to get the gently caress over it in the process, that is a bonus! RAHOWA and vive la revolucion, chooo chooooo! Don't forget mass transit makes it easier for poors to invade and ruin pristine neighborhoods.
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Jul 11, 2013 21:43
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On the other hand, train tracks can make effective barriers against poor people accidentally walking through your neighborhood. You can't have right or wrong sides without any tracks!
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Jul 11, 2013 21:45
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Zeitgueist posted:The real travesty of the train is how slow it is and how long it will take. We had trains that were almost as fast back when we were on steam, and we could build the entire system in less than 10 years but, you know, ~America~. Wait, have they released how fast (slow) the express train will be yet?
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Jul 11, 2013 21:47
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A Winner is Jew posted:Wait, have they released how fast (slow) the express train will be yet? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_High-Speed_Rail#Travel_times Assuming that's express. I told a coworker visiting from Hong Kong about an average speed of 180 and he laughed.
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Jul 11, 2013 21:51
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Seeing the exploding projects costs, it's good all the GOP controlled states bailed on the project.
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Jul 11, 2013 21:54
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Zeitgueist posted:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_High-Speed_Rail#Travel_times Uh the fastest (regular service) TGV goes about 200 miles per hour. Ardennes fucked around with this message at 22:05 on Jul 11, 2013 |
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Jul 11, 2013 22:02
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Ardennes posted:Uh the fastest (regular service) TGV goes about 200 miles per hour. I bet he was thinking in km/h, which would actually be pretty drat slow.
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Jul 11, 2013 22:05
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Ardennes posted:Uh the fastest (regular service) TGV goes about 200 miles per hour. Heh, I'm getting my fastest speeds mixed up with running speeds, my bad. I was under the impression that those trains ran at 300mph, because they can do it. I'll go back to whining about project timetables.
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Jul 11, 2013 22:09
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GD_American posted:Why does the line take such a pronounced hook south of Bakersfield? Geography? Antelope valley, theres a big rear end mountain range there. According to the high speed rail proposal, it will go right behind my residence, which means its sharing lines with BNSF and Metrolink.. plus street level ground crossings so no way its going to be high speed unless they eminent domain a bunch of land to build a separate track. Basically it looks like its only going to be highspeed in the middle and slow at the ends, which means it'll still be just as fast to drive.  Rail would make more sense if it swing out to victorville, then loop into Ontario along the I15/Cajon Pass, but the problem is the freight lines there have priority and they are pretty much 24/7 hauling long beach container traffic in mile+ long trains. And a LA->Vegas line would be terrific. Except California doesn't want to finance a big straw thats going to suck revenue right to Nevada. In fact if I recall correctly, groups in Nevada would offer to finance their line right to victorville if someone in California would finance "the last mile" into LA or Anaheim. In fact they pitched a Vegas -> Disneyland express at one point except Vegas isn't exactly family entertainment (except for when they tried that image in the 90's) Big K of Justice fucked around with this message at 23:05 on Jul 11, 2013 |
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Jul 11, 2013 22:58
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Geared Hub posted:Basically it looks like its only going to be highspeed in the middle and slow at the ends, which means it'll still be just as fast to drive. That's how most high-speed systems end up working. That's also how driving from LA-SF works too, traffic at the ends and fast in the middle.
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Jul 11, 2013 23:05
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Miss-Bomarc posted:Tell me more about how thousands and thousands of people will have their property taken and their lives bent out of shape so that you can ride a train from SF to LA once or twice a year. I personally have no reason to go to LA and will probably have no need for the high speed train. This isn't about me at all. But more important, people's property is not just "taken", it's purchased at market rate. If you have a problem with eminent domain as a government tool, that's fine, but that's a larger and different argument to have... but eminent domain is well established in the law and using it to build infrastructure is the most defensible justification for the practice there is. quote:****** Putting the word "just" in front of an extremely complex, expensive, and politically mired endeavor does not magically turn it into a trivial task. Train track requires a big fat right of way, a bunch of money spent on infrastructure, and the cooperation of local governments and organizations. High-speed bullet train track is much more expensive than regular rail, on top of that. And every spur, every switch, every branch adds to the complexity and cost of running and maintaining the system. quote:Traffic management gets a lot more complicated, though, and with that complication comes expense. Exactly. quote:The reason that HSR is using the old Union Pacific tracks is that if it had to buy 100% new right-of-way and build 100% new tracks the whole thing would cost about as much as the Apollo Program did. It will have to build 100% new graded bed and track anywhere that the train will go faster than conventional rail. You simply cannot run a bullet train at high speeds on old, conventional grade/track. The rights-of-way are of course going to be used (because it beats the hell out of carving a new 100+-foot-wide path through private property for hundreds of miles) but in some cases will have to be widened, to make room for high-speed track parallel to regular track, add switches, spurs, side yards, areas for maintenance equipment, eliminate level crossings (that's a really big one), and so forth. Trabisnikof posted:Also, there will never be a high speed line past Victorville for the same reasons the BART will never get to San Jose via the Peninsula: Rich Suburban Cities. I think it's actually much harder than BART to San Jose; there are entrenched economic interests in California against exporting wealth to Las Vegas, in particular the indian gaming lobby. Zeitgueist posted:Heh, I'm getting my fastest speeds mixed up with running speeds, my bad. I was under the impression that those trains ran at 300mph, because they can do it. There may be experimental trains capable of going 300mph but the cost in energy to accelerate to such a speed is difficult to justify. The relationship between speed and energy cost is nonlinear, due to air resistance dynamics. One must also of course build track to ever-higher levels of precision and robustness to support even faster trains. Remember also that top speed is only achieved between stations. If you have two stations thirty miles apart, and you accelerate to 200mph in two minutes, and it costs another minute to decelerate from that speed (numbers pulled out of my rear end), how much faster do you actually get there if you spend another extra minute and a half pushing up to 300mph only to drop back almost immediately? The answer may be nothing nearly enough to justify the added cost. This is part of why top speed is a lot less important than just the sheer number of stops. Every stop not only adds to the duration of the trip due to sitting at the station: it adds another very long segment where the train is braking into the station, and another where it is accelerating out of the station, and both of those cost a bunch of energy and reduce the average speed of the whole trip. I mentioned level crossings above, but I'll come back to it for a moment. You can't run a train at 200mph across a level crossing. It's just horribly unsafe to both the train and to people using the crossing. Caltrain runs at ordinary train speeds and still hits a pedestrian several times a year (often a suicide, unfortunately, but not always). Bullet trains need to either slow down before they hit a series of level crossings, or they need to have under/overpasses constructed to avoid them (best is an under or overpass for the road/foot traffic, since that's usually vastly less expensive than running the train itself underground or on elevated track). Part of the deal with NIMBYs isn't just the noise of the trains, or the need to buy up property, but the expense and disruption of reconfiguring traffic corridors at and around the high-speed rail right of way. This is a really, really, really complicated thing we're trying to do here. It's no wonder it's incredibly expensive and incredibly difficult to make it happen across dozens of cities and hundreds of miles of California. I support it because I believe very strongly in the economic power of adding infrastructure, and I'm hopeful that it'll happen, but I think the risk that it will fall apart is very high right now.
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Jul 11, 2013 23:34
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