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Caltrain, California High-Speed Rail Authority reach agreement on electrification
220 mph light weight trainsets won’t meet FRA crash-worthiness and strength specs. When you build HSR trainsets that are FRA compliant, you get just-barely 150 mph Acela. How will they interoperate with FRA compliant commuter trains?
Who finances all of this? The American taxpayer of course. The ones who get no benefit from what they pay for. This is transportation welfare. Those who will actually use the system will never pay for it. At best, they will pay a token fee, and still complain about having to pay that small amount. If the People’s Republic of California wants it, they should pay for it themselves. Of course, they are bankrupt. But Marxists never let small details like finances stand in the way of the new socialist order, espcially when they can get somebody else to pay for it… Just remember, socialism is for the people, not the socialist.
Electric is the only way to go. While a dedicated corridor would be nice to have, this country is not ready yet to spend the money to make that happen. Electric operations interacting with commuter and freights has been proven to work for almost 100 years here in the northeast. 150 mph Acela type trains is better than what’s their now and something to build on.
With the projected traffic density, this plan make sense (other issues aside, like the one @ Don Oltmann). But is highway grade crossing elimination also part of the package? This route is peppered with crossings and close clearances.
Dear Mr Guse:
Ever been to California?
The Caltrain line approximately parallels US101, which is also paid for with ‘socialist’ taxpayer dollars. This freeway is infamous for becoming a parking lot at spots during rush hour. It can’t economically be expanded because it’s surrounded by expensive California real estate. A couple of decades ago, the highway department was contemplating expanding such highways by building a second deck atop the existing lanes; in the wake of the Loma Prieta earthquake and the collapse of the upper deck of the Nimitz freeway, that’s no longer in the cards.
In lieu of commuter rail, what solution do you propose?
Could we see a West Coast Corridor some day…? (WCC), we would love to see it!
I remember them citing the FRA standards you mention when describing the issues getting into the LA Basin (sharing UP lines) long ago. with the new PTC requirements perhaps come kind of waiver can be had.
Those who worry about the American taxpayer funding this need to recall that taxpayers also pay for airports, freeways, harbors, schools, dams, etc. Does every taxpayer use every service? No. But these kind of “socialist” projects benefit many people and add jobs to areas that are in need of jobs. Boulder (Hoover) Dam is a perfect example. Federal money paid for it, and people in four neighboring states benefit from it.
This pact between CalTrain and the HSR folks is very welcome news, and a good sign that there is practical thought happening in trying to get this system built and running while trying to keep costs at a minimum.
This is certainly welcome news to get tis project moving forward. While I was living in California and attending meetings of TRAC, RailPAC, NARP,SoCaTA, Modern Transit Society, and others, I don’t know how many times It was mentioned to electrify the Caltrain corridor, and this was decades ago in the late 1980’s.