Just saw this one off of my Railway Age newsletter that I get in my inbox at work. This one, dealing with a supposed study going on about High(er) Speed Rail in Colorado along both the I-25 and I-70 corridors. Since I know Mudchicken will get in on this one (hopefully), I wanted to beat him to the punchline with a few laughing heads of my own…[(-D][(-D][(-D]
Seriously, though, WHAT is so hard about getting these idiotic planners and their counterparts over at the Colorado Dept. of Highways (guess that’s what they should REALLY be called anyway) together with both BNSF and UP and saying, “Look, we need to expand capacity on the Joint Line mainline between Denver and Pueblo for rail passenger service. What exactly needs to be done here and what kind of costs are we looking at?”
Ooops. I was laughing so hard at my own work I bloody forgot to add in the story from Railway Age:
Colorado study to weigh high(er) speed rail
Colorado municipal, county, and state transportation officials, coalescing as the Rocky Mountain Rail Authority, will participate in a study to evaluate a “high speed passenger railway.” Colorado’s Department of Transportation will finance 80% of the $1.5 million study, with local sources supplying the remainder. As envisioned by the authority, such a system, with Denver as the hub, could include a north-south route, roughly paralleling Interstate Highway 25, and an east-west route following I-70, along with potential spur routes. Transportation Economics and Management Systems Inc. of Frederick, Md., will prepare the report.
For more on this story, visit: Railway Age Breaking News
CDOT and UP and BNSF have been talking for years about building new rail to make capacity on the joint line for commuter service, but not so much about over the Continental Divide. I-70 is impassible on weekends and finally people are starting to realize that adding lanes isn’t the best use of money, thanks to orgs like the RMRA.
Not sure how long it takes to get a coal train from Denver to the Springs but you can ride a bicycle faster than the trains up the hill into Palmer Lake. Common sense would just extend the light rail line itself. But then politicians don’t have much common sense.
Superficially, it isn’t that hard at all. But this is not a problem unique to any state transportation department, and it’s not even a problem unique to politicians. It’s a political problem. Fundamentally, it’s a problem with a sizeable number of people who elect politicians, and they are people who for several reasons have heartburn with the government negotiating with railroads. Every time the state and federal transportation policy planners start to close in on an infrastructure-sharing arrangement with railroads, the opposition usually manages to impose deal-killers designed to ensure no deal is struck. From up close I’ve watched this happen again and again: the deal is a week away and then the lobbyists representing some consituency – which could be shipper, green, anti-tax, anti-big-business, rural-vs.-big city, or whatever – shows up, tells some key committee member that "you’re making sure we work against you next election because this deal isn’t nearly g
Railway Man’s answer makes sense and bears out with what I’ve seen and experienced with previous rail efforts here in CO. Still, I’m wondering what New Mexico (just to the south of us) did to get the Rail Runner up and running. Obviously, we’re not identical, but given the similarities of topography, regional sentiments and growth demographics, how did they manage to pull it off? Does anyone know?
here is 2nd hand info so I solicit response from those who have ‘good’ info. My source says that the State of NM took money from other transportation requirements to fund the extension to Santa Fe and there will be (already are) unhappy legislators, bureauocrats and cities because of the huge cost for so few riders.
The projected cost-benefit numbers are not good even though manipulation has tried to make it look better. This has the potential to be a significant boondogle but NM has had them before, just not of this magnitude.
Light rail is too slow. An acceptible solution has to be as fast or faster than one can drive the same route. So I think the trains will need to increase their max speed by at least 20 mph. even to be a consideration. In fact, when they first started talking about light rail I envisioned 100 mph+ service. In fact, I envisioned even more like the high speed trains so one could live in Trinida and work in Denver. I’ve been greatly disapointed that even with heavy traffic it takes 30 minutes longer to take the light rail than it is to drive.
It isn’t necessarily politicians. There are so many business, private, and special interests involved, I’m surprised it has gotten as far as it has. I have been on at least two of these study committee’s in the past. The number of entities that get involved is mind boggling. Also, as a prior poster stated, there is a very strong “anti-rail” lobby and voting population. 2. What one person considers common sense many anothers consider sillyness. Even if there was 5 billion dollars in cash sitting around for the project, it would be complicated, hard to implement, and time consuming. Since there isn’t any money, it is even harder.
Superficially, it isn’t that hard at all. But this is not a problem unique to any state transportation department, and it’s not even a problem unique to politicians. It’s a political problem. Fundamentally, it’s a problem with a sizeable number of people who elect politicians, and they are people who for several reasons have heartburn with the government negotiating with railroads. Every time the state and federal transportation policy planners start to close in on an infrastructure-sharing arrangement with railroads, the opposition usually manages to impose deal-killers designed to ensure no deal is struck. From up close I’ve watched this happen again and again: the deal is a week away and then the lobbyists representing some consituency – which could be shipper, green, anti-tax, anti-big-business, rural-vs.-big city, or whatever – shows up, tells some key committee member that "you’re making sure we work against you next election because th
