New Rail Lines Using Interstate Rights-of-Way

Trains Magazine General Discussion
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Two of the biggest obstacles in the U.S. to expanding passenger trains are the problem of obtaining land and the problem of environmental permits.

Since most Interstates already have the land and at least some of the permits, it seems to make sense to follow what Brightline West is attempting.

I’m not talking about High Speed. I realize the curves on Interstates would not allow HSR. But it seems the curves could accommodate higher speed rail service.

Could we avoid the huge amounts of money in buying the property, and avoid the many years of environmental legal challenges by using the ROWs?

I know this has been discussed on this forum before, but it seems to me it may be time to revisit the idea

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One obstacle that comes to mind for me is grades. The interstates near me in southern Michigan have the median area you mentioned but the rolling hills create grades in the 3-4% range along with transitions that would likely send a 79mph Amtrak train airborne. Even without the land/permit cost it seems like it would still cost a pretty penny to modify the land to make the grades and transitions acceptable for trains.

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I believe the Interstates have been constructed to have a maximum grade of 6%. In driving the entirety of I-68 from Hancock, MD to Morgantown, WV - a number of the descending grades in both directions have truck emergency escape roads to deal with run-a-ways.

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Could those grades be moderated with cuts and added elevations? I know, I know, we’re talking huge money. But it wouldn’t be any bigger than buying new land and then having to deal with the grades there.

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The big problem is bridges --all exits have to be redesigned, probably involving extra height for catenary. Stations are a nightmare.

Any road accident involving going into the median is now a potential high-speed collision without warning.

I do think that there is a place for using median ROW for some HrSR… where there is and can be no cost-effective alternative. What I suspect is that it might be like the line relocation along the 240 east of Pasadena… perhaps even single-track sections like it… with other portions of the route built (using some of the Chinese construction conventions) for elevated or beamed track with more ‘railroad’-like civil.

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How does that compare in cost to buying new land and building new bridges on the new land?

How much does the cost of building concrete barriers to stop traffic entering the medians compare to buying new land for railroad ROWs?

That’s the part I’m wondering about – the cost-effective alternative. Even out here on the Great Plains, where land is plentiful, it would cost a fortune to buy this land. The people who own this land are proud descendants of generations of land owners. Even 60 years after the Interstates were built through here, there are still very hard feelings about government taking their land.

We’re looking at never building new railroad ROWs, continuing to pay railroads for using their tracks while they relegate passenger trains to sidings. Or we can build new rail lines, paying landowners billions (trillions) of dollars for land. And don’t even think about lawyers fees and court battles brought by environmentalists. Or … we need to find alternatives.

We have many on this Train forum decrying the fact that Europe, Japan, and China all have better passenger rail than us, but what are the practical suggestions for getting what we want?

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I think the problem is still going to be getting enough people to ride these trains. Outside the major metro areas, there is no practical incentive for people to ride trains.

This is not Europe, large segments of the population do not live huddled in 800 or 1200 square foot urban apartments, nor do they want to.

If you can’t walk to the train how do you get to the train?

Where are you going on the train? To work? Out to dinner? To a movie? On vacation?

I work construction, pretty tough to take my tools on the train. I go out to dinner 4 miles from my house - in my car. We don’t vacation much, my wife will not get on a plane - not out of fear, out of no tolerance for the “airport experience”. A reasonable train station experience might work for her.

All those places that have “better” passenger trains than us have different lifestyles than MOST of the U.S.

What we should really be doing for our quality of life, safety, and for the environment, is getting more freight off the highways and on to trains. We should have never let trucks get to 53’ trailers and 80,000 lbs.

How much better the country might be if the government would have deregulated trains and trucks in 1953 rather than 1983. And if highway trailers had been held to 35’ except for special loads.

I would take a long trip on a train if the service was, A - better, and B - easier to understand. Have you ever been on the AMTRAK website and tried to figure out a trip? It is beyond difficult to understand and navigate.

We should have kept the mail on the trains, so it could continue to fund the passenger service like it did 80 years. That operation is not doing any better with trucks and planes…

“What we want”? I don’t want high speed rail that I would hardly use. i surely don’t want to pay for it.

Sheldon

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Well said, Sheldon. :+1:

Rich

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Save your breath, it’s certainly not going to happen during this Administration, if you want to call it that.

Rich

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I think this pretty much nails it. The only thing I will add is that at least in Japan, it seems like the culture supports it better too- it seems far more community-centric as opposed to individualistic. Under those lenses, any sort of major infrastructure project seems difficult, if not impossible to implement. Too many people who either don’t receive, or aren’t aware, of personal benefit, so they’re against it.

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Lots of good discussion here. Another factor I thought about is at least in Michigan the current Amtrak lines follow interstate corridors already and the state owns at least half the track.

Wolverine: I-94
Pere Marquette: I-196
Blue Water: I-94 and I-69

Like has been said, in this country the money and public support probably isn’t available to build passenger-only rails in the same corridor where they already exist.

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Distances are much shorter in Europe. London to Edinburgh or Glasgow, encompassing most of the population of the UK for example, is just a bit over 400 miles. It’s fast and scenic. I’ve ridden it before and would again.

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With regard to the Mail - will the USPS even exist a decade into the future?

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Community-centric is one thing in an urban area, and looks completely different in a rural area.

I live on the outskirts of Havre de Grace, MD. A historic east coast small “city” where the mighty Susquehanna River empties into the Chesapeake Bay. It is a very “community-centric” little town of 15,000 people. We have cultural events every weekend all spring, summer, and fall, we have a strong sensibility for historic preservation, it is a community of people who look out for each other.

A crime wave is three missing bicycles and a drunk in a bar all in one week.

The town thrives on tourism, history, and a few major industries.

The old PRR and B&O Northeast mailines (CSX & AMTRAK) run right thru town. But I don’t see how better rail service would help us.

Around us are dairy farms, cattle ranches, farming of all sorts of crops, some warehousing because we a close to I95, Baltimore, Wilmington and Philly. And some small specialized manufacturing - some served by rail. The rest is forest and state parks, yet to be disturbed by man, despite it proximity to major cities.

What is high speed rail going to do for us? Bring criminals quickly from the hood to disrupt our safety?

Yes, there is a pickup in every driveway - not because it is a fashion - because we work.

Sheldon

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They sure as hell won’t involve ugly tracks and vulnerable catenary shoehorned into the median of 70-mph-design-speed highways, with trains stopping between heavy travel lanes with long escalators and walkways to get to wherever you change modes. Even a BEV version of the Onion’s Velocibus makes more sense than that – with hover seats and amenities and hourly service, and the ability to go anywhere the exits do, it’s better than any built-to-a-price train that could be effectively ‘publicly’-financed here. The roads are built, and the roads have multiple, desired alternative uses. Are you suggesting two-speed regional and high speed service flirting with each other via CTC? Real operations are not like toy trains, and a great many potential problems are going to make double track in a trench a misery to run. And tell me how you propose to do track maintenance…

One of the ‘solutions’ to Chinese construction is that true HSR can tolerate surprisingly steep peak gradients – up to 8 and even 10% – on momentum. The fun is that you actually need modified-trapezoid vertical-curve transitions to get the approach and departure angles workable… which means just as much or more civil engineering as a Great Way Round with tunnels and long-radius curves. BUT when the vertical curvature can be implemented on ballssted-deck self-launching viaduct construction, the trick becomes doable for new construction. That’s no help for most Interstate ROWs in populated areas, but it does offer some very real advantage for many of the prospective segments on Brightline West… which would capitalize the viaduct equipment and TLMs for further corridors and segments.

Any ‘second spine line’ for the NEC would almost completely be in deep cuts/tunnels or on viaducts for reasons we’ve mentioned often before. To get any real time saving out of that colossal investment, it will need high sustained peak speed without terrifying everybody near it (on or off the trains!). And except perhaps for a shared 684 bridge or whatever, that ain’t going to be co-located with defense highways.

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Maybe not, but we have a better chance now that DeJoy is gone.

“While we’re glad to see DeJoy go, the fear is that his mismanagement will continue casting a destructive shadow,” Kevin Yoder, a former Republican congressman and executive director of the advocacy group Keep US Posted, told Axios.

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It didn’t happen under the last administration, or the one before that, or the one before that …

And before you compliment Amtrak Joe, take a look at the U.S. Treasury numbers for the past administrations (if you can call them that).

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In other cultures it provides an affordable way to travel quickly long distances without the hassle of airport travel.

I’m not aware of “criminals from the hood” preferring one mode of travel over another, but it seems like a car would be just as, if not more likely? So that seems a bit of a made up risk.

I’m not sure what the truck comment means either, as I live about 15 minutes from Havre De Grace, I have a well paying job, and yet I don’t have a truck. Maybe I missed the memo.

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The perfect solution is right before us! Who needs a 60 foot right-of-way! This bad boy will perch right on top of the “Jersey barrier” with ease —

The Brennan Gyro-Monorail (stamped 17 February 1920) by Historical Railway Images, on Flickr

The Brennan Gyro-Monorail by Historical Railway Images, on Flickr

More here:

“Curve coming up! Everyone lean starboard!”

Cheers, Ed

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And it ain’t gonna happen on the next one after this one or the next one after that one. There just is not sufficient public support or the congressional will to do it, although I do support high speed rail, but in the center of the Interstates? I don’t think so.