The Wall Street Journal this morning (Tuesday, September 21st) carries an article on the pitfalls of getting HSR off the ground, essentially (as we all know) because the freight railroads own 90% of track and cannot profitably nor safely operate with concurrent 90+ mph passenger rail service. Here is the URL of the on-line version:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703305004575504180006530598.html?ru=yahoo&mod=yahoo_hs
This was easily predictable. The ultimate NIMBYS to HSR will be the freight railroads. Apparently, they are leery of their stake in the stakeholder role being imposed on them by the federal government. The heavy-handed federal presumption that the freight railroads are just going to hold hands with the government and go along to get along is breathtaking.
John Pocari, deputy secretary of the Department of Transportation puts it this way:
“The success of many projects depends on cooperation between freight railroads and the states,” Mr. Pocari said. “It is something we’re going to insist on.”
Basically, the government wants to use the freight corridors for new HSR in order to save money. The governm
That article is pretty much a summary of the more recent rhetoric on HSR. In my opinion, most of this is posturing for negotiations.
Certainly there will be posturing for negotiations, but I don’t think that dismisses any of the incredible difficulty of this partnership with the government. And it does not sound like the Department of Transportation is in the mood for negotiations when they say they are going to insist on the cooperation of the freight railroads.
In negotiations, about all the freight railroads can negotiate is receiving more money from the government. But the public money with strings attached is the basic problem in the first place, so asking for more of it works against the railroads, rather than for them.
I don’t think the
Well, rightly or wrongly depending on one’s perspective, that will be true enough if something isn’t worked out.
Villainize and nationalize, governments have done it before.
Recently a retired railroad engineering type told me that the classic railroad response to any request for passenger service over their tracks is "Hell, no ! Then we go from there . . . ". [swg]
I can see the debate and the results going either way, for the reasons stated above on each side. But the bottom line - literally - is that the government simply doesn’t have enough money to build its own HSR network, or buy all it wants from the freight railroads - maybe 1 or 2 short corridors, but that’s it. After that, the govt. is going to have to negotiate - or beg - for cooperation from the freight railroads. That will provide the Class I’s with the better hand to play. There’s been enough experience with that kind of operation for the last 50 years or so for most of the bugs to have been worked out, and the pitfalls to have been identified and noted so that
But will it be true?
Is this scary enough for any freight railroads to consider dealing with the passenger element themselves again?
As I said, regardless of rightly or wrongly, if the freight lines cannot reach a deal on trackage or in the case of the California HSR, easement usage, then they will be at least partially responsible for holding up HSR, etc. Simple causality even with the right to refuse.
The freight railroads have no responsibility or obligation for the implementation of HSR. So, how can they delay it?
The bottom line, as has been pointed out by others, including the RRs themselves, is that the country MUST have its rail freight service … twice as much of it, in fact, by 2030. Anything that compromises this is dangerous, including HSR that results in a loss of the freight capacity the RRs need to prosper and the country needs to function.
Medium-distance rail passenger service, on the other hand, is in most places an expensive frill. With the exception of the Northeast Corridor and a couple of other places, it simply is not critical to anybody and not worth hurting what modern railroads in the U.S. have been asked to do and that they do best.
I enjoyed my rides on the private rails as much as anybody and in an ideal world would welcome the chance to repeat the experience with HSR. But Washington wants to do this on the cheap, out of the pockets of the railroads and shareholders like me, and I say the hell with it.
You’re kidding right?
Interested but ultimately non-responsible non-obligated parties hold up implementation of things all the time.
I am not kidding, but what makes you think I am?
Bucyrus,
I don’t know how you can be so dense. You sound like the kind of guy who would refuse the let that poor family across town move in to your house just because you paid for it. What a socially irrresponsible attitude!
Mac
From what I read in the WSJ article the main pitfall mentioned in the article seems to be running high speed passenger trains on the same alignment as freight railroad track. How is high speed rail defined? I don’t consider anything less than an average speed of 150 mph high speed rail, and certainly the high speed passenger trainsarunning at average speeds of 150 mph cannot coexist on the same track or alignment as freight trains. Moreover, i agree with others who have said tht the freight railroads are not delaying high speed rail.
If the government ever wants high speed passenger trains they will have to put up some of the money to build the necessary dedicated high speed right-of-way.
At least that’s my 5 cents worth. [:)]