A day after proposing a spending freeze (that everyone from Glenn Beck to Paul Krugman thinks is stupid), Obama gleefully announced $8 billion in federal grants for high-speed rail. But Obama knows full well that the final cost will be much, much more than $8 billion.
How much more? The Antiplanner once estimated $550 billion in capital costs (not counting cost overruns). BNSF CEO Mark Rose guesses $1 trillion (he must have included cost overruns). Oregon Congressman Peter DeFazio compromises at $700 billion.
“The thing is unimaginably expensive,” admits DeFazio. But, he adds, $700 billion is “the same amount of money that Congress gave in one day to Wall Street!” In trying to make high-speed rail sound cheap, he is hoping you won’t remember that Congress didn’t give Wall Street anything; it was almost all loans and most, if not all, will be repaid. That won’t happen with high-speed rail.
So what states got how much money?
- $2.344 billion goes to California, mainly to improve the LA-San Diego corridor from 90 mph to 110 mph, increase frequencies in the Oakland-Bakersfield corridor, and relocate a little track in Sacramento and Davis
- $1.25 billion goes to Florida for the only true high-speed rail in the program, a 168-mph route all the way from Orlando about 84 miles to Tampa
- $1.191 billion ($706 million of which comes from Amtrak stimulus funds) to make various improvements in the Northeast — Philadelphia-Pittsburgh, Boston-Portland, New Haven-Springfield, Buffalo-Albany, Boston-Washington, and a few other minor corridors, not of which will significantly increase speeds or frequencies
- $1.133 billion for Chicago-St. Louis — about a third of what was requested — to increase frequencies from 5 to 8 trips a day and increase average speeds from 52 to 68 mph
- $823 million to establish passenger service between Milwaukee and Madison at top speeds of 79 mph
- $598 million to Washington state to increase frequencies between Seattle and Portland from 5 to 8 trains and increase speeds by about 5 percent
- $620 million to boost speeds in the Charlotte-Raleigh corridor to 90 mph and increase frequencies from 2 to 8 trains
- $400 million for three 79-mph trains a day from Cleveland to Cincinnati
- $244 million to improvements in the Chicago-Detroit corridor mainly aimed at improving reliability and reducing rail congestion
- $17 million for “power crossovers” in Iowa, and
- $4 million for grade crossing improvements between Austin and Ft. Worth
The good news is, except in Florida, these projects will not build much in the way of new rail lines and the resulting long-term obligations to maintain and operate those lines. The grants are particularly a slap in the face for California, which wanted assurance that the feds would provide half the funds for its $45 billion to $60 billion (or more) 220-mph rail project. The fact that most of the funds for California are mainly for improving existing track and service means that state may have to rethink its plans.
The 2009 FRA route map — only the red lines are part of the FRA high-speed rail vision.
The main new obligations outside of Florida are in Illinois, North Carolina, and Washington, where the grants include funds for new trains for more frequent service; and Wisconsin, for new service to Madison (at conventional speeds). The states will have to shoulder much of the cost of operating those new trains, which may temper the future demand for future capital funds. And Florida’s high-speed line, if it ever gets completed, is likely to prove a flop: few will trade off the flexibility of having their own car in order to save a few minutes on an 84-mile trip.
The 2010 FRA route map: a much more expensive vision.
The bad news is that much of the $8 billion is likely to end up in the hands of lobbyists who will work hard to gain more billions for future projects. The FRA added lots of new lines to its route map, including Cheyenne-El Paso, Phoenix-Tucson, Chicago-Omaha, Kansas City-Oklahoma City, Louisville-Atlanta, Memphis-Little Rock, Orlando-Jacksonville, Austin-Houston, and Albany-Montreal. This will encourage more states to pressure for more funds for their own raildoggles.
As DeFazio notes, the states that got the money were the ones that had finished environmental reports; now states know they can get a windfall from the feds if they complete such reports (and put up matching funds and promise to pay to operate the trains). All of which will add up to a giant waste of money.
We need some truth in advertising here. I learned in physics classes that speed is relative – first one has to define the reference frame.
Here are some example record speeds without using petroleum fuels:
sail boat 51.36 knots for 500 m, l’Hydroptère, France
bicycle 82.33 mph for 200 m flying start, Sam Whittingham, 09/18/2008, Battle Mountain, Nevada
land yacht (land sailer)126.2 mph Richard Jenkins in the Yacht Greenbird on 03/26/2008, Ivanpah (dry) Lake, California.
So the trains we are concerned with have average speeds in the range of the fastest sailboat/bicycle/ landyacht top speeds. That doesn’t seem very fast to me, a motorcycle rider, because I know I can buy a new motorcycle for $10,000 that will go much faster than the trains.
This is nuts.
$1.3 billion to increase the speed of the St. Louis – Chicago route from 52 to 68 mph? Nuts!
I understand why many Democratic politicians support rail projects like these, given that they see many of the dollars going to unionized workers to build, maintain and operate the rail lines (for some reason, anything having to do with moving passengers on vehicles equipped with steel wheels on steel rails means unionization and usually strict work rules – and high operating costs).
But where is the Republican Party on this? Many of the states that (supposedly) benefit from this spending have the GOP in charge in the governor’s office, or in one or both legislative houses, or in all three. Yet these states seem to be just as enthusiastic about passenger rail lines as my home state of Maryland (where Democrats are in firm control of state government).
Such staggering waste. As DeFazio’s quote indicates, it’s clear that Obama and the Congress simply have no sense whatever of the scale of their spending.
They even nodded to this phenomenon on last night’s new episode of The Simpsons. Homer wins the lottery and has to forfeit a third of his winnings in taxes. The government representative comes to Homer’s lottery award ceremony to collect Uncle Sam’s cut, and proudly boasts to the crowd, “This money will be used to cover a portion of the cost of a commission to determine what to do with this money!”
Patrick,
At least here in Texas, the Republican Party is split. There are some big name Republican supporters of the Texas T-bone. But, I’m part of a group of people who are trying to come together locally down here to put a stop to runaway trains.
As far as Peter Fazio’s remark justifying spending $700 billion on rail because that kind of money was loaned to banks (and AP, I’m glad that you pointed out that those monies were loaned and are being paid back), that smacks of making a justification based on the premise that “we need to do this because it is mandatory that we throw away good money after bad”. It’s that kind of reasoning that has given rise to the Tea Party movement, and it’s that kind of sentiment that means that people like Mr. Fazio need to be sent packing.
C.P.Z,
Your mistake is thinking that there is some sort of substantive difference between Democrats and the GOP. On the federal (and often gubernatorial) level, the ones that have not lost sight of their “service,” and are in it for the right reasons are few and far between, regardless of party. That’s why red states are getting big chunks of the health care reform funding. “But where is the Republican Party on this,” indeed? I’m sure that officially, and on the record, they are against it. They’re the minority. When your the minority your against everything. That’s how you win the next round.
Sure, HSR would be slightly nice. First of all, it’s mostly medium speed and very limited on grade-separation (causing vehicular traffic backups & accidents).
Secondly, this niceness is expensive.
It would be much nicer to have more lanes.
How often do people travel between UAs, within ~500 miles?
And you still need transport to the station & around the area of the destination.
It will not reduce congestion. Consider the % of all travel.
It will not add to economic productivity. Hey, for all construction projects, create more jobs by disallowing heavy machinery & use manual labor instead.
It’s roughly energy neutral.
It’s political.
It’s theoretical feel-good.
My name is Laura Hancock and I’m a newspaper reporter out of Salt Lake City, at a daily called Deseret News. I’m doing a story about some of the smart growth plans our local transit agency wants to do. Do you have a phone number?
Today I’m at the Utah Legislature (it’s in session) but I’m online. My work e-mail (the best way to reach me) is lhancock@desnews.com.
Thanks – Laura
Scott,
I agree with most of your premises. But let me go through them 1 by 1 (or as I see fit):
“(causing vehicular traffic backups & accidents)”
This has been the effect of toll roads in much of TX, particularly Austin. Huge traffic delays on any road intersecting the toll road and accompanying accidents. But yes trains will do this too.
“It would be much nicer to have more lanes.”
But this doesn’t reduce congestion either. At least not substantially over more than say 2-5 years. The more capacity, the farther people move away. Big fat highways or wastefully expensive trains do not help congestion!
“How often do people travel between UAs, within ~500 miles?”
Quite a bit, which is one reason Southwest Airlines has done so well. Hits up all of those smaller market airports.
“It will not reduce congestion.”
No it won’t! Neither will adding lanes to the highways. Thats theoretical feel-good too.
“It’s political.”
Exactly. How would you propose changing the conversation? Honestly, I’m at a loss.
Boy, it’s been an anti-HSR campaign by ROT of late. How many HSR articles can one really write? I wonder if some outside “influence” has something to do with the quantity of these types of articles? Hmmm…
Bennett,
What’s the point about toll roads causing bottlenecks? Seems irrelevant. That type of user fee is inefficient & why gas taxes are better.
More lanes do reduce congestion. Look at the LA UA. It has the least lanes per person & the most congestion. Look at Kansas City & OK City. They have the most lanes per person & good free flow traffic. People don’t just drive endlessly when they can. Look at rural areas. based upon this induced traffic theory, those lanes would be congested. People drive for a purpose. Duh! There are also many reasons that people choose where to live, have job, shop, etc. Being the farthest away from those, if there are clear freeways, is not a reason.
People travel often less than 500 miles? Wrong!!!
What % of flights are for short distances?
For those, how many would rather take the train.
What’s the advantage for trains over planes? It’s not energy.
How are more lanes, feel-good? Well, more lanes do reduce pollution & increase mpg.
When supply falls behind demand, it’s inaccurate to claim that more supply is not needed.
Imagine the country without any freeways. Oh crap! the GDP would be 2/3 less.
Don’t forget trucks & goods transport.
BTW, for goods transport, Europe [compared to the US] relies much more on trucks & less on rail.
bennett,
“It’s political.â€
Exactly. How would you propose changing the conversation? Honestly, I’m at a loss.
Heck, this is the easiest part of the question. The answer: Privatize as much as possible. Commuter highways in particular, which serve no legitimate military or police purpose, should all be private and user-fee supported.
ws
Boy, it’s been an anti-HSR campaign by ROT of late. How many HSR articles can one really write? I wonder if some outside “influence†has something to do with the quantity of these types of articles? Hmmm…
Indeed. One would almost think he was “dedicated to the sunset of government planning.” If only he would disclose that bias somewhere on this website. Perhaps near the banner, even. Because then we’d know.
Mike:“Privatize as much as possible. Commuter highways in particular, which serve no legitimate military or police purpose, should all be private and user-fee supported.”
ws:Pretty much any road or highway can be argued as having the ability to serve the military or police purpose. Anyways, who decides that? Planners?
Regarding the political nature of rail & “changing the conversation”:
How about producing infrastructure/transportation that people use & want?
And that users are willing to pay for (ie gas tax)?
How about accurate cost benefit analysis?
Scott,
Your road example is ludicrous. The correlation is obvious, but your solution for places like LA, SF, and NYC would be impossible, the population is too big. Should we just take all of the WY highways and give them to LA (being ridiculous to make a point). Also, do not confuse correlation with causation. Last I saw (cdot data can’t find the link) T-Rex in d-town hasn’t helped congestion, and the endless highway expansion on I-35 in TX hasn’t made any difference. The reason that your more lanes is “theoretical feel good”, is because highway lane expansion has a poor track record in reducing congestion when implemented, JUST LIKE PASSENGER RAIL. It’s the wrong argument for both sides. Congestion (or the simple supply and demand relationship as you see it) is more complicated than just making the pipe bigger, it’s about making the system more efficient (i.e. better connectivity, timed traffic lights, fewer dead end subdivisions etc. etc. etc.), not just bigger. Bigger is not always faster.
You missed my point about short trips. Fact is they happen all the time. I was never advocating that trains were a better mode so you can ease off the attack. But again, it’s not a good argument. People have to travel 200 to 300 miles all the time (particularly on business) and they usually drive, and that’s fine. But saying we shouldn’t have rail because “How often do people travel between UAs, within ~500 miles,” isn’t going to convince anybody of anything.
bennett wrote:
> You missed my point about short trips.
I didn’t. 😉
> Fact is they happen all the time.
Agreed.
> I was never advocating that trains were a better mode so
> you can ease off the attack. But again, it’s not a
> good argument. People have to travel 200 to 300 miles all
> the time (particularly on business) and they usually drive,
> and that’s fine.
This is correct. Were it false, the I-95 corridor (the one highway corridor that runs relatively near the only operating HSR corridor in the United States today) would have very little traffic on it. I drive I-95 (and the routes that bridge the I-95 “gap” in New Jersey, I-295 and the N.J. Turnpike) between Maryland and New York somewhat frequently, and can assure readers of this blog that there is plenty of auto and truck traffic running north and south, every day.
> But saying we shouldn’t have rail because “How often do
> people travel between UAs, within ~500 miles,†isn’t going
> to convince anybody of anything.
Agreed. Just because people travel 500 miles by ground or air does not mean that a corridor is appropriate for a multi-billion dollar infusion of taxpayer capital subsidies (and never mind the inevitable operating losses)
Bennett,
You avoided most of my points, although skirted them & misinterpreted.
“Moving a road system to another state” Why would you type such a thing?
You confuse correlation with causation. Actually, I’ve looked at statistics for VMT/driver and drivers/lane-mile. There is no correlation.
According to your theory, to halt over-population, no more food should be grown. According to you, a garden hose can fight a fire equally as a firefighter hose, because additional capacity is irrelevant.
Your assertion that more freeway lanes induces more driving was shown to be inaccurate:
Many rural Interstates are free-flowing. According to you, people will just drive there because they can & or move there.
This theory is that lane capacity induces driving, right?
You seem to forget that people drive to get somewhere & prefer to do it in the least amount of time. If a person can freely drive at 75 mph, they would still like it to be a short distance, but you think that they then would drive for an hour.
There are many UAs (OK & KS) that have high lane-miles/capita, but are not congested.
The reverse is true in NYC & LA areas. According to you, since the freeway capacity is low, the VMT/driver would be low.
There is no reason that adding more lanes is impossible because of a large population.
You are mis-characterizing short trips. Out of all VMT, those at 50-500 mile are a small part.
And how many of those trips will be near a rail route?
And how many will be substitutable with rail? For example, say points A1 & B1 have rail stops, but each person lives at Ax & wants to go to Bx & By, which are each miles away from A1 & B1. There’s still a matter of transportation.
You say people travel medium distances all the time, especially for business. That seems way exaggerated. Think, how many % of jobs entail travel like that? How many medium trips/year does each person make? Of those, would a rail trip be convenient? Think about having 1-2 passengers & the car use is cheaper.
Here’s the Southwest system map to see how short flights are far from the majority of their flights. http://www.southwest.com/travel_center/routemap_dyn.html
The main answer to see how new rail is too expensive is to look at the cost per passenger mile. There is no definite figure/estimate, but it is way too high. Let the private sector do this. Hey they can’t, because the ticket price is too expensive. Why should borrowing $1 trillion from 100% of the unborn pay for 0.01% of all travel-miles?
Oh bennet, I missed to point out a false assumption.
Just because any freeway has traffic on it, does not mean that they are driving 100s of miles. Why would you even think such a thing?
For I-95 in Bosh-Wash, sure there will be traffic all the time.
That doesn’t mean that many are traveling 100+ miles.
“$1.3 billion to increase the speed of the St. Louis – Chicago route from 52 to 68 mph? Nuts!”
Speed is not the only attribute being improved here. Reliability and capacity are also improved. Sure, increasing the speed from 52 to 68 MPH doesn’t sound like much. Increasing on-time % from, say, 60% to 90% is the big improvement I am hopeful to see.
“Boy, it’s been an anti-HSR campaign by ROT of late.”
Yes, he holds an anti-rail bias. I hold a pro-rail bias. Who cares?
I am new to this dialogue, so new that I can’t understand most of the dialogue in these comments. For the information of those commenting here: I am not learning anything from your discourse since I can’t follow or understand it.
Scott,
You need to slow down and read! Why would I type such a thing? If you would have read the next sentence you would of realized I understood the insanity of that, I was using it to make a point about your ridiculous assertion that highway capacity should be based on some sort of per capita calculation.
My theory never had anything to do with population and food supply, but efficiency of the entire road system, not just highways.
“This theory is that lane capacity induces driving, right?”
Only for people that have the capacity to think about transportation issues outside of their own personal ideology and more than 30 minutes into the future.
Regarding short trips. I agree that cars and commuter flights are better than rail. What the hell. Why don’t you read? You’ve clearly made your point about the distance-split, it still doesn’t change the fact that millions upon millions of 200 to 500 mile trips are made every year. You saying that we shouldn’t have rail because this doesn’t happen, even though you know it does is idiotic.
But I can see I’m going to get nowhere with you. 1st you don’t read carefully. Secondly you think that people commuting to work is akin to firemen putting out fires. Yes yes, soooooo many similarities.
So whatever. You win. Lets build a 87 lane highway in LA, not consider ALL of the other thousand of factors that contribute to congestion, and all will be better. Sheesh!
bennett: “Quite a bit, which is one reason Southwest Airlines has done so well. Hits up all of those smaller market airports.”
I agree that the demand for < 500 mile transport is significant. But your understanding of the success of Southwest Airlines' success is a little out-of-date, IMO. In its early days the intra-Texas and other short-haul traffic was critical to SWA. Today, the airline earns much of its revenue in the longer markets and larger cities. Its busiest airports now include Los Angeles, Oakland, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Chicago Midway, Baltimore-Washington, and Orlando as well as its long established Dallas and Houston operations.
A slight correction here. OTOH, a tiny bit of the money applies to the DC-Richmond corridor and a little bit for crossovers that are really in the Raleigh-Richmond corridor.
On the other, this will only increase frequencies from 2 to 4 trains (each way). (1 of which goes all the way to New York, the rest are only Raleigh-Charlotte). The eventual plan is 8 roundtrips, but that’s only if the rest of the phases of the program are funded.
Bennett,
You seem hung up on thinking that people drive just because of available road capacity.
Your theory goes that without roads, people don’t have a need to go somewhere.
Look at other countries, few if any have the amount of lane-miles/capita as the US, and the congestion is horrible. The need to drive comes first. The farther that capacity lags, the more congestion. Forgive me for this, but if you lack knowledge & ability in economics & math, perhaps you shouldn’t really ponder this much.
Here’s another example: Look at about any UA & there are Interstates leading out, going into rural areas. According to you, since those lanes are more clear, people will try to live out there. Actually the spread of UAs has slowed & yard size has even been going down. Overall, the portion of population that is urbanized (about 80% in 2000 Census) is still increasing (meaning fewer living in rural). Congestion is actually less in lower density areas, on average. Again, look at the LA UA, the densest in the US & the worst congestion.
You missed the real world examples of UAs & the analogy of food production.
Elaboration: LA does not have excess lanes, therefore, according to your theory, people will not want to drive more. You also neglect to account for population growth. It is fallacious to think that there is demand for travel only when it is provided. Look at food–people still need it, whether it’s there or not.
You seem to be missing the point that out of all miles traveled, the portion for trips of 100-500 miles is small, and that rail will not be able to meet many of those trips, because of other transportation still needed, and the incredible expense.
To get an idea of real data on transportation, rather than just thinking “a lot of trips” or “millions”, here are sources:
http://cta.ornl.gov/data/index.shtml
http://www.bts.gov/publications/national_transportation_statistics/html/table_01_32.html
Although it does not have a break-down (as I could see) for medium length trips.
Two particular items to look at are the air VMTs of almost 7 billion & the road VMTs of over 3 trillion. The total # is so high, it’s hardly fathomable to… Let’s analyze:
What portion of those are medium length?… between possible rail stations?
And broken down to 50+ routes [between UAs]?…Running every day?…20+ times per day?
It comes down to how many passengers per trip?
There’s an actual route to look at. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acela_Express
The Acela, runs almost 500 miles, with almost 9,000 riders/day. That’s an incredibly low ridership amount. For comparison, one of the worst major LRT lines (San Jose) is 40,000/day, over about 40 miles.
The population of the area served, BosWash, is almost 60 million, with the most potential, by far, for medium length trips.
The avg trip length is not given, but assume that it’s about half the length (probably even less). When you look at just one direction (half of ridership) it comes down to an avg of 2,000 riders/day through-out. That’s the capacity of one freeway lane for one hour.
In other words, the total passenger-miles of the Acela, for one day, is the same as the VMTs, for one hour, on a lane in each direction, on I-95 (mostly parallel), for the same distance.
For a whole day, a freeway lane-mile can comfortably handle 20,000 vehicles. That allows for hourly changes in traffic, as opposed to a max capacity of 48,000/day for constant full capacity.
For more info on flow, see the daily traffic for bridges & divide by lanes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bay_Bridge_(California)
For I-95, assume it’s 4 lanes each direction.
That’s 80,000 vehicles/day through any one point.
So, Acela carries about 2.5% (1/40) of what I-95 does.
Should more rail lines be built/upgraded to carry <3% of what the freeways do?
Sure it would be nice to have more rail available, but it's awfully expensive for just a few 1,000 riders/day/route.
Thanks for being asshole Scott, not every one on I-95 is driving between Washington & NYC.
Also for that matter there were tracks on the Bay Bridge at one time.
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