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Post by culvercitylocke on Apr 19, 2016 21:43:16 GMT -8
Likewise if the metro link is that bad, improve the metro link. and remember that wobbly two hour metro link route built 100 years ago is the route hsr is scheduled to follow on the 68 billion plan. given the speed constraints of a train on the metro link route, it is unlikely hsr will be much faster than the metro link train. Or they could abandon the ancient route and tunnel directly, but that sort of scoping change will add billions to the already astronomical price. I appreciate having a poster that isn't part of the pro-transit circlejerk, but could you please criticize the project on its merits instead of completely making shit up? That's like saying the 405 can't be faster than Sepulveda Boulevard because the latter winds through the pass. Guess what: move some dirt around and build some retaining walls and you can go straighter (and therefore faster) than the 19th century route! Even when the plan was to follow SR14, it didn't exactly follow the Metrolink tracks. The "scoping change" to tunnel directly already happened: the current alignment options don't even go near Santa Clarita. You are of course correct, I dashed off he above on my phone and neglected to add the nuance. The SR 14 route will not be at ancient rail speeds, obviously, but given the geographic constraints and the amount of winding it will have to do, the train will move quite slow along that route mostly because they geographically cannot build curves for the hsr track at hsr curve radius, that means the train speed is mathematically constrained by the maximum curve radius they can manage through the sr 14 route. It will be faster, but it will be relatively slow for the line. And you are correct about the scoping change to study the direct tunneling. This is fundamentally the better choice logistically in terms of hsr design specs, and yields the best result for commuters, (which also means the most urban sprawl in Palmdale and yields our legislative real estate speculators the biggest profit margins with the housing boom such sprawl entails) but it is a mammoth cost increase for a scoping change, which is why it isn't part of the 68 billion budget. And it is bad for Southern California because the cost and time of the scoping change to tunnel directly are arguably a big part of why Southern California was just kicked to the curb in the hsr construction timeline. The scoping change we need is to remove the Palmdale dogleg entirely and run a grapevine adjacent route instead. That's the sort of scoping change that could shave tens of billions off the project.
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Post by fissure on Apr 21, 2016 20:15:03 GMT -8
Yeah, Tejon makes more sense to me too. The Vegas line is often cited as a reason for the dogleg, but it can connect at the 138/5 interchange to go north (it's all on flat desert either way), and building through Cajon to get to LA opens it up to San Diego/IE/OC.
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Post by culvercitylocke on Oct 20, 2016 19:01:02 GMT -8
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Post by johanragle on Oct 21, 2016 12:02:31 GMT -8
On the bright side, with the longer headways that HSR runs at, if they need to add future capacity without rebuilding they can always add more trainsets and shorten the headways.
Sometimes I don't get the critics. They blast it for being an overly ambitious project that will cost too much, then when the authority makes changes to keep the cost from ballooning, they blast it for making the cuts. I guess we'd rather spend the same amount of money doubling the width of Interstate 5 and making traffic even more congested through Santa Clarita.
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Post by cygnip2p on Oct 21, 2016 13:33:59 GMT -8
12 ten-cars trains per hour vs 6 twenty-car trains doesn't strike me as too much of a compromise. If we have learned anything from the Southwest model of operation, its that people much prefer lots of departure options. And with the route compromises that NIMBYs are trying to force along the 14 corridor section, that platform money may be better spent elsewhere. And while I believe the project will be very successful, it will take a good deal of demand to make 12 ten-car trains an hour inadequate. I think they will have plenty of headroom before needing to move to double-deckers far in the future.
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Post by culvercitylocke on Feb 17, 2017 14:12:17 GMT -8
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Post by culvercitylocke on Jul 31, 2017 9:33:38 GMT -8
On the bright side, with the longer headways that HSR runs at, if they need to add future capacity without rebuilding they can always add more trainsets and shorten the headways. Sometimes I don't get the critics. They blast it for being an overly ambitious project that will cost too much, then when the authority makes changes to keep the cost from ballooning, they blast it for making the cuts. I guess we'd rather spend the same amount of money doubling the width of Interstate 5 and making traffic even more congested through Santa Clarita. HSR headways are constrained by physics: aka, the hard limits on braking: time to full stop, distance it takes to brake to full stop over that time. etc. you cannot simply add trainsets and reduce frequency like you do with slower HRT and LRT. Reducing the number of cars in the train reduces the overall capacity since headways cannot increase very much to add capacity. Quite simply, I don't think you can go shorter than ten to twelve minute headways on HSR, not safely. On the other hand, I think the peak headway for any HSR is 14 per hour in Japan, So perhaps every six minutes is possible, increased headways may be possible simply because the California High Speed Rail will be one of the SLOWEST high speed rail lines in the world. *** There are great pictures of construction in this LA Times link about the latest HSR legal woes: www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-high-speed-rail-court-20170728-story.html*** Likewise, the August Construction update is out, here is the PDF (with pictures stats etc), detailing the state of construction on the eleven active construction sites (some of the first projects like the Fresno River Viaduct are virtually completed!) www.hsr.ca.gov/docs/programs/construction/road_closure/2017_Aug_Construction_Update.pdf*** There is also a great video for the august construction update that shows the state of a lot of the current construction projects. www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Yvs5ztTLY0&feature=youtu.be*** the build HSR website is quite interesting as well www.buildhsr.com/The interactive map there provides a fabulous array of details about all the current construction, as well as pictures www.buildhsr.com/interactive_map/*** Finally, here is a flyover video on the range of alternatives for HSR through the city of San Jose www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5qZ6e8MVdE
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Post by culvercitylocke on Sept 6, 2017 14:03:36 GMT -8
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Post by culvercitylocke on Oct 19, 2017 19:44:19 GMT -8
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Post by culvercitylocke on Mar 9, 2018 17:46:56 GMT -8
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Post by culvercitylocke on Mar 9, 2018 18:06:50 GMT -8
this is a little out of date, but im digging through my sd card and found a photo i took at a la county library. behold the full 2005 DEIR for california high speed rail! Well look at that, a DEIR all finished and everything, I bet it only cost a couple million dollars too. how mysterious we have to fund a new environmental impact report that will cost over a billion dollars. What a conundrum! Certainly no graft going on today, no sir.
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Post by culvercitylocke on Mar 12, 2018 9:14:26 GMT -8
www.hsr.ca.gov/about/Business_Plans/Draft_2018_Business_Plan.htmlDraft 2018 Business plan. they are estimating 259 billion in cumulative revenue by 2060, and between 0.7 and 2.5 billion per year in revenue by 2030 However fares are rather... interesting. $34 fare from Palmdale to Union station. Currently it is $10.75 on metrolink. Given a monthly pass, metrolink is $3000 a year. Since they don't denote any monthly pass in the draft business plan discussion of fares, that $34 fare from Palmdale to Union station means a cost of $17,000 per year for commuters, or five times the cost of existing service. Since commuters are the bedrock of HSR success, that seems to be a fare level designed to deter use, and encourage use of "free" automotive or cheaper metrolink alternatives.
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Post by jeisenbe on Mar 12, 2018 18:44:41 GMT -8
"commuters are the bedrock of HSR success" [citation needed]
I think intracity business travelers are the bedrock of HSR success. It's competition is short-haul flights, not commuter trains or buses.
Since a comuter from LAX to Palmdale is taking up a seat that could otherwise be sold from LAX to SF, there needs to be a high enough fare to encourage longer trips.
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Post by culvercitylocke on Mar 12, 2018 22:05:28 GMT -8
"commuters are the bedrock of HSR success" [citation needed] I think intracity business travelers are the bedrock of HSR success. It's competition is short-haul flights, not commuter trains or buses. Since a comuter from LAX to Palmdale is taking up a seat that could otherwise be sold from LAX to SF, there needs to be a high enough fare to encourage longer trips. Ron Diridion for one: www.mercurynews.com/2018/02/14/opinion-why-california-should-continue-building-high-speed-rail/and I believe I saw it on Alon Levy's blog, in the last three months, he said something about how the majority of trips on Japanese (and possibly also european) HSR trips are commuter trips. but a cursory search of his recent posts doesn't reveal it, which makes me think it was an aside he mentioned in the comments.
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Post by exporider on Mar 13, 2018 11:13:01 GMT -8
"commuters are the bedrock of HSR success" [citation needed] I think intracity business travelers are the bedrock of HSR success. It's competition is short-haul flights, not commuter trains or buses. Since a comuter from LAX to Palmdale is taking up a seat that could otherwise be sold from LAX to SF, there needs to be a high enough fare to encourage longer trips. From my reading of the Ridership and Revenue Report it looks like 23 percent of the ridership and 12 percent of the revenue will come from trips that are fully within the "SCAG" (Southern California) and "MTC" (Bay Area) regions. For the sake of argument we can assume that these are the "commuters" referred to in the earlier comments. I'll let you decide whether that share of the market qualifies as a "bedrock". By comparison, truly long distance trips between northern and southern California will account for 22 percent of the ridership and 35 percent of the projected revenue for the HSR project. The bulk of the remaining ridership and revenue is expected to come from connecting the Central Valley communities to the northern and southern California urban areas.
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Post by culvercitylocke on Mar 16, 2018 8:46:11 GMT -8
To save a billion dollars, San Jose to gilroy will be at grade with crossing gates and a 110 mph limit.
If Union Pacific allows the corridor to even be used.
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Post by culvercitylocke on Mar 19, 2018 9:05:08 GMT -8
Construction package four begins heavy construction today in Kern County as work begins on bridge foundations for an HSR overpass above Garces highway
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Post by culvercitylocke on Apr 5, 2018 12:38:31 GMT -8
April construction update has a lot of aerial photos of the various projects being built www.hsr.ca.gov/docs/programs/construction/road_closure/2018_April_Construction_Update.pdfIt's crazy that they get grade seperations for all these rural "avenue x" roads, but From San Jose to Gilroy with much heavier road use it will be dangerous crossing gates and 110 mph speeds. That's the problem with starting construction in the middle of nowhere, spending lots of money on low priority elements but then no longer having enough money for much higher priority elements a few years down the line. backwards thinking, backwards planning.
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Post by culvercitylocke on Apr 5, 2018 14:45:49 GMT -8
The update had me looking at the rail alignment through Palmdale again. it blows my mind that a perfectly straight 42 km right of way from lancaster to mojave isn't being used, and to save 12 km, we're crafting a new diagonal right of way through privately held land. No wonder they have such trouble buying property!
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Post by culvercitylocke on Apr 5, 2018 14:47:09 GMT -8
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Post by culvercitylocke on May 16, 2018 11:21:31 GMT -8
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Post by culvercitylocke on Jun 27, 2018 16:32:32 GMT -8
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Post by culvercitylocke on Jul 31, 2018 10:55:55 GMT -8
NYT and LAT had parallel stories about the HSR over the weekend. If you're wanting a less Vartebedian-take on the project, it's an interesting compare and contrast, even in the picture selection used (LAtimes uses a picture that is very very wide and implies the viaduct they chose to show is isolated): www.nytimes.com/2018/07/30/us/california-high-speed-rail.htmland here's the LA Times story, where they manage to take a positive story--simulations show that nonstop express service between LA and SF will be under the 2hr40min limit, and turn it into a negative story full of Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-bullet-train-speed-20180729-story.htmlNote that the NYT story only has pictures of the CAHSR, while the LAT story goes out of its way to include pictures of Japan, France, and Miami trains instead of putting in pictures of the CAHSR.
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Post by culvercitylocke on Jul 31, 2018 10:58:21 GMT -8
Of much more interest to Rail fans, here is the document the LATimes received regarding express service simulations that they spent a few thousand words disparaging and trying to discredit in the above article. www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-cahsr-performance-calculations-20180730-story.htmlLooking at the simulation data, For all the hullabaloo made about the mountain pass from Madera to San Jose, it certainly is a much less severe mountain crossing than Tehachapi!
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Post by culvercitylocke on Aug 2, 2018 8:41:59 GMT -8
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Post by culvercitylocke on Aug 2, 2018 9:02:23 GMT -8
Here's the direct link to the August Construction update for the HSR. Currently the link on the ca.hsr.gov website mainpage is broken, so I did some digging and figured out the web address. www.hsr.ca.gov/docs/programs/construction/road_closure/2018_August_Construction_Update.pdfIt's a big, thorough picture update of a lot of the projects. The biggest change is that some of the embankments have started to be built for the road overcrossings, so the bridge structures no longer look quite so embarassingly disconnected from the landscape. There's also some great aerial views of the deck construction that rests on top of the HSR's signature iconic Pergola.
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Post by culvercitylocke on Aug 4, 2018 17:17:43 GMT -8
of tangential interest to HSR. SB1 is providing 500M in funding to the ACE corridor for DMU improvements between Sacramento and Madera and Sacramento and San Jose. I don't know if this will be making improvements the HSR can take advantage of, like grade separations, or cleaning up old curves in the ROW, but it might prove helpful if HSR ever reaches a phase 2 www.acerail.com/About/News/2017/Valley-Rail-and-SB-1-Funding
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Post by exporider on Aug 6, 2018 10:25:12 GMT -8
Interesting, thanks for posting. This project won't have any direct benefits to the HSR ROW, since there's no overlap over planned alignments. It should have more long-term benefits to connect smaller cities in the Central Valley and Tri-Valley to the HSR stations. In the near-term, it would make so much more sense for this project to go all the way to Madera, so that it would tie in with the current construction plan to provide the first leg of HSR service between Bakersfield and Madera in 2029. IF ACE was extended to Madera, they would be able to coordinate these services to provide one transfer rides from Sacramento (and all interim stations) to Fresno and Bakersfield. My guess is that they are reluctant to develop this segment (Merced to Madera) with one mode (ACE) which will become redundant (hopefully) a few years later when Phase 1 of HSR is extended to Merced, which will provide an even higher level of service between these markets.
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Post by culvercitylocke on Aug 6, 2018 12:01:01 GMT -8
I am strongly suspicious that the proposed Merced dog leg in phase one is going to be eliminated to get the SF-Bakersfield route completed in budget
The LATimes had a stupid article today saying that the LATimes dug up internal HSR emails whining about union pacific, but the public stances of the contractor and UP are that there is no conflict. It's a non story, really (unless it actually does blow up into something that could kill the project, which seems unlikely). Sure UP is being an arse demanding additional safety compliance with their miles and miles of barriers, and we built the iconic pergola to cross their ROW, and are tunneling under SR 180 to not impinge their ROW, but they're getting so much money out of the project, they don't want to kill the golden goose.
But also, the HSR went out of its way to piss off every farm owner in the central valley and build a new ROW rather than work with the UP right of way, they do in Fresno out of necessity and it is costing them dearly, but this is an alignment story that is roughly what six years out of date?
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Post by culvercitylocke on Sept 13, 2018 17:26:07 GMT -8
Battery Electric trains are coming. Well sort of. Basically, technology has developed that equips electric trains with batteries, this lets them take advantage of regenerative braking. It's not meant to be run purely on batteries, they have a range of 25 miles. It is more meant to create a train that can bridge a "not-electrified" gap on tracks. It actually would be an extremely good option for Burbank to Union station, because it would allow passengers to stay on the same train rather than have to transfer to a DMU to get to union station for ten years as is currently the plan. insideevs.com/bombardier-battery-operated-train/*** unrelated, the right of way is 65 meters (220 feet) wide between Vineland and Hollywood Way, yet the CAHSR website shows that section being scheduled for a tunnel (but at grade for other parts of the right of way. That seems needlessly expensive. anyone know why? I'm guessing some of it has to do with the burbank airport not wanting overhead electrical, but wouldn't a trench make more sense than a tunnel?
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