Posted on Friday September 25th by Jebediah Reed | 234
Our weekly Friday round-up of HSR news from around the world:
- This winter, 220-mph trains will start plying the rails in Russia, linking Moscow and St. Petersburg. The locomotive-less creation by Siemens is the culmination of a Soviet era dream of bullet train service. It also stands as a prime option for California’s HSR system. (NYT - Pictured)
- After a triumphant victory at the polls, California’s HSR authority has been “flat-footed” and has ceded the debate to NIMBYs and critics, says the Sacramento Bee. The authority is finding that building the thing is “far more difficult than selling the dream of the sleek, fast trains.” (Sac Bee)
- Where will San Fran’s fancy new HSR terminal be sited? For years, plans have focused on the Transbay Terminal at First and Mission. But the state HSR authority is now “exploring alternatives.” It is legally obliged to do that, says the chairman. (SF Chron)
- Next year, Spain is due to overtake France and Japan as the world leader in HSR system mileage. AVE now transports 40,000 passengers a day and more or less killed air service between Madrid and Barcelona, long a great cash cow for airlines. (BBC)
- Next door, Portugal’s plans for a connecting HSR network will likely be thwarted if the opposition candidate wins next week’s national elections. She describes it as “a luxury” in a bad economic environment. (Bloomberg)
- In their transportation spending bills the House and Senate provided $4 billion and $1.2 billion respectively for passenger rail. So which will it be? NY’s senator Chuck Schumer is urging his colleagues to go with the higher figure. (WTEN)
- Taiwan’s vaunted HSR system, mostly in private hands, went bust this month and was taken over by the government. Now they’ve decided to delay construction of three new stations in order to keep costs in check. (eTaiwan News)
- Doubters Corner: Taiwan stands as a warning for California and other ambitious HSR projects in the US, warns one critic–planners were expecting 275,000 daily riders and had recently been getting something like 90,000. It is, in any case, a very expensive way to reduce carbon emissions. (Heartland Institute)
September 25th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
Posting anything from Wendell Cox guarantees a trainwreck.
September 25th, 2009 at 1:48 pm
Eh, I’m no fan of Cox’s, etc., but linking is what the internet is for.
JR
September 27th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
Anybody who has read the much more realistic Due Diligence report on the CHSR project should know that Wendell Cox’s word of warning is not unfounded. Accounting for optimism bias kills projects, which is why the CHSRA has avoided reality at all costs.
October 1st, 2009 at 9:37 pm
Wendell Cox is an idiot. More importantly, he makes stuff up if it helps him attack rail — any rail.
Taiwan managed to be absurdly optimistic (it has a smaller population than California, folks) *and* didn’t actually finish building its system (so they only get riders from, uh, the part they finished).
CHSRA has its problems, but I’ve seen almost nobody describing what they actually are (terrible prioritization, mostly, at all levels of operation, and insufficient attention to the importance of standardization).