One question that’s arisen (and rightfully so) around the subject of U.S. high speed rail is, who would be in charge of security? With millions of people riding a brand new, modern rail system that travels up to 200 miles an hour, the issue of security can’t be ignored.
Granted, train travel doesn’t bring the same inherent security concerns as air travel — as Obama noted in a recent speech, you can’t fly a train into a building, or take over a train and turn it into a makeshift pressurized missile. Still, the bombings in Madrid and London have driven home the fact that rail travel is hardly immune from terrorism. And as Politico’s Josh Gerstein noted, “given that Obama was announcing that the federal government is awarding $8 billion in stimulus money for the planning and construction of high speed rail projects, wouldn’t it be unwise to allow an Al Qaeda operative to blow up a chunk of that investment?” In fact, there’s the possibility that HSR security could become a Catch-22 — in order to get it built, we need to make a big deal of it in the U.S., but the bigger deal we make of it, the more likely it is to become a target for terrorists (a possibility that could hinder it getting built in the first place). And round and round etc.
So it’s clear that U.S. HSR will need security. The questions are, how much, and who will be charged with providing it? TSA’s long string of unabashed failures doesn’t exactly make a case for government agency control. And the absence of shoe-removal hassles are one of the main benefits of taking the train — inputting them in HSR might drive passengers back to air travel. Robert Cruickshank at the California High Speed Rail blog had the following suggestion:
Certainly you don’t want to turn HSR into a target by boasting about how it has less strict security than airplanes. But one doesn’t have to create a big and unnecessary security theater system to deal with potential threats. Instead, the US needs to take cues from its European counterparts when it comes to HSR security.
Despite people who think the US is constantly under threat of terrorist attack (the reason we haven’t been attacked by overseas terrorists since 2001 is because they just don’t pose the kind of ongoing threat many believe they do), Europe actually has FAR more experience with actual terrorism than the US has. Countless terror attacks targeting transportation infrastructure in Europe since the 1970s have shown them the threat is very real. Yet their HSR security isn’t anywhere close to what the TSA operates at US airports.
Granted, given the U.S. propensity for guns guns everywhere, we’ll likely need a few more metal detectors than your average European train station. But the presence of smart security, with the absence of security theater, could make HSR trains a safe and attractive way to travel.
Image via Flickr
February 2nd, 2010 at 3:06 pm
Amtrak has already got into the security act by requiring each passenger picking up a ticket at the station to show a picture ID. This means that a husband cannot pick up a ticket, even in advance, for his (non-present) wife. The system has flaws in that all you need do is walk over to the ATM machine located nearby and buy the tickets with a credit card, possibly stolen. Of course a terrorist would not know that! On the other hand why would a terrorist hijack an Amtrak train? Its trains are so late that no one would notice for hours or days.
February 2nd, 2010 at 3:25 pm
“Granted, given the U.S. propensity for guns guns everywhere, we’ll likely need a few more metal detectors than your average European train station.”
Heh, give us our guns, there are way more good guys than bad guys, we will take care of the terrorists.
February 2nd, 2010 at 4:41 pm
Once again, this issue is not really an issue. This is of all anti-HSR arguments maybe the most ludicrous. There is, unfortunately, targets with a much more higher risk (for us) and image (for terrorist) profile out there than HST.
If terrorsits wans to make a terror attack on some US rail infrastructure, it will be easier and more effective for them to target a heavily used subway or suburban system, like NYC’s. It will generate a lot more fear than say bombing an HST. First, because it’s impossible to secure such an open system. Second, because everybody that commutes by transit will feel concerned, a potential victim. Third, because it will be easier to have a high number of victims… Subway is a favourite (and for good reasons) of terror attacks. You spoke about Madrid and London bombing but if you go back a bit further you will find Paris (bombed two time) and Tokyo (gas attack) in the mid 90s and many more.
On the opposite HSR is a closed system with a small amount of potential victims and/or collateral dammage. In fact, with little effort, security can be enforced you can control trains on the yard, you can control and CCTVed the infrastructure, the stations and even filter people. Of all the HST systems I know, only two have security checks before boarding: AVE and the Eurostar.
Anyway, trains are far less vulnerable than planes. They are more sturdy, not prressurized and are not in an instable state of equilibrium some thousand of feet above ground. Also they run on a guideway and you can’t deroute them and since they are not stuck in the air it’s more easy to escape from them once the train is stopped.
HST has a major infrastructure will ever be a potential target but not much more than a crowded freeway at peak hour. In our world, risk zero doesn’t exist but that’s no reason to blow such issues out of proportions. Like I said, you don’t need to do much to protect such a close system and you clearly don’t need to hassle passengers with horrenduous security checks.
February 2nd, 2010 at 5:54 pm
I don’t think trains are as high risk for terrorists as airplanes… a terrorist cannot hijack a train and drive it into a building… all they could do is possible derail it, or crash it into a freight train. In addition someone with a bomb on a train will not be able to kill everyone on board the train, sure they might kill a few people around them, but the act of setting off the explosive would not depressurize the cabin or derail the train.
February 2nd, 2010 at 7:11 pm
France has suffered many islamist attacks, with hundreds of people killed or maimed, but those which targeted the TGV (French high-speed train) failed. No blood bath, no train crash.
The bombs they exploded on the TGV have been counterproductive: they showed how safe the train was and how ineffective the terrorists were.
Human density is rather low on a high-speed train, with all passengers seated and ample legroom. Sardine-packed commuter trains or subway platforms at rush hour have unfortunately proved to be much better locations for terrorist bombs.
Targetting the tracks has also failed. Intrusions were detected and trains automatically stopped. Just delaying trains is clearly not what terrorists are after.
It’s rather funny to see the security argument brought against HSR by people who probably use everyday the most dangerous means of transport: the private car.
In 3 decades the TGV has transported 1.3 billion passengers with not a single casualty. Meanwhile the road, in France, kills 4500 every year.
February 2nd, 2010 at 9:08 pm
Why does HSR need airline-like security? There’s nothing like that in France, or Germany, or Korea, or Japan, or… Eurostar has security because it’s considered an international route; the AVE has security due to the commuter train bombings in 2004 (though I think that they overreacted, seeing as how the bombs targeted low-speed commuter trains and not HSR infrastructure).
The risk of major damage being caused by an aircraft hijacking or explosion is simply not there when you’re talking about a train. Yes, they can be blown up — but so can a commuter train, or a subway train, or a bus, or a car, or a bridge, etc. Trains can’t be turned into missiles as an aircraft can.
As for guns, treat them the same way you would on Amtrak (well, the way they did before the Senate forced them to allow guns) — ban them. You can check for them by placing metal detectors around platform entrances.
February 2nd, 2010 at 9:40 pm
Malls on black friday are a much, much easier and deadly target. No money is spent securing them (apart from crowd control).
Let’s not fool ourselves into thinking that “security” is necessary, or even provides a benefit.
Yes, London got hit, as did Madrid…. but only 191 people were killed in Madrid. That’s around the same number as are killed every day in the US in automobile collisions.
56 were killed in London on 7/7. That’s half the number killed her every day on highways.
February 2nd, 2010 at 10:26 pm
Good conspiracy theory, airplane industry will push the TSA/Congress/FRA/DOT to put metal detectors, “sterile areas” and taking off shoes to get on trains. No advantage of rail over air anymore, and airlines win.
February 2nd, 2010 at 10:42 pm
JJ is on the right track. The security risk to high-speed rail is *less* than that of shopping malls. Trains require a ticket, which malls do not, the logistics of an attack are more complicated on the railroad and shopping malls are a higher-profile target. Plus shopping malls gave large populations of teens mixing with large populations of elderly (mallwalkers . . . )
February 3rd, 2010 at 12:38 am
Using common sense, how is a high speed train really any different to a normal train, security wise? Governments need to be sensible regarding security, when normal honest citizens are living in fear, aren’t the terrorists already winning? Maybe instead of putting so much energy in trying to fight terrorism, maybe governments around the world should be investigating what causes people to become terrorists in the first place, and then work towards removing those causes, and thereby reducing the number of people that want to be terrorists, which in turn reduces the risk, which in turn reduces the need for ultra heavy handed security.
February 3rd, 2010 at 2:39 am
I certainly have my issues with TSA but the Detroit bomber breezed through Amsterdam’s privately operated airport security (which I might add conducts the security check at each individual gate). How TSA gets blamed for this is beyond me.
Exactly, if we are going to get paranoid about transport safety lets start with automobile carnage. How about maximum auto speed limits of 40 mph?
February 3rd, 2010 at 6:42 am
Poncho, according to Smeed’s law, accident rates are limited by human psychological acceptance of road carnage, not by technology. Put a speed limit and soon people will drive more carelessly.
February 3rd, 2010 at 9:32 am
Sure, objectively HSR should be a lower-profile target than lots of others one could think of, and AQ seems to like to go for sporadic, high-vis kinds of things rather than the constant, seemingly random attacks favored by terrorists in Israel that would have the potential for the most impact on people’s everyday behavior (pizza parlors! shopping areas!).
Having said that, are there any civil engineers who can opine on the potential for breaching the Hudson or East River tunnels with a sufficiently large explosive (and the possibility of one person or a small group of people carrying said explosive onto a NEC train)? If someone could do that, and put both tubes out of commission for a while, it would tie up NYC commuting and NEC travel.
Finally, despite any assurances of the relative safety of HSR, pete’s right that, if HSR were to take substantial share from airlines, the airlines would have every incentive to lobby for the inclusion of HSR under security theater, and I’m sure TSA would be only too happy to join in the lobbying. After all, if HSR took share from airlines, TSA would have some redundant employees, and to them the easiest alternative would be to redeploy them at train stations. No bureaucracy downsizes voluntarily - they just find a new mission as necessary (and, no, that’s not mindless government bashing - it applies equally to government and private bureaucracies).
Excess security would be death to HSR, because a large part of its appeal is convenience. With HSR, I could drive to the Birmingham, MI station (ten minutes from my house) mere minutes before train time, compared with driving 45 minutes to Detroit Metro and arriving an hour or so before plane time for a one-day business trip to Chicago. Take away the time advantage of less security, and it’s harder for HSR to be time-competitive with air.
February 3rd, 2010 at 3:43 pm
I wasn’t being serious about the speed limit. Its worth pointing out a similar restrictive speed limit was imposed on rail in the 1940s that we are living with today.
February 3rd, 2010 at 4:19 pm
You guys are talking as if there’s no airline or airline security lobby in France, Germany, Spain, Korea, or any other country where HSR has taken a large share of airline traffic.
February 3rd, 2010 at 6:24 pm
I like Robert Cruickshank’s perspective, but the issue of security is not limited to terrorist threats and hijackings and the like.
Where I live in Fresno, California, our greatest threat is the cavalier, irresponsible HSR administration itself: HSRA is planning on installing its tracks on a 60 fit high trellis, whose scaffolding will travel for 12 miles, right alongside and essentially high above the Union Pacific RR’s main north-south freight corridor for the western U.S. This mean 200 plus HS trains will be traveling just above more than 20 super long feights a day that regularly carry explosive, toxic, flammable, and otherwise hughly hazardous materials. HSR eliminated other, safer routes for its own private reasons, leaving this route which has to be elevated like this to clear the many already grade separated bridges spanning existing freeways. And the corridor has to remain so highly elevated because the non-strop trains traveling at such high speed would become roller-coasters if the rise or fall of the elevations were protracted over shorter distances.
The freight rail road is hardly the problem here. It has beeing using this corridor for over 100 years, and our way of life, not just here but across the U.S., depends on the safe and responsible movements of these cargos. But how smart and secure is it to subject HSR trains whizzing precariously so high above to the risks of such hazardous cargo just below?
Imagine the utterly horrific disaster that could result from a derailment either from above or below. At certain times of day, the number of lives at risk could exceed those lost in New York City’s 9/11 disaster. A well-timed derailment of a 200 mph HSR train tumbling 60 feet from above when it was passing above a freight train carrying tankers of anhydrous ammonia or LP gas or god forbid, something worse, as it passed Fresno’s adjacent AAA baseball stadium with a packed house could rival any Hollywood horror movie one might produce.
And derailments are always a risk. A derailment doesn’t have to come from a terrorist or hijacker attack (although with so many freight tanker cars traveling slowly below and clearly identified with markings like “Hazardous,” “Explosive” “Flammable” and such written right on the side like giant bulls-eye targets, one ought to be concerned). The derailment could just as well come from and Act of God–despite HSR’s apparent lack of concern for this, presumably on the naive (or perhaps chauvanistic) assumption that California’s Central Valley is less prone to earthquake than the coast–big earthquakes do happen and where you least expect them. Certainly all of California is at risk, and even if it weren’t prudence would dictate extra safeguards. Haiti, where earthquakes were thought never to happen, had a catastrophic one last week. And, of course, a derailment could come from an ordinary operator error or vehicular intrusion on the freight tracks. The UP is a responsible, safety-conscious, and risk-adverse operator, but nonetheless these things happen all the time. So why tempt fate?
It seems to me the biggest safety and security issue with HSR in California and across the U.S. is the maturity, experience and responsibility of the operators in the first place. If design engineers are smart enough not to put metropolitan water systems on top of sewer plants and hazardous material dump sites, why can’t HSR route its trains somewhere else besides being high atop a major freight corridor carrying dangerous cargo and courting disaster?
February 3rd, 2010 at 7:02 pm
I rode HSR’s in Italy back in 2005, as well as the Eurostar (London-Paris) in 2001. The London-Paris route had airport-type metal detectors; there was little (visible) security along the routes and stations in Italy.
Even the security gates in London didn’t seem to be such a big deal. (Just about any public building in London has similar security.)
Hopefully HSR security in the US will not approach the level of that of the airlines (taking off shoes, no liquids, etc.)
February 3rd, 2010 at 11:29 pm
Larry, in the history of the Shinkansen, it’s had one derailment, without deaths. I believe the TGV has had three, including one at 300 km/h, with a total of zero deaths as well. In all cases, those derailed trains did not leave the track area and stayed upright.
UP trains carrying toxic chemicals can derail with or without HSR. But grade separations brought by HSR make such incidents much less likely.
February 7th, 2010 at 3:23 pm
Andre Peretti, I agree that the TGV is an incredibly safe way to travel. It is not completely correct to say that no one has ever been killed due to the operation of a TGV train. The claim put forward on the english wiki page for the TGV is the “TGV has not recorded a single fatality due to accident while running at high speed.” Reading a description of the accidents listed below shows that at least 5 people have died due to a TGV traveling on a Classic Line (lower-speed with level crossings). Still an incredibly safe way to travel, but not quite as safe as you described it.
cph, I think the difference you noticed on the level of security for the Eurostar and the Eurostar Italia is related more to the UK not being a full member of the Schengen Zone while Italy and France are. I.E. when entering or leaving the UK you still have to go through passport control. The treaty between the UK, France, and Luxembourg that proscribes the legal operations of the Eurostar allows a traveller to go through customs and immigration at the point of departure instead of the destination.
February 9th, 2010 at 12:20 pm
Like the hapless French whose Maginot Line was built to refight the 1st World War, but instead was useless in the second, the discussion here is all about preparing to fight the wrong battle.
The threat is not so much someone carrying a bomb or gun onto a train — the threat to HSR is a bomb going off on the TRACKS just in front of a “bullet train.” I’ll post a couple thoughts on that.
February 9th, 2010 at 12:23 pm
The normal response of HSR proponents is that terrorists are interested in planes only as missiles they can dive into buildings. But one has to wonder if such Pollyannas have been watching the news since 2001. Does “shoe bomber” or “underpants on fire” ring a bell?
But put that aside. The 9/11 attacks cost the bad guys 20 men. How many must die to blow up a HSR train track? Zero.
A “bullet train,” according to the HSR con men, will carry 950 when fully loaded. Presumably that full load is the terrorists’ target.
So, assuming the bad guys want to repeat the casualties of 9/11 — How may HSR trains much be demolished to kill the same number of people as 9/11?
Three.
With no loss of life to the terrorists.
February 9th, 2010 at 12:28 pm
Remember, our CA HSR is (supposedly) a 220 MPH train. At that speed, if the train left the blown-up track, it would be like a plane coming down.
Almost everyone would likely be killed. Those that weren’t killed, would probably wish they HAD been killed. The graphic pictures of the horribly maimed and dead would be exactly what the terrorists long for.
Most important, HSR an EASY train to wreck. Planes are well protected. HSR takes minimal explosives, and recycles the terrorist. And the terrorists get to pick the worst spot to plant the explosives — perhaps just before reaching a bridge over a river or valley.
Sure, terrorists are willing to die for their cause — but any terrorist (and their bosses) would rather they cause several catastrophes before finally getting killed or caught.
In truth, the terrorists would never get three filled HSR trains to blow up — unless they coordinated the attacks at the same time (sound familiar?). After the attack(s), there would be no more HSR in CA. Just rail.
February 9th, 2010 at 12:45 pm
On behalf of terrorists everywhere, let me say that HSR is a Godsend to the Jihad (or whatever cause turns them on).
HSR will be like a plane flying at ground level at supposedly) 220 MPH. Terrorists will take their cue from the French and Russian partisans in WWII who blew up NAZI trains with great success. Planes are hard to bring down — not so for trains.
With HSR, all one need do is put a relatively small explosive charge, properly placed on the rail. Romotely detonate just as a HSR train comes flying up to the spot, and watch the resulting carnage with gleeful satisfaction.
And the best part for terrorists is that one doesn’t even have to be a suicide bomber. Just set the charge, detonate it, and drive away for another bombing later.
One such bombing will be the end of California’s “high speed” rail. For safety purposes, “bullet train” traffic will have to be slowed to 60-70 MPH to reduce casualties from such bombings. Train passenger traffic with plummet, and this useless financial albatross will hang around our necks for decades.
February 9th, 2010 at 6:28 pm
John H. ATM Machine is redundant.
Colin is right. Good guys have guns and that is why the bad guys, the Socialist Left, want to take them away. It would be better if WE could take care of the terrorists but the government won’t let us.
Samussas. Subways have been done before and a NEW High Speed Rail crash would be much more spectacular. And what makes you think that a missle like train is going to stop quickly from 200+ MPH?
Mathew, read the above if the bomb caused the derailing. Kill a lot more than just those nearby.
Trainsintokyo. See Colin above. 200+ mph ain’t a missle? And when all the guns are banned, the bad guys will still have them. Guns were taken from Europeans in the ’30s and soon after came the holocaust.
Naive, Pinball. Go back about 1200 to 1500 years. Terrorism is not new. Just the weapons have gotten better. Governments know or should know, that with an extremely tiny number of exceptions, these people are radical Islamists. NOT all Islamists are terrorists but it seems that all terrorists are Islamists. Obama wants to “make nice” with them while they are laughing at him behind his back. Talk about naive.
Poncho. Even at 40mph there would be as many or more morons out there yacking or texting while trying to drive. And I suspect the lower speeds, in the ’40s, on the trains was for the same reason lower speeds were imposed on motor vehicles and that was to save fuel(s) for the war effort.
Don K. is right. Bureaucracies never shrink voluntarily and we have too many already.
Larry Miller is right and has said just about all. One other thing to consider. See if you can find any rail system in this country that is operating with out some kind of government subsidy. They are not a profit making proposition. Govenment subsidy means support with TAX money. Your TAX money.
I got more into this than I really wanted to. I like trains. A good way to watch the scenery which you can’t do, because you’d better be watching the road, when driving. But, I wonder how much more you can see at 200+ mph than 20,000 feet. SF to LA will also be laden with stops so how much of that distance will you really reach 200 mph and for how long?
Jupiter-8
And Automatic Teller Machine Machine still redundant.