The Department of Transportation's High Speed Ground Transportation (HSGT) program aims to finance high-speed rail connecting major urban centers at distances of 100 to 500 miles, with trains running at 150 - 250 mph. But a Washington Post front-pager offers disquieting numbers that give considerable pause:
The dream of rail backers is a nation connected by high-speed lines that would be faster and more convenient than driving or flying. For instance, a trip on a proposed 432-mile line between Los Angeles and San Francisco would take 2 1/2 hours.
But experts and government officials caution that despite the billions, the amounts are still not nearly enough to pay for the kind of sleek "bullet train" systems that crisscross Europe and Japan at speeds of 200 mph or higher. The California project, for example, would cost an estimated $45 billion, including $9 billion in state bonds that voters approved last year.
"It sounds like a lot of money to Americans, but it's really just a start," said James P. RePass, president of the National Corridors Initiative, a nonprofit rail advocacy group. "We're not going to wake up in a year and see a bullet train. But we are going to see much faster service for relatively little money."
The WP quotes President Obama, regarding China's 300 mph train project: "I don't want to see the fastest train in the world built halfway around the world in Shanghai," Obama said. "I want to see it built right here in the United States of America." The LA - SF & DC - NYC - Boston corridors plus (surprise) the Chicago hub lead the pack of applicants (besides, that is, Harry Reid's Fantasyland to Hotel Mirage mag-lav earmark).
The head of the National Corridors Initiative (here is a high-speed rail status report from the group) tells the WP that relatively cheap money--call this RCM--is involved! RCM, in the Golden State, means $45B, including a $9B bond issue, for a ling between LA & SF that makes the 432-mile trip in 2-1/2 hours (average speed = 172.8 mph).
Let me apply some basic arithmetic, as a rider who travels the DC - NYC part of the northeast corridor. I mostly fly, but from time to time take Amtrak's Acela. Saturday I booked a pair of trips on US Air's shuttle, one for $298 RT on 10 days' notice & one for a $128 RT on 18 days' notice. I checked comparable trips on the Acela--we are talking high-speed trains, so I ignored the regular trains--and found a $288 RT 10 days out ($155 DC - NYC + $133 NYC - DC) and a $254 RT 18 days out ($155 DC - NYC + $99 NYC - DC). Thus Acela is slightly cheaper for a 10-day advance but much pricier for an 18-day advance, a case study in pricing illogic. Trains are less likely to be canceled due to weather, a factor still live in March. Door to door, on average, the shuttle beats the Acela by an hour. (I have seen over the years comparisons in newspaper articles that purport to show the train is faster, but the numbers in each case appeared to me to be tilted in favor of train over plane--ignoring ground transport times for the train.) Gate to gate the plane is quite reliable on OK weather days, while the Acela has frequently been late when I took it.
Bottom Line re the Acela v. Air. It is a rough wash at present. Suppose a 250 mph train is built linking NY C & DC, a 236-mile trip, 55 percent of the ground distance between LA & SF. Take California's hoped-for $45B LA - SF link and assume two numbers: (1) California will complete the link without cost overruns, a dicey assumption but for simplicity accept it; (2) that the cost of a DC - NYC rail link is 55 percent of an LA - SF link, a conservative assumption that probably understates northeast corridor costs, as administrative expenses will not be only 55 percent of those on the west coast.
The result is $24.75B--round it to $25B. If the NYC - Boston link is included, the 220-mile NYC - Boston distance by rail would create a 456-mile link, about 5 percent longer than LA - SF and thus with higher track costs. So use $25B as a cost proxy for high-speed rail between DC & NYC. With a 250 mph train (the top speed at the HSGT site), non-stop is 57 minutes. But does anyone think Baltimore, Wilmington (Joe Biden's station) and Philadelphia will be left out? (The Acela also stops at BWI, Trenton & Newark, but let's leave them out.) Add 5 minutes per stop to get 72 minutes, conservative, as it assumes instant acceleration & deceleration (the latter, especially, not a good idea). The result would roughly equal the 71 minutes typical US Air shuttle gate to gate schedule, albeit US Air is often early if one flies at off-hour times.
Factor in Acela's 304-passenger capacity versus about half that on a US Air shuttle Arbus 320. Factor also that US Air flies 15 hourly DC - NYC shuttle RTs on a typical weekday, whereas Acela today has less than 5 RTs daily. With travel time roughly equal, with twice the passenger volume per trip but 1/3 as many trips, would--call it Super Acela--cover a $25B outlay? Intuitively it is hard--very hard--to see high-speed rail covering its costs versus air travel options. OK, my calculations are back-of-envelope. LFTC readers, as the old ad goes: "You make the call."
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