High Speed Rail from Los Angeles to Vegas

If you are unfamiliar with the primary contenders, the the DesertXpress is the completely privately funded option. The technology under discussion is a Bombardier trainset (Bombardier makes the trainsets for Acela Express in Washington-Boston run). It would make the 186 mile run from somewhere on the Vegas strip (probably the Rio Casino parking lot) to some land purchased on the edge of Victorville in 86 minutes with no intermediate stops . Advantages is it involves proven technology that has been operating for more than 12 years and cost is roughly $4 billion which will involve private financing. Tickets will probably be $100 each way. A future link to Palmdale where it could connect to the future California High Speed Rail is discussed, but not budgeted and may be more of a selling point than anything else.
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Initially the DesertXpress would primarily be of interest to single person drivers, more than likely who live in the inland empire (population of 4-5 million). It would have very little attraction to residents of Las Vegas since the need to rent a car in Victorville would offset the small advantage of the high speed. It would have limited appeal to the more populous counties of Los Angeles and Orange County since driving to Victorville is the most congested portion of the trip. In the future, if airport crowding in southern California airports means that cheap shuttle flights to Las Vegas disappear, the DesertXpress may grow more popular.
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The second contender is California Nevada Maglev . This route would make the 269 mile link from Las Vegas strip to Anaheim stadium in as fast as 86 minutes. Anaheim stadium is a short drive from most of the population centers, 16 miles from the beach, and a few miles from Disneyland. It is also a transit hub for Amtrak to San Diego and metrolink. There would be four intermediate stops (1) Future Ivanpah Valley Airport, (2) Primm, Nevada, (3) Barstow, California and (4) Ontario, California. Despite the fact that Japan is budgeting over $54 billion for a 180 mile Maglev to start in two years, the advertised budget for this 269 mile CA-NV system is $12 billion. Financing would be a public private partnership.
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Naysayers say the DesertXpress will appeal to such a small group that it might as well not be there. Naysays say that Anaheim Maglev will never be financed and will remain on the drawing board for more decades. Pro-DesertXpress people believe that if they can meet their initial goal of 5 million passengers each way it is a positive boost to the Vegas economy. Future enhancements will boost it's appeal. Pro-Maglev people believe it is the only way to have a sustainable economy for Las Vegas well into the 21st century and a hedge against overcrowded airports that will dramatically raise the cost of short haul flights to maintain room for long haul and international routes.
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Metrolink has discussed expanding the Inland Empire-Orange County Line which currently goes from Oceanside to San Bernardino (15 stations). There is a demand to expand as far as Victorville (possibly future negotiations could co-link with the Victorville High Speed Rail station). However, Metrolink has used existing rail lines in the past. The current rail tracks through the El Cajon pass are overcrowded with freight trains. So far it has been considered a insurmountable obstacle. It would allow people to connect to Victorville from all 15 current stations, but the initial segment would be at low speeds.

Here is a proposed extension of the metrolink into the Victor Valley with a connection to DesertXpress. Let me emphasize that there is currently no funding for this proposed line.

Quote: pacomartin

Naysayers say the DesertXpress will appeal to such a small group that it might as well not be there. Naysays say that Anaheim Maglev will never be financed and will remain on the drawing board for more decades. Pro-DesertXpress people believe that if they can meet their initial goal of 5 million passengers each way it is a positive boost to the Vegas economy. Future enhancements will boost it's appeal. Pro-Maglev people believe it is the only way to have a sustainable economy for Las Vegas well into the 21st century and a hedge against overcrowded airports that will dramatically raise the cost of short haul flights to maintain room for long haul and international routes.

Count me among the naysayers. The privatly funded option I doubt will make it-railroads in the USA went out in the 1950s for a reason. Even if you could get the funding, very expensive for one route. An investor would do better to put a private line from San Fran to LA/San Diego and get many times the traffic. Another disadvantage is that it seems they are building their own full terminal instead of a small airline that rents a gate and (maybe) slot.

As to Magtlev, I was once a true believer but now am a critic. Maglev sounds good but it is always "decades away." I first read about maglev in study hall--in 1985! It is barely closer now. The problem with high speed rail/maglev of any type seems to be that you only hit the "high speed" for a small portion of the trip. So a short hop of 300 or so miles the time savings over a plane is negligable and over a long haul of say 1,000 miles the construction cost is too high.

No idea if it was reality, but in "Bugsy" Ben talks about having a high-speed train to go from LA to Vegas!

The Spanish built a roughly 269 mile high speed rail from Madrid to Seville. They joined the EU in 1986 and had the line open and running so you could purchase tickets by 1992. It goes a maximum of 300 km/hr (182 miles/hr). This turnaround of only 5 years was remarkable for a nation who at the time was very poor for Western Europe. Certainly it was considerably poorer than Nevada or California. The new train cut the trip from 9 hours, to about 2.25 hours. Seville has a metropolitan population of 1.5 million (less than Metropolitan Las Vegas).
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Los Angeles to Las vegas is the busiest air route in the country of less than 300 miles. Flying air routes of less then 300 miles is a massive misuse of scarce facilities (runway capacity) and a terrible environmental atrocity. Needless to say, doing the same route in millions of private vehicles is off the chart in terms of environmental abuse.
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Most of Europe aspire to nearly replace domestic air transport with train transport. That is clearly impossible given the geographic size of the USA. However, interstate transport over California and Nevad, and within Texas, Florida, Seattle to Portland, and in the Northeast is a achievable goal.

>it is the only way to have a sustainable economy for Las Vegas well into the 21st century
Have they consulted the casino owners of Reno who have seen significant declines in visitors from California who now patronize all those Indian casinos?
What will Las Vegas offer even after an ultra-fast MagLev ride that won't be available in California after a much shorter but less impressive trip?

Sounds like they're going to tear up the freeway for about 10 years, making it a very unpleasant drive. Delays, cost overruns. Earthquake proof construction will cost far more than the line in Spain.

$100 one way? I can fly Southwest for $59 bucks.

And how many stops will it make along the way? Barstow, Baker, S. Las Vegas, etc.

The company will go broke and we'll end up bailing them out too.

Bad Idea.

People can't envision the loss of inexpensive fares.
The $59 fare on Southwest is not going to exist forever. San Diego, Orange county, Long Beach, and Burbank airports are almost at capacity. For the first time in the history of the world a major airport, LAX, is going to stop growth. When passengers get to 75 million they are required by the terms of the court to begin closing 2 gates a year until they get to 10 gates closed. The passenger load can't exceed 78.9 million passengers a year. One sure consequence of this is that the 236 mile flights from LAX to Las Vegas will either be gone or become a lot more expensive. This route is currently the busiest route out of LAX.
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Ontario Airport will pick up the slack for a few years, but they will hit capacity in no more than 10 years. There is some vague plans for a train system to get peple to Ontario airport. The city owns Palmdale Airport, but people are counting on some future transport system to get there since the road is already moving at about 20 mph in rush hour.
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Since 1979 this country has gambled on cheap intercity airfare, but it won't last forever.


To FleaStiff. Look at my post about the different games. Baccarat is the only game that has returned to pre-depression numbers. Las Vegas offers the fanciest casinos and the lifestyle associated with baccarat and big fights and luxury at relatively affordable rates. I don't think they can re-create this in California. But as far as penny slots and blackjack tables they are available at slot parlors, racinos, and Indian casinos all around the country.

High speed rail, quick and easy boarding, minimal security checks? For me, it beats flying hands down. Flying has become a real pain in the butt and anything less than 500 miles just isn't worth it.

Las Vegas bought land in Ivanpah for a "reliever" airport when McCarren gets full. Now just for a minute think about what that means. Cities have "replaced" airports (like Austin and Denver), and they have taken very old airports that have operated for decades and beefed them up to function as reliever airports (like Tenafly NJ which is only 12 miles from Newark International) or Ontario airport which is about 50 miles from LAX.
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Guess how many communities have built a reliever airport from scratch and kept their original airport open? That's right, the correct answer is none. No community can afford the expense of running a new reliever airport. It was done once by the US national government (Dulles airport in suburban Washington DC). It took 20 years until it became profitable. Only the US federal government could sustain the losses for the first 20 years, it would bankrupt any city. The Canadian government tried it outside of Montreal. It was one of the most spectacular failures in the history of northern America. They tried to keep the original airport open, but no one would use the new airport. Finally after decades they closed the "new" airport. In the meantime the population and the economic center of eastern Canada shifted to Toronto.
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So basically McCarran is going to fill up and Las Vegas is going to build a "reliever airport" in Ivanpah. Las Vegas is going to do what no other city in the entire world has done. Think about that for a second. Doesn't it make more sense to try to shift the short haul traffic to trains and reserve the airport for passengers that have no other reasonable choice except to fly.

Count me among the DesertXpress naysayers too. I'll go further to say it is one of the stupidest ideas I have ever heard of. For those unfamiliar with the proposed route, it would go from Victorville to Las Vegas. Victorville is located about 80 miles from downtown LA, and 200 miles from Las Vegas. The population is about 100,000. The population of Victorville is much too small to fill the trains, and if LA drivers can make it to Victorville, they will likely hit the gas and speed the rest of the way through the desert, as opposed to park, buy tickets, wait for a train, and pay for ground transportation in Vegas.

I'm less skeptical about the Maglev. Nevada is long overdue its fair share of pork, but putting my regional selfish interests aside, I tend to oppose it on cost/benefit grounds. I think the public would get more benefit from expanding service between DC and Boston, making it faster and more affordable. It would also be nice to see more bike trails.

So my order of preference is:

1. Neither
2. Maglev
3. DesertXpress

I've got to ask the obvious, why can't they just build the las vegas to LA route using conventional high-speed rail, rather than the maglev? This stuff is so common in Europe that the train technology is basically 'off-the-shelf' and could include many bidders and options. The track specifications are close to or the same as regular rail and simple to build - we've been doing it for over a century. Speeds are 2-3x faster than normal highway speeds.

I have to imagine that would be the logical option here. Maglev is far too expensive for the benefit. It should only be considered between the largest urban centers where a highly-popular train route is already established. Because its such an expensive project, it cannot be built simply on the hope that people will ride it enough to justify the capital cost. But the desertXpress, while being far, far cheaper, just isn't long enough. It should at least come within 25 miles of downtown LA and integrate with the local and commuter transit systems. So combine the best from both and present it versus the 'do nothing' option and see what wins out.

Mea Culpa, DesertXpress is advertising a $100 round trip fare (not a one way fare)
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The problem is that Los Angeles funnels much of it's northern traffic through the Cajon pass, which is a jagged zone produced by earthquakes. The gradients are very steep and the buildable land is jammed full of roads, freight rail lines and transmission lines and fiber optic cables. The third freight rail was just built in the last two years, and there may be demand for as many as three more. The whole thing has the San Andreas fault running through it in a portion which hasn't slipped in known history (they think it slipped in the 18th century). Sometime soon (trillion dollar question is when) the fault is going to slip and everything will be cut off causing 100's of billions in damages and severe loss of life.
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Eventually the rail lines will have to be built one on top of the other using trestles because there is simply not enough room on the flat ground. Also part of the newer rail linea are cut into the mountainside at altitudes. The original track opened in 1885 uses the prime land.
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Current Passenger Rail
There is no commuter rail coming through the pass because of the logistics problems. There is one daily Amtrak train that goes through the pass.
It travels between 38-40 mph for the 47 miles from Victorville to San Bernardino (6 miles is at 3% grade).
The Amtrak speeds up to 57 mph for the 37 miles between Victorville and Barstow (a 50% increase in speed) when the terrain gets flat.
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Rather than face the considerable expense of trying to build through the pass, the DesertXpress is stopping at the outskirts of the urban area before the geography gets difficult. The hope is that Los Angeles Commuter rail (Metrolink) will take on the challenge of extending commuter rail to Victorville and connect up to DesertXpress.
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DesertXpress will only appeal to a small group of people, but they are among the most prized Las Vegas visitors. It is also anticipating the future when cheap air shuttles will not be available (see my earlier posts). Also it is hoped that an extension to Palmdale where it could connect with commuter rail and the future California High Speed Rail station. Palmdale is 350K people and expected to grow in the future.
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THe population of Victorville is only 100K, but San Bernardino county is 2 million and Riverside County is 2.1 million. The inland empire is roughly the size of metropolitan Phoenix, and most of them are within 30 minute drive at off peak times.
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There should in the future be a rail link from Orange County to Los Angeles to Palmdale, and the over to Victorville and on to Las Vegas. Although the route from LA to Palmdale also crosses the San Andreas Fault, this portion slipped about 150 years ago. It might last another century before this portion slips again. In the event of an major earthquake that slips the southern portion of the San Andreas fault, there will still be a way to get to Las Vegas while the roads are being repaired.
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No one expect DesertXpress to displace the majority of automobile traffic or even air traffic initially, but the question is if it is profitable then it can be added on in the future. The primary customer at first will be the mid-level male gambler who would rather check into his hotel in Victorville, and begin relaxing drinking. The financial cost is somewhat justified because he would have to buy gas to drive himself, and he would rather be coddled. DesertXpress is advertising 5 million round trips in its first year of operation. Keep in mind I have never seen one of these predictions that wasn't optimistic,
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In contrast Maglev is going to build it's initial test section to Primm (talk about useless).
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Let me re-emphasize that the Japanese are budgeting $54 billion for a 180 mile Maglev. The number that is presented publicly to build a 269 mile Maglev from Las Vegas to Anaheim is $12 billion. Even at $12 billion the tickets are probably going to be $200 each way. In any case it is not going to appeal to the family of four and get them out of their mini-van.
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Also keep in mind that unlike a normal transit system whatever is built must appeal to the high rollers. It is difficult to limo a bunch of high rollers from downtown Los Angeles to Van Nuys airport (25 miles of crowded urban driving) and coordinate their schedules, and fly them to the executive airport in Henderson. Costs are probably well over $3K one way. It might be much easier to fly from helo pads in downtown Los Angeles the 64 miles to Victorville and put them in an executive car on the train. That way you are not dealing with LA traffic and the wait time to get clearance for private jets. Since the DesertXpress is going to be owned by the same people who own the casinos these 100 high rollers per day are very important.
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The high roller argument is admittedly a little weak. In five years there may be double bladed helicopters that can travel at 350 mph. Once helicopters like this exist, it would be easier to helo a real high roller from a downtown helipad the entire 225 miles to Vegas.

Nice post Paco, thanks. You convinced me the Maglev idea is even more stupid than I first thought. I suppose my position is that if California builds public transit to Victorville or Palmdale, I would be more enthusiastic. Going first, in the hopes California builds something sometime over the San Gabriel Mountains, is not enough. The helicopter service I don't see being cost efficient; too expensive and slow.

Yep, the desertXpress seems like too expensive a project to simply say, "If we build it, they might come", referring to the hope that california will simply connect the system with rail on their own. Concrete plans so that people do not have to drive to the outlying station, park and take the train need to occur. If this is impossible logistically, no line should be built.

It needs to be accessible, with more than just a parking lot or it will very likely be a failure.

Reading your post paco (which provided a lot of useful information), what I don't understand is how the maglev group was going to overcome those obstacles.

Thanks for the re-read.
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The commuter rail will be difficult to build. Commuter rail usually has stations every 8 to 10 miles. That's a 47 mile stretch. Metrolink uses almost exclusively existing rail line that was often laid down in the 1880's. The competition with the freight lines through the Cajon pass is so extensive. There is room for a single late night Amtrak train, but not a dozen commuter trains. And the current rail station in Victorville is 2 miles from the proposed DesertXpress station. To eliminate another shuttle bus you would have to take care of that problem.
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I can speculate on Maglev overcoming obstacles. I think the extreme speed of maglev means that it almost has to be elevated. If you put it on ground level then someone will breach the security and try to run across the tracks. If the train is moving at 450 km/hr they will inevitably be killed and possibly do more damage to the people on the train. I think that the train will not be very tolerant of dogs, or deer as well. A conventional train would simply crush the animal. Plus since maglev is powered by the magnetic field in the track it would be very vulnerable to terrorist attack if it was on ground level.
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In San Diego near Old Town there was one weekend when three people were killed at one intersection. One was crushed by the high speed Amtrak that did not stop there, one was crushed by the commuter train (the Coaster) and one was crushed by the Trolley (the slowest of all three). There is a perverse psychological principal that says that people will make very safe systems dangerous by dropping their level of awareness appropriately. If you are driving in the Andean mountains you are constantly aware of twists and turns and running into a goat, but on an American freeway people talk on the phone and apply lipstick leveling the playing field.
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Once you begin elevating the train there is a lot of existing engineering experience with some very tall concrete pillars. You can control some of the worst of the steep gradients with different heights of pillars. Of course you have to do this in a severe earthquake zone. The fact that you are already at altitude means there is less competition in the narrowest parts of the canyon.
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I am not convinced that the engineers have done a full evaluation of every problem of building this system through the Cajon pass. When the earthquake comes the slip could be up to 15' vertical. The cost of transport systems tends to go way over budget in the long run.


BTW the old Amtrak Desert Wind that was discontinued in 1997 took 7:10 to do the distance from LA to Las Vegas. It was way to slow to appeal to any but the most ardent trainfan.
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If they ever build the 100 mile high speed rail from Orlando to Tampa perhaps the boost to the economy will convince people around the country that it is a worthwhile investment. In theory it would expand the tourist region so that people could easily enjoy the beach and DisneyWorld at the same time.

Though I don't know much about the technology, I think that high speed rail overall as a mode of transportation makes alot of sense between heavily traveled urban centers. I think it would be very ambitious as well to build in high speed rail from the North-East corridor (Boston / NY / Philadelphia / Washington) to the Midwest (Detroit / Chicago) and to the Southeast (Charlotte / Atlanta / Orlando / Miami). 1.4 million people travel by air between SFO and LAX. Imagine making that 400 mile trip a 2.5 hour train ride.

But I think that if you are going to spend the money, do it right and build the link from LAX to LAS and use the current infrastructure (terminals) already there. You would model it just like the Acela with Express trains (non-stop) and local trains. Anaheim as the hub actually makes sense as it is a Metrolink stop.

I know that us North Americans have a love affair with our car, but Western Europe was able to pull off its high speed rail.

These are the four busiest short haul (under 250 miles) air routes in the country. All airports are included
229 mi | 3,733,037 | Las Vegas;Paradise, NV | Los Angeles;Long Beach;Santa Ana, CA
232 mi | 2,910,797 | Dallas;Fort Worth;Arlington, TX | Houston;Sugar Land;Baytown, TX
185 mi | 2,745,311 | Boston;Cambridge;Quincy,MA;NH | New York;Northern New Jersey;Long Island, NY;NJ;PA
190 mi | 2,535,758 | Hilo, HI | Honolulu, HI
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Obviously the Hawaii route is over water, but the other three are natural candidates for high speed rail. It will relieve pressure on the airports and reduce carbon footprint considerably.
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The third one has limited version of high speed rail

The only route in the country that has significantly lower air traffic because of good rail service is:
222 mi | 2,396,311 | New York;Northern New Jersey;Long Island, NY;NJ;PA | Washington;Arlington;Alexandria, DC;VA;MD;WV

Quote: pacomartin

The only route in the country that has significantly lower air traffic because of good rail service is:
222 mi | 2,396,311 | New York;Northern New Jersey;Long Island, NY;NJ;PA | Washington;Arlington;Alexandria, DC;VA;MD;WV

It would lower air traffic more if Amtrak were not so expensive and slow. When I lived in Baltimore I considered Amtrak lots of times to get places, but it was always less expsensive and/or faster to fly or drive.

This is a bit off topic, but a statistic I would like to see is how much is collected from gasoline taxes, and how much is spent on road construction and maintenance.

I'll have to research that question, but I know that what is collected in gasoline taxes is nowhere near enough to finance road construction and maintenance. You can see that if you go to Mexico where road tolls are astronomical. Also in Europe it is often so expensive to drive a car from city to city between the taxes and tolls, that a single driver will always save money taking the train.

I drove a car from La Spezia in Liguria, Italy to pick up someone at the Milan Airport. Distance was less than 150 miles one way. I felt like someone cut my caratoid artery and was bleeding me the entire drive.

Generally I would think that Baltimore to New York city is one of the few routes in this country where you save money by taking a train. Especially if you factor in New York city parking. But the Acela offers very little advantage over the regular train and at a much higher price. But if you are not going to city center then the commuter trains and buses suck up so much time that you might as well have driven the entire distance.

Quote: Wizard

It would lower air traffic more if Amtrak were not so expensive and slow. When I lived in Baltimore I considered Amtrak lots of times to get places, but it was always less expsensive and/or faster to fly or drive.

The problem is that Amtrak loses money as it is even with mega-subsidies. Now, if this is because it is government run and forced to lose money in much of it's network or if rail is just not feasable in the USA is up to debate. I tried it once and never again. Air is comporable in price and car in time. Bottom line is car travel is cheap and efficient enough that it is hard to overcome with mass tansit, a good thing.

Fewer people traveling more often is what seems to be needed. Kind of Boeing's answer to the A380: "The best way to fly 800 passengers is just use two airplanes!"

It doesn't seem fair to complain about Amtrak subsidies, if roads are subsidized as well. It would be interesting to see the subsidy per passenger mile both ways. If there must be subsidies, I think it should be on whatever moves the most people the most miles per dollar.

The most popular AMTRAK line outside of the Northeast is the Pacific Surfliner . Most of the subsidies come from Caltrans. This route is pretty important to traffic management in Southern California. At 1/4 of the 2.7 million passengers per year are just commuters. Commuters are allowed to ride the AMTRAK line for the length of their commuter distance using their monthly pass. Basically they just get on the first train that arrives, it doesn't matter if it is Metrolink, Coaster, or AMTRAK.

The problem is that the system can't really be expanded. Most of the track is not double track so trains must pull into sidings while trains going the other direction pass. Double tracking the conventional rail is an environmental nightmare because of decisions that were made in 1885. One of the worst was a decision to push the rail right to the edge of the ocean on some bluffs by some of the most expensive real estate in the world (Del Mar City). Double tracking would involve tunneling for two miles under the city.

Sandy Shapery (a San Diego developer) proposed replacing the entire system with a new passenger line. It would be a maglev suspended over Interstate 5 . One of it primary purposes is to connect five southern California airports. He believes that the old rail line can be torn up and replaced with a bicycle trail.

About reliver airports, the Mexican federal government once tried to set up an airport in Toluca, about 35 miles away, to relive air traffic from Mexico City's airport. It didn't work, though it became a subsidiary hub for courier companies and it drew lots of general aviation.

Then in 2005 two low-cost airlines set up shop in toluca, Volaris and Interjet. Since then the airport at Toluca has been a huge commercial success, and has undergone one expansion since (new terminal and parking garage, plus a larger shoppign area). Other airlines followed, mostly low cost locals, but also Continental Airlines and one of the flagship mexican airlines, Aeromexico.

Since then the picture has also muddled. Volaris and Interjet aren't as low-priced as they once were (though they still beat the competition). Interjet took over the Mex City's airport's slots of a failed mexican airline and now runs perhaps half its flights from Mexico City. All the low-costs that followed eventually failed.

Still, Volaris has been growing, even in the middle of the current crisis. Interjet has a major maintenance facility for the A-320 at Toluca and services all its fleet there, plus some aircraft from other companies; it also claims it will expand operations at both airports as soon as circumstances allow.

Bottom line, the Toluca airport is succeeding as relief for Mexico City's airport and will continue to grow as conditions improve.

So it can happen.

There are other factors to consider. More info on request.

Quote: Wizard

It doesn't seem fair to complain about Amtrak subsidies, if roads are subsidized as well. It would be interesting to see the subsidy per passenger mile both ways. If there must be subsidies, I think it should be on whatever moves the most people the most miles per dollar.

Exactly, we've made it pretty clear that we are going to significantly subsidize basic transportation as an economic and quality-of-life benefit, whether road or rail. Its been going on for a long time. This applies for both passengers and freight (trucks and trains).

Even airlines, which are the premium product, have gotten lots of help and basically have never made a dime.

Subsidies should definitely be tied to the criterion you stated, to keep the playing field level.

Quote: Nareed

About reliver airports, the Mexican federal government once tried to set up an airport in Toluca, about 35 miles away, to relive air traffic from Mexico City's airport. It didn't work, though it became a subsidiary hub for courier companies and it drew lots of general aviation.

Nareed

You have given a good example of the government taking an old pre-existing airport, and improving the facility so it can function as a reliever airport. As you pointed out the process is slow and has hiccups along the way. Toluca had the advantage that it was convenient to Santa Fe . But Mexicana and Aeromexico didn't move to Toluca, the new low cost airlines found it convenient to build there business from scratch.

My point is that if you try and build a reliever airport entirely from scratch you have huge capital expenditures. No pre-existing airline wants to give up their position at McCarran to move to the more remote airport. As McCarran gets more and more crowded, the airlines simply raise their prices rather than move. Then what happens is that the government begins placing flight restrictions to force traffic to move to the new airport. The airlines counter sue. What Washington DC did was to restrict flights at National Airport downtown to flying only domestic no further than Houston. The airlines are forced to go to Dulles to fly to the Phoenix, Denver, and the West. Eventually it worked out but it took 20 years. In the case of Montreal it never worked, and after 30 years they closed the new airport.

If you build an airport at Ivanpah, then no single domestic carrier wants to move their because they are at a huge competitive disadvantage for two reasons. They are far from the strip and landing fees are high. What happens is that the airport authority moves immigration to Ivanpah to force the international flights there. They also move the cargo planes to Ivanpah. The international carriers are angry and threaten to cancel flights. So it is necessary to subsidize the airport to keep landing fees low, and subsidize transportation so that international passengers are not forced to pay huge taxi fares. You either run a fast bus service or you build a light rail. But the international flights are not busy enough to pay for the airport, so the whole thing runs at a loss. In the meantime the domestic carriers begin raising fares to keep demand low enough so that McCarran is not at overcapacity. Eventually the Southern California passengers begin to drive instead because the fares are too high and there is no train. Some of them just don't come to Vegas. North Las Vegas Airport starts accepting commuter jets to offset the demand. Eventually the region stops growing and the county has an airport at Ivanpah that is running under capacity. In the case of Montreal, the economic center of eastern Canada began to shift to Toronto. The airport situation was a big part of that process. In 35 years Montreal-Mirabel has only 200K passengers a year, despite having the capacity for 50 million psgrs.

Like I said, only the US federal government has enough resources to subsidize a brand new airport for 20 years until it is competitive. In all other cases the community resists the calls to keep the older airport open. They close it to force the airlines to all move. The most common call is to keep the older airport open just for commuter jets. You can't do that either, because the airlines just keep increasing commuter flights to serve the old airport.

The only thing that makes financial sense is to try and give the passengers going less than 300 miles another transit option besides flying and driving.

McCarran should reach capacity at 53 million psgrs in as little as 7 years. By then all the major Southern California airports except Ontario (ONT) will also be at capacity. Since McCarran is the biggest destination for LAX psgrs, LAX will have to begin shedding flights in favor of the long haul capacity. Although some flights will pick up between ONT and LAS, it is a 57 mile drive from LAX to ONT through heavy LA traffic. That drive will be longer than the flight to Las Vegas. Add in terminal wait time and security checks and you have a lengthy trip.

Another good example of a failed feeder airport is Hamilton, Ontario (YHM). Located about 40 minutes southwest of Toronto's Pearson (YYZ) airport, it has the capacity to serve 2-3 million residents in southwest Ontario. However, the airport only has six commercial flights per day today and passenger statistics for 2008 show that the passenger traffic was 2% of Toronto's. However, it is a great cargo hub, being the 3rd largest in Canada but only with 25% of YYZ's traffic.

On the other hand, a good example of a successful feeder airport (so far) is Toronto's Island airport. Porter Airlines is having a very successful run there running 55 departures per fay on small planes. If City Council builds a bridge to the island (there is only ferry service today) it has the potential to be a great airport for for smaller aircraft.

I think it has everything to do with location and connections. Southwest effectively uses Midway airport as a Midwest hub. London - Gatwick is successful but carries 1/2 the passengers as Heathrow. Absolutely, LAS will always be THE preferable airport in Las Vegas unless you build an airport with a dedicated high speed rail link to the strip and direct international traffic and customs there (and their associated connections). What will consumers tolerate? Given that the cab ride to the strip is on average about 10 minutes, I would say at most, a 25 minute high speed link would be tolerated... extend the monorail to the LAS terminal and have the high speed link connect the two airports together with the monorail.

But that would cost billions of dollars and has the potential to fail if not done right. However, the airport would also handle alot of cargo volume as well. Absolutely it would not be as successful as LAS, for location alone, it can't be. But if airline volumes are at capacity, then you have to build more capacity (a new airport) or find another way to get to Vegas (train).

At the risk of repeating, myself Hamilton, Ontario (YHM) was a military airport in WW2 and turned over to civilian use in the 1960's. It is being upgraded as a reliever airport for Toronto Pearson. My main point is that the majority of reliever airports were built almost 50 years ago. No community has successfully built one from scratch (except Dulles Airport which had the wealth of the federal government to sustain it for 20 years).
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I understand that the record of decision on the Ivanpah airport will be made later this year. McCarran Airport hit 44 MAP in 2008, but will end up at 40 MAP this year. The capacity number is usually listed at 53 MAP. Target for opening Ivanpah was 2018.
Here is a discussion of maglev and the airport .

Anyway who is going to use the airport? The international passengers are less than 2 million a year. Right now after USAir leaves there shouldn't be any single airline with more than 3 million passengers except for Southwest. Southwest is not going to move. They are now the lifeblood of Las Vegas, and no one can make them do anything they don't want to do. Are you going to build a 30 mile maglev for several billion dollars for a few million passengers? In addition to several billion to build the runway and the initial terminal and parking lot.

Quote: pacomartin

You have given a good example of the government taking an old pre-existing airport, and improving the facility so it can function as a reliever airport. As you pointed out the process is slow and has hiccups along the way. Toluca had the advantage that it was convenient to Santa Fe . But Mexicana and Aeromexico didn't move to Toluca, the new low cost airlines found it convenient to build there business from scratch.

As a matter of fact, Aeromexico is running a few daily flights out of Toluca right now, either directly or through its subsidiary Aeromexico Connect. Mexicana tried to launch its low-cost affiliate, Mexicana Click, from Toluca. It moved operations to Mex City, though.

At that Toluca is one of the worst airports for catching a flight out of. There isn't a single screen providing flight departure or arrival info. So you wind up doing things like printing your boarding pass online, then going to the ticket counter anyway to ask where the flight departs from Not to mention the perpetual low ceilings and frequent fog issues.

BTW a few years ago the federal government approved replacing the current airport with one in Texcoco. The local government wanted to keep the existing airport while adding a reliver in Hidalgo. Both measures failed. Since then the city's airport built a new passenger terminal, which relieved terminal congestion but has done nothing to alleviate the air traffic problem.

Quote:

My point is that if you try and build a reliever airport entirely from scratch you have huge capital expenditures. No pre-existing airline wants to give up their position at McCarran to move to the more remote airport.

That's very likely so, especially an airport such as McCarran, which is right next to the most valuable real estate in town. The air fare to the reliever airport would have to be much lower to compensate for the added time and expense of getting to your hotel as compared to McCarran.

It might make more sense to build a huge airport outside of town and close McCarran down.

Or try this: keep government out entirely. Let the airlines figure out how to cope with an overcrowded airport. They can run larger planes on fewer schedules, for example (though the idea of a wide body making short hops to and from LA, Phoenix and other nearby areas seems ridiculous).

Toluca succeeded when some airlines decided it amde sense to operate from there, not because any government actions. It was a combination of lower costs, an overcrowded main airport and a convenient location for the new airport. Government's been playing catch-up since.

Donald Trump is a fucking criminal

There are dozens of communities that have contingency plans to build reliever airports from scratch. LAWA purchased Palmdale for when both LAX and ONT are at capacity. Almost all these airports are in remote locations. The reality is that no one has actually done it (besides Dulles). Many people proposed closing National Airport from it's downtown location to shift all the flights to Dulles. But congressman are very powerful and they liked the convenience of National.
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President Kennedy dedicated the site for Dulles on November 17, 1962. It is now a vital part of the air transport on the East Coast. My point is that no community can afford to subsidize the airport until it becomes important.
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People will freak at the idea of closing McCarran. Especially after they dumped all that money into building new terminals.
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What happened at Montreal is that they never built the ground transport to make the remote airport more accessible. They were waiting until there was enough capacity to make it worthwhile. They pushed the international flights there, but international flights often need domestic connections. Las Vegas doesn't have as much of a problem because in most cases Las Vegas is the destination. But I am afraid that Las Vegas will have a similar problem.
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Unfortunately Las Vegas does not have any secondary airports which would be suitable for reliever airports. Henderson Executive airport is going to take some of the pressure off by taking care of the private jets.
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Right now Mccarran is averaging 76 people per aircraft movement.McCarran is listed as being at capacity with 53 million passengers and 625 thousand aircraft movements. That works out to 84.8 people per aircraft movement. What I think is that they have to increase people per aircraft movement to something like 125 (average passenger load of Southwest Boeing 737). If you multiply 125 times 625 thousand you get 78 million passengers.
It is not necessary to go to widebody aircraft, just get rid of the small ones.

In order to do that they will have to find someplace to go with the most of the private jets, change the landing fees so that no airlines will be able to afford to land regional jets, and greatly speed up the throughput of the passengers so that the gates are not overcrowded. In order to do that you need off-site check in for people and baggage, and a monorail extension to funnel more people out of the airport, and better off-site computer check ins and security.
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Quote: Wizard

It doesn't seem fair to complain about Amtrak subsidies, if roads are subsidized as well. It would be interesting to see the subsidy per passenger mile both ways. If there must be subsidies, I think it should be on whatever moves the most people the most miles per dollar.

As much as I admire you, Wiz, I have to disagree on "roads being subsidized." I drive a car and I pay a tax on gasoline at every fill-up. There are also auto registration and other fees. This is my fee for using the roads. When an airplane fills up they pay a fuel tax, which should be going to airports. They also pay a landing tax, plus gate rental to the airport.

OTOH, Amtrak gets direct operating subsidies. I have no idea if they pay any tax on the diesel they buy, but the operating subsidies are direct. They get a big check for operating funds.

To me the best thing would be to shut Amtrak down completely. Do it orderly and let privatge companies bid on the routes. Find a way to get freight RRs to least the right to use the track just like the phone company gets a fee to route calls thru their lines. The northeast routes would be run profitable. The dead routes would die peacefully.

Paco,

Understand your point. But what are the solutions? Las Vegas is a special place in the world, in that is derives a great portion of its economic activity to tourism exclusively. With all of the innovation in Vegas, there has to be an innovative solution that will work with such a unique place.

Building a high speed rail link between LAX and LAS would only relieve a percent of passengers that are taking that route (10%). So you build the link and reduce the total passenger traffic by optimistically at most 5%. This may push out the capacity at the airport by two years.

At that point, you're still looking at a feeder airport for LAS. But only 5 airports have been opened in the past 30 years in the United States, to your point (Denver replaced Stapleton at a cost of 4.8 billion). Opening a feeder airport 30 miles from LAS (as Ivanpah is proposed) probably won't work because it's too far away. McCarran will continue to operate at capacity while Ivanpah will pick up and lose customers based very sensitively on the economy. Perhaps it will take some cargo capacity away but that's not the issue. For passenger traffic, by far the preferable airport will always be McCarran, but I see a direct correlation between passenger airport and the distance the airport is away from the strip (in time). Perhaps the government could regulate the new airport like Dulles with regards to what traffic can land at LAS.

Right now Mccarran is averaging 76 people per aircraft movement.
1) Find someplace to go with the most of the private jets. Although it is true that according to FAA regulations you can't forbid anyone from using the airport, you simply make it so expensive that no sane person would do it.
2) Close all the Fixed Base Operators to serve private jets. Subsidize Henderson Executive Airport or North Las Vegas Airport so that they can handle all the private jet traffic.
3) Change the landing fee structure. Typically the charge is per pound of aircraft. There is not a severe penalty for landing small regional jets even though they require larger spacing on the runway. Make the airlines bleed for landing small jets.
4) Offsite check in. Ideally you use cut and cover (i.e. dig a trench and put a rail line in and then cover it with a roof to build a secure passenger link to the airport. People can check in on the strip and go through secure 1 mile tunnel. That way you can extend the monorail to Tropicana and Paradise, let people check in there and ride to the secure portion of the airport. You need a people mover like they have at Mandalay Bay but with secure access.
5) Inducements to people who ship their luggage and only have carry on bags.
6) #4 and #5 speeds up throughput of passengers and minimizes vehicle traffic at the airport. That way you can handle more people in a gate. There are many things you can do that cumulatively have an impact on passenger throughput. But the efficient mass transit (i.e. monorail) will clear out thousands of individual vehicles.
7) Negotiate with at least a few major hotels to have 24 hour room rates like the hotels have at LAX. That way people can land at off hours and check in. It encourages airlines to run more night flights because people don't have to wait until 3:00PM to check into their room.
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Right now the prediction is that McCarran is at capacity with 53 million passengers and 625 thousand aircraft movements. That works out to 84.8 people per aircraft movement. If you can increase people per aircraft movement to something like 125 (average passenger load of Southwest Boeing 737). If you multiply 125 times 625 thousand you get 78 million passengers.
It is not necessary to go to widebody aircraft, just get rid of the small ones.

The runways can handle a lot of aircraft movements if all the jets are at least as large as a Southwest Boeing 737. It is a myth that runways are the deciding factor. It is almost all passenger load. Weather and visibility are very good at McCarran.

Good comments. In my opinion there should be a flat price per landing.

The reason why Amtrak doesn't work is because it's slow, America is a vast country, and gasoline is kept very inexpensive here. Increase gas taxes, speed the trains up to be considerably faster than a car (140mph) with fewer stops and Amtrak would be very viable. Certainly you would have alot of cars off the road. Certainly start with the corridor cities first. For example, New York to Jacksonville is 1284 miles and 20 hours by car, but it's 27 hours by train. Make that trip an 10 hour trip and you would take a bunch of drivers off the I-95 corridor.

The subsidy to Amtrak is 2.6 billion per year (including capital) to the year 2013 but its passenger revenue is only $1.6 billion meaning that a passenger only pays 38% of the cost to travel.

Similarly, MTA's expenses was 9.1 billion but only had passenger revenues of 2.8 billion meaning that a passenger only pays 30% of the true cost to travel. For BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit), passenger revenue is $233 million with costs of $582 million. The passenger pays 40% of the cost to travel. Nationally, a 2007 report shows that for urban transit where the transit serves over one million people, fare revenue only pays 33% of the total annual expenditures. This drops to 17% for populations of 200,000 to 1,000,000 and 20% for populations below 200,000. This doesn't account for the $14 billion in annual capital funding.

Similarly, average gas taxes are $.46/gallon ($.50/gallon for diesel) in 2008. In 2010, funding for total roads spending by all levels of government is estimated to be $220 billion. American Fuels estimated that 2008 gasoline consumption was 138.2 billion gallons, while diesel fuel consumption was 60.6 billion gallons.The gasoline tax on this usage would therefore be $138.2 * .465 + 60.6 * .505 = 94.9 billion dollars. Therefore, the gas tax only accounts for 43% of the total spending on roads. [Edited to include diesel]

Amtrak's subsidy (62%) is on par with all other public transit's subsidies. Roads are 57% subsidized.

From a gas usage standpoint, public transit is much more efficient than driving, even when the subsidy is taken into account. Therefore, my feeling is that public policy should be pushing mass transit whenever possible.

Quote: boymimbo

The reason why Amtrak doesn't work is because it's slow, America is a vast country, and gasoline is kept very inexpensive here. Increase gas taxes, speed the trains up to be considerably faster than a car (140mph) with fewer stops and Amtrak would be very viable. Certainly you would have alot of cars off the road. Certainly start with the corridor cities first. For example, New York to Jacksonville is 1284 miles and 20 hours by car, but it's 27 hours by train. Make that trip an 10 hour trip and you would take a bunch of drivers off the I-95 corridor.

The subsidy to Amtrak is 2.6 billion per year (including capital) to the year 2013 but its passenger revenue is only $1.6 billion meaning that a passenger only pays 38% of the cost to travel.

Similarly, MTA's expenses was 9.1 billion but only had passenger revenues of 2.8 billion meaning that a passenger only pays 30% of the true cost to travel. For BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit), passenger revenue is $233 million with costs of $582 million. The passenger pays 40% of the cost to travel. Nationally, a 2007 report shows that for urban transit where the transit serves over one million people, fare revenue only pays 33% of the total annual expenditures. This drops to 17% for populations of 200,000 to 1,000,000 and 20% for populations below 200,000. This doesn't account for the $14 billion in annual capital funding.

Similarly, average gas taxes are $.46/gallon ($.50/gallon for diesel) in 2008. In 2010, funding for total roads spending by all levels of government is estimated to be $220 billion. American Fuels estimated that 2008 gasoline consumption was 137,800,488,000 gallons. The gasoline tax on this usage would therefore be $69 billion (at $.50/gallon). Therefore, the gas tax only accounts for 31% of the total spending on roads.

Amtrak's subsidy (62%) is on par with all other public transit's subsidies. Roads are 69% subsidized. Gas taxes only pay for 31% of total road costs.

From a gas usage standpoint, public transit is much more efficient than driving, even when the subsidy is taken into account. Therefore, my feeling is that public policy should be pushing mass transit whenever possible.

You cannot get rid of much of the "slow" on Amtrak. Example: I took it from Rochester, NY to Atlantic City, NJ. Going across NY you stop at every dink town along the way. Most didn't even have "stations" in the true sense but rather little kiosks of sorts. So even with high-speed rail you need to keep stopping. Eliminate the stops and you cut off much of your market, at some point those people figure why not drive? For your NYC to JAX trip it will be mostly the same. Unless you make a "cannonball" express type service who will still have loads of stops to make.

The real question is how could mass transit have been profitable until about 1960 in this country and since then few if any private entities have made a go of it on any level?

BTW: The government should not be "encouraging" mass transit. Let it find a market so we can quit paying extra taxes to support it, like the 5% drink tax we have here.

Quote: Wizard

Good comments. In my opinion there should be a flat price per landing.

Well if not a flat price at least a minimum price so that all planes the size of a Boeing 737-400 or smaller pay the same amount.

I think of the plane movements at an airport as a community asset (like television bandwidth). People don't realize how much of this asset is squandered on private jets and regional aircraft. Unfortunately regional aircraft are seldom used to open up newer and smaller markets to remote airports. Instead there are 25 normal jets that fly to San Diego and 5 regional jets as the airlines look for small business efficiencies. The current 76 passengers per aircraft movement is more indicative of a what you would expect to be on a 90 seat regional jet.

Private aircraft are an important part of the economy. I'm just saying that they can be accommodated elsewhere. It bugs me that San Diego airport ran a major campaign to say that there single runway airport was going to hit capacity in a few years, and that no other major airport in the country had a single runway. Yet they are tearing down the FBO that was in place for over 50 years and replacing it with a much larger facility with competing businesses. At the same time the city owns a nearly empty airport (Brown Field) where weeds are growing around the giant empty runway. Their argument is that Brown Field is under a different management as San Diego International.

Reward people for traveling without checked bags. At least on the way home, people would ship bags if it was reasonable and they could find a place to ship them. Anything to improve efficiency at the airport.

The Automated People Mover at Atlanta airport moves 64 million people per year. The entire system is 2.8 miles (which by my calculation is the distance from the terminal to the Hawaiian Village). I know that taxis make a good portion of their income from rides to and from the airport, but once again it is a question of the public good. The airport is a community asset and it will operate much more efficiently with mass transit. People love going to Portland airport and there is train right in the terminal that will take them downtown. It is one of the pleasure of landing in an airport in Europe or Japan.

Even if you have to create a 1.25 mile tunnel under the runway to the strip for a people mover you could shift passengers to a facility near the ACE bus rapid transit stop on Las Vegas Blvd. That would be expensive, but it would be nothing compared to building a high speed rail for 30 miles to Ivanpah. The real thrifty will simply ride the ACE bus rapid transit up and down the strip to their hotel, or there are 10,000 rooms (some very cheap) within a good walk.

And if we build an interstate to Phoenix, let's construct the road so that there is some advance planning to accommodate a future rail. In 30 years maybe we will be discussing HSR to Phoenix.

Quote: boymimbo

The subsidy to Amtrak is 2.6 billion per year (including capital) to the year 2013 but its passenger revenue is only $1.6 billion meaning that a passenger only pays 38% of the cost to travel.

To illustrate how subsidized Amtrak is, a couple years back Amtrak used to have a deals section on their website where you could buy discounted tickets. At one point they were offering a ticket from Orlando to Los Angeles for around $40, if I remember correctly. I calculated this to probably be the cheapest method of moving people in history. It would cost more to walk just to pay for the caloric expenditure alone!

Quote: boymimbo

Similarly, average gas taxes are $.46/gallon ($.50/gallon for diesel) in 2008. In 2010, funding for total roads spending by all levels of government is estimated to be $220 billion. American Fuels estimated that 2008 gasoline consumption was 138.2 billion gallons, while diesel fuel consumption was 60.6 billion gallons.The gasoline tax on this usage would therefore be $138.2 * .465 + 60.6 * .505 = 94.9 billion dollars. Therefore, the gas tax only accounts for 43% of the total spending on roads. [Edited to include diesel]

Great post, thanks! My personal opinion is that gasoline taxes should at least be enough to cover road constructions and maintenance. Going by your figures, that would be an extra 61 cents per gallon, assuming no change in driver behavior. I say bring it on, and reduce income taxes commensurately. That would encourage conservation, thin out road traffic, and thus save time for those who do drive. It would also increase demand for public transportation, which should bring down prices, due to the low variable cost. Hopefully it would also encourage more vertical urban growth, and less horizontal.

Two questions:

1) What subsidies did the government give to passenger railroads before the era of interstate freeways and mass air travel?

2) Why didn't government subsidize or take over the operations of horse farmers, carriage makers and the whale-oil industry?

Looking at the OMB tables for 1916 federal government receipts were $761 million and outlays were $713 million. This was before deficit spending for WWI. Around that time John D Rockefeller became the world's first billionaire.
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Today the government spends $4 trillion dollars, far more than the net worth of any one individual.
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Basically, I don't think the government thought in terms of subsidies or bailouts back then. The rich individuals were comparatively as rich as the whole federal government. I think that laws were passed which aided certain industries, but not direct subsidies.

I don't think any subsidies were given out before 1971 when Amtrak was formed (out of a necessity - most passenger rail services were on the brink of bankruptcy and the country wanted to maintain a national public rail service). With Eisenhower's interstate system built, cheap gasoline, fast cars, and the birth of modern air travel, passenger rail dropped precipitously. Of course, the infrastructure for both airports, air traffic control, and roadways was completely paid for by the taxpayer while rail service continued to pay full and inflated property taxes and was not subsidized. Rail travel became the antiquated (romantic) way to travel. There was also a 15% tax on all rail services until 1962. As well, unions worked by the mile and by the end of the 50s they were working 3 hour days instead of 7 hour days. And like airlines, Amtrak pays sunk costs like pension benefits to all railway workers (all railway workers pay into a single Pension fund).

And don't kid yourself. Governments subsidize all kinds of industries, be it energy, farming, new industries, and public transit.

Quote: boymimbo

And don't kid yourself. Governments subsidize all kinds of industries, be it energy, farming, new industries, and public transit.

Politicians will subsidize anything that gets them re-elected.

My point is that business should be allowed to succeed or fail on their own, without any help from the government. For one thing it's not fair. Not all businesses will get such help, many don't even want it (see the recent bank bailouts). Letting the government hand out subsidies, seize companies and meddle in business only makes things worse.

Passenger rail travel became obsolete in most routes for various reasons. What was there to be gained by keeping it alive? Many other industries have become obsolete as a result of other developments. Kerosene lamps replaced whale-oil lamps, the automobile replaced horse-drawn carriages and horse riding, the internet is wreaking havoc all over old media. It's the way progress works.

Imagine if governments were to subsidize scribes because the printing press put them out of business.

Quote: Nareed

Kerosene lamps replaced whale-oil lamps, the automobile replaced horse-drawn carriages and horse riding, the internet is wreaking havoc all over old media. It's the way progress works.

I don't think it is that clear cut. When Japan began building a new generation of high speed rail we built a interstate system that is mostly free which made trains obsolete. When europe began building a high speed rail we de-regulated air travel. Now we are facing a lot of infrastructure problems including the need for a massive investment in the airports.

Because Europe has made so much progress with trains, most countries are now trying to replace their domestic air service as much as possible with trains. It is infinitely more efficient, convenient, and kinder to the environment.

California is way too addicted to short air flights and is facing massive economic problems because it cannot enlarge it's airports to meet the expected need.

Quote: Nareed

Two questions:

1) What subsidies did the government give to passenger railroads before the era of interstate freeways and mass air travel?

2) Why didn't government subsidize or take over the operations of horse farmers, carriage makers and the whale-oil industry?

On #1 if you go back to the 1800s the government gave loads of land to the RRs. I think it was if you laid track in a state you got a 5 mile wide strip and 10 miles wide in a terriroty. This was freigh and passenger and I think back then most lines dealt in both. This was smart in Uncle Sam's part as it settled a frontier in 80 years that they projected would last 1,000.

But there was a catch--the feds got discounted rates on freight until 1945. On "The History Channel" it said the government got 10xs the value of the land back. Or maybe it was more. Whatever it was there is no question the feds got a good return. Compare that to the rathole Amtrak has become.

On #2, well, way back we believed in the free market here. Whale oil was running out so this guy Drake found a better oil by drilling a well that produces to this day. Today people cry "we need to subsidize solar and wind" and politicians listen.

Sorry for the sarcasm in #2 to those easily upset by it.

Quote: Nareed

"Passenger rail travel became obsolete in most routes for various reasons. What was there to be gained by keeping it alive? Many other industries have become obsolete as a result of other developments. Kerosene lamps replaced whale-oil lamps, the automobile replaced horse-drawn carriages and horse riding, the internet is wreaking havoc all over old media. It's the way progress works."

Passenger rail became obsolete because the government completely subsidized the construction of airports and roads beginning in the 20s. Meanwhile property owned by the railroad companies which were paid entirely by the railroad (no subsidies) was taxed very heavily by local governments. Roads and most airports are not subject to property taxes. In the end, passenger rail failed (in the United States) because it faced unfair competition from the car and airport.

"The Interstate Highway System was authorized by the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 – popularly known as the National Interstate and Defense Highways Act of 1956 – on June 29. It had been lobbied for by major U.S. automobile manufacturers and championed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who was influenced by his experiences as a young Army officer crossing the country in the 1919 Army Convoy on the Lincoln Highway, the first road across America. Eisenhower also had gained an appreciation of the German Autobahn network as a necessary component of a national defense system while he was serving as Supreme Commander of the Allied forces in Europe during World War II. In addition to facilitating private and commercial transportation, it would provide key ground transport routes for military supplies and troop deployments in case of an emergency or foreign invasion." Federal funds paid for 90% of the the project while 10% was paid for by state governments.

Passenger rail is very successful in other parts of the world and is a very successful, economical, and environmentally sound way to travel because the government subsidized the infrastructure and operating costs, just like the United States today subsidizes roads, airports, and public transit. Rail, just like airports, is a type of infrastructure that deserves the same kind of fair shake as roads and airports have. The Acela in the northeast between New York and Washington is also successful. It is subsidized, but so are roads, including current maintenance.

Statistics show that the largest airline by far that serves LAS is Southwest with 14,970,000 passengers for the year ending October 31st, 2009 (source - Bureau of Transportation Statistics). That's 41.2% of the total 36,284,000 passengers (arriving and departing, down almost 10% from the previous year). So maybe you build an airport for Southwest and the private planes.

But back to the issue at hand. What's the best way to get to LAS from LAX? The latest statistics from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics show that there were 909,000 passengers from LAS to LAS in the year ending October 31, 2009, 5% of the total passenger traffic. Meanwhile, according to CalTrans, 2008, Average daily vehicular traffic is about 37,000 cars (both directions) at the Nevada border on I-15. Of course some of this travel is for traffic beyond Las Vegas. For a round number let's use 75% are going to Vegas. And let's assume that there are 2 passengers in each car. This puts our total annual passengers to Las Vegas along I-15 at about 10,129,000. While this seems incredibly high, a 2008 study for the Las Vegas Convention bureau showed that 57% of visitors were visiting Las Vegas by car (43% by air). It also jibes well with the statistic that 24% of visitors in 2008 were from Southern California (9,000,000) and it's a good assumption that the great majority of them were driving.

Therefore, the market for the train is the 900,000 air travellers plus the 10,100,000 car travelers for a total of about 11,000,000 passengers / year or about 30,000 / day in each direction. Depending on the technology used, you could carry 250 - 560 passengers for each train. So if you start off with 30 minute service from 6am to midnight (more frequent on Fridays and Sundays) with a 30 minute stop in each direction, you could probably get away with purchasing 10 trains. You would have about a capacity of about 10,000 passengers per day.

The problem is that Victorville will not serve the residents of Los Angeles. By the time that the driver makes it to Victorville, the remainder of the drive takes 3 hours and you'll have your own car, whereas the train trip (according to DesertXpress) will take 84 minutes. So you save 96 minutes but the trip (at $50) is much more expensive than driving. My feeling is that the federal and state government should team up with DesertXpress to extend the high speed rail line 50 miles to Palmdale (or 70 miles to Anaheim) and to connect it to the proposed high speed line to San Francisco and the East Bay, or at least to the Metrolink system. This would increase the efficiency of the entire line (as folks from the Bay area could be in Vegas in 4.5 hours), would reduce cars, air traffic, and would increase tourism to Vegas.

Quote: boymimbo

Passenger rail became obsolete because the government completely subsidized the construction of airports and roads beginning in the 20s. Meanwhile property owned by the railroad companies which were paid entirely by the railroad (no subsidies) was taxed very heavily by local governments. Roads and most airports are not subject to property taxes. In the end, passenger rail failed (in the United States) because it faced unfair competition from the car and airport.

That's why I keep saying government should stay out. It subsidizes one thing, brings another down, subsidizes the other to "save" it, etc. It never ends.

BTW IN Mexico long distance transportation relies on buses and aircraft. There's very little rail travel (the railroads were government owned). I can tell you there were no massive subsidies for either highways or passenger trains. Highways in Mexico are still subpar comapred to what you find in Europe, particularly Germany, and in America.

Mexico is a good case study. In size it's bigger than most European countries (and all western European countries), but smaller than the US or Canada (how's rail transport on Canada, BTW?). Railroads were the main means of long distance transportation for a long time, but now I honestly don't even know if passenger trains still run (I think they do).

If you want a fair experiment, get all government subsidies out of the way and let transportation companie sand private individuals sort things out. If you offer cheap, fast travel from point A to point B, you'll succeed regardless of whether it's on the ground, by rail, ship, blimp or airplane.

Quote: boymimbo

Statistics show that the largest airline by far that serves LAS is Southwest with 14,970,000 passengers for the year ending October 31st, 2009 (source - Bureau of Transportation Statistics). That's 41.2% of the total 36,284,000 passengers (arriving and departing, down almost 10% from the previous year). So maybe you build an airport for Southwest and the private planes.

My feeling is that the federal and state government should team up with DesertXpress to extend the high speed rail line 50 miles to Palmdale (or 70 miles to Anaheim) and to connect it to the proposed high speed line to San Francisco and the East Bay, or at least to the Metrolink system. This would increase the efficiency of the entire line (as folks from the Bay area could be in Vegas in 4.5 hours), would reduce cars, air traffic, and would increase tourism to Vegas.

As to the airport. Southwest does not want to be disadvantaged any more than any other airline. It would be a considerable disadvantage to be 30 miles away. In San Diego (where Southwest also dominated by a similar amount) a proposal to build a new terminal for Southwest was flatly refused by Southwest.

Yes I agree that a complete train system would be better than half a system. The private money behind DesertXpress isn't interested in doubling or tripling the price of the rail. But to extend it to Palmdale (easier choice) would make it much more appealing. At least people can get to Palmdale by Metrolink. Ideally it would hook up with the Metrolink track so that the train could go from downtown LA straight through Las Vegas at night. The train would have to travel slower on the older tracks. Possibly there would also be an opportunity for a complete run in the middle of the day when there is less demand for commuter rail.


Another possibility is for California to extend their commuter line from Lancaster to Barstow. There could be a stop in Barstow, and then it could merge with the DesertXpress line. It would involve running the same trainset so that it could go faster on the newer rail. It is 52 miles from Lancaster to Barstow.

Lancaster (7 miles north of Palmdale)
Palmdale
Vincent Grade/Acton
Via Princessa
Santa Clarita
Newhall
Sylmar/San Fernando
Sun Valley
Downtown Burbank
Glendale
Union Station (2 hours from Lancaster)


Presumably DesertXpress considered and rejected terminating their line at Lancaster instead of Victorville. It would involve laying another 30 miles of track. Also there are only 9 metrolink trains on weekday, 6 on Saturday and 3 on Sunday. DesertXpress will be busiest on weekends. Theoretically with a track sharing agreement, then DesertXpress could use the metrolink track on weekends to run through service directly to downtown Los Angeles.

Quote: boymimbo

The latest statistics from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics show that there were 909,000 passengers from LAS to LAS in the year ending October 31, 2009, 5% of the total passenger traffic. Meanwhile, according to CalTrans, 2008, Average daily vehicular traffic is about 37,000 cars (both directions) at the Nevada border on I-15. Of course some of this travel is for traffic beyond Las Vegas. For a round number let's use 75% are going to Vegas. And let's assume that there are 2 passengers in each car. This puts our total annual passengers to Las Vegas along I-15 at about 10,129,000. While this seems incredibly high, a 2008 study for the Las Vegas Convention bureau showed that 57% of visitors were visiting Las Vegas by car (43% by air). It also jibes well with the statistic that 24% of visitors in 2008 were from Southern California (9,000,000) and it's a good assumption that the great majority of them were driving.

Well your forgetting another 930K air passengers from the other four airports: Burbank, Ontario, Long Beach and John Wayne in Orange county. In addition, Vegas is hoping to bring in another 6 million visitors a year so that they can fill there 150K hotel rooms. So the potential market is bigger than your estimate. DesertXpress is advertising that they can bring 5 million their first year. Of course estimates for transit systems are notoriously optimistic.

Quote: pacomartin

Of course estimates for transit systems are notoriously optimistic.

Of course. I'd watch out for various unstated goals. A private system that will later need subsidies to survive or will be eminent domained? A system that is truncated in the planning stages but once built gets extended through the already valuable and already crowded real estate by public funds. Now if only you can get a train built that is nothing but flatcars: you drive tractor-trailer rigs onto the flatcars and you drive your family car onto the flatcar, the wheels get chocked and then the engineer puts the pedal to the metal. Such bimodal transit systems won't require parking lots or transition zones and won't require the expensive "first mile-last mile" construction.

Quote: pacomartin

Well your forgetting another 930K air passengers from the other four airports: Burbank, Ontario, Long Beach and John Wayne in Orange county. In addition, Vegas is hoping to bring in another 6 million visitors a year so that they can fill there 150K hotel rooms. So the potential market is bigger than your estimate. DesertXpress is advertising that they can bring 5 million their first year. Of course estimates for transit systems are notoriously optimistic.

I stand corrected.
Statistics for passengers to Las Vegas from November 2008 to October 2009

LAX: 884,000 (982,000 2007/08)
Ontario (ONT): 235,000 (292,000)
Burbank (BUR): 397,000 (439,000)
John Wayne Orange Cty (SNA): 294,000 (353,000)
Long Beach is primarily a JetBlue airport and they don't fly to Long Beach.

Total passengers from Los Angeles: 1,810,000 (2,066,000).

There was a study done as to how many passengers are in various domestic markets in the country. They included all airports in a region, not just a single pair. Numbers are for boardings, so they are twice as high round trip numbers.

The Dallas to Houston run was the original route that Southwest was founded on.

Quote: pacomartin

These are the four busiest short haul (under 250 miles) air routes in the country. All airports are included
229 mi | 3,733,037 | Las Vegas;Paradise, NV | Los Angeles;Long Beach;Santa Ana, CA
232 mi | 2,910,797 | Dallas;Fort Worth;Arlington, TX | Houston;Sugar Land;Baytown, TX
185 mi | 2,745,311 | Boston;Cambridge;Quincy,MA;NH | New York;Northern New Jersey;Long Island, NY;NJ;PA
190 mi | 2,535,758 | Hilo, HI | Honolulu, HI
===================
Obviously the Hawaii route is over water, but the other three are natural candidates for high speed rail. It will relieve pressure on the airports and reduce carbon footprint considerably.
===================
The third one has limited version of high speed rail

The only route in the country that has significantly lower air traffic because of good rail service is:
222 mi | 2,396,311 | New York;Northern New Jersey;Long Island, NY;NJ;PA | Washington;Arlington;Alexandria, DC;VA;MD;WV

The Vegas to LA air traffic is about 6.2% of the total air traffic of these airports, but it is the biggest single destination for LAX. But you can expect prices on these flights to increase exponentially in cost as all of these airports approach capacity. Since Ontario airport has the most growth potential (with new terminals) it will be able to keep prices for Las Vegas shuttles low for the longest.

Here is a graphic of a proposed Victor Valley extension to Metrolink commuter trains, with a transfer station to DesertXpress. Devore to Hesperia on the map is about 1200' of altitude in 24 miles or 1% average grade, but there are sections that are at 3% grade.


On the negative side this line would be pretty slow. On the plus side many commuters already own monthly passes on Metrolink so it wouldn't cost anything to get to the DesertXpress station.

This commuter line seems to exist mostly in the minds of forum users.

I am skeptical that the DesertXpress can achieve the corporate goal of ten million (one way) riders in their first year of operation. In contrast the Northeast Spine (which includes the Acela HSR) only had 10 million riders in FY2009. Ridership on Eurostar from London to Paris hit 9.3 million in 2008.