Detroit to Chicago corridor part of Obama's high speed rail proposal

[detmsp]

I would be interested in finding out how "high speed" these high speed trains will be.

110 mph. hardly high speed by european/asian standards.

[ghettopalmetto]

110 mph. hardly high speed by european/asian standards.

Let's keep a few things in mind, here:

It has taken France and Japan over 30 years to get their high-speed rail systems to where they are today. We can't just up and build new trackage for a dedicated high-speed passenger rail system. Improvements are likely to be incremental as money is available, and the ridership market develops.

I expect initial improvements to include upgrades of interlockings, tie replacement, and construction of additional sidings. Some construction of additional track would not be unexpected. This kind of work is most likely, because they are the projects that states [[like Virginia) have been trying to complete in the past few years.

Over time, one could expect to see new passenger cars and locomotives, full double [[and some triple?) tracking, station capacity enhancements, and electification. All of those are a long ways off.

[DetroitPlanner]

110 mph is much faster than what can be done on I-94. It is also a more direct route, making a beeline from K'zoo to Michigan City.

These are not bullet trains, but this is high speed rail. Any faster and you would need to spend a significant amount in infrastructure to separade the grade of the track from crossings. Getting caught up in symantics will not do a darned thing to improve service. Incidently, just beacuse it can get 110 mph does not mean they will run the train that fast. It does stop at small towns like Dowagiawac.

[kraig]

I think I would actually prefer that the MCS be involved. I know that there is this big push to have things publicly owned, but, I think that dealing with Matty Moroun would go a lot better than dealing with City Council or having Ken Cockrel trying to facilitate anything. Let's face it, The Mayor and City Council, don't just suck, they blow.

[detroit313]

Why hasn't anyone in the Mayor's office lobbied in Washington for even more money for a better transit system? It just seems like Detroit is setting itself up to fail, or lag behind at best!

MCS has so, so much potential. IMOA Union Station in Chicago pails in comparison to MCS.

[[Detroit could possible keep the midtown station open also.)

Here are a couple of things to consider in a dream station!

Renovation cost [[$300M)

MCS should have been the new Rosa parks terminal, or at least the east wing. [[$30M)

New DARTA HQ combining the total staffing in the tower of the building. and bringing Amtrak back.

Free shuttle service Downtown Via DARTA with Train ticket/receipt.

I estimate a total cost of $500,000,000.00

Two options to lower cost [[correct me if I'm wrong or seem like a sociolist)
Lease the structure from MM, careful of the language in the contract therefore not to impede on his trade empire

Or...exercise Eminent Domain...

[401don]

I hope this comes to fruition but I know that, being 50 yrs old, I'll never live to see it. Here in Ontario they just threw a couple of million at the 12th study in the last 30 yrs. or so for high speed rail in the Montreal to Windsor corridor.

I read an article on the weekend where a politician in the Eastern corridor between Washington and N.Y. said that if all of the high speed rail money for Obama's proposed sites was spent in that one corridor it might be enough to upgrade the rail lines. Much as it doesn't help Detroit, it probably makes far more sense to build the busiest corridor properly first and study the usage and economic viability. Instead, gov't will probably build 40 stations across the country, buy the locomotives and then scrap the project.

[kraig]

Why hasn't anyone in the Mayor's office lobbied in Washington for even more money for a better transit system? It just seems like Detroit is setting itself up to fail, or lag behind at best!

The Mayor didn't want stop watching the Sci-fi Channel.

[Russix]

Why hasn't anyone in the Mayor's office lobbied in Washington for even more money for a better transit system?

Because Washington doesn't pay for all of it, they require you to cover 40% of the cost and produce the ridership numbers to justify the expense. DTOGS[[8 Mile to Downtown) has the numbers to get Washington's approval, but no local funding source. Instead of private backers trying to come up with $150 million to build DTOGS, their spending $100 million to build another novelty people mover.

[Mackinaw]

This is good news, but I'm really with UpinOttawa. It would really be great for Detroit if it became a multi-spoke hub, too. Indeed, we should be directly connected to the cities of Ontario. We also need a rail connection to Toledo so that we are plugged into the main E-W corridor and you can take a train from Detroit to NY or DC. It is unacceptable that the 11th largest city and a top-10 metro area is cut off like this.

Detroit can be a hub, and it can support a full-on train station. This will be especially true if there is also comprehensive local/regional transit, be it light rail on Woodward and the spoke streets, a train to DTW and A2, and/or bus rapid transit. See ANY OTHER major city's main transit station and you'll see that even in this car-crazy country, inter-city and inner-city transit connectivity creates something amazing. See DC Union Station, Boston South Station, Newark Penn Station, hell even Toledo is way busier than any train station in Michigan. Detroit needs to aim for this as these sorts of federally sponsored opportunities come its way, so that we can be a hub from which you can get anywhere.

Finally, this goal is not inconsistent with the City's goal of growth through visitor traffic, conventions, and tourism. Why do you think other major non-sunbelt cities do so well with major events? You can get there, and then get around, easily, going through a major hub where everything is laid out. I feel very sorry for anyone that comes to Detroit for the first time without a guide, not just for the fact that there is no user-friendly hub to guide them, but for the fact that it is costly as hell to rent a car and have to park it. Detroit will be all the more desirable if you can fly to metro, take a train to your downtown hotel, and then walk around the downtown or take a jaunt to the DIA etc. on an easy-to-understand light rail system. Or if you can take a bus or train from another city and be deliver directly to the downtown area [[e.g. at Michigan Central Station). Only Detroit could lapse backward in the way that we have. We had all this 60 years ago, but not now, when you need it most to be a competitive city.

[milesdriven]

110 mph is much faster than what can be done on I-94. .

I disagree.

[detmsp]

Let's keep a few things in mind, here:

It has taken France and Japan over 30 years to get their high-speed rail systems to where they are today. We can't just up and build new trackage for a dedicated high-speed passenger rail system. Improvements are likely to be incremental as money is available, and the ridership market develops.

I expect initial improvements to include upgrades of interlockings, tie replacement, and construction of additional sidings. Some construction of additional track would not be unexpected. This kind of work is most likely, because they are the projects that states [[like Virginia) have been trying to complete in the past few years.

Over time, one could expect to see new passenger cars and locomotives, full double [[and some triple?) tracking, station capacity enhancements, and electification. All of those are a long ways off.

well i'm not positive about this [[so correct me if i'm wrong) but i don't think existing railroads can be improved to handle a REAL high speed train. That would mean that this isn't some incremental step towards real high speed rail... it means we're building something we will quickly want to completely replace because it's not fast enough

[Novine]

As I said above:

"True high-speed rail would require a dedicated, grade-separated right-of-way. That's not going to happen any time soon."

For those not familiar with the concept, it would mean creating an entirely new train corridor where the tracks don't have road crossings or even crossings with other rail lines and generally it's elevated to keep people, animals, etc. out of the way of trains moving at 200+ MPH. As Russix stated, we don't need bullet train speeds to create a rail alternative that's better than highway and bus travel. If Amtrak can crank their trains up to 110 MPH between the stations, we can get trains to Chicago in much less time than they currently take.

[softailrider]

110 mph. hardly high speed by european/asian standards.

Sounds pretty damm fast to me. Of course, I haven't been on a train in about 30 years. Really have no desire to take a train ride either.