Texas poised to get America's first bullet train
Texas poised to get America's first bullet train
Plans are reportedly being revived for a high-speed rail link utilizing Japanese trains running between Houston and Dallas.
President Joe Biden is reportedly seeking to revive a project that would construct a high-speed railway from Houston to Dallas in Texas utilizing Japanese bullet trains.
According to a Reuters report on Tuesday, citing unnamed administration sources, the White House is looking to make an announcement on the project following talks between Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in Washington, D.C., this week.
The Japanese government and the White House declined to comment on the report, though the project has seen renewed support from Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who told KXAS in Fort Worth on Sunday: "We believe in this."
Texas signed up first because it has “bullet” in the title.
They think it's gonna be fired from a giant gun.
I'd prefer some other state to get it than Texas. If Texas is going to deny federal money for unemployment and for healthcare, then Texas doesn't deserve federal money for other good projects.
And this is coming from someone in Texas who would benefit from it.
Texas GOP governor Greg Abbott has told state employees to try to avoid federal money because it might come with strings that require treating non rich and non whites as human.
Remember when Greg Abbott had a tantrum and basically shut down the Texas-Mexico border to most road traffic and fucked over all the rest of the US who was depending on products to come from Mexico?
Let Texas feel what it would be like to secede.
At the same time HSR could encourage social lives and urban neighborhoods that would encourage less conservative thinking. I think if we get into petty partisanship, it will just continue to spiral until we have a second civil war.
While I agree that Texas is not the most "deserving," if it gets rapidly improving infrastructure it will probably at least flip into a swing state, with more liberals than fascists. "Punishing" them just lets them play victim.
I wish they were more than playing sometimes. If they’re going to claim persecution then we should persecute them a little.
is accelerationism everywhere now? just let a single good thing happen geez
They're gonna be real pissed when they find out somebody used the word bullet to dupe them into building public transport.
Had to lol at this. Too true. Whaddaya ya mean there’s no shootin’ on this train?!
It'll get canned as soon as Texans realize it's not called a bullet train because of any involvement with guns.
Texas figured it out?
Texas?
Yeah, this is a real low point. This one hurts.
They had to use > bullet> train to get them onboard.
so you just shoot the train? I gotta see this gun!
No one else got your Good Place reference so I just wanted to say, have some frozen yoghurt.
Biden shouldn't be doing shit for Texas. He should try push this mainstream across the country. But Texas wants to secede Abbott probably find away to make this not happen anyway and funds will be stolen and wasted.
Umm. Not really, it's because Amtrak is involved now in Texas and the Build Back Better Act has sent money for several projects not just Houston to Dallas. Cali HSR, Las Vegas to LAX, Orlando to Tampa, Seatle-Tahcoma-Portland, and Atlanta to Charlotte all got funds. All these projects (with the exception of Cali) are using federal/private funds, so state governors can't really pull the plug (Cali HSR is a constitutionally mandated project approved by the voters of the state... to use state funds).
Maybe it's a diesel bullet train and they're "running coal"?
So I mentioned the odd dichotomy that Texas has in another post
Hey, trust me, I know how this shit goes. I'm in Kansas.
With Texas' hardon against regulations I forsee this having a massive derailment within two decades of it opening.
Hope that isn't the case, because we do need better mass transit.
Eh maybe. Usually the calls for deregulation are sponsored by the industry giants. So due to there not being a strong passenger rail lobby yet, I can see the regulation being fine. Once someone is trying to get rich then the derailments will start.
Texas conservatives are notoriously anti-regulation now, after decades of being paid to build that platform. There will be as few regulations as possible (with or without a lobby); that is a guarantee.
I still think NYC-Chicago is the real test of high speed rail in this country. A route people want to take, that’s far enough to fly, between two cities where car ownership is optional.
I’m glad Dallas-Houston is happening but I wonder how much traffic it will get. In my midwestern mind they’re both just “texas big city”
It's not surprising that the first city pair would be a commonly traveled route with cheap flat land in between. Once that's demonstrated to work, they can start trying it for cities where the need to purchase rights for the route will be more expensive, and on terrain where long straight segments are more challenging to construct.
I wonder how much traffic it will get.
This source says average, about 24,000 people drive between the two cities any given day, and there are about 30 commercial flights per day between the cities. That sounds like a decent amount of potential demand.
I mean, getting out of Texas as fast as possible is an admirable goal for the future.
Crossing the great emptiness of it is a great starting point. Like building a river backwards, starting with a delta at multiple cities.
So, let's say such a train takes the same security as amtrack does, which is to say very little.
If the train is a viable option it would need to compete on time but there's a caveat. The flight between the two cities is 2 and a half hours. Not including getting to the airport early, going through security, and waiting for your flight. So we can reasonably say it's 4 and a half hours of down time.
The distance the train would travel is just over 700 miles. A 200 mile per hour bullet train at best possible speed does that in 4-5 hours. Assuming it's express, and there are no delays.
If the train is faster and similar in cost it's a no brainer, take the train every time. If it's more expensive, which is will be if it isn't subsidized, then it won't succeed. People will see the longer travel time and not consider security and waiting around, and just buy the cheaper ticket. Then curse ass spirit air gets them stuck on the tarmac.
Plot twist. The train will be loaded into a giant gun and literally fired like a bullet because Texas.
I would be so down for this
Its the absolute most no brainer route for high speed rail in the US. Two metropolises with a combined population in the 10s of millions that are around 300 miles apart, minimum elevation changes on a straight route, largely empty space in between.
When it's successful, you can hook it into fort worth pretty directly, and suddenly you have the core of a high speed rail network in a huge state that desperately needs it.
To everyone outside if Texas: they've been talking about this for decades.
You know who will always find sneaky ways to sabotage it? The airlines.
Damn man, that engineer had a shitty day and probably some shitty pants after that one.
Time for Elon Musk to create a new vapour-ware like the boring tunnel to stop mass transplantation that will compete with his electric car empire
Maybe he'll mass transplantate himself to Mars and take a few other sociopaths with him.
Gregg Abbott in a few weeks: "Trains?! Sounds like trans... No thanks, Biden!"
https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-politics/texas-bullet-train-abbott/
This fall (December 3, 2020), the project received approval from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Railroad Administration, and Governor Greg Abbott wrote a letter to the Japanese government, a key investor in the project, voicing his support. The potential benefits of the rail seemed manifold. It would offer travelers a ninety-minute alternative to the four-hour drive between Dallas and Houston and relieve highway congestion that’s projected to double by 2035. It would reduce greenhouse gas emissions. And it would create thousands of high-paying jobs at a time when Texas is suffering from both a pandemic-related recession and an oil-price bust.
“The Texas High-Speed Train will be the first truly high-speed train in Texas and the United States, connecting North Texas, Houston and the Brazos Valley in less than 90 minutes, using the safest, most accessible, most efficient and environmentally friendly mass transportation system in the world today,” Texas Central spokesperson Erin Ragsdale wrote in a statement.
Abbott’s letter, however, sparked a firestorm among some of his longtime supporters. Even before the governor expressed support for the rail project, Meier said, her circle of friends had become increasingly wary of him because they believed he was pandering to liberal interests by imposing restrictions on some businesses during the early days of the pandemic. “I was the only one I know of that was still basically supporting him,” Meier said. “If he continues to support the [train], he will not get my vote, and I will passionately spread the word.”
Four days after Abbott penned his letter, his staff walked back his support, telling the Dallas Morning News that the governor intended to reevaluate his position out of concern for Texans’ property rights and because he was provided with “incomplete” information about the project.
Dude has been all over the map, chasing whichever way popular opinion has been blowing.
Man they’ve been trying to do this for years, but companies like Southwest lobby against it. Even Rick Perry was on board.
I would love to see it become a reality, but I’m skeptical.
Texas Monthly, 2015:
A Tale of Two Cities, a Bullet Train, and the Farmland in Between
So people can get out of Texas faster?
Texas has the second highest domestic migration in the country (second only to Florida). New York, Illinois and California (worst) have negative migration rates.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_net_migration
A bullet train? in my Texas?! That sounds like some east coast liberal anti-car woke socialism!!
We dont want none of that hippy dippy liberty stealing foreigner mass transit in our glorious state!
/s for the oblivious
Meanwhile, China has over 30,000 high-speed rail lines.
yeah but how many of them are bullet trains?
The correct numbers are 159,000km of rail lines, with 5,500 commuter stations. 45,000km of those rail lines support HSR (bullet trains), serving 980 stations with 76 different HSR lines.
But do they have a massive fossil fuel industry to prop up?!
China has 76 High-Speed Rail lines...
Surely you mean km, and the current number is 45,000km across 990 stations.
As of December 2022, it extends to 31 of the country's 33 provincial-level administrative divisions and exceeds 40,000 km (25,000 mi) in total length, accounting for about two-thirds of the world's high-speed rail tracks in commercial service.
Must be nice to live in a modern industrialized country.
I think you mean 30 million high speed rail lines
As much as I hate to admit it, The People's Republic of Texastan kind-of makes sense as a starting point given the geography. If we can extend this to a nationwide network, it would be a very, very big deal.
The year is 2008 and Texas residents are being promised a bullet train.
The year is 2016 and Texas residents are being promised a bullet train.
The year is 2024 and Texas residents are being promised a bullet train.
If we get a bullet train in the US it should be something like a DC to San Francisco route, make a proper substitute for cross country flights.
That would be awesome, but I think the best value would be with a run up the northeast (DC-Baltimore-Philly-NYC-Boston). All massive population centers close together.
Greg Abbott is not about to let this dope idea happen. Ain't no way.
Why not do it from NYC to WDC?
There's a lot less stuff in the way in Texas
California has been trying to build a bullet train from LA to SF for decades. Would love to see them get some help with it.
Because all the politicians from Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey will demand that their cities be included on the stops, and cutting into the efficiency of the whole project.
And all the landowners in between would have to be paid off at market rates for that land, so it'd be much more expensive on that front.
I wish. That would serve the most people, and we clearly want it the most. However, the estimated costs for that were so far into the $100Bs, that you might use $T.
They’re taking a path of continuous improvement so we get slightly better every year, without ridiculously huge project costs. It’s probably not the best way of doing things, but at least we have useable service.
One of the proposed upcoming projects is to re-route Acela inland through Connecticut. While it’s great that the regionals provide service to all those coast towns, there’s just no way of straightening the curves, or raising speeds. If that happens, we’ll see the express on different tracks than regional. It’ll be interesting to see how that works and who screams
Ya cool, but are Texans going to run it? They don't exactly have a good track record when it comes to infrastructure. Maybe put it someplace, how do I put this... smarter?
I just want to see their faces, when they realise, that Bullet is NOT that bullet they thought...
Yeah, not going to happen. Most projects of this size are dead in arrival, even if faintly realistic at the start.
How about you just start with good rail infrastructure and upgrade and improve there? So many more gains for a fraction of the cost.
I'm so fucking skeptical of this happening though. I hope it does get through.
No New York, Boston, Pittsburgh, Detroit, Chicago though right? Only the Terrible people of Texas?
Houston and Dallas are blue enclaves you absolute dip. The people who live in those cities contain almost all the good people of Texas. Austin too. "The terrible people of Texas" so all the people of texas who aren't Republican are just nothing to you? This is a huge state with a ton of diversity in culture and opinion. The Texas GOVERNMENT is full of terrible people, and there's enough terrible people to vote them in, but not every Texan I'd automatically terrible. An absolutely massive portion of us hate what's happened to our beautiful state.
Yeah I don’t hate it because of where it is, though I do think that because of the state it’s in it will disproportionately favor certain people. But I’d rather the East Coast-Midwest line largely for its practicality. Once we’ve got NYC-Chicago you’re never getting rid of that shit if it’s good. And it could be more easily expanded than the texas route
Yeah well I want a god damn bullet train in Michigan so fuck Texas.
The Acela exists at least. Toronto Detroit Chicago should be a thing. Vancouver Seattle Portland should also be a thing, among other corridors.
At least the Texas one seems a cheaper easy to build, populated corridor, that if its made, should set the stage.
Give me Seattle to Atlanta!
Just three or four decades after the rest of the civilized world! Yeah!
Having lived in houston, I'm not sure what you'd do without a car there for many destinations. I guess it is at least fewer cars and emissions betweenr the two even if many will have to rent a car or taxi around the cities themselves.
Hign speed rail is really more effective at cutting down short domestic flight and the number of cars driving on interstates than it is at enabling car-free lifestyles. Not to say it doesnt help with that, but the correct tool for that job is local transit and bikable/walkable communities, which both Houston and DFW are working on, even if they are under constant threat of regression by the irresponsible actions of TXDOT aka the highway widening mafia
I don't think most people get how big houston is; its sprawl is nuts. I lived not far from where I-45 meets I-10 for many years. Getting to my rehearsal studio a bit northwest of there frequently took nearly an hour (288 and BW8 IIRC, but I might be misremembering this far on) most times of day. Getting out to see my friends in Katy (still pretty much Houston) could take 1.5 hours. Getting across houston can take a couple of hours, even without traffic on the freeway. It is huge.
I love highspeed rail (I'm on the bullet trains in Japan usually at least 1 round trip every couple months), but I think houston in particular is challenging. I've been to the DFW area, but not spent enough time there to comment on that end's public transit.
Right but that’s the point. If these cities don’t have good transit and walkability, will HSR be able to succeed?
Acela is a huge success because it connects cities with good transit and walkability. When you get to your destination, you don’t need or want a car. When you get to Houston, how do you get where you’re going?
NRA did not do their homework with this one...
