Washington, Oregon, and British Columbia are cooperating on a study of routes, stations, equipment, and costs of a high-speed rail system operating at up to 250 miles per hour. Microsoft is also funding the study, to be delivered this year, which is a follow-up to an earlier preliminary study from Washington’s Department of Transportation into conventional high-speed rail as well as maglev and hyperloops. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown made high-speed rail one of her seven long-range transportation goals in a presentation last year.
In the latest development, the transportation budget (Senate Bill 5214, House Bill 1160) submitted to the Washington Legislature for the 2019-2020 biennium includes a $3.25 million allocation to establish a “new ultra high-speed ground transportation corridor authority with participation from Washington, Oregon, and British Columbia.” “Ultra high-speed” is defined as 250 miles per hour.
The corridor authority will be responsible for such tasks as conducting outreach and preliminary environmental review, including “a robust community engagement process to refine the alignment for communities and businesses relevant to the ultra high-speed corridor” Portland and Vancouver, B.C.
The state Department of Transportation is required to provide a report to the governor and the Legislature “an assessment of current laws in Washington, Oregon, and British Columbia related to an ultra high-speed ground transportation corridor, [and to] identify any laws, regulations or agreements that need to be modified or passed in order to proceed with developing an ultra high-speed corridor, and summarize the results from the community engagement process.”
Washington’s current 105-day legislative session is scheduled to end April 28.
Come on folks, contact your elected officials. Standing on soap boxes and ranting never has accomplished much of anything except perhaps a broken leg if you fall off the thing.
I don’t know about 250 MPH but I would be happy to see any kind of high speed transit between Vancouver (BC) and Portland. If they could extend it to Eugene I would be ecstatic.
I tried not too long ago to plan out an all-rail trip from Eugene to Vancouver (BC). Had to change trains once, but also had to meet a fairly restrictive schedule. Still, having done the drive many times it was better than pounding my way down I-5. For my money a good start would be to get rid of the bustitution and have more through trains. But I think my chances of winning the Irish Sweepstakes are better than the chances of that happening, especially with the current regime.
The above remarks are general in nature and do not form the basis for an attorney/client relationship. They do not constitute legal advice. I am not your attorney. Find your own damn lawyer.
I think they would be much better off getting the $6 billion WSDOT Cascades plan from a decade ago off the ground, it would get the Seattle-Portland service up to a “Brightline” level of service, and if would even like “Brightline” according to the study make a small annual profit. A new line Seattle-Vancouver makes more sense, given the landslide problem I keep reading about on BSNF — but a new line compatible with existing equipment would make the most sense for a seamless journey Oregon-Canada. Design it for 160-mph but settle for 125-mph has a intern, unless you electrify Seattle-Portland.
If a mile of trolley tracks down a Seattle street costs a third of a billion dollars, how much will this cost?
I live in Seattle and love rail of all kinds, including the much maligned Seattle streetcar. But this plan is ridiculous and a total waste of time, effort and money. We can’t even get our Amtrak trains above 79 mph, so what’s the rush to get to get to 250? It’ll never happen. We need more FREQUENCY of Amtrak Cascades. And now the extra promised frequency on the Cascades won’t happen even when the Nisqually bypass route [hopefully] restarts this spring, Let’s live in the real world and work to incrementally increase both frequencies and speed on the existing route between Seattle and Portland. As to Vancouver, there is relatively little reason for ultra high speed as mostly summer tourists use it with relatively little business travel between Seattle and Vancouver. I just want us to spend our dollars wisely, that’s all.
Doesn’t matter to people there. They love spending other people’s $$$$.