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Amtrak, formerly the National Railroad Passenger Corp., celebrates its 40th birthday this week.
As we debate the merits of a high-speed rail system in CA lets look at a few ridership numbers. After 40 years of nationwide service Amtrak carried 28.7 million passengers last year. Source. CA Progress Report.
The HSRA for our state projected 39.3 million riders by 2035 in the 15th year of operation.
The 2010 census reports the population of the USA at 308,745,538. In the same report the population of CA was 37,253,956, or 12 1/2% of the U.S. total.
If after 40 years Amtrak carried less than 30 million passengers, how can the HSRA, with a straight face, project such outrageous projections after 15 years of operation?
It took some digging but I have found and printed CA HSRA ridership projections for the full system in the year 2030.
HSR fares at 50% of air fare levels the numbers are 93.1 million riders. If the ticket prices increase to 77% of air fares the ridership projections dropped to 74 million passengers. Source. California High-Speed Train Project prepared by Parsons Brinckerhoff, Cambridge Systematics, SYSTRA.
To recap. Amtrak took 40 years to reach an all time high of 28.7 million passengers yet the CA HSRA is trying to convince us that we will triple their ridership numbers in 15 years. The Acela Express 457 mile high-speed rail corridor from Washington DC to NYC and Boston had 3.020 million riders in FYE 2009. What are they smoking?
A good rail system will attract people. The proof is in countries out there that have a great rail system. I’d much rather take a high speed train from Osaka to Tokyo than a car or bus or plane. So would most other Japanese people.
If we had something similar here in Orange County, I’d love to take a high speed train to San Diego, Los Angeles, The Bay Area, Las Vegas, etc.
I am thoroughly thankful for Amtrak. Even though the trains aren’t as nice as what other Western nations have and it has to share the rails with freight trains, it’s still a great way to go for certain trips. Will be taking it to San Diego next month for an expo.
JT.
If you notice, while I have been on high-speed rail in the UK, Europe and China, I have not objected to their transportation systems that I/we did not have to pay for or subsidize.
Our federal government has a trillion dollar deficit in the current budget. CA has a smaller cavity to fill in the neighborhood of $26 billion dollars.
The “3 P” for our HSR was to include funding from the fed’s, the private sector, and cities served by the system before proceeding with any of the corridors. Local cities are also on the verge of bankruptcy and are cutting back on their staff.
I take you back to that old commercial “where’s the beef”–or the Jerry Maguire movie “show me the money”