The U.S. Pacific Northwest High Speed Rail Corridor At True High Speed? | Cascadia HSR

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Looking at the Federal Railroad Administration's high speed rail Pacific Northwest Corridor and what it would be like to build a true HSR line from centered around from Vancouver British Columbia to Eugene, Oregon via Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington. The route runs through the Willamette River Valley in Oregon, then along mostly Interstate 5 through the hearts of Portland and Seattle before crossing over to Canada and finishing the trip on BC99 before reaching the core of Vancouver. Where will go? How much will it cost? Is it worth building? Find out inside.
Leave a comment and also join the continuing discussion at the Discord Lucid Group: / discord
Links:
wsdot.wa.gov/construction-pla...
www.cascadiarail.org/
cascadiahighspeedrail.net/
www.broadwaycorridorpdx.com/
www.thecentersquare.com/washi...
Chapters:
0:00 Hey It's Your Old Pal Lucid Stew Again
0:04 Introduction
1:03 The Four Metros
3:34 HSR Guiding Principles
4:20 Eugene, Oregon
5:25 Eugene to Portland
6:32 Portland, Oregon
7:43 Portland to Seattle
10:26 Seattle, Washington
11:18 Seattle to Burlington
12:23 Options North @ Burlington
13:25 Burlington to Vancouver B.C.
14:29 Vancouver B.C.
14:50 Travel Times
16:15 HSR vs. Intraregional Flights
16:47 Estimated Cost
17:51 Conclusion, Up Next, and Lucid Group
18:28 See You On That Big, Beautiful Freeway!
Image Attribution:
"中文：武汉光谷空轨" (altered to STU)
by Painjet
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"Car 005 of the Portland Streetcar system, a 2001 Škoda/Inekon 10T, is leaving the Broadway Bridge (in Portland, Oregon), on the B Loop service, a counterclockwise loop. The Broadway Bridge is a bascule-type drawbridge that was completed in 1913 and is listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places. It has carried streetcars from 1913 to 1940 and again since 2012."
by Steve Morgan
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"Streetcar at Lake Union Park"
by Dllu
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"West Coast Express commuter train at Waterfront station in Downtown Vancouver. June 2019."
by Northwest
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"King County / Elliot Bay water taxi and downtown Seattle."
by Adbar
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"Seattle monorail train near the northern terminus."
by Klaus with K
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"Two Sounder trainsets at Tukwila station"
by Sounderbruce
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"A Kinkisharyo-Mitsui light rail vehicle on Central Link approaching SeaTac/Airport station. The airport's control tower is seen in the background."
by Sounderbruce
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"A double-decker Sound Transit Express bus on Route 513, seen at Mountlake Terrace Transit Center's freeway median stops."
by Sounderbruce
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"2014 New Flyer XT40 on King County Metro route 36"
by Sounderbruce
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"An EmX New Flyer DE60LFA bus waits at the intersection of Tenth Ave. and Willamette St. in Eugene, Oregon, a week before the line begins service."
by Chris Phan
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"A northbound Amtrak Cascades train arriving at Vancouver station in August 2021"
by David Wilson
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
'"Burrard Beaver SeaBus" crossing Burrard Inlet.'
by ~riley
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"Mark I train on the Expo Line in New Westminster, British Columbia."
by Northwest
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
"Low-floor trolleybus (or trolley bus) 2214 of Vancouver's TransLink is a 2007-built New Flyer E40LFR. It is shown leaving the bus loop/transit centre at the Marine Drive station of the Canada Line rapid-transit line."
by Steve Morgan
creativecommons.org/licenses/...
Topics:
Washington
Oregon
Eugene
University of Oregon
Ducks
Interstate 5
Willamette River
Willamette Valley
Lane Transit District
Salem Oregon
Portland
Portland International Airport
Portland Union Station
Keep Portland Weird
Columbia River
Interstate 205
High Speed Rail
HSR
Vancouver Washington
Vader Washington
Fort Lewis
Duwamish Valley
Seattle
King Street Station
Everett
Mt. Vernon
Burlington
Sumas
Bellingham
Canada
British Columbia
Surrey
Fraser River
Vancouver B.C.
Waterfront Station

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Опубликовано:

31 май 2024

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Комментарии : 360

@LucidStew 21 день назад

I decided to do some better calculations on the Mt. Vernon, Burlington, and Bellingham bypass. I have that knocking Seattle-Vancouver down to 54 mins conventional, 55 mins tilting. That's 18 and 17 minutes saved. Brings the whole thing down to 3h3m conventional and 2h49m tilting. I probably lowballed the cost. Additional Nukage is 25 buildings, mostly homes, with probably 100 properties in the way. The tunnel would need to be about 2 miles longer than I figured, so cost is likely closer to $8 billion than $6.5 billion.

@jerredhamann5646 19 дней назад

The main issues i see with creating hsr or metro in most coastal cities is that ur building on literally the most expensive and difficult to build on from a permitting and regulation stance. building something like hsr in these areas is often prohibitively expensive. Thats why the vegas brightline ends in rancho

@LucidStew 17 дней назад

@@jerredhamann5646 A lot of that is solved by being able to use freight rights of way for an electrified high speed train. It would be slower, but you'd have a core route. Ideally your trunk would then bypass the core at speed.

@qjtvaddict 14 дней назад

A maglev is even faster and can handle the turns better

@qjtvaddict 14 дней назад

@@LucidStewjust increase frequencies of connecting trains brightline west would be better off going to San Diego via I-15 and offer connections to the inland empire line

@noeonoohno4219 21 день назад

This is content for people having a mental health breakdown to disassociate to. Thank you.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

I think you just described the process of me making one of these...

@austintimyan6760 21 день назад

I have spent the last 9 months watching this type of content. I am offended... by your accuracy.

@dahliam5397 21 день назад

As someone who lives in Eugene, I love that people consider it a large enough population for HSR. I think realistically though if the project were to be underway, the connection to Eugene is probably the first the thing to be dropped for budgetary reasons even if Portland to Eugene would be a game changer for both my personal travels and my job.

@user-cc7vx7sw4z 21 день назад

That was my first thought, but with a large university there, it could punch above its weight.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

The Oregon legislature could prove tricky for the project if the Eugene extension is NOT included. Politically, this project would run through and potentially serve the entirety of the western portions of populated Washington state. Meanwhile, if it terminated in Portland, the rest of Oregon would get jack squat.

@TheCriminalViolin 21 день назад

Something people fail to realize is that one of the most well ridden and profitable portions of the Amtrak Cascades is the segment between Portland and Eugene. It genuinely sees higher overall consistent ridership and demand than the rest of the line. It was also the first segment to regain that same ridership and some new as well after it was reinstated post pandemic, as well as the most vocal riders of it for the months Amtrak put off opening it back up to service again. So in all honesty, it has a much stronger influence on this HSR project than people realize, and it definitely packs a punch WAAAAY above it's weight class (size).

@TheCriminalViolin 21 день назад

@@LucidStew I know many of us Oregonians would absolutely make a very public and loud stink about it too until they reintegrate that segment. It has a ridership well above what most would ever expect, too. So it already punches above it's size. Also, the sheer amount of folks moving from the Portland metro down into the Eugene metro lately is growing and it's noticeable. It's difficult for us not to meet people who themselves have had neighbors, coworkers or friends move down there from up here recently. They're growing a lot lately, and that definitely is going to grow the demand as well.

@jordanledoux197 21 день назад

Portland could also throw weight to get Eugene the connection. It's entirely possible that the city of Portland itself would protest the removal of Eugene. Portland killed the Columbia River Crossing because they refused to fund it unless Vancouver committed to a MAX line extension into Vancouver. Vantucky wanted 13 car lanes and no public transit, and Portland told them to get fucked.

@GeologyDude 21 день назад

Too many tunnels of course. Also your choice in southern Washington is an area prone to landslides-which is why the freeway was located near the river. Obviously a challenging route

@Jazz-Man1910 21 день назад

Hehe. I like trains.

@dante6563 19 дней назад

Me too!

@cobaltblue42 4 дня назад

Awesome route @LucidStew! As someone who's lived in the PNW my entire life, works for WSDOT, and is an avid supporter of high-speed rail in the region, I'd make the following suggestions respectfully: 1. Consider increasing your costs by about 20%, if not 25%. We're overdue for the Cascadia Megathrust Earthquake, an expected 9.0 mag from South Oregon to British Columbia that has a 20% chance of occurring in just the next 50 years! We'd want to make sure such a massive infrastructure investment will still function, or at least be easily repairable, after such an event or we're just throwing money away. It will require high-cost seismic standards, which includes dealing with our many river valleys that are filled with highly liquifiable soils/silts, meaning even your ground level sections may need to have reinforced foundations or subbase, and all bridge structures will need to have foundations extending into bedrock, which in some areas is well over 200 feet or more below ground. Can't tell you how many new WSDOT bridges have had bored foundations extending 300 feet or more! 2. The region's population is spread out in many moderate sized cities/metros, so having only major stops in the biggest metros could severely hamstring ridership potential. A two-tier service level, with local and express service, has been shown by the most recent studies as having the largest ridership potential and cost benefit. Potential local stops in Albany/Corvallis, OR; Salem, OR; Longview, WA; Centralia/Chehalis, WA; Olympia, WA; Tacoma, WA; Everett, WA; Bellingham; WA, and possibly Abbotsford, BC (depending on route chosen), could greatly boost the populations served and make securing political buy-in a lot easier (not every city above needs a stop at first, but infill stations later on could be very useful too). This also mirrors the very successful Japanese High Speed rail system, which has local and express services and works to significant effect (not to mention frequency of service most countries can only dream of providing). Regional Commuter Rail is likely not going to ever efficiently connect these cities as BNSF simply won't allow Amtrak to run more trains or have schedule priority, and if we invest in HSR, money for local commuter trains will likely be harder to come by as the focus for decades will be on building and completing the HSR network first. 3. Don't forget about Native American tribal reservations!!! This is a big deal for the PNW. Your selected route through the Nisqually River Valley east of Olympia would be dead on arrival as the Nisqually Tribe would absolutely be sure to stop it from ever happening, it's a sacred valley to them. You'd want a route that either minimizes the crossing distance with a high viaduct, or just tunnels beneath.... both very expensive. Avoiding tribal lands as much as possible is strongly recommended because the tribes are federally protected and very happy to exercise in court the sovereign treaty rights they have historically been denied for so long. 4. You're 100% right on the money regarding tunneling under the major Portland/Seattle metros. There're few feasible options that can avoid this without even more expensive costs. These areas are just too densely built and topographically varied to allow for better alignments. Outside the metros though, especially in rural areas, don't be afraid to straighten curves or make bypasses of challenging terrain. Timberland, and farmland to an extent, is very very cheap compared to urban sprawl, so maximizing speed and efficiency where you can should be done even if it costs a bit more. 5. It's pronounced Sheh-hailis, not T'chalis * flashbacks to Hermione Granger in Harry Potter * ; ) Honestly, I think you did a great job. But being very familiar with the area and construction costs here, I do think your cost estimate is low for the challenging geology and terrain we have to deal with. Hope the above makes sense and I look forward to more from your awesome channel. : )

@LucidStew 4 дня назад

Definitely appreciate the input. 300ft to bedrock was an eye-opener for sure. With my estimates being influenced by projects occurring in California, I should naturally have some protection for seismicity built into the cost. Some of that is also going to factor into regional variance discussed in the cost algo part. I do have Washington as one of the more expensive states. Sensitivity to tribal lands was one reason I steered clear of the Somas route. The maps I checked indicate the route I chose near the Nisqually reservation and community steers well clear of their borders, however. Unless they have trust lands I'm unaware of, I don't think they can reasonably obstruct such a route. I am aware that environmental impact reports must consider far more than routing, but at the same time I'm not attempting to actually build the thing, so I can and will take some liberties.

@cobaltblue42 4 дня назад

@@LucidStew Thanks so much for the quick response!!! : ) And you're welcome! Regarding the 300-foot-deep foundations, I will say that it's not always that bad, 100 to 200 is more common. Some river valleys are worse than others, the Chehalis, Duwamish, Snohomish, and Fraser get extremely silty the closer you are to the Puget Sound / Coast, so a generally rule of thumb is to expect higher foundation costs in river valleys that are closer to large bodies of water. (Though parts of the Willamette can get dicey too as a lot of those soils were backwater silt deposits from the Brett's Floods and so can be very fine in nature.) Glad you already have decent seismicity factored into your costs!!! If that's the case then perhaps only 10% increase, if any... just because there are deep foundations that will be needed for some areas. As to the Nisqually, you are correct that the reservation itself does not extend into the alignment you chose, however there are some off-reservation lands owned directly by the tribe there, as well as a dozen or so tribal families scattered throughout the valley outside the reservation. The tribe would heavily support those families interests and absolutely use any EIS process to minimize or stop any route they feel destroys too much of the valley or is too impactful to the Nisqually River itself. One option you could consider is a seldom used and partially abandoned BNSF line extending from Tenino to Yelm, Roy and then north to Lakewood thru JBLM. Very flat, rather straight... and barely used at all. Have to deal with BNSF's typical BS, but might be worthwhile to bypass the tribe and tribal adjacent lands. (see: geo.wa.gov/datasets/d840cbadf3d04ccea6ee1063b01d802f ) Regardless, as a thorough preliminary route I think you did a great job and it's very practical all things considered. Ultimately we just need to move from the "study hell" phase to the "funding hell" phase and get things moving forward towards design and construction. Can't waste too much more time as we have a lot to do to catch up to California and it's very on-track and on-budget HSR corridor. ; )

@LucidStew 4 дня назад

@@cobaltblue42 I'm assuming WSDOT is going come up with something blended, like CAHSR. Trying to keep it pure HSR looks like such a massive challenge. I also get the sense from WSDOT docs I've read that the agency is VERY keen to avoid CAHSR's mistakes, perhaps to a fault, such that they may chicken out when it comes time to pull the trigger. Also, on the subject of the next study, if the various bodies involved were THAT enthusiastic about it, they'd surely be able to come up with the funding for it. It all just strikes me as noncommittal and it's tough to build a $80 billion megaproject without being committed. Ask CAHSR! 😄

@cobaltblue42 4 дня назад

@@LucidStew you're close to the money there. There are those in the agency and region that want a true HSR project for the entire route, like what's seen in Japan, but everyone knows the cost of that for our region would be insane. A blended approach like you suggest is most likely the route that will be taken. We absolutely do not want a repeat of CAHSR lol, and so yes, everyone is very noncommittal, "well it could be this, or that, and maybe cost this much". Ultimately, when it comes to WSDOT, we can't actually make the final call, or really pursue the projects we'd like to. Our state legislature fully controls our projects and budget. The legislature, with the governor, directs us to "study" things and "work towards certain goals" but ultimately, they are the ones that have to decide how they want to move forward. I, and I'm sure many of my colleagues, would love to just start the detailed planning and design process already, but until the politicians make the final decisions, we can only hand them the studies they ask us to make. And I'm really afraid, in a major election year, including for governor, that there will be absolutely no progress made on this issue until after the elections, assuming the new legislature and governor are friendly to the idea. What I'd absolutely love to see happen, but doubt it will, is to directly invite the JRTT from Japan to help design and construct the system for us. Would be a great opportunity for international cooperation and would secure an agency at the forefront of HSR transit to assist us with making it happen. Their climate and geology is very similar, and while they do use a different system of measurement, that's just unit conversions, pretty simple compared to other engineering tasks lol. Just tired of seeing states/agencies struggle to build an industry from the ground up that doesn't really exist in the US. Makes it really easy for contractors and consultants to take advantage of projects like CAHSR when it's never been done before, making it hard to have actual accountability. Probably just a dream on my end though and I'm sure doing this would add its own set of problems.

@eejit12 21 день назад

Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver also all have MLS soccer teams that get good attendance. I just like trains and soccer.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

soccer train!

@TheCriminalViolin 21 день назад

Everyone forgets about the Winterhawks here in Portland, too. Forgetting about the WSL teams however, I can't blame anyone for lol. Or the WNBA teams.

@Liggie55821 15 дней назад

With the 2026 World Cup coming to both Vancouver and Seattle, an operational HSR line here would've been sweet.

@GustavSvard 21 день назад

Random thought right at the start: Eugene being the smallest of the four cities sitting at the end of the corridor is actually a good thing for getting HSR built. Why? Because it means that connecting the 3 bigger cities looks better numbers-wise than if it had been big-big-small-big.

@user-uy7vh8sm6s 21 день назад

You've really knocked this one out of the park my friend! I'm literally about to board Amtrak cascades from Seattle to Vancouver and will be thinking about this the entire time. I would love to also see this route featured in your taking back the streets series, as I think I-5 has plenty of space in the Seattle area, especially if you take the express lanes... what we'd lose in speed might be worth it since we'd effectively be eliminating the 19 or so miles of tunnels this alignment would require. But again, fantastic, I'm forwarding this to everyone I know in the area who cares about this stuff to hopefully get some local traction.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

I've had requests for I-5 border to border, so that's likely in the cards sometime in the future.

@bk2544 21 день назад

As a Vancouverite, Pacific Central station is much better. It’s actually better connected for most people and exising surface station with surface tracks to use. Waterfront would be horrendously expensive for negligible gain. Less tunnelling to get to Pacific too. Stations at Bellingham and Seatac would be needed.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

Cool, thanks for the local perspective. The more I looked at Vancouver, the more I realized its transportation situation is somewhat I foreign to me. No freeways near the city core. I'm used to them going THROUGH. Fascinating.

@counterfit5 21 день назад

Plus less of the 2 mile radius circle, and basically none of the ½ mile radius one, is water

@grahamballantyne1129 15 дней назад

Yeah, tunnelling under the entire length of Vancouver to get to Waterfront makes zero sense. Pacific Central is right on the edge of downtown, and right next to a SkyTrain station. The problem with it is that there's no good high-speed route from the border to it; the existing Amtrak Cascades route on freight ROW takes FOREVER to get to the border. An option I've seen in other studies is terminating the line somewhere south of the Fraser River, like Surrey. Surrey is poised to surpass Vancouver's population, has an existing SkyTrain connection to the rest of the region including downtown Vancouver, and has more SkyTrain expansion in the works.

@LucidStew 14 дней назад

@@grahamballantyne1129 Another option would be the airport.

@grahamballantyne1129 14 дней назад

@@LucidStew possibly. There's some soil condition issues there; that island is going to liquify and sink into the ocean when the big one hits Vancouver.

@recurrenTopology 20 дней назад

If a route can't be found that allows for sustained high speeds between what is by far the most important city pair, Seattle and Portland, the project is a none starter IMHO. If that is the case, it'd be better just to add improvements to the existing BNSF route that Amtrak uses, aiming for more modest speeds of 90-110 mph, as has been proposed.

@JKVisFX 21 день назад

This is a project I am really looking forward to. Any major, disruptive transit project is worth it in the long run. It would save so much time over driving (which is what the vast majority of us do here in the Great Pacific Northwest.

@TheCriminalViolin 21 день назад

Always worth it. But that's exactly it - _in the long haul._ People want results yesterday, not today, not tomorrow, three weeks out or god forbid a couple months down the road. And when they don't get it, they quickly get upset and want to say "See! WE TOLD YOU THIS WOULDN'T WORK AND WASN'T WORTH IT!" while trying to shut the projects down completely. No one has patience anymore. And considering it averages about 3 1/2 hours to go from around Sunset hwy around Beaverton/Aloha to SeaTac with a relatively uncongested freeway, that proves how needed and beneficial this HSR system would be.

@KoruGo 19 дней назад

Not just any major transit project, high speed rail specifically has the highest level of benefit to costs when controlling for all negative/positive externalities (the EU did a study on this years ago). It is literally the most efficient use of transit money.

@brycestewart7228 21 день назад

This was epic. You did the exact route I hoped you would. I would love to see a national high-speed, intercity, long distance train network

@bryanCJC2105 21 день назад

I would think that stations in Salem (OP capital), Tacoma, Olympia (WA capital), Everett, and Bellingham may be needed to garner enough support, although express runs can be operated such as are planned with CAHSR. British Columbia may also want a station serving the Surrey/Richmond market as well. I do think that the extra tunnel south of Bellingham to eliminate the 90 mph section would be worth it for the 20 min time savings. With airline fees for anything and everything only increasing while the experience is decreasing, and if Boeing planes keep dropping things out of the sky, demand for HSR should be quite high.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

There's a problem with systems that try to please everyone: they'll either end up too slow or too expensive. Regional rail can handle all the smaller regional stops. If it were up to me, the thing would stop at Portland from the north.

@bryanCJC2105 21 день назад

@@LucidStew Politics forces compromises. I imagine it would be hard for WA and OR residents to agree to pay for it if the only stops were in Seattle and Portland. That's why CAHSR will stop in Burbank, Palmdale, Hanford, Merced, Gilroy, and Millbrae. However, they will add substantial ridership. The San Joaquins Amtrak line is the nation's 5th busiest outside of the the NE corridor and serves more riders than the Cascades Amtrak line with 847k vs 669k in 2023. However, CAHSR will offer a number of express runs throughout the day for the LA to SF run. So, I believe it's doable without degrading service.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

@@bryanCJC2105 If you look at the CAHSR ridership estimates for the completed system, the percentage the Central Valley contributes is quite small outside of Sacramento, which is predicted to have a strong connection with Los Angeles. The intermediate stations are mainly politics. The big metros provide the ridership. If you have the capacity to provide both intercity and express on a system, then that of course is less of a concern. However, I would argue the funding for that should be local. I'm looking at it more in terms of what you get for the cost and 107 miles of HSR is a big regional expense to connect Salem and Eugene at ~800k combined. 3 times that population and now you're on par with the rest of the system.

@TheCriminalViolin 21 день назад

The ideal function here in my mind is run the HSR as a true HSR, meaning, it only serves the main cities, so these four. But with it, you implement a second phase, which is regional rail (or IC/ICE if that better matches your own definitions of the types) which then focuses on proper intercity services. It would then be those trains that would serve the other cities/populations centers between the major cities, connecting the entire route up at a more local level. Think Vancouver > Surrey > Bellingham > Everett > Seattle > SeaTac (people always forget that Seatac is a actual city itself, not just the airport) > Tacoma > Olympia > Kelso/Longview > Vancouver > Portland > Tualatin > Salem/Keizer > Eugene. Something like that would strike a balance between a solid distance between each stop achieving the localized access, while also ensuring good speed and time as well. It's a healthy balance. If one wanted it to be even more local, then sure you could add more stops, however that would massively slow the route down, and may make it comparable or slower than driving, which obviously then makes it non-viable as a option. There's such a thing as too many stops. And that as another addition would mean you absolutely would need to clear out another ROW for it to run along so that it doesn't slow down the HSR and ICE lines. Realistically from a logistics perspective, it may even be necessary to add additional track segments that branch off the main HSR route for the ICE route, too (it technically has to anyway in order to access Kelso/Longview with a station there, as well as Olympia, Tacotown & Everett.

@bryanCJC2105 21 день назад

@@LucidStew Firstly, I appreciate your videos and the information in them. They are excellent. I respect your work a great deal. According to CAHSR 2020 Business Plan Ridership and Forecasting Report Table 5.3, 2040 ridership estimates for the SJV (all stations from Stockton to Bakersfield and excluding Sacramento) are as follows: San Joaquin Valley to Bay Area 5.2 million SJV to Los Angeles 5 million Intra-SJV 1.9 million Other to SJV 700k (not sure what that is) SJV to San Diego 400k SJV to Sacramento 300k Total SJV trips = 13.5 million/ annually Planned total HSR trips = 38.6 million San Joaquin Valley trips % to total = 34% That's pretty significant. Total Sacramento ridership (a single city market) to all other markets is projected to be 2.4 million or 6% of total ridership. LA to Bay Area ridership is forecasted to be 7.2 million or 19% of total riders Top 3 trip generators are projected to be: #1 Bay Area - Southern CA at 7.2 million #2 Bay Area - San Joaquin Valley at 5.2 million #3 intra SoCal trips 5.1 million Sacramento County has a population of 1.5 million and will generate 2.4 million trips. Using that ratio, Eugene/Salem at 800k people could generate well over a million rides/year. That could be pretty significant being that the entire Vancouver to Eugene corridor contains only about 9 million people or about 1/4 the size of the CAHSR market.

@GustavSvard 21 день назад

I've always been a big fan of the Portland STU system. Sure, it *is* a gadgetbahn, but the way it glides under the big span of the Fremont bridge is just so glorious.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

Some might say it's redundant because it replicates 90% of the route of both MAX and the streetcar, but all I can say to that is: "I like STU".

@wolfy_dragon 21 день назад

@@LucidStew what is stu

@TheCriminalViolin 21 день назад

Funny enough, I'm a lifelong born and raised westsider who has been to the heart of Portland many times in my life, AND a mass transit whore (have been since I was in diapers, no joke), and I have NO clue what the hell the STU even is. Never heard of it. Surprised it got mentioned, but the Aerial Tram didn't (despite how genuinely useless of a advertisement project it was for both OHSU and TriMet). What the hell even is it?

@atavanH 21 день назад

@@wolfy_dragonalso confused and I live in Portland. I don’t know anything that goes under the Fremont bridge except more cars lol.

@Skip6235 21 день назад

I mean, given that driving (especially with the border crossing) between Vancouver and Seattle is currently a 4-hour affair (could be worse with traffic), cutting down on tunneling and just making slow-speed passenger-only tracks in existing ROW would probably still be worth it even if it cuts down on time. Especially since a “one-hour” airport penalty is not nearly enough. Airports are away from the CBDs of the cities, and getting there only an hour before your flight is really living life on the edge.

@counterfit5 21 день назад

There's a lot of time savings to be had by doing immigration checks before boarding. It's a little harder if you've got multiple stops on either side of the border, but that can be solved by joining two trains and splitting before the border proper

@seanschannel3264 13 дней назад

@@counterfit5 You can just design better station arrival procedures. Require a passport number for a cross border ticket, and have the trains arrive at specific platforms in BC. These platforms can be connected to immigration/security facilities just like airports. The reverse can also be true - it can be a preclearance facility for Canada - US travel, like they have in Vancouver's airport.

@donalddavis303 21 день назад

Hell yeah. You love to see it. Considering the iv bridge would be 7.5 billion or just goes to show how much rail is cost effective. Driving to Seattle takes 3 hours if you don't hit traffic.

@alexverdigris9939 19 дней назад

This should have been built 20 years ago, but it's still not too late to consider it today. I'm familiar with the Washington - Portland topology thanks to a flight simulater I used to play a long time ago, and it was based around there (Flight Unlimited 3). The region is my favourite part of the US, and British Columbia is stunning too. To me, Cascadia HSR would be the most exciting railway project in America. Thanks for doing this, really enjoyed it.

@TheCriminalViolin 21 день назад

"Sheh-haah-lis" hahaha. It's hilarious the timing of watching this, and I just got done commenting on a video about I-84, and how people from elsewhere tend to almost overthink and thus fixate on very deliberate and clear syllable enunciation in our places names here in the Northwest, which then leads to even more hilarious and botched enunciation than if they had just gone lazy with it. It is said "Sh-hay-lis". So all the other similarly spelled names here are said in the same way. Think Chehalem. Sh-hay-lum or "Sh-hay-lim". Che and Chi are also enunciated the same way. So it's "Shi-nook" and not "Chy-nook". Think of how someone would say it somewhat lazily and lightly slurred, slow down the speech a bit, and wha-bam! You got how we speak here. It to me is more than worth it, as I am sure you're well aware of by now given some of my past comments haha. This is one of the intensely rare instances where the "TAKE MY MONEY" meme is applicable for me. And we all know it always will encounter steep cost-overruns, but even then, as long as we at least get something like this with good frequencies? I'm all about it. My bias however will ALWAYS be grade separation wherever possible, because I will forever live in my utopian imagination of what the best, most sound route would be. And that would be VERY VERY VERY spendy, because... well max quality everything, and plenty of via-ducting, tunneling and elevated stations. And of course... Shinkansens only. :)

@babybloc 15 дней назад

I was gonna comment on how he couldn’t pronounce Chehalis, while saying they’d have to blow it up

@alhollywood6486 21 день назад

This just reminds me of the Super Train concept in the movie Singles.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

Great coffee seems entirely possible.

@petern7292 15 дней назад

All Hail the Seattle Super Train

@mamarussellthepie3995 11 дней назад

How interesting! I recently did a similar 30-minute presentation at my local train club on this system and others only a few months ago! Epic video! 😊

@PaperAirplaneFactory 21 день назад

Love watching these with my kids at bedtime

@LucidStew 21 день назад

Haha, that's awesome! Tell the kids that Lucid Stew said to remember to brush their teeth before bedtime! 😁

@legojayman 14 дней назад

I love this video! I want Cascadia HSR in my lifetime sooo badly

@jazzylazzy_ 21 день назад

I-5 north of downtown seattle you can use express bus/carpool lanes. WSDOT didn't have a problem letting ST use extra i-90 lanes for light rail. That would probably explain why the cost estimate is slightly above high end

@LucidStew 21 день назад

Perhaps, but certain assumptions make a route impossible as opposed to merely improbable, and I tend to err to the side of improbable when dealing with sensitive areas.

@flippypie1120 21 день назад

Very thankful you didn’t have to drop an explosion animation on my house ❤️💥

@hdevine825 18 дней назад

I just want to shout out your excellent and thorough Creative Commons attribution!

@WhatsOnTheOtherEnd 21 день назад

When I was living in Vancouver there was always an interest in high speed rail to Seattle. It would greatly help with housing affordability too. Skytrain has some fairly good reach but it’s not as efficient as proper inter urban rail. While this wouldn’t be it, it would be neat to see a NEC style quad track arrangement allowing high speed long distance and inter urban services on the line. Living in abbotsford wouldn’t be such a drag if getting to either downtown core only took 30-45 mins or so.

@cmdrls212 21 день назад

Seattle is as unaffordable was Vancouver 😂

@cduemo 19 дней назад

As a Metro Vancouver resident I think the diversion east to Sumas has a lot going for it. The corridor could support higher speed commuter or regional rail. The route would easily support a stop at Abbotsford Airport, a underused but large airport with great potential. Also this route would much more likely attract funding from the Canadian and British Columbian governments.

@grahamballantyne1129 15 дней назад

Terminating somewhere like Langley or Surrey makes a lot of sense when you take into account the SkyTrain expansion. Getting HSR into Vancouver-proper at actual high speed is a pipe dream.

@Skip6235 21 день назад

I need it. I NEED IT!!!!

@topsnek4603 21 день назад

I understand why a lot of people consider this to be one of the less viable high speed rail corridors. You need to skip over a lot of potential stops like Salem, Tacoma, and Bellingham to be able to maintain high average speeds without overinflating cost, and it still comes out pretty expensive. I think a Milwaukee-Chicago-Lafayette-Indianapolis corridor would be much better value for the money.

@chestnu1 21 день назад

I can’t wait for (what I assume is) the eventual Eugene to Sacramento connection of CHSR and Cascadia HSR.

@dwc1964 21 день назад

the terrain between Eugene and Redding is challenging, to say the least

@TheCriminalViolin 21 день назад

@@dwc1964 But it can be done just fine and reasonably if engineers and developers here just learned from the now really old systems in Japan that is the Shinkansen. A connection to the very underappreciated Redding would definitely be rad. Wouldn't mind as a Oregonian going there via HSR for a visit or two to snoop around.

@bbbeezy 16 дней назад

First off, a huge thank you for putting this together. I think this is like the best case scenario in terms of route and speed we could ever hope for as it relates to the Cascadia route. However, having said that, I don't think this will ever happen--at least in this best case scenario. It would probably make more sense to focus HSR between Portland-Seattle-Vancouver and push for more reliable/frequent but slower service between the smaller cities like Eugene, Salem, Vancouver, Olympia/Tacoma, etc. I don't think you could leave those smaller cities out of the route and still have hope for funding unless the route was purposely shortened between the three major cities and there were residual benefits to those cities along the corridor of new tracks. South of Portland would need something, though, since new tracks wouldn't benefit them in the abridged version of Cascadia HSR.

@LucidStew 15 дней назад

There is some difficult in that politically as there have been bills in the state Senate previously that would mandate a Eugene connection. Honestly, I was very down on Eugene going into production, and I still think it should be left off, but its potentially a very fast connection and growth in the Salem and Eugene areas could end up justifying it. I doubt it, but maybe.

@Gnefitisis 19 дней назад

Best damn train channel strikes again!! 6 billion is totally worth it for 20 min

@GustavSvard 21 день назад

Passing though Salem, OR without stopping? I'm sure the state capital would like a station, and actually get one. Far from every train would stop there though?

@LucidStew 21 день назад

This is just the express. Nothing like this is going through downtown Salem. There isn't room. That's what regional rail is for.

@devanwilliams1127 19 дней назад

@@LucidStewI disagree. Most HSR services in Europe still have stops at small cities in between. This line only having 4 stops would be a non stater, especially if Eugene gets a stop which is Smaller than both Vancouver, WA and Tacoma. Most major metros will have 2-3 stops with in them. From previous studies I’ve seen Eugene, Salem, Portland, VancouverWA, Olympia, Tacoma, Seattle, Everett, Bellingham, and Vancouver would be non-negotiable stops given their size and regional importance. That will be 10 stops on 400+ mile route which seems about right. You probably will have 3 stops in Seattle, 2 in Portland and 2 in Metro Vancouver.

@user-dp2mu6xr5l 5 дней назад

All of those politicians who would use the route would be using your tax dollars to pay for the trip. Bypass it and keep the train moving fast or just go from Vancouver to Vancouver with Bellevue in between and leave Portland out.

@ramanshah7627 20 дней назад

Lovely and thought-provoking episode as always, thanks! That was a lot of tunnel!

@AtticusThings 21 день назад

I'm curious how the Portland Downtown Tunnel Trimet is currently studying as a way to by-pass street running in the city core would affect this plan, your aligns with the general location of TriMet's tunnel plan.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

We're actually going to share.

@AtticusThings 21 день назад

@@LucidStew hell yea multi use tunnels

@jmegp 21 день назад

On the East Side Access in NYC the MTA had up to 36 workers on 1 boring machine and for the 2nd ave. subway. In Europe they do the same job using only 12 workers. My point is your estimate of $79B will balloon like in California... way over $100B with all that tunneling needed.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

The tunnel boring expense isn't exact, but its pretty realistic. I'm not using a European paradigm for tunnel costs. Those are based on real-world expenses in the U.S.

@user-dp2mu6xr5l 20 дней назад

Happy to see commuter rail stops in Olympia, Kelso and Tacoma stripped from mach maps. Happier to see both A) a solution (tunnel) to crossing the Columbia River as ongoing billion dollar preliminary plans to replace the bridge there don’t include a regional rail option, and B) a stop at PDX as that eliminates the need for further air traffic to SeaTac and even YVR flights as PDX would service those areas with HSR. I only wish LS would have shown a slightly different route that would have eliminated at least the downtown Seattle tunnel (for a shorter one perhaps) going up I405 with a station in Bellevue as opposed to Seattle. This route seems to be preferred 2/1 in the recent studies and I was curious to see the cost and time estimates from Lucid Stew on this bold choice. Surprised and glad to see that 167 was his choice to enter King County - great idea, and well done overall. With Cascadia firmly in the CID, they may get funding in the next round of federal allotments this year for a final study examining said route selection before the final EIS can be complete. Exciting times! Really great work. Thank you

@jrmikulec 12 дней назад

Sub earned on first video of yours I’ve seen. Awesome attention to detail.

@LucidStew 11 дней назад

Thank you!

@scottg.g.haller3291 21 день назад

@08:45 -- I believe that it's "Che-HAIL-us" not "Che-HALL-us". My great grandfather emigrated there from Switzerland at the turn of the previous century and I visited to discover evidence of his owning land there. I excited about all of the possible high speed rail corridors! I've ridden the Amtrak Coast Starlight route (taking my bike from Los Angeles and back to pedal on the Washington rail trails) and enjoyed it very much.

@mzs112000 15 дней назад

Instead of tunneling under Seattle for a downtown station, it might be possible to put your HSR station in Bellevue instead without tunneling, going fully above ground with land acquisition instead. While transit connections would not be as good as they are in Seattle proper, there will be a Link light rail and bus connection to downtown Seattle as of 2025. So it could still work.

@user-dp2mu6xr5l 5 дней назад

Bellevue makes more sense. People can ride the world’s only floating bridge light rail into Seattle from the better off (more newer hotels, and bustling second core of business in Puget Sound that could get great support from HSR) from Bellevue. Regional stops like Tacoma already served from Seattle and Amtrak.

@kazuhiramiller8024 21 день назад

Was waiting for this video as a metro vancouver resident, the tracks would pass right in front of me

@29brendus 21 день назад

As usual, excellent analysis.

@noeonoohno4219 21 день назад

Why not just make the entire route a tunnel at this point

@SeattlePioneer 18 дней назад

Heh, heh! JOLLY good idea! Just add in the additional cost. The SKY is the LIMIT!

@Whatneeds2bsaid 21 день назад

Yeah, was waiting on the north Seattle clusterf***! My idea involves a four-track cut and cover tunnel under Rt 99/Aurora Ave. Two for HSR and two for subway/RER/S-Bahn that way there’s local benefits to compensate for the disruption. Honestly didn’t try even try to get through Portland, but probably would have a high speed bypass using I-205 and slow speed to serve the downtown. You’d still need to tunnel (or figure something out) for the section when Max uses the median. The problem though is that comparatively few people are going to want to completely bypass Portland, so we’re probably stuck with a slow crawl through Portland.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

SR99 might be a little cheaper, but even there you have sections you need to bore due to grade separation or to maintain speed. It'd probably be faster though because you wouldn't have the slow part on the freeway. I had considered an I-205 Portland bypass. Some of the constraints on freight or I-5 could probably be handled if one doesn't care much about speed through Portland on a branch loop. The biggest reason really for going underground through Portland is that it would be SO slow otherwise and you're still going to need at least one tunnel...

@jordanledoux197 21 день назад

@@LucidStew I wish you all the luck in the world trying to build HSR through Portland without a stop there. It's probably the city in the US that would react the most drastically to that idea. You can get away with a lot less tunnel in Portland. You tunnel from Union station south across the river to around US-26, then follow the river along 99E and use a 0.25 tunnel to cross into the existing freight rail corridor to the east of 99E. Follow that south to OR-224, which then lets you follow I-205 back to I-5 near Wilsonville. Going north from Union Station you tunnel to around Columbia Boulevard, and then there is enough space on the freight right of way to add HSR with a lot fewer curves up through Vancouver towards Longview. The I-205 to OR-224 turn would be pretty gnarly, and you might want to tunnel that too in order to keep the speed higher, but it's probably a much cheaper option that would add less than 5 minutes to the total travel time, and is probably a big factor in why the official estimates are so much lower, but I absolutely guarantee you that no one in any kind of decision making position would even consider tunneling that much through Portland. EDIT: BTW, Chehalis is pronounce "Shuh-hay-liss"

@TheWolfHowling 18 дней назад

While highly unlikely, given the current uncertainty of CAHSR & no firm commitment from the State DOTs on Cascadia HSR, I would love to see the State Agencies collaborate on linking up the systems, allowing electric trains to travel up and down the West Coast. I could see CAHSR initially extending from Sacramento up to Redding, Cascadia continuing down to Medford and the tracks eventually meeting halfway somewhere around the vicinity of the Mt Shanta area

@aidangoddard9607 21 день назад

Your time estimate doesn't factor in the additional travel from the airport to the city center, making HSR significantly faster than flying. I added the travel time from each airport to city center, under *perfect* traffic conditions, to update your comparison. Portland-Vancouver: Flying 2h55m HSR 2h22m Seattle-Vancouver: Flying 2h38m HSR 54m Portland-Seattle: Flying 2h24m HSR 1h28m Eugene-Seattle: Flying 2h42m HSR 2h9m City center-airport times are: Vancouver 22min, Eugene 16min, Seattle 16min, Portland 18min I included the tunnel bypass option because it would be awesome for the train to literally be faster than flying from the moment of takeoff and landing (without airport time).

@LucidStew 20 дней назад

That's correct because not everyone lives in the city center so I'm not biasing toward that. Conversely, if someone lived right by the airport, flying times would improve. If you're talking about limited stations, they're going to serve the whole area, much like an airport does. If you're talking about regional stops on the trunk, those wouldn't be served by an express.

@PaperAirplaneFactory 21 день назад

You gotta make a tutorial on your 3d unreal process. So cool

@Nouvellecosse 15 дней назад

Very interesting. Only thing I'd say is that it's ok for HSR to go through cities at conventional speeds. Sure it might not be as fast but lots of HSR services around the world make it work since all that tunneling is a bit nuts. You could probably save the average rider an equal or greater amount of travel time by investing the tunneling budget into local transit upgrades which would buy say, a downtown transit tunnel for Portal MAX or a big chunk of a new line for Vancouver Skytrain. Plus thos investments would be useful for stuff other than intercity trips.

@LucidStew 15 дней назад

A blended system of some sort seems far more likely to me, but the exercise here was trying to get it to average 150mph. Even with the long tunnels through the metros its a fail in that regard. Maybe with 30 more miles of tunnel. The conclusion I came to while making it is that this approach doesn't seem particularly realistic, my route is slow compared to some others that have been proposed.

@Nouvellecosse 15 дней назад

@@LucidStew No worries! I'm just one of those people who doesn't properly listen to and/or read the methodology requiring others to take time and explain things. The internet is a fun place 😊

@jasonhowell7763 11 дней назад

For the Seattle segment, I often think about converting the express lanes on I-5 to be a rail corridor. That or just taking over highway 99, which is very straight (compared to I-5) all the way up to Everett. Even south towards Tacoma it would be a pretty nice route, and it passes right by SeaTac airport. I don't see that ever happening though.

@LucidStew 6 дней назад

Seattle is a difficult segment and I think if its going to happen, there are some difficult, hard to sell, decisions to make. I like this region because its such a challenge. I've already started on working on another video there, and I think I'll have a third approach as well eventually.

@brucehain 3 дня назад

I've always found that Seattle-Vancouver leg intimidating, while the proposals from consultants over the years seemed like anything speedy was just pie-in-the-sky. I didn't do much better starting off thinking I could show them how to do it. (Vancouver with some kind of long tunnel, otherwise it's and eternity.) As a sort of indication about this segment: the luxury train is slower than Amtrak but has higher ridership. The Eugene-Portland thing in the Highway looks pretty good. I never studied that part but clearly there should eventually be a fast passenger service from Sacramento to Seattle anyway. I did do a tunnel up to Mt. Shasta, CA, which seems to shorten it a lot, though at the south end it dumps you into some more tight curvature, just to eliminate the switchbacks. The only solution I can think of is make the lttle town to the south a permanent express stop, about 5 minutes before Mt. Shasta. A few more tunnnels suggest themselves going north from there to Eugene. I did find a great way to configure Seattle-Tacoma-Olympia-Portland (there's a tunnel going NE out of Tacoma) that makes it faster than bypassing Olympia because there's no serious obstacle to having straight tracks, once you're past the Tacoma "shared assets" realm. (that's all got to be grade separated) It follows a certain less-than-Interstate highway going south into Olympia - Martin Way. I found a super place for a train station right by the capitol, except it's a stub-end terminal, which I thought could be remedied by some German or Japanese system for reversing the seats automatically. But what if passengers get chewed up in them? Still, no one likes riding backwards.

@LucidStew 3 дня назад

It's a lot of tunnel! I got some guff for punting somewhat with the 19 mile tunnel out of downtown Seattle. The feedback was that I should have cut and covered under U.S. 99 instead, so... a 24 mile tunnel! I just can't see this happening. I think maybe they could do a blended system, although even that would be a pain through Seattle. There is some potential for bypasses in the countryside, but the metros are hell. I also don't see where they're getting travel times between major pairs at less than an hour for less money. I got feedback from a lot of Canadians that it should just be run to Surrey and let local transit handle the rest, which sounds a little crazy, but they know their area a lot better than I do. A lot of them also liked that eastern approach to connect Abbottsford and Vancouver. I see what you're talking about there with Martin Way. Honestly, I think I just got tunnel fatigue at some point and sort of gave up on Olympia and Tacoma. Also, in hindsight, in that area I could have shortened my 13 mile tunnel by hooking up with SR512 for 7 miles, but hey, its published.

@brucehain 2 дня назад

@@LucidStew Ha-ha to tunnel fatigue. That comment I wrote was unintelligible. Yes, I drew a tunnel going NE from near Tacoma. (From there it made use of disused right of way going north with no big tunnel otherwsie, I think.) On the other side (Martin Way) it only absolutely needs to be tunnelized where there's a big hill, where it first meets Martin Way on the east for a mile or two. The idea of getting the tracks in/over the median west of there is maybe possible. It's pretty boxed in though. That's in addition to tunnel starting a mile out of Olympia, mostly under roads.

@theoclarke4365 21 день назад

Hi Stew, First off, I have to say that I have been actively watching for a while now and love the content you make. I have a engineering proposal for the route through Portland. I imagine this would result in a longer travel time, but could be significantly cheaper. Instead of a tunnel between Tualatin and Portland, I would suggest a single track along the right of way of OR-217 then join up with the Red and Blue Max Lines at US-26. The route could potentially use or parallel the Robertson tunnel beneath Washington Park, then connect to the proposed MAX tunnel from Goose Hollow Station to the Lloyd Center. From the Lloyd center, the route could parallel existing MAX tracks/I-84 as I would argue there is sufficient space for a single track. Then connect with I-205 and cross the Columbia River in the median of the existing bridge Sharing this route would also allow for easy transitions to the MAX Red Line which was just double tracked to the airport. I would recommend reading the MAX Tunnel Study Findings for more information. This is a tunnel that would make significant changes to the MAX system considering the need for greater capacity on the steel bridge.

@TheCriminalViolin 21 день назад

Though I understand your proposal and it makes some sense, it would ensure we'd need to discount the major issues it would cause with scheduling and frequencies, and single tracking it for so much would prevent a lot of potential trains from being able to continue on schedule through along the line, as it would be taken up by one train traveling one direction. Further, unless you build another tunnel, you really don't have the space for it around the Robertson area, and even that would be heavily space constrained. Furthermore, if you double track it (as it should be logistics-wise), then you definitely do not have the space to build the tunnel (or two). And sharing with MAX makes the least amount of sense as that too would heavily conflict with each other. One of them would require more rights to the ROW of the tracks than the other, and that is always going to be TriMet with MAX. It additionally would mean these HSR trains would have to HEAVILY slow down for the portions it shared tracks with MAX, because the LRTs are capped at 55mph top speed (they're made with that cap), and worse, the catenary and rails are not of the grade capable of handling high speeds, either. And in summer, MAX trains get capped at 30mph due to concerns that the friction and heat would melt the catenary wires, as well as that the pantographs and the rails themselves would warp. And that means the HSR trains would be further slowed and screwed by sharing any tracks at all with the MAX trains during any days it is 90f or above (that's the safety rules). And uhh, in case you didn't realize... today was 90 or above, depending on where in the metro you were. PDX hit 91. Last year we had three days in MARCH that hit 90+ in the metro. So those rules apply anytime that temp is forecasted to be reached. So the concept you proposed kind of implodes on itself to be blunt with you. It simply isn't logical and doesn't make sense. And I think we can both agree that either system, MAX or Cascadia HSR getting heavily slowed down or otherwise logistically stuck restricted to the other's requirements and ROWs isn't right either, especially to the riders of either system. The primary focus always needs to be on maximizing reliability, frequency and ridership, with emphasis on the latter's consistent use and satisfaction. Riders are the literal life blood of transit. They have to be your primary focus every time, with the logistics following right behind in importance of focus. Trying to engineer our way into "easier" and potentially "cheaper" methods doesn't do that at all.

@bgabriel28 20 дней назад

Great job! $79 billion seems like a bargain for such a system, given that the eastside access tunnel in NYC cost $10 billion. I also wonder if they should just build the station in Surrey, BC, rather than downtown Vancouver for cost savings. Surrey has good connections with the Skytrain network.

@lindsiria 20 дней назад

My guess is all three cities wouldn't have stations downtown for this reason. Seattle's would be in Bellevue, Portland on the outskirts and Vancouver would be surrey. Its very similar to how most European cities run HSR tbh. It's not super common for these stations to be in the center of the city but rather be at a good transportation link.

@bgabriel28 20 дней назад

It at least makes more sense to go through the heart of Portland and Seattle, as the HSR would go from one side of the city to the other, but Vancouver would be the northern terminus of the line.

@RailMan102_Productions 21 день назад

$79 billion geez, but for real though so many people complain about the cost of these projects when they don’t even realize that the Shinkansen route in Japan had similar problems, it’s annoying. I just want this project to start construction either this year or next year.

@cmdrls212 21 день назад

The environmental studies alone will take easily a decade. Nothing fast happens in the Pnw. Look at link rail. It won't reach Everett amd Tacoma for another decade lol.

@ajm619 21 день назад

I think any new HSR program that happened in the PNW needs to either include the option for local service to be included on the ROW, or needs to make serious investments in the current Amtrak Cascades route. I also think you could shave a significant amount of tunneling off of the Seattle area if you used SR-99 ROW to around Everett.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

You don't want stops every 20 miles. It wouldn't allow the trains to get up to full speed. If the regions decided to have regional rail services, they could hook in to the trunk and build stations, but you'd want HSR to skip all that. For SR99, do you mean like remove the road and replace it with the train?

@cmdrls212 21 день назад

Not possible due to all the crossings. It would be a viaduct or underground. If undergroud then what's the point of following 99

@awrybowtie5591 21 день назад

Love this series. I wonder if you'd ever consider sharing routes w/ regular rail near termini. Kinda like the French and Italian HSR networks where typically the 10 or so miles from the city center are thru slower, conventional routes (obvs will lose time but 15 mile tunnels cost $$$$)

@LucidStew 21 день назад

The current assumption here is that freight rail right of way will prove extremely difficult due to the freight rail companies. The little section south of King Street in Seattle by the BNSF yard, I was assuming a huge concrete barrier between the two based on demands by UP and the FRA for CAHSR. I initially had a route put together that utilized some freight ROW coming into Portland from the south, but I finally realized that it was so slow and circuitous that driving straight through underground just made more sense even if it was more expensive.

@junglist_ikon 21 день назад

In Europe the HSR network can run on established conventional passenger rail routes in metropolitan areas. Often they even belong to the same state rail company which makes it an obvious choice in contrast to the U.S. freight rail companies which have no inherent interest in sharing their tracks.

@counterfit5 21 день назад

@@junglist_ikonin 2002 I took the TGV between Paris and Grenoble. Going to Grenoble I had to change trains, but coming back it was a single seat on a TGV, so that method definitely works.

@TheCriminalViolin 21 день назад

@@LucidStew Yep, as always. Their monopolies will not ever go without them waging a all out war in court, and of course with hordes of lobbying.

@isaacanderson5083 21 день назад

@@LucidStew I always ignore freight companies because, if we're being hypothetical, I assume that in alternate USA where HSR is actually being built, the railroads are nationalized. Maybe it's wishful thinking but...

@Seawiz21 День назад

Yup, those off-ramps are for the express buses and carpool. Sound Transit runs almost freeway exclusive bus network regionally.

@PerkyRebel 17 дней назад

Could take the I-5 express lanes for HSR from downtown Seattle up to Northgate. From there would need to be a tunnel, unless you could feasibly run HSR on the Link Light Rail tracks (which could be worth investigating).

@LucidStew 17 дней назад

Sure. Things become much easier if existing systems are pushed aside, but that's part of the challenge because it's often quite unlikely to happen.

@karlmiller7188 21 день назад

Very very interesting idea!

@williamowen4706 21 день назад

Re Vancouver- pacific central station would probably be better than Waterfront for an international train, simply because they already have a border pre-clearance facility there

@preachyourstory3452 21 день назад

Hi Stew, love your work! Just wanted to check - some of the lower-speed (e.g. 90mph) sections of your corridor: are you assuming a non-tilting train? If so, could an Avelia Liberty-type train with 6 deg. tilt boost curve speed by 25% - so 90 might become 115mph? As I understand things, the Avelia Liberty should also be able to achieve 200mph on straight sections. Your thoughts? Regards, Warwick

@LucidStew 20 дней назад

Thanks! I am assuming a conventional train, but I also give some tilting times near the end. Since its pretty curvy, there is a nice improvement with that technology.

@joshualee-reid867 20 дней назад

My own rendering of this corridor includes a bit more willingness to alter properties on the ground and a lower tolerance for speed limitations, but follows a mostly similar route with the exceptions of swinging west between Eugene and Portland to have city-center stations in Corvallis, Albany, and Salem, while also adding in several other stations in places like Everett, Tacoma, Bellingham, Surrey, etc. The way I see it, creating HSR ROWs is a once-in-a-generation infrastructure project, akin to airports or the interstate highway system. Its too important and will have impacts too far into the future to be squeemish about costs. Spending a billions of extra dollars to save a few minutes on the corridor might sound crazy now, but if you add up the economic productivity gained from those minutes from all the yearly passengers over potentially centuries of use, nearly any improvement to the ROW will pencil out. HSR in the US is a social and economic necessity for the future of this country, and we need to treat it as such.

@peterdibble 21 день назад

I'm curious if using the I-205 corridor for its entire length would allow HSR to run through Portland without needing a 19-mile tunnel? We would lose the direct connection to the city center but it would still get us plenty close enough, I think, especially if you connect it to the MAX lines that run through that corridor. In this case you would be putting HSR bridges over the Willamette and Columbia, but that would still be a fraction of the cost of the tunnel.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

There are some issues with local transit taking up the ROW that keep that from happening. You also have some major challenges around Oregon City.

@DavidNunezPNW 13 дней назад

Having a stop in Mount Vernon and not Bellingham is wild since Bellingham has Western Washington University

@LucidStew 6 дней назад

no stop in Mt. Vernon in the video. However, keep an eye out for a future video in terms of Bellingham stops.

@user-dp2mu6xr5l 5 дней назад

In that video maybe you can do the Bellevue route option connecting to Surrey in BC? No way King street allowing more tunneling or construction. The Link Light rail already changing their plans, besides the stadium district is a dump and Bellevue would serve Seattle with the world first and online floating bridge link light rail in just 12min to the same King St station you proposed.

@TheLiamster 20 дней назад

I wonder if it’s possible to build a high speed line from Detroit to Halifax going through Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Quebec City

@shopdog831 21 день назад

So what your saying is this train isnt going to need windows.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

fair assessment. Actually, the view of the mountains from the east side of the train looks pretty sweet.

@cv-05 19 дней назад

I feel like better Amtrak Cascades service would be more realistic and cost effective than full blown HSR, especially given how slow the route's gonna be anyways. I'd rather see Amtrak Cascades running regular 120mph trains consistently.

@davidjackson7281 17 дней назад

That makes sense.

@user-dp2mu6xr5l 5 дней назад

For regional stops in Tacoma, Olympia, Salem yes. You could even add better service out of Seattle on Amtrak to that list and have the HSR bypass Seattle all together to the nicer, more hotel and business centric ( honestly even Amazon has more office space in Bellevue these days), Bellevue which could support and grow into a rival to Seattle. Nothing wrong with an Amtrak regional train hub in Seattle with a Bellevue high speed rail station that serves Seattle by the worlds first and only floating bridge light rail in just about ten minutes.

@jfreelan1964 19 дней назад

If you build it they will come!

@eddog6666 14 дней назад

Tunnel is the only way to deal with Portland, Oregon and Vancouver Washington. The main problem is that the tunnel would have to be pretty deep underground to safely cross the willamt and Columbia Rivers. That would make a connection to the Portland airport quite difficult and there is a high danger of liquidfaction ( major earthquake)

@LucidStew 14 дней назад

I'm not sure of the geology of the area. My understanding is that the airport is built on fill, but I'm not sure where the bedrock is there. I only looked up the depth charts of the rivers in terms of depth for a tunnel. Fairly deep tunnels are not necessarily a problem, they're just going to require more robust means of getting people to the surface quickly.

@eddog6666 14 дней назад

@@LucidStew Cascadia subduction zone which stretches from Vancouver Island all the way to Crescent City California. they say a full rupture would create a 9.2 earthquake. they estimates a possible casualties and 2000-3000 and homeless between 1,000,000-2,000,000. and it is due to the fact Portland Oregon is built on reclaimed land. about 50% of the city. Which includes the Gas and Oil pipelines that run throughout the city. However it is consider the second biggest possible disaster. San Andrea Third. New Madrid Semic zone ( borders of Arkansas, Missouri, Kentucky, and Tennessee.) It would be the biggest disaster in human history only from 2 8.0 earthquakes. you don't want to know the possible deathtoll. but here's homeless possibilities: 7,000,000! with damanges reaching Minneapolis and New York City and Dallas!

@darpavader4811 21 день назад

Eugene might be a spot where to save money you put the stop right outside of town. One less tunnel.

@isaiah_hi93 19 дней назад

Agreed Eugene has a pretty adequate bus and BRT system that could connect the HSR into Eugene/Springfield from say a station at exit 195 (Gateway St/Beltline) , the 105 or Franklin blvd. Tunneling or acquiring ROWs on the surface directly into city centers would unneccessarily inflate costs and cause local push back.

@ericbruun9020 21 день назад

As a Seattle native, I still see woefully inadequate transit in many cities along the line. And very infrequent service on the Cascades. If we are serious about cutting GHG quickly, invest in upgrades. The US has waited too long for HSR to help out. This is the same in most corridors.

@LucidStew 20 дней назад

I might do a similar video in the future seeing just how much the Cascades route could be improved within reason since this seems to be a popular idea in the region. That would likely only be high-ER speed 125mph diesel-electric, so not really the heart of the channel theme, but I'll have some room to expand themes slightly once this series is done.

@davidjackson7281 18 дней назад

@Lucid Stew: How much property has the CAHSRA acquired for the ROW extensions to Merced and Bakersfield?

@jeffberner8206 19 дней назад

The problem with this plan is that it doesn't work until ALL of the route is built, especially in the Portland-Seattle segment which would get the majority of the passenger travel. Why do we need to wait for 19 miles of tunnel to be built when we could get fast and reliable Amtrak Cascades service by 2035? Amtrak Cascades can give 2.5 hour service to Portland at 70 mph average speeds, which is the same speeds as Acela and Chicago-St Louis. That is good enough without breaking the piggy bank. Putting all our investment funds into a extravagant HSR system means that other important infrastructure projects don't get built instead.

@AGothro 21 день назад

This is awesome. What about Salem? It’s just as big a metro area as Eugene and it’s the capital. Since you couldn’t find a good way around the city anyway…the train would stop there, right?

@LucidStew 21 день назад

I assume there would be more regional stations. The WSDOT study has something like 16 total. Various reason I left it out. I wanted to keep it an end to end express and had to leave Eugene in there because it's expressly part of the corridor.

@AGothro 20 дней назад

Okay, sweet. Thank you! I love your videos.

@juanmontull8550 21 день назад

Perfect population and perfect distance for HSR, so many studies for nothing, Come On USA! Amazing video as always @Stew👌

@rebeccawinter472 20 дней назад

I love your stuff always. But as a general critique I’d love if you put speeds and distances in km - in parenthesis below the miles is fine. I mention for this video especially as you have a Canadian connection involved so it seems especially important to consider the measurements used internationally. 😊

@jens_le_benz 21 день назад

This is cool and all, but I am concerned that you would consider demolishing the centers of small towns for the ROW, but (at 9:20) insist that removing two lanes of freeway traffic would be impossible.

@LucidStew 20 дней назад

The nukes make it look worse than I have it on paper. You're only talking about 6-7 structures there. I can't make assumptions about removing freeway lanes just like I can't make assumptions about being able to requisition freight rights of way. I can however, assume that eminent domain would be used for a public project, because that is commonly the case. If you like the idea of removing freeway lanes, see my Taking Back The Streets video.

@drewsteps 18 дней назад

Fun to watch. As others commented, some key cities were missed that would severely limit ridership potential. And more importantly, unless this is a 400mph maglev, the curves are unnecessarily wide. You can remove 80% of the proposed tunnelling by simply meandering the tracks along better existing ROW corridors. And finally, center-running high-speed rail down the middle of I-5 is not what professionals do... look at Japan, Europe, and even developing countries. A) Emergency/maintenance access turnarounds would be impossible, B) Infill stations not practical for intermediate stations; no one wants to walk across a noisy freeway and stand at a station in the median, and C) Major car collisions, car fires, and other emergencies can impact train efficiency, causing closures to the rail line.

@LucidStew 17 дней назад

The curves are based on real-world curve radii for given speeds and actually tend toward the minimum necessary. "Center-running is not what professionals do" see Brightline West. Not so much HSR, but median running trains are not uncommon. I've ridden one myself. And I didn't provision for the things you're talking about because regional rail like Amtrak Cascades can handle that. It's not necessary to put that on a high speed trunk. If you notice, all of the chosen stations are near Amtrak Cascades stops. In the case of King Street and Portland Union, they'd be right underneath.

@drewsteps 17 дней назад

@@LucidStew brightline is not an example of a professional hsr system.

@ahoog69 21 день назад

This is a thorough presentation, and I would love to see it come to fruition. However, knowing how our politicians operate, I suspect teleportation will come about first.

@larryyok2838 20 дней назад

Excellent presentation. However, another tunnel to King Street Station in Seattle will be problematic. There are two tunnels under downtown Seattle now, the BNSF tunnel and Sound Transit's Line 1 tunnel. By the time the HSR project gets underway, there will be a third tunnel, Sound Transit's Line 2 tunnel to Ballard that will meander under the Westlake and South Queen Anne neighborhoods. It might be better to run the HSR tunnel farther east under the south Sixth Avenue industrial area and reactivate the former Union Station that was used by the Union Pacific and Milwaukee railroads in the 20th century as the Seattle terminus. Exiting downtown northward the HSR tunnel would need to avoid conflict with the Line 2 tunnel under the Westlake neighborhood and the Line 1 tunnel that runs under the Ship Canal and then crosses northwest through the University and Roosevelt districts.

@jonasrettig327 16 дней назад

Definitifly worth it

@samul7531 21 день назад

nice video, have you ever thought about sharing the details of your cost estimation model? I'd love to use it on some projects of my own!

@LucidStew 21 день назад

It's really not good or informed enough for ANY other purpose. XD

@seattleneighbor357 19 дней назад

Consider routing from SR-167 to Bellevue Main Street light rail station. More tunneling under the narrow ithmus that is Seattle, and the reality of impacts due to tunneling, just doesn't seem to be future forward when the Pusget Sound regional growth boundaries are more centered on more reliable land and wider flat in Bellevue. Access to light rail gives access to the region, not just downtown Seattle. Besides climate realities and land availability, human settlements and commerce will shift considerably given what appears to be new post-industrial work scenarios.

@user-dp2mu6xr5l 5 дней назад

Exactly. Bellevue is the route that makes sense. Nobody in a hurry to get to King St station. More amenities in a shorter distance by way of hotels and restaurants that can serve more people quicker in Bellevue than getting out in the International District where you would still have to transfer to a light rail and get out at Westlake which itself isn’t really the best location and leagues below Bellevue as of the last five years with that trend continuing.

@trevorlongman3783 17 дней назад

I was really looking forward to this video but this route is truly ill conceived and not based in reality. The approaches north from Seattle and South from Portland are certainly challenging but not so difficult that they require 20 mile tunnels. I really wish you would've taken more time to approach this problem more pragmatically, creatively and realistically.

@LucidStew 17 дней назад

Pretty likely no route is based in reality.

@gphoops1 21 день назад

Can anything be done with the i5 express lanes in central/ Northern Seattle?

@cmdrls212 21 день назад

No. Not even sound transit link dared touch that as it is a huge mover of vehicles that link rail could never replace and it also moves a lot of the buses that aren't close to link.

@commercialcritic4676 19 дней назад

Sweet!

@SmartMaterial 21 день назад

Sweet.

@williammcgough 19 дней назад

Thank you for this thorough yet approachable analysis! Do you know if there is a need to construct safety barriers between the highway and rails when running HSR down a highway median such as in this plan (or Brightline 2)? (I am thinking about a situation where a vehicle drives off the road into the median at 60+ mph the same time an HS train is passing in the opposite direction at 150+ mph.) P.s. Imho, it should be a goal of such a project to connect directly to SEA-TAC airport given that it is almost directly in the path of the general alignment and given the fact it is reportedly reaching capacity ... with a HSR stop at the airport, accessibility to SEA-TAC's many long-haul flights would be greatly increased for the region and the need for short-haul "feeder" flights would be substantially reduced along the corridor. (Would love to see something like Frankfurt's "The Squaire" replace the parking structure next to SEA-TAC, with retail, hotels, and offices above a HSR and local train station connected by skybridge to an international airport.)

@LucidStew 19 дней назад

Brightline West, as far as I know, will be using a barrier similar to standard freeway median barriers, but with a short fence on top. Median running alignments could also be elevated slightly, and probably would be naturally as HSR needs tighter control on rate of change in elevation than an interstate does. SeaTac is already connected to DT Seattle via light rail. It's also only 10 miles from DT Seattle. That's a local transit distance, not HSR. Traffic generated by downtown would be far higher than an airport.

@rebeccawinter472 20 дней назад

While the Pac Central option isn’t as centrally located, the reality is there isn’t much room for development downtown around Waterfront. If building there there is greater opportunity for development. Plus it’s connected to Sky Train including the new Broadway subway being built, which will better extend the transit radii. Seems like a reasonable way to save a bit, and gain something.

@conorgilles81 19 дней назад

I like putting the station in downtown Portland, but with all that expensive tunnelling, maybe theres a way to put the station at the airport instead. You could use 205's median the whole way ans not need to tunnel at all, other than maybe under the airport. Its not ideal, but it would probably be way cheaper and the airport is connected to light rail anyway.

@davestevis200 21 день назад

So worth it. I'm curious how customs might work between stops in US and Canada. Would that cause additional delay?

@counterfit5 21 день назад

It would have to change to a pre-boarding method to not massively waste time

@stevenroshni1228 21 день назад

I think Vancouver would both countries customs, just like Canadian airports

@LucidStew 21 день назад

I thought about this on the flight comparisons. Basically you have international trains with boarding limited to certain stations. Those then all have customs checks for those trains, so basically would function like an international flight from a passenger perspective.

@Liggie55821 15 дней назад

For Canada-US plane and train routes, you go through Customs at the Canada airport/station before you get on the plane. I learned the hard way; I once arrived at the Vancouver train station for a trip back to Seattle, but I wasn't allowed on board because I was too late for the customs process. I had to shell out for an hour-long puddle-jumper at the YVR airport.

@spartan0x75 21 день назад

Could someone explain why tilting train could make travel time slower? I had no idea that was possible

@LucidStew 20 дней назад

Tilting trains generally have a top speed of 300kph. Generally, top service speed of a conventional is 320kph. It varies based on radius, but active tilt is roughly 15% faster in curves. If you have a straight route, tilt runs slower.

@spartan0x75 20 дней назад

@@LucidStew i see, this is very interesting. Thanks for the explanation!

@MikeWillSee 16 дней назад

I wonder if some of the tunnelling could be reduced by serving the city centres on spur lines rather than on the mainline? Obviously such an approach isn't ideal operationally, but in my opinion it's a compromise I'd be willing to make when the alternative is that NOTHING gets built!

@LucidStew 15 дней назад

Normally, yeah, but where is the bypass going? You also have a problem on spur lines here because there's also no room for THEM. Really depends what you could talk freight into, but like with Seattle even that won't help. It's just a really tough route for the concept.

@MikeWillSee 15 дней назад

@@LucidStew that's fair enough - it looks like it's a challenging route whichever way is chosen!

@goombacraft 21 день назад

It's so annoying how there's just no route north out of Seattle

@LucidStew 21 день назад

Very crowded now. You have express lanes and light rail in the I-5 corridor. Freight has no chance and it'll probably be in the ocean in 100 years anyway.

@lindsiria 20 дней назад

@@LucidStew it's even worse than you realize. Between king street station and the canal (north of downtown), there is little room both above AND below ground. It might not even be possible to tunnel through downtown Seattle because of the other tunnels. In that couple mile section you have two existing tunnels and one more being built. It would likely have to be so deep that it isn't practical for king street station or become a huge earthquake risk (as that area is built on landfills and demolished hills). I personally don't think a HSR will go through Seattle at all. It's just too expensive. Instead they will opt to go east of lake Washington, through Bellevue. Next year the light rail will connect between Bellevue and Seattle, so as long as the stations are nearby, Seattle would only be 15-20 minutes away. I see similar things happening in Portland and Vancouver. They won't go through the cities but rather stop on the outskirts (which many European cities do) near public transit options. This would likely drop the costs by 1/3rd to 1/2 and might actually make this route viable. I just don't see anything over 60 billion getting approved between WA/OR/BC. Hell, Washington and Oregon can't even agree on a much needed new bridge over the Columbia River, and amtrak had to beg BC to fix the rail lines to allow for two daily amtrak trips each way.

@epicsnake21 21 день назад

Keystone Corridor #1

@pirazel7858 21 день назад

not only are the costs high, construction time will be very long with so long tunnels

@LucidStew 21 день назад

Yes, it would take very long to complete, as would most projects this size. I'd assume 2 or 3 decades at least.

@brucehain 3 дня назад

"Light Metro" - I like that. It was about the time that the first "Light Rail" boondoggles (especially "Newark Light Rail" - whereby they ruined the Newark City Subway with grade crossings) were getting underway in NJ that the Feds indoctrinated their designation for the subway mode as "Heavy Rail" - this in an apparent effort to dissuade anyone promoting planning for subways and hopefully get more relatively useless and nevertheless outrageously expensive "Light Rail Projects" going, creating boom times for their fused-at-the-hip consultancies. Anyway, they succeeded in establishing a Light Rail Boom as far as planning for the things. It sort of seems like a propaganda effort to gain acceptance for grade crossings (that get etched in stone so you can never get rid of them) and the culmination (let's hope) is Brightline/FEC.

@LucidStew 3 дня назад

I had to look up what 'Light Metro' meant. I'm not super familiar with transit. We barely have any out here. It's kind of like with Montreal and their rubber-tire metro. I had no idea such things exist. The idea of a huge bus-train is something out of 60s science fiction. Amazing.

@brucehain 2 дня назад

@@LucidStew I think Vancouver has linear induction of the Bombardier Innovia type and their successors, also Kennedy Airtrain and Detroit People Mover, which was the first. - but they can't seem to get it over 60mph. When they were first being developed they had to weigh the train cars down because a side effect of the linear induction is they lift the train off the tracks. I have it on good authority it's possible to get linear induction without the third rail - 'contactless' - and without the lifting effect as well, which would signal the end of the Railroad Dark Ages as I see it. With no square wheels they'd be able to go everywhere third rail powered stuff goes, just not on road-rail grade crossings. Well IDK maybe there could be some way to accommodate the 'exciter rail' but figure it would need to be bigger for higher speed, or closer - and that's the thing that freaks me out about being a few millimeter from an object that's not moving. I think TransRapid has said they can now operate with a 1-cm gap, which is better. the one at Kennedy goes about 60 at one point and it's pretty scary. It's on a curve in the air.

@adambuesser6264 21 день назад

Can High Speed rail run on existing freight lines with room for high speed passenger trains?

@LucidStew 21 день назад

Not generally. Usually you'd need dedicated tracks and freight is going to want those separated from its tracks in its ROW. Some of that is due to difference in superelevation and that fact that freight usually is most efficient at slower speeds. At those slower speeds, you then have an issue with freight loads tilting due to the higher superelevation an HSR train is going to require to get through a given curve. Some of it is also from freight companies trying to throw their weight around and protect their operations and rights of way. And then of course you have many other problems with sidings and keeping freight out of the way of passengers trains, which Amtrak deals with all the time even at 79mph.

@bjturon 21 день назад

Yeah, there is no good way to get north of Kings Street Station, but a very long tunnel, even for a 125 MPH "Brightline Florida" that might make more use of existing freight ROW to get to city centers. I think it's also true for crossing the Columbian River, a big long tunnel is best.

@LucidStew 21 день назад

The fact that existing rail is coastal... I looked at it for about 2 minutes.