Posted on 06/06/2008 6:49:16 PM PDT by Hildy
WASHINGTON (AP) - Plans for a levitating train from Las Vegas to Disneyland can move forward under a transportation bill signed by President Bush on Friday that frees up $45 million for the futuristic project. Derided by critics as pie in the sky, the train would use magnetic levitation technology to carry passengers from Disneyland to Las Vegas in well under two hours, traveling at speeds of up to 300 mph. It would be the first MagLev system in the U.S.
The money is the largest cash infusion in the project's nearly 20-year history. It will pay for environmental studies for the first leg of the project.
The money had been delayed by a drafting error in Congress' 2005 highway bill, which was corrected along with some other changes by the legislation signed Friday by Bush. The delay had allowed a competing and cheaper diesel-electric plan to emerge as an alternative, but with the money now freed up supporters hope to move forward with the MagLev plan.
The train is meant to ease traffic on increasingly clogged Interstate 15, the main route for the millions of Southern Californians who make the 250-plus-mile drive to Las Vegas each year. There is no train on the route—Amtrak's Desert Wind between Los Angeles and Las Vegas was canceled in 1997 because of low ridership.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., praised passage of the law, saying the MagLev project "will safely and efficiently move people between Southern California and Las Vegas."
Actually it is pretty Important. If they can get it going and it shows potential I can see private companies getting in line to go nationwide. With all the problems with Airlines a nice high speed rail system in country would rock in my opinion.
“There is no train on the route—Amtrak’s Desert Wind between Los Angeles and Las Vegas was canceled in 1997 because of low ridership”
So why do they think there will be more ridership now?
I am all in favor of using speed rail for transportation (as they do in Japan and France). But $45 million just for environmental studies is a boondoggle.
Disneyland has had its monorail operating since 1955; and for fifty years people have said, “Why can’t we have a rail like that for real—maybe going to San Francisco from LA?”
The price tag of $45 million just for yet another study, is part of the problem.
45 million wouldn’t build 5 miles of it.
Idiot Politicians and their d@#^ passenger trains.... Where the taxpayers have to pay, on average, 80% of the REAL cost per passenger.... And that is on ones where there was already suitable infrastructure in place.
If it made any sense economically, the Casinos would have built it already... But even the little elevated train on ‘the Strip’ proved to be such a boondoggle that, last I heard, services had been cut way back, and there was talk of just shutting it down completely.
Howard Hughes was going to do a high speed train from Palmdale airport to vegas. I miss that guy.
20 years and all they have is money for the first leg to find out that the 12 toed caboose lizard is allergic to magnetism.
What do you think the REAL cost of an airline ticket would be if passenges had to pay for all the infrastructure, ATC, DHS screeners, etc?
From LA to Vegas is moronic.
From South Florida to Orlando, however, would be a good project for the state to finance. It would certainly boost tourism in both areas.
I would ride these type of trains. L.A. to Vegas though? I try to stay away from both.
“From LA to Vegas is moronic”
Sir, you have obviously not traveled I15 to Vegas lately.
Its about time, lots of mass transit projects will get the green light since fuel is getting higher and higher, besides by the time you usually leave Loss Wages you probably couldn’t afford the gas anyway, just buy a R/T ticket before you leave home.
Delta chose to remain anonymous.
Irrelevant.
You have no more right to expect me to pay for part of your personal, private transportation to Las Vegas, whether it be by plane train or horseback, than I do to expect you to pay for part of my food and lodging when I go on vacation.
Maybe I'm wrong; Could you refer me to the part of the U.S. Constitution that even hints at it being the responsibility of the Federal Government (that is, the taxpayers) to provide transportation for tourists?
$45 Mil for “environmental studies”. We’ve allowed these morons to hijack the country.
Cripes ! Send me $45k and I’ll tell ya, the environment is sand, sand, cactus, some mountains and then some asphalt. Build the friggin’ train, the jackrabbits will get out of the way, believe me.
Today, there are plans for another bridge to connect the two towns. You all don't know this, but you're paying for it. Money was allocated in that last transporation boondogle. Mr. Reid sure takes care of his casino friends. ANYWAY, that bill was four years ago. You might ask how your investment is doing. As of today, they're still debating where to put the damn thing. FOUR YEARS...they still don't know where to put it. Your government at work, folks.
LOL!
Completely relevant.
Do you think that the 50 cents or so per gallon of liquid fuel tax is the REAL cost of the Interstate highway system that you enjoy?
Fact is that at the beginning of the automobile era policy decisions were made to subsidize that transportation system. Prior to the 1900’s all decent roads were turnpikes operated by private companies. Likewise major bridges, canals, etc.
Because the railroads “did a number” on the federal goverment during WWII (mainly due to union rules) there was a deliberate move to exact punishment on them in the 1950’s by heavily subsidizing the airlines and by developing the highways—originally called the “National Defense Highway System”.
Our current defense emergency requires better land-based transportation that is other than highway.
***So why do they think there will be more ridership now?***
$5.00 a gallon gas.
Somewhere Willie Green is braying.
This is crap. All this $45M will do is line a bunch of greedy pockets. Who’s wankin’ who?
As I read about this train all I can think is that it will be covered with graffiti, like everything else in SoCal.
Should we be paying for it to go to Disneyland though?
If Amtrak had a route from STX to NTX I would use it, esp if they made car trains reasonably priced.
Didn’t Amtrak used to go South or did it stop at Orlando.
check it
http://www.roadtripamerica.com/eats/madgreek.htm
“If they can get it going and it shows potential I can see private companies getting in line to go nationwide. With all the problems with Airlines a nice high speed rail system in country would rock in my opinion.”
Agreed. I think if we get one segment going, others will quickly follow.
LA to Phoenix might make sense, too. That would get the East-West juices flowing. Phoenix to Dallas/Ft Worth or Houston would be next.
I question whether the environmentalists would allow LA to SF.
I’d be willing to bet a substantial sum that if someone began digging into the particulars that land titles or other permits would reveal the names of Reid’s sons/sons-in-law or Indian tribes that Reid ran interfence for in getting rights of way. Harry Reid is going to make a big pile of money if this project goes forward - that’s the way he works. I think it’s called “Pay Go;” if you pay me, I’ll make it go. If you don’t pay me, it won’t happen. Choose.
I'm glad you brought that up. I would have, but wanted to keep it short.
OK, that made it sort of constitutional for the feds paying for the highways, (and it looks like you are a harsher critic and know much more about the overall situation than I, as I was unaware of the Highways being built to punish the railroads).... That and and a argument being made for the Interstate Highway system providing for the general good by better facilitating interstate commerce are two reasons I don't complain much about the cost of roads to taxpayers.
Yet you seem to be saying that the Feds... (That is, we federal taxpayers).... paying for the Mag-Lev train between Vegas and LA is OK, because it will be a more efficient way to provide for the national defense than the existing roads????
Well, I guess it might be useful for shuttling troops between Nellis AFB and Ft. Irwin.
I'm obviously missing your point, but it is going to be difficult for me to grasp why this is a good and proper use of taxpayer money.
Why doesn’t anyone EVER look behind the scenes of these things? Oh, wait, they do...if you’re a Republican (Duke Cunningham).
Therefore, since all forms of long-distance passenger transport require federal subsidy, we should subsidize the form that provides the service with the lowest infrastructure cost-per-mile: rail. According to a 2002 study of 21 intercity passenger rail corridors conducted by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO), an estimated $60 billion Federal dollars would be required over a twenty-year period ($3.3 billion annually) to make the short-term and long-term investments needed to make fast intercity passenger rail service possible. (The DOT spends $68 billion annually on highway capital spending.) [1]
Rail is the best mode of long-distance transportation in terms of fuel efficiency as well. Commuter rail (both light and heavy) averages 32.9 passengers per vehicle, and expends 5.3 L fuel per 100 km, resulting in a fuel efficiency of about 45 MPGe. Amtrak averages 17.9 passengers per vehicle, and expends 5.6 L/100 km for a fuel efficiency of 42 MPGe. Contrast this with private automobiles (1.57 passengers per vehicle per trip, 7.2 L of fuel per 100 km of travel, 33 MPGe) airliners (90.4 passengers per vehicle per trip, 8.1 L/100 km, 29 MPGe) and motor buses (8.7 passengers per vehicle per trip, 8.8 L/100 km, 27 MPGe). [2]
With these figures in mind, it's easy to see that taxpayer subsidies go further when spent on rail infrastructure, and that rail transportation is the most efficient way to move people over long distances.
The only plus-up on building this train...is to get middle-class LA residents to frequent Vegas...twice a month. You build some kind of package...round trip with one night in a good hotel...$129. Friday afternoon and evening...I could fill the entire train filled up completely. But I don’t see much traffic between Monday and Thursday. They might be able to have more concert-style shows and bring in teenage groups from LA with a cheap ticket. But the problem I see...is that train tickets on this rail...aren’t going to be that cheap.
I agree. Or Orlando to any “day-tripper” beach locale, Atlantic or Gulf.
I think you’re right.
Isn’t there a maglev experiment languishing at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, VA?
Imagine where we would be today if we had to do environmental studies before building anything significant over the last two hundred years...
I was thinking about that while watching a film about the building of the Hoover and Glen Canyon dams.
http://hamptonroads.com/2008/01/odu-partners-massachusetts-company-test-another-maglev-train
ODU partners with Massachusetts company to test another maglev train
By Debbie Messina
The Virginian-Pilot
© January 15, 2008
NORFOLK
Old Dominion University is partnering with a Massachusetts-based company to test another maglev train on its campus.
The partnership, which has won the backing of the federal government, could bring a prototype about the size of a van or small bus to the Norfolk campus by summer 2009.
Officials plan to announce the partnership and financial support today. ODU and MagneMotion Inc. will jump-start their efforts with a three-year, $6.3 million grant from the federal Urban Maglev Program.
More than $700,000 will go to ODU for its role. The project beat out four others for Federal Transit Administration funding. ODU officials said Monday that they are excited about the new prototype, but it won’t halt plans to continue developing their own maglev vehicle, which has eluded the school for years. The partnership will help the university fulfill a goal of becoming a research center for maglev development throughout the country.
[snip]
I question the overriding need to build a high-speed train between the two cities.
I see more benefit in a system like that in Florida than I do in the desert. Florida is basically a collection of tourist destinations. When people plan trips, they usually just go to one, stay a few days, then go home. It would boost tourism revenues immensely if a family that came to visit Disney World for a week could hop a 45-minute train ride down to South Beach, normally a 4 or 5 hour drive.
Oh, absolutely. Orlando could be the hub in a spoke of high-speed trains linking the state. A family could get a hotel in Orlando for a week and be less than an hour away from St. Augustine, South Beach, or Busch Gardens in Tampa.
Will the pork stop here?
Reid pledges change, but he pushed funding that may benefit him.
By Chuck Neubauer and Tom Hamburger, Times Staff Writers
November 13, 2006
WASHINGTON — Incoming Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid vows to make reform of congressional earmarks a priority of his tenure, arguing that members need to be more transparent when they load pet projects for their districts into federal spending bills.
But last year’s huge $286-billion federal transportation bill included a little-noticed slice of pork pushed by Reid that provided benefits not only for the casino town of Laughlin, Nev., but also, possibly, for the senator himself.
Reid called funding for construction of a bridge over the Colorado River, among other projects, “incredibly good news for Nevada” in a news release after passage of the 2005 transportation bill. He didn’t mention, though, that just across the river in Arizona, he owns 160 acres of land several miles from proposed bridge sites and that the bridge could add value to his real estate investment.
Reid denies any personal financial interest in his efforts to secure $18 million for a new span connecting Laughlin with Bullhead City, Ariz.
[snip]
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-earmarks13nov13,0,6626376,full.story
In Cocoa Beach they are always wondering why they don’t get more tourists coming over from Orlando. Traffic, toll roads, few places to park when they get there, that’s what I see.
If a family had a hotel in Orlando and could take a train to the beach in the morning and return in the evening, a whole lotta more people would do so. Then having done so, on the next trip to Florida, they’d be more likely to set aside time to stay at one of the beaches after doing Orlando.
If I were king of any one of the relatively sleepy beach towns between, say, Jax and Cocoa, I’d want a train right into town. Everybody gets off at the beach, there’s everything they need right there for daytripping (beach rentals, restaurants, basic up and down the strip transportation, souvenirs), one or two hotels for starters. I think more Floridians would go over, too, if it was easy to daytrip.
Thanks for the info.
And while I fully agree that Rail is the most efficient way to transport people (and especially heavy cargo) between fixed points on land, it is also the most inflexible, requiring other modes of transportation for those with destinations that don’t lie directly along the lines and within walking distance of the terminals.
I still don’t see where it is any of the Federal (or even State) Government’s charter to be subsidizing the private travel of private individuals for private purposes.
If the taxpayers of Nevada and California want to get together and vote the money to build a railroad to further enrich the Vegas casino owners and maybe get the cocktail waitresses some bigger tips, I guess I can’t complain. But to expect the whole nation to pay for it seems to be stretching things a bit.
We went from the Party of Reagan and smaller government to being in favor of more taxes and more government for goodies and making excuses for this type of behavior and then having the temerity to call ourselves conservatives.
Wake up “conservatives”!
I see more benefit in a system like that in Florida than I do in the desert. Florida is basically a collection of tourist destinations.Who's stopping you or the citizens of Florida from doing just that? Federal money?
The difference might be that the Disneyland (Cal.) to Las Vegas (Nev.) train is federal money because it's interstate transportation while what you're suggesting is intrastate transportation.
Given how freaked out the enviros have gotten over the truly “pie in the sky” border wall, I can’t see them exactly getting behind a 200 mph train through the desert.
I realize the difference between interstate and intrastate transportation, thanks.
My point is that I believe a magnetic train would be better implemented in Florida than as a Vegas-LA conduit. It has nothing to do with funding from the government, but rather questioning the utility of an LA-Vegas train in the first place.
And for the record, we approved a ballot initiative years ago for an intrastate monorail system, but the state government (rightly) took it to court because there was no method of funding the damn thing. Besides, a monorail is a bad idea compared to a magnetic train.
According to this ODU has poured alot of money into a non-working system. American Maglev seems to be a scam company who is probably involved in this new 45 million dollar “study”.
http://hamptonroads.com/node/249581
I like this line:
“Morris told the Atlanta paper that he hasn’t forgotten his debt to Virginia taxpayers. He said he plans to repay a $7 million loan from the state for the ODU project with revenue from a working project in Virginia sometime in the future.”
Sure pal, tell it to the judge.
Yes, that was a big story here in AZ and Nevada...FOR ABOUT A WEEK..and then..nothing. I live about a mile from that land they are talking about and he will benefit from that bridge. It’s so incredibly obvious, but yes, nobody says a word if you’re a Democrat.
Instead of “Bridge of Nowhere,” we ought to start calling it “Bridge to Harry Reid’s Land.”
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