(The bypasses in question are not for center cities, just for curves. The big one is for the section between Elkton and Perryville.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amtrak_Susquehanna_River_Bridge

I was only looking at this info from the cited source: “$200 million to replace three bridges. The funds would study the replacement of the Bush, Susquehanna and Gunpowder bridges. The new three-track bridges would replace the existing two-track bridges and increase passenger service to meet the demands of high-speed rail that Amtrak requires….” — Baltimore Business Journal

The bridges over the Susquehanna and Gunpowder Rivers would probably be needed even if you built a bypass to get around that city’s tunnels and congestion. (The Bush bridge is 15 miles from the city, so maybe, maybe not.)

Like Ocean Railroader, I’m just surprised to think that we’d want to build new bridges to carry only three tracks on the spine of the NEC. The existing bridges have lasted over 100 years and carry about 100 trains a day (at a maximum speed of 90 mph), and a few freights at night. If we get the tens of millions of NEC riders you project for >2 hr trip times, I could imagine using four tracks before the next 100 years, or the next 20 years, have passed.

I’m with you on this. I don’t why they don’t go for it — four tracks on every inch of the NEC from NYC to D.C.

The Baltmore and Washingtion DC railroad tunnels are huge bottle necks on the rail lines in how they are very old and narrow. If the replaced the two bridges and the tunnels the NEC would do very well and they could always use more trains.

The rail line from Richmond VA to Washingiton is far worse and there are planns to widen it from Richmond to Washingiton as a three track mainline which would raise train speeds from 25 and 40 miles on hour to 90 and 110 miles on hour.

Section 5.2.2: “Following the evaluation by [techie] panels, the Administrator will review . . . this review will include . . . Ensuring appropriate level of regional balance.”

I assume the regions here are the regions that FRA reported the preapplications under: NE, SE, MW, West. So, yes, the West will get at most $3B (probably less) and some of that will go to Oregon and Washington.

Conversely, getting Chicago-STL to 2 hours requires new HSR tracks, at an estimated cost of $7 billion. Yonah linked to the relevant study a few weeks ago – it estimates $11 billion, but $4 billion of that is budget padding. Unlike the NEC, lines in the Midwest require grade separations, concrete ties, new signaling, and continuously welded rails.

I said that every state’s Congressional delegation will think its state should get 1/50th of the $8 B pie, or $80 mil each. And I got a lot of squawks for saying that. I didn’t say that Wyoming deserved 1/50th of the pie. But if you don’t think they will say they want “their share” then you don’t really understand how the political world works.

I promise you, when Obama and LaHood dish out the gravy, it WILL be spread around, and Cali will not get it all. Not half. Lucky if they get $1 or $2 B. Instead, many biscuits will get a sop of it. Maybe not all 50 biscuits, but probably half of them.

(I count 19 candidates on this list, and still nothing as yet from Minnesota, Ohio, Wisconsin, Colorado, or other potential entrants.)

Same for the Northeast Corridor. There’s a widespread perception elsewhere that the NEC has got all the gravy for a decade or more, while other states went dry. Two important politicians from Illinois involved in this thing probably share that view.

Living in NYC I share this view. So I’m glad to see Maryland and Delaware looking to make some improvements. But to make any breakthroughs in the NEC will cost $15 or $20 billion. Not worth it, not now.

If my brain were working better I’d try to cook up some solid statistical ways to compare bang for buck. But here’s by the seat of my pants: For $2 to $5 billion each route we can get trip times down from 5 or 6 hours or so Chicago-Detroit and Chicago-St Louis to maybe only 2 or 3 hours. Then the passenger count on those routes will increase by a factor 10 or so. For that amount of money, you could shave another 5 minutes off the timetable NYC-DC, and because you can only run one Acela per hour on that crowded line, your ridership on the already-full trains would increase by naught.

So the political reality is to spread the gravy, and in this instance, that will be O.K. from a transport view as well. We will get far greater benefit from improving many parts of the national system than from pouring $10 or $20 more billions into the NEC. Later for it. Not never, but later.