September 8th, 2010 |
» Proposed extensions to the SkyTrain network could have it reaching to the University of British Columbia or southeast into Surrey.
Of all North American cities over the last few decades, Vancouver has pursued the most steady expansion program for its rail rapid transit system, called SkyTrain. The system, whose first line opened in 1985, was extended with new lines in 2002 and 2009 — and the Province of British Columbia is soon to begin building a fourth alignment. The region’s population has taken to the network, riding at a rate of about 350,000 trips a day, pretty good for
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September 6th, 2010 |
» Plan, yet to be fully laid out, would devote billions to 4,000 miles of new railways, in addition to roads, air traffic, and transit. Congressional approval is unlikely to be easy.
President Obama, at least, is not yet willing to give up on his Administration’s hope to eventually connect 80% of the American population to intercity rail service. After committing $8 billion to such services a year and a half ago during negotiations for the stimulus, the President announced today that he would campaign to devote $50 billion to an improved transportation system, including more spending on high-speed rail, road maintenance,
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September 5th, 2010 |
» This week’s big news. Open thread in the comments.
Follow my Twitter account (@ttpolitic) to get news in real time.
The Transport Politic:
European transport agencies consolidate intercity rail operations in face of competition
Stations picked, huge automated transit project for Paris is closer to realization
Promoting a second stimulus with the goal of actual job creation
Next American City:
Minding the Gaps: Streetcar plans in Detroit and New Orleans (in the magazine)
New Orleans could be up for radical change with the removal of a highway
If transit investment produces jobs, why isn’t there more of it?
Canadians like transit
The Canadian federal government has agreed to
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September 3rd, 2010 |
» Unlike the first stimulus, whose benefits will produce major investments in new transit systems and intercity rail, a second economic push could highlight operations support.
In case you missed the news, the first economic stimulus wasn’t a panacea for the struggling U.S. economy.
Unemployment, around 8% when the bill was passed last spring, has expanded to 9.6%, and the economy isn’t growing nearly as quickly as is necessary to increase employment too full-employment levels. Many economists have suggested from the beginning of discussions at the end of 2008 that the scale of the spending — at less than one trillion dollars —
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September 2nd, 2010 |
» Three intersecting lines will serve mostly circumferential routes around the Paris city core, providing fast trips to a currently under-served clientele.
In the Western World, the most significant rapid transit project currently being contemplated is Paris’ 96-mile Grand Paris network that would extend brand-new automated rapid transit lines across and around the region at the eye-popping price of more than twenty billion euros. If adequately financed, it would be a huge undertaking designed to speed travel between locales now at the periphery of the region’s fast transit network, spurring housing and population growth in the metropolitan area’s suburbs.
Announced more
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August 30th, 2010 |
» As Veolia closes in on Transdev, Deutsche Bahn completes acquisition of Arriva. All before much real competition has begun.
Compared to Western Europe, the U.S.’s intercity passenger rail system seems positively easy to understand, with exactly one major carrier. The Old Continent has a glut of operators providing services along thousands of miles of travel corridors, representing billions of rides every year. In Western Europe, with serious competition in play in the United Kingdom, Germany, and the Netherlands, this makes for a complex system of corporate link-ups and competing systems, as the chart above shows.
With European Union regulations promoting
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