Innovation Newsbriefs
Vol. 25, No. 13
Count me among the skeptics…Former Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood liked to justify a national HSR program by drawing a parallel with the commitment to build the Interstate Highway system. But the analogy is misleading. What made the Interstate highway program politically feasible and financially sound was the concept of a user fee collected from millions of highway users and dedicated exclusively to the program. A national rail program could not hope to have this kind of revenue stream. Instead, it would need to depend on massive federal subsidies for years to come.
Archive for the ‘Rail’ Category
Will There Be a “Tipping Point” for High-Speed Rail in the U.S.?
Monday, October 6th, 2014Boston, MA: MBTA Rail Cars Get the Deep-Clean Treatment
Thursday, September 18th, 2014
Tom Mulligan, General Manager of Keolis Commuter Services, and his cleaning crew take on the massive challenge of deep-cleaning MBTA’s rail fleet.
View this complete post...The High-Speed Rail Debate Revisited
Tuesday, August 19th, 2014Innovation Newsbriefs
Vol. 25, No. 12
Two recent columns in the New York Times (both reprinted below) have revived the semi-dormant debate about the future of high-speed rail in America. The first column, by New York Times correspondent Ron Nixon, casts a skeptical eye on the Administration’s high-speed rail program and concludes that “despite the administration spending nearly $11 billion since 2009….the projects have gone mostly nowhere…”
The second column, closely following the first, is an opinion piece by the Times’ editorial board. The editors may have felt obliged to respond to the highly critical assessment of the White House initiative by one of their own reporters.
View this complete post...A 25-Year Transportation Plan for Oklahoma
Monday, August 11th, 2014
The Oklahoma Department of Transportation (ODOT) welcomes you to the 2015-2040 Long Range Transportation Plan website. The purpose of this website is to provide information on the Long Range Transportation Plan and to keep you connected throughout the process.
View this complete post...How to Invest in Fixed-Guideway Transit
Thursday, July 31st, 2014
TRANSPORTATION RESEARCH BOARD
Fixed-guideway transit projects, such as urban rail and bus rapid transit (BRT) lines, are among the largest infrastructure investments that cities and metropolitan areas make. With capital costs ranging from tens of millions to several billion dollars, decisions on whether to build a fixed-guideway transit project, and what kind of project to build, are not taken lightly by local officials or their funding partners. Such decisions may follow many years of planning and analysis at the system, corridor, and project levels. It can cost millions of dollars just to develop and apply the analysis tools that are typically used to evaluate alternative projects.
Modal Shift and High-Speed Rail: A Review of the Current Literature
Wednesday, July 9th, 2014MINETA TRANSPORTATION INSTITUTE
This report provides a review of scholarly literature with direct relevance to the topic of modal shift and high-speed rail (HSR). HSR systems are usually planned on the expectation that they will attract riders who would have chosen other modes (such as air, automobile, bus, etc.) had the HSR not been created. Identifying and measuring the actual ability of HSR to effect modal shift is therefore critical. To establish the most current systematic research on the topic, this report examines the evidence concerning HSR and modal shift in both secondary analyses of previous studies and in newer studies that use primarily original data. The studies that were reviewed comprise a large variety of HSR systems, time periods, data sources, and means of analysis.
Runaway Train: The Reckless Expansion of Crude-by-Rail in North America
Tuesday, June 10th, 2014
OIL CHANGE INTERNATIONAL
This report tracks the rise of crude-by-rail in North America, detailing where crude trains are being loaded and unloaded, how many trains carrying crude oil are crossing the North American continent, and who is involved in this burgeoning trade.
Moving Forward: Bringing Communication-Based Train Control to NYC Subways
Thursday, May 8th, 2014
REGIONAL PLAN ASSOCIATION
The New York City subway system has made strides in recent years in upgrading stations, subway cars and passengers’ experience. But in one crucial area – signaling – the subway system remains antiquated, relying primarily on century-old technology to keep trains running. While New York is in the early stages of converting to communications-based train control, the modern telecommunications system that many of the world’s metro systems rely on today, the pace of change has been slow. At the current rate, a full transformation wouldn’t occur for more than 50 years, putting the city decades behind its peers around the globe.
Women at the MTA New York City Transit: A Celebration
Monday, April 28th, 2014
Visit our website to learn more about career opportunities at MTA New York City Transit: http://web.mta.info/nyct/hr/
-mtainfo on YouTube
The Northeast Corridor and the American Economy
Thursday, April 24th, 2014
NORTHEAST CORRIDOR INFRASTRUCTURE AND OPERATIONS COMMISSION
The NEC Region is home to more than 51 million people and four of the ten largest metropolitan areas in the country. The NEC connects interdependent markets that collectively are a national and global force. Its economy is the fifth largest in the world, ahead of France and just behind Germany. The NEC Region is an international center for education, healthcare, technology, media, and finance, all industries widely expected to fuel economic growth in the 21st century. Research in this report finds that the NEC contributes to the productivity and livability of the Region in ways that increase the nation’s global competitiveness.
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