TxDOT: high-speed rail is marathon, not sprint

Plans are only preliminary

Steve Hawley, May 07, 10.

Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) Rail Division Director Bill Glavin says that any high-speed rail system in Texas will take years of meticulous and careful planning to implement, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

Rail advocates have been encouraged by recent steps taken by TxDOT to promote rail. Last year, TxDOT formed the Rail Division and hired Glavin, and this year the division is preparing the first Texas Rail Plan. TxDOT is hosting a series of visioning workshops around the state to seek input on the plan, including a May 17 meeting in Houston.

TxDOT applied for roughly $1.8 billion in high-speed rail stimulus funds last year but was rejected because of the state’s lack of a common rail vision supported by political leaders. Instead, the state got just $4 million to improve signal timing on existing passenger rail tracks. Advocates and rail officials hope the new rail plan will significantly boost the state’s chances of receiving federal funding.

But Glavin noted that the initial rail plan will only discuss broad corridors and will not delve into the exact details of any routes:

“The plan we produce this fall will not have lines on a map. We’re not there yet,” Glavin said. “We will have a list of potential improvements, public and private, freight and passenger rail, and we can begin to lay out the costs and the expected revenues.”

Possible high-speed rail corridors that TxDOT will study include Houston to Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston to Austin, and San Antonio to Fort Worth and continuing to Oklahoma City.

Last year, America 2050 assessed hundreds of potential high-speed rail routes across the country and concluded that a link between Dallas and Houston would be the most viable high-speed rail line outside of the Northeast, which already has limited high-speed rail service, and California, which is currently building a high-speed rail system.

Other Texas routes ranked lower despite their large populations and strong economies, primarily because of a lack of transit connections at either end.

America 2050 report: Where High-Speed Rail Works Best

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