Official:High Speed Rail Discussion(Omaha to Lincoln)

[S33]

Hey, we can't invest in the future.  That's SOCIALISM.

Nope, Actually socialism is spending public funds on |expletive| (most social programs) without any proven return on the investment.

[wasting money]

Return on the investment? What are you talking about?! The "return on investment" (since you have to put it in capitalistic terms) for investing in social programs is better quality of life and higher standards of living for more people. Is there supposed to be some monetary return that the government receives back that is reflected on its bottom line? Ridiculous.

Unfortunately, Streets, in the real world it's pretty unsustainable to assume investment returns in the form of something intangible with no intrinsic value. My statement above was just more of a broad statement, but I think debating this is pretty useless unless we know specially what "programs" each other is speaking of.

[StreetsOfOmaha]

This could easily have been posted in the Iowa Passenger Rail thread, but I thought here was appropriate, too.

ProRail Nebraska are holding a meeting this Saturday morning at UNO. Here is a little piece the OWH did on it:
http://www.omaha.com/article/20110211/N ... ting-topic

A few highlights (lowlights?) from the piece:

The Iowa Department of Transportation has received $1 million for planning, environmental analysis, route study and preliminary engineering for an Amtrak route between Omaha and Chicago that would run through Des Moines.

As we've talked about, this would be a fantastic addition to our California Zephyr service. We'd have one or two more daily trains to Chicago, and there would finally be train service between Omaha and Des Moines! This would be standard-speed rail, but would lay the foundation for high-speed rail implementation.

The Omaha-Lincoln route, Purdy said, would operate on Nebraska football game days.

The concept, he said, began as a study by Matt Roque, a graduate student at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Roque is scheduled to update the group on the plan.

I'm most-definitely in favor of this, since it's probably the best way to get NU football-obsessed Omahans to experience the virtues of passenger rail. I would see the service quickly being expanded. Unfortunately, I'm sure the trains would be all painted up with Husker logos and colors, but oh well.

President Obama this week called for a six-year, $53 billion investment in high-speed rail. It's not likely that any of the money will come to Nebraska, said Jake Thompson, a spokesman for U.S. Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb.

“The state hasn't shown much interest in getting high-speed rail,” Thompson said.

This is where our state leaders are really playing the fool. Apparently they don't understand that high-speed rail is where we're headed as a nation, and to not lobby for service to the state is putting it at a severe disadvantage. This is tantamount to not having the initial railroads or the Eisenhower interstate system come through your state/city. Cities on the routes grew and those that weren't fell into obscurity.

There are, however, two huge advantages that Nebraska has that make up for the lack of leadership:1) Iowa is on board and is pursuing expanded passenger rail service. Omaha will benefit because it is essentially the anchor of western Iowa and is the logical terminus of a route connecting the state with Chicago. When Omaha/Lincoln rail finally happens, Lincolnites and those within a certain radius of that city will be connected to the system as well. 2) If Denver and Colorado ever want to be connected to Chicago and the East via high-speed rail, the route will most logically connect through Omaha, thus bringing high-speed rail to the state in spite of lackluster Nebraska leadership.

[Seth]

I wish I could go to the meeting, but I'll be very busy working on our house.

[StreetsOfOmaha]

I'm hoping there will be a video of the meeting, or at the very least, a transcript/meeting notes made available. I am very interested in what the selected speakers had to say.

[nebugeater]

This High Speed Rail passenger car was / is in Omaha right now on the BN tracks off of Gibson Road.  You can see the dome at the zoo in the background.  It looks to maybe be a new car headed for the TRE.  
The TRE links downtown Fort Worth, downtown Dallas and DFW Airport.  


IMG_3782 by nebugeater, on Flickr

[thenewguy]

"westside!"

"TRINITY!!"

"WESTSIDE!"

"TRINITYYY!!"

(anyone? :p )

[StreetsOfOmaha]

Cool catch.

Anyone go to the meeting on Saturday?

[mrdwhsr]

This High Speed Rail passenger car was / is in Omaha right now on the BN tracks off of Gibson Road.  You can see the dome at the zoo in the background.  It looks to maybe be a new car headed for the TRE.  
The TRE links downtown Fort Worth, downtown Dallas and DFW Airport.  


IMG_3782 by nebugeater, on Flickr

Nice shot.

LA MetroLink is replacing this same commuter rail passenger car design with newer equipment. There might be several used cars on the market that could be used in a Husker Game Day commuter service?

[bigredmed1]

I just spent a week in New York and New Jersey and I'm now convinced that there needs to be a NebTrain line running from UNL / Memorial Stadium to Eppley. I'll explain more in another post.

As some of you may be aware, years ago, a passenger train DID run between Omaha and Lincoln on game days, so it's not exactly a new idea, but I'm interested in your idea.

And Greyhound had a stop in Millard and downtown in Omaha as well as downtown in Lincoln. On Fridays, a special route ran at 3 pm and then a couple of more runs and similarly on Sunday in reverse from Omaha to Lincoln.

[Cmicah312]

Besides speed, you have to look at gas ($$$) savings for commuters. Lets do the math...

60 miles 1 way (give or take from DT to DT) 120 miles round trip. Even at 30MPG thats 4 gallons a day. 4 times even $2.50. $10 a day times 5 days a week, $50 a week. 4 weeks, $200 A MONTH. Now say a monthy commute pass is $100.

I work with 2 guys that do exactly that (commute from Lincoln to DT Omaha) and they said they'd gladly add 30mins to an hour MORE to their commute to save on their commute costs.

I'm in full agreement that the BNSF line with a few improvements is the way to go for this.

What if we used mag-lev tech? Expensive, but def worth connecting omaha and lincoln together.

[daveoma]

I think we should invest in a hyperloop. Can you imagine Omaha to Lincoln in 15 minutes?

[ScrattyB]

Here's an interesting video on the lack of high speed rail in the USA.


(Sorry, I can't seem to figure out how to embed videos)

[buildomaha]

Yes rail sucks in America (understatement of the post-war world). I really do think they should start creating plans for some sort of high speed rail between the 2 cities. I think both Omaha and Lincoln really are on the cusp of breaking through if they can both keep creating/attracting huge recognizable businesses, implementing policies that will protect their back from the state Continuing to be “not for everyone” (aka conservative social policy), and the urban centers of the two continue to get more dense and “cool” while maintaining growth in suburbs as well. Omaha and Lincoln are much smaller and much further apart that Twin-Cities or DFW, but if a more cohesive region could be created it would only benefit both cities. Heck let’s through DSM on board with high speed rail. The Midwest as a whole needs to get rid of the inferiority complex and start thinking bigger.

[bigredmed1]

Yes rail sucks in America (understatement of the post-war world). I really do think they should start creating plans for some sort of high speed rail between the 2 cities. I think both Omaha and Lincoln really are on the cusp of breaking through if they can both keep creating/attracting huge recognizable businesses, implementing policies that will protect their back from the state Continuing to be “not for everyone” (aka conservative social policy), and the urban centers of the two continue to get more dense and “cool” while maintaining growth in suburbs as well. Omaha and Lincoln are much smaller and much further apart that Twin-Cities or DFW, but if a more cohesive region could be created it would only benefit both cities. Heck let’s through DSM on board with high speed rail. The Midwest as a whole needs to get rid of the inferiority complex and start thinking bigger.

Yes, if you could shoot a highspeed rail out of downtown, then out to Millard and the Data Centers, then down to Lincoln via the tech campus and then downtown, you could get a stable crowd of people to use it if local bus routes, Uber, etc could be linked to a few stops (Downtown O and L, Data Centers, and the NU campi).

[ScrattyB]

Kansas City -> Lincoln -> Omaha -> Des Moines -> Minneapolis
If we're actually being serious about HSR, Lincoln probably would not make the cut.

[ita]

Yes rail sucks in America (understatement of the post-war world). I really do think they should start creating plans for some sort of high speed rail between the 2 cities. I think both Omaha and Lincoln really are on the cusp of breaking through if they can both keep creating/attracting huge recognizable businesses, implementing policies that will protect their back from the state Continuing to be “not for everyone” (aka conservative social policy), and the urban centers of the two continue to get more dense and “cool” while maintaining growth in suburbs as well. Omaha and Lincoln are much smaller and much further apart that Twin-Cities or DFW, but if a more cohesive region could be created it would only benefit both cities. Heck let’s through DSM on board with high speed rail. The Midwest as a whole needs to get rid of the inferiority complex and start thinking bigger.

With our region's history dominated by the railroad, it would be neat to see our region incorporate high speed rail connecting NE's primary urban cities. Omaha could be pioneer (at least in the US) with incorporating high speed rail. For all the talk our government leaders give touting their plans and desires to grow the region economic, investments in infrastructure are key. Would it be practical? Not really, at least not at this time. But it could spur the kind kind of growth and development everyone wants to see in our area and it would open up the whole corridor between Omaha and Lincoln. If not high speed rail, than some other form of transport. We need something more to activate the Omaha-Lincoln region.

Edit: I realized that we are already talking about something that is purely hypothetical, but I know California's just lost federal funding, so I looked up the cost. There is a number out there that it costs about $90 million per mile. For an Omaha to Lincoln route, rounding up to 60 miles, a high speed rail project would cost upwards of $5.4 billion. We can't even get the public and government to be OK with a Streetcar project for $170 million.

[bigredmed1]

Even if we could get rail at 100 miles per hour, we could improve commutes. Recognize that if there were two stops in each city that would require slow speed and then distance to accelerate and decelerate, we would need maybe 30 miles of high speed track.

[buildomaha]

I think the bill for creating regional transit districts that are opt-in for suburbs of Omaha is a great start for public transport. If they could even start with a well marketed, not terrible bus from DTO-DTL that would again be a great start. Maybe overall Nebraskans just need to be eased-in to public transport. I’m super stoked to ride ORBT and to see what Omaha thinks of it. If people heavily utilize it, it could be the first BIG stepping stone in turning public opinion on investment in public transport. I definitely think Omaha streetcar would happen wayyyy before HSR line.
As I’ve said before, Omaha is layed-out perfectly for the city to build out Transport infrastructure because there are so many centers of life spread out throughout the metro (existing and being built currently: DT, MT/Blackstone, UNO/Aksarben, Dundee, West Farm, Millard plus other random developments and major centers that are easily connected via great bus service like Westroads and Village Point(e) (redevelopment of Oak View?), mixed use developments in Sarpy County, Florence and N 30th resurgence.
Nebraska would have to have a HUGE influx of people for anyone to consider connecting Omaha and Lincoln better, but I really do think they should start a planning process maybe structured in the way the Airport Authority created their traffic-driven tiered upgrade schedule.