5 ms·

The Brightline vision is finally arriving, partially, after three decades of failures in funding and planning. To call that “ahead of the game” is disingenuous.

by itisit 3y ago

rippercushions 3y ago
Brightline is operational and wildly successful between Miami and Palm Beach, expanding soon to Orlando, and it's literally the only higher-speed passenger railway actually built in the US since the Acela. So, yes, it is very much ahead of the game.
- Kon-Peki 3y ago
  The Amtrak Wolverine service (Chicago to Detroit) begs to differ. And just last week the Lincoln service (Chicago to St. Louis) and the Texas Eagle service (Chicago to Dallas/San Antonio) got approval for higher-speed operation. Brightline is very successful, part of which is due to having so few stops, something that a public railroad could never get away with politically. The Amtrak trains stop so often that they spend very little time at their top speed.
- cool_dude85 3y ago
  I don't have access to stats, but is it really particularly successful? I just checked and the Boca - Downtown Miami route takes 51 minutes, compared to (not quite comparable) Boca - MIA on the Trirail in 61 minutes. This, with way fewer stops in between. I can't believe too many commuters are paying a premium price unless they're specifically wanting to go downtown for work.
  - bombcar 3y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brightline#Ridership_by_year https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brightline#Ridership_by_year They had 1.2 million rides in 2022, that's good by any measurement. Pacific Surfliner in Southern California is a wildly successful intercity rail and only had 1.6m rides in 2022. Some people may use them to commute but it's not primarily commuter rail, would be my guess.
    - cool_dude85 3y ago
      Compare to Trirail which now covers largely the same region, opened in 1995 with around twice as many riders (2.5 million). Last stats on the wiki are 4.5 million in 2019.
      - bombcar 3y ago
        Tri-Rail seems comparable to Metrolink or the Coaster - that's commuter rail and often has lower costs and higher ridership, because the average ride is shorter. The San Diego trolley has 63 miles of track and 34 million riders in 2022; but that's an entirely different type of rail that serves a different purpose. Even if it eventually reached all the way to Los Angeles there would still be uses for commuter and intercity rail. Many places in Europe have the various types of rail all sharing the same "lines" or stations, but the ICE is a completely different beast than the Regionalbahn or Regional-Express.
    - cge 3y ago
      The Pacific Surfliner in 2022 may not be a great comparison, as what I believe is the most popular and frequent segment (between San Diego and LA) was out of service for the entirety of Q4, and apparently has been out of service since then, with the exception of 10 days in April.
      - bombcar 3y ago
        I didn’t know that - was it replaced by a bus or just completely gone? Edit: looks like it got bussed: https://www.railjournal.com/infrastructure/aamtraks-pacific-surfliner-to-resume-fully-in-southern-california-after-six-month-suspension/ https://www.railjournal.com/infrastructure/aamtraks-pacific-...
- cge 3y ago
  It's worth pointing out that higher-speed rail is technical jargon used to describe rail services that are not high speed, but aren't slow. Brightline is also apparently only planned to be higher-speed at some point, but currently has an operating speed of 130 km/h, slower than most definitions of higher-speed. There were regularly-scheduled services with comparable or faster speeds in the early 20th century in both Europe and the US; there were faster US services in the 1930 pulled by steam locomotives. Brightline is far slower than high-speed services elsewhere in the world today, going less than half the speed of many TGV services, for example. With that said, as you point out, it's a new intercity service that is actually operational, popular, and being used today, which for the US is an enormously rare feat.

The Brightline vision is finally arriving, partially, after three decades of failures in funding and planning. To call that “ahead of the game” is disingenuous.

by itisit 3y ago

The Brightline vision is finally arriving, partially, after three decades of failures in funding and planning. To call that “ahead of the game” is disingenuous.

rippercushions 3y ago

Brightline is operational and wildly successful between Miami and Palm Beach, expanding soon to Orlando, and it's literally the only higher-speed passenger railway actually built in the US since the Acela. So, yes, it is very much ahead of the game.

Kon-Peki 3y ago
The Amtrak Wolverine service (Chicago to Detroit) begs to differ. And just last week the Lincoln service (Chicago to St. Louis) and the Texas Eagle service (Chicago to Dallas/San Antonio) got approval for higher-speed operation. Brightline is very successful, part of which is due to having so few stops, something that a public railroad could never get away with politically. The Amtrak trains stop so often that they spend very little time at their top speed.
cool_dude85 3y ago
I don't have access to stats, but is it really particularly successful? I just checked and the Boca - Downtown Miami route takes 51 minutes, compared to (not quite comparable) Boca - MIA on the Trirail in 61 minutes. This, with way fewer stops in between. I can't believe too many commuters are paying a premium price unless they're specifically wanting to go downtown for work.
- bombcar 3y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brightline#Ridership_by_year https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brightline#Ridership_by_year They had 1.2 million rides in 2022, that's good by any measurement. Pacific Surfliner in Southern California is a wildly successful intercity rail and only had 1.6m rides in 2022. Some people may use them to commute but it's not primarily commuter rail, would be my guess.
  - cool_dude85 3y ago
    Compare to Trirail which now covers largely the same region, opened in 1995 with around twice as many riders (2.5 million). Last stats on the wiki are 4.5 million in 2019.
    - bombcar 3y ago
      Tri-Rail seems comparable to Metrolink or the Coaster - that's commuter rail and often has lower costs and higher ridership, because the average ride is shorter. The San Diego trolley has 63 miles of track and 34 million riders in 2022; but that's an entirely different type of rail that serves a different purpose. Even if it eventually reached all the way to Los Angeles there would still be uses for commuter and intercity rail. Many places in Europe have the various types of rail all sharing the same "lines" or stations, but the ICE is a completely different beast than the Regionalbahn or Regional-Express.
  - cge 3y ago
    The Pacific Surfliner in 2022 may not be a great comparison, as what I believe is the most popular and frequent segment (between San Diego and LA) was out of service for the entirety of Q4, and apparently has been out of service since then, with the exception of 10 days in April.
    - bombcar 3y ago
      I didn’t know that - was it replaced by a bus or just completely gone? Edit: looks like it got bussed: https://www.railjournal.com/infrastructure/aamtraks-pacific-surfliner-to-resume-fully-in-southern-california-after-six-month-suspension/ https://www.railjournal.com/infrastructure/aamtraks-pacific-...
cge 3y ago
It's worth pointing out that higher-speed rail is technical jargon used to describe rail services that are not high speed, but aren't slow. Brightline is also apparently only planned to be higher-speed at some point, but currently has an operating speed of 130 km/h, slower than most definitions of higher-speed. There were regularly-scheduled services with comparable or faster speeds in the early 20th century in both Europe and the US; there were faster US services in the 1930 pulled by steam locomotives. Brightline is far slower than high-speed services elsewhere in the world today, going less than half the speed of many TGV services, for example. With that said, as you point out, it's a new intercity service that is actually operational, popular, and being used today, which for the US is an enormously rare feat.