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[QUOTE]Originally posted by Doodlebug: [QB] Y’all, I fear that I’ve helped hijack a thread originally begun to help [b]ehbowen’s[/b] project to compile a list of best trains. So maybe the most recent posts here should be moved somehow to a new thread with a new title. But discussion of what my two home states, California and North Carolina, are doing with passenger rail development is important somewhere in this forum because they are leaders in the United States, and what they are doing may be our window to see the future. North Carolina’s system, at present, does two things. First, it links the state’s three largest cities, Charlotte, Greensboro and Raleigh, using two pairs of daily trains, the [i]Carolinian[/i] and the [i]Piedmont[/i], which are scheduled so that a passenger anywhere along the route can make a round-trip in the same day. They parallel the Interstate 85/40 highway corridor that is the most heavily traveled intercity route in the state. Second, it links the in-state system to the segment of the national Amtrak system that is most important to North Carolinians, the Northeast Corridor. While the [i]Piedmont[/i] consists of state-owned equipment operating over a state-owned corridor (Norfolk Southern’s tracks are laid on state-owned right-of-way dating back more than a century and called the North Carolina Railroad) contracted out to Amtrak, the [i]Carolinian[/i] operates over the same route, and on to New York, with Amtrak equipment. It would not be operated, however, without North Carolina’s additional subsidy. Note the wording posted on any Amtrak schedule of those two trains: “The Carolinian and Piedmont are financed primarily through funds made available by the North Carolina State Department of Transportation.” Two expansions of this system are in various planning stages. One would bring the coastal city of Wilmington into the system, and the other would reach west to Asheville in [b]notelvis’[/b] neck of the woods. North Carolina’s goal in developing this service, with the cooperation of Virginia, another state leader in passenger rail, is essentially to connect the major cities of those two states into the Northeast Corridor with trains that are both more frequent and much faster than Amtrak currently offers, but probably short of electrification. North Carolina’s rail system has an informative website at [URL=http://www.bytrain.org]www.bytrain.org[/URL]. There is a 165-page report on these plans, which includes a description of the kind of trains and their schedules, at [URL=http://www.sehsr.org/reports/rich_vol_1.pdf]www.sehsr.org/reports/rich_vol_1.pdf[/URL]. Georgia and South Carolina may eventually join this effort, but at present they are somewhat behind. Frequent high-speed service from Charlotte would be extended along Norfolk Southern to Atlanta, and then south to Macon. Service would also be extended south from Raleigh along CSX (former Seaboard) through Columbia, S.C., and Savannah, Ga., to Jacksonville, Fla. These plans are outlined at [URL=http://www.sehsr.org]www.sehsr.org[/URL], the website of Southeast High Speed Rail, which is a cooperative effort of the transportation departments of the four southeastern states. Southeast High-Speed Rail has examined routing trains between Raleigh and Columbia through Charlotte on the Norfolk Southern, but so far has favored Raleigh-Columbia along CSX. The reason, according to South Carolina’s DOT website at [URL=http://www.scdot.org/getting/pdfs/SC_SEHSR.pdf]www.scdot.org/getting/pdfs/SC_SEHSR.pdf[/URL], is “The route [through Charlotte], however, would be 60 miles (or 30 percent) longer than the ‘S’ line between Raleigh and Columbia, and due to alignment considerations, negate the potential for faster running over the ‘S’ line, at least in South Carolina.” I’m sure that’s a factor, but overlying that, I believe, is a larger reason, which I alluded to above. The growing cities of the Southeast, such as Charlotte, see transportation links to the already important business centers of the Northeast as their highest priority for future transportation planning. Any examination of the air travel destinations of passengers boarding in North Carolina shows New York and Washington as the most traveled-to destinations. Designing a system that leads to Florida is less important. [/QB][/QUOTE]
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