Downloaded from http://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/memagazineselect/article-pdf/138/02/36/6359634/me-2016-feb2.pdf by guest on 24 September 2021

A privately funded high-speed rail line promises to whisk passengers from to Dallas at 200 mph.

HOUSTON But building the project may divide rural areas even as it unites cities.

PRAIRIE HOME The countryside in Ellis County, , shown here, could soon be split by the grade-separated tracks of the Texas Central Railway. The high speed line will use Japanese bullet-train technology (opposite). Photo (opposite): Texas Central Railway MECHANICAL ENGINEERING | FEBRUARY 2016 | P.37 Downloaded from http://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/memagazineselect/article-pdf/138/02/36/6359634/me-2016-feb2.pdf by guest on 24 September 2021

3dŮbcdͨ@Nbdi;X[ScgNcRS[XVWdSRd_WSNbdWNdNWXVWΌc`SSR It’s easy to believe in high-speed rail bNX[gNiΏdWSGShNc5S^dbN[ΏgNcV_X^Vd_dbNfS[dWb_eVWbebN[ when you are sitting in jammed traffi c 7[[Xc5_e^diͨGShNcͨgWSbS;X[Sc[XfScͥ7[[Xc5_e^diXcYecd on Houston’s Katy Freeway—all 26 lanes of it—or wasting four hours at c_edW_T6N[[Ncͨ`Nbd_TdWS]X[[X_^Ό`Sbc_^6N[[NcΌ8_bdJ_bdW DFW for a 90-minute fl ight. High- @Sdb_`[ShͨN^RXdcSQ_^_]iXcR_]X^NdSRPidWSQXdiͥ speed rail, such as that in Europe, GWSQ_e^diWNRPSS^dWScXdS_TdWSX[[ΌTNdSRN^R[_^VΌcX^QS Japan, and now China, is promoted as QN^QS[SRFe`SbQ_^ReQdX^VFe`Sb5_[[XRSbͨNVXVN^dXQ`NbdXQ[S beautiful, comfortable, quiet, pleasant, NQQS[SbNd_bdWNdWNRPSVe^d_PSQNbfSR_ed convenient, and, of course, fast, none _TdWSe^RSb[iX^VQWN[ZͥGWS`[NQScdX[[ of which can be said about any mode of transportation ^SSRSRRSfS[_`]S^dͼd_VSdXd_ed_T in the U.S. In Europe, dWScWNR_gc_T6N[[NcͨͽcNXR;X[Scͨ bankers take the Eu- gW_XcNfSdSbN^[_PPiXcdN^R rostar from London [_QN[P__cdSbͥ to Paris for lunch ͼG5EcSS]SRd__ŬSbNVbSNd (it’s just two hours _``_bde^Xdid_PbX^VPecX^Scc away) and then dWSbSͨͽWScNXRͥͼJSg_bZSR head back. Shouldn’t we _^N^SQ_^_]XQRSfS[_`]S^d be as civilized ce]]XdT_b7[[Xc5_e^diX^f_[fX^V when we travel, e^XfSbcXdXScͨV_fSb^]S^dͨ rather than hold- By Bridget PecX^SccͨN^RdWSQXdXScͥͽ;X[Sc ing our shoes at T_b]SRNVb_e`ͨGShNc5_^QSb^SR the airport security Mintz Testa 5XdXkS^cͨd_W_[RdWSSQ_^_]XQ checkpoint? But while high-speed rail RSfS[_`]S^dce]]Xdͥ;SdW_eVWddWSGShNc backers have spent decades trying to 5S^dbN[g_e[R`[NiNPXVb_[SX^WXc`[N^cͥ get Americans on board, it has been 4edNTdSb;X[ScN^RWXcVb_e`NddS^RSRdWSŮbcdG5E a losing battle up to now. ’s ]SSdX^VX^6N[[Ncͨ;X[SccNXRͨͼ<QN]SW_]SRe]PT_e^RSRͥ Acela, which is as fast as it gets in the GWSbSg_e[RPS^_e^RSb`NccScΒYecdPSb]cͥ

In 2015, for instance, the TCR obtained Downloaded from http://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/memagazineselect/article-pdf/138/02/36/6359634/me-2016-feb2.pdf by guest on 24 September 2021 $75 million in its fi rst round of fundraising, a step toward the $10 billion it will need to knowledge economy— build the route. one that isn’t limited to What those private companies are fi nding, though, is hotspots like Silicon Valley or that it is easier to draw up a business plan than to build Cambridge, Mass. a railroad. Ahn recently visited South Korea and saw how easy the Korea Train eXpress (top exas is big. Houston is about as far from El speed: 190 mph) makes business trips and Paso as Paris is from Vienna—and no one is meetings, even impromptu ones. suggesting that Texans or Americans gener- “You can meet face-to-face in one day,” ally are going to ditch their cars in favor of Ahn said. “Face-to-face builds trust. It’s dif- mass transit. But two points suggest that ferent from a video conference. If you can high-speed rail could fi nd a niche here. First, get to New York City in 45 minutes from a survey of 1,005 Americans from Septem- Boston, everything becomes one city. HSR ber 2015 showed that, once informed of opens up a lot of opportunities. It lowers high-speed rail’s benefi ts, 63 percent of them barriers to social interactions that include (including 65 percent of Republicans) would sharing ideas, which are the engines of the Tuse such a service if it were available today. Previous HSR information economy.” surveys have shown that even “car people” aren’t opposed Einhorn-Russell added, “HSR could RAIL CARRIAGES to giving up their cars for long trips. be the fuel for economic development in AND PICKUP The second point is that Amtrak hit new—positive—fi - the next decade. Lowering the barriers TRUCKS nancial records in 2014. The U.S. passenger rail company increases competitive advantages.” The Texas Central generated record revenue of $3.2 billion and the lowest The two say that there should be a na- promises a comfortable operating loss since 1973—$227 million. Moody's Investors tional strategy where local or regional HSR 90-minute ride from Service, a company that rates the creditworthiness of busi- strategies—like those in Texas, California, Houston to Dallas in modern coaches (inset nesses and government agencies, renewed the rail service's Florida, and elsewhere—are linked into a top), but the route will rating of A1, the best possible. national one. “HSR offers such an explo- bypass rural spaces Also, the business case for a high-speed rail system is sive model,” Ahn said. between the major cities. stronger than ever. Michael Ahn, assistant professor of It’s a model, however, that would have to Photo (above): Texas Central public policy, and Malcolm Einhorn-Russell, senior fellow be built. Amtrak created its corridor Railway at the Center for Peace, Democracy, and Development, out of the remains of an East Coast rail net- both at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, believe work it inherited when Penn Central went that high-speed rail is the key to building a nationwide bankrupt in the 1970s. Upgrades to that network have had to fi t within the existing landscape of rail infrastructure, some of which is more than a century old, as well as the cities it runs through. Those limitations have made it well-nigh impossible to raise the Acela’s average Boston-to-Washington speed above 65 miles per hour (though individual stretches are faster). Newly constructed track running from one population center to another could in- crease that average speed considerably. In France, where TGV vehicles are designed to run at 200 mph, dedicated track was MECHANICAL ENGINEERING | FEBRUARY 2016 | P.39

built between metropolitan suburbs; those along the way. A train that serves every ven more problematic are the lines then connect to existing railroads to city—decelerating to a stop, then slowly tracks. Standard-issue freight bring trains (at slower speeds) to stations accelerating back to running speed—would track, with its joints and in the center of the city. A high-speed take forever. connections and curves, can’t trip from Paris to Marseilles, for instance, Unfortunately for businessmen in places handle a train going 200 mph. travels more than 400 miles before making like Ellis County, that means watching the The track needs tighter toler- its fi rst stop, bypassing every other city train whiz past. ances and welded joints to keep the trains from shaking

themselves apart. Downloaded from http://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/memagazineselect/article-pdf/138/02/36/6359634/me-2016-feb2.pdf by guest on 24 September 2021 Indeed, engineering the Etracks is one of the biggest challenges in building the TC. “Texas soils have high clay content,” said Shaun McCabe, Texas Central vice TRAILS FOR RAILS president of engineering and environ- Several routes between Houston and Dallas mental. “[This produces] high shrinkage DALLAS were studied by the Texas Central Railway, all of and swelling. Because the track has strict which incorporated existing rail or utility rights of way. The route chosen (in yellow) is a series tolerances, there will be geotechnical chal- of long straightaways and gentle curves. lenges related to civil structures and cor- Image: Texas Central Railway responding performance criteria relative to the track. The track must be relatively fl at. We can’t have shrinkage and swelling UPRR Corridor that has an impact on the track geometry. BNSF Corridor Utility Corridor We’ll investigate innovative technologies to IH 45 Corridor ensure stability both for situations where the track is elevated via a viaduct or on an embankment.” Those technologies include various methods to stabilize the soil, such as geo-membranes, which are fabrics that cover the ground to minimize changes in moisture content. Other techniques include driving pilings or using retained engineered fi ll, where each type of fi ll is designed to address specifi c soil issues. Other challenges are related to the phys- ics of high-speed travel. For instance, to keep down radial acceleration—the force that would push passengers against the wall of the car or throw trains clean off the tracks—high-speed rail alignments have HOUSTON curves so gentle that they look like straight lines. According to a 2015 study commis- sioned by the Texas Central, “In order to support the desired operating speed of 205 mph, the HSR curves would need to have a minimum radius of 17,060 feet.” (Because radial acceleration goes up by the square of the velocity, a track for a hypothetical 300 mph train would need a radius of curvature of more than 7 miles.) The route that the Texas Central is developing runs along utility corridors in the counties between Houston and Dallas. According to Ellis County Commissioner Lane Grayson, the utility corridor route is going to cut the county into mul- n spite of the political objections tiple, virtually isolated segments. “We’ll be greatly impacted,” Grayson said, and technological challenges, “with emergency and school bus routes and farmers who may have to travel maybe the best argument in favor of 10 to 20 miles to get to their property. Even if we do have elevated sections [of high-speed rail in the U.S. is the cost the rail], we don’t know if we can get the big farm equipment under it.” of the alternatives. The prospect of taking more time for farmers to reach their fi elds than “Our population forecast is 50 for London bankers to get to their Paris lunch dates has led to opposition to million by 2050,” said Orville Thom- Downloaded from http://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/memagazineselect/article-pdf/138/02/36/6359634/me-2016-feb2.pdf by guest on 24 September 2021 the project in every county along the TC route—except for Harris and Dallas as, a spokesperson for the California counties, initially the only places where stations were planned. But in Octo- High-Speed Rail Authority, which ber, the company announced a station for northern Grimes County, between is building a Los Angeles-to-San the college towns of Huntsville and College Station. IFrancisco line scheduled to begin limited So, a small victory for “fl yover counties,” but at a cost measured in time. service in 2022. California’s current popu- “A stop is about seven minutes,” McCabe said, “including stop and start.” lation is about 38 million, Thomas said, and already travel on the state’s congested exas Central Railway chose the Japanese (almost Interstate Highway System is rising fi ve perfectly rhymes with Wisconsin) bullet train technology times faster than the rate at which capacity for its trainsets and rail. The Japanese bullet train was the is being added. Flights between Los Ange- fi rst operating high-speed railroad in the world when it was les and the Bay Area are the most-delayed inaugurated in 1964, and it has “demonstrated best-in-class in the country. performance and safety with 50 years of no passenger fatalities If the state built enough new highways as a result of derailments or train-on-train collisions,” McCabe and airports to handle the worsening said. “Nobody else in the world has a perfect safety record.” The Shinkansen established the basic technologi- cal template for high-speed rail. Electric power Tis supplied by overhead lines via a pantograph, the train- sets are lightweight and streamlined, and the trains run over newly built dedicated track. A version of tilting technology, which enables trains to lean into curves and thus take them at higher speeds, was introduced in Japan in the 1970s, but was refi ned elsewhere and is now fairly universal. Distribution of the motors has differed from system to system, with some using a power car (an electric version of the old steam locomotive) at the front and back, while others distribute the propulsion units along each of the passenger cars. Since TC is a private venture, it can disregard stan- dard government requirements for minimum U.S. content or States-side manufacture of the equipment. That means the Texas Central can be pragmatic about where its initial buy of 15 eight-car trainsets will be manufactured. The current plan is for all the power and passenger cars to be made in Japan. However, for the Texas Central, Mc- Cabe said, “The cars are a very small part of the project costs. We are focused on bringing $10 billion to Texas in jobs for civil works alone.” However, should TC accept any federal funds—which, as of now, is not yet determined—McCabe said, “We’re aware of the government’s requirements related to different loan programs and will continue to investigate potential sources of capital investment.”

SLOW TRAFFIC OR FAST TRAIN California is building a high-speed rail system; one station is illustrated in the photo at the top of the opposite page. While track for bullet trains requires a , congested freeways (see inset) create much the same sort of barrier. Photo (bottom): Texas Central Railway. Photo (top of opposite page): California High-Speed Rail Authority MECHANICAL ENGINEERING | FEBRUARY 2016 | P.41

traffi c from popula- does is almost the same as we conduct business and conceive of the tion growth—which those big railroad berms,” national geography. some state politicians said Raphael Clemente, That is, of course, if the companies build- want instead of building executive director of the ing high-speed rail lines can fi nd the right the HSR system—the downtown development alignments between cities without alienat- California High-Speed Rail authority for West Palm Beach, ing residents, businesses, and farmers along

Authority says it would cost where in 2017 a privately owned, the way. Downloaded from http://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/memagazineselect/article-pdf/138/02/36/6359634/me-2016-feb2.pdf by guest on 24 September 2021 more than twice as much as construct- faster-than-Amtrak rail project called All Right now, the HSR reality is gnarly ing the rail system. It would also, according Aboard Florida will connect the city with and controversial. But if it can meet the to the Authority, mean building 4,300 new Miami and Orlando. technological, logistical, and even political highway lane miles, 115 additional airport “To get from my neighborhood to down- challenges, it could change the nation. ME gates, and four new airport runways, which town, you must cross an eight-lane road,” would total an estimated $158 billion. Op- Clemente said. “It splits my city in half.” BRIDGET MINTZ TESTA is a freelance writer based erations and maintenance on new highway Inter-regional passenger car travel and in Houston and a frequent contributor to Mechanical lanes would cost $132.8 billion for more three- to fi ve-hour air fl ights—the kinds of Engineering magazine. than 50 years. trips high-speed rail aims to supplant—are And highway building can create the increasingly plagued by delays, hassles, kind of displacement that rail opponents and bureaucratic security theater. Ahn in Texas and elsewhere object to. “Cars and Einhorn-Russell at UMass-Boston provide almost universal freedom of move- believe high-speed rail can compete in that ment, but what car-based development market, potentially transforming the way

BILLION THE COST FOR CALIFORNIA TO BUILD AND MAINTAIN THE ROAD AND AIRPORT $291 INFRASTRUCTURE. HIGH-SPEED RAIL CAN REPLACE THAT FOR ABOUT $70 BILLION.