125 mph corridors really make a lot of sense in so many closely spaced medium-sized city pairs in North America, especially given our not-so-great track record building true high-speed rail and decent track record for upgrading classic lines for a somewhat reasonable price. This would be a game changer for the Pacific Northwest.
@@louiszhang3050 250km/h (~155 mph) is the maximun at which "commuter" HS trains work and make sense. I'd say that 200 could be very good for such close stops, but if long stretches of flat land exist, they could push for 250 on those sections
@@kowalskidiazdegeras9190Agreed, at least then transition to linear motors might be possible on the same line. I know it's not exactly a 'current' problem in the current west, but linear motors do make sense in a 'dispersed' metro system
125 mph is the sweet spot because it still allows you to have at grade intersections if need be, just with upgraded barriers and gates, which lets face it should have been standard practice along all rail corridors already... Anything more than that you're talking costly grade separation projects often every mile so along the route which drives up costs significantly.. In other words? Welcome to the law of diminishing returns... For 3X the cost you get only a small bump in overall line speeds...
@@kowalskidiazdegeras9190 Just as long as they are grade separated above 150 mph/240 km/h... In fact in most places it's 125 mph/200 km/h... But for rural areas with few overall crossings I agree. Or better yet use Interstate corridors that already are grade separated, then you can run trains even faster with no worries as to interference...
@@stickynorth well, I disagree. Everywhere in Europe, at-grade crossings are being removed, and a line upgrade is a very common excuse to finally have an overpass done. At least in Spain and France, at-grade crossings are only allowed at a maximum of ~100mph. There are literally like 4 level crossings allowed for 125mph in France, and they are literally manned (probably the very last on the country)... so yes, I do consider full grade separation to be important, specially since we've been building fully separated lines for literally a century by now
I'm just glad that all transit (Sounder, Link Cascades, ferries, kc metro, etc) within the State of Washington is free for those under 18. Maybe changing the habits of the next generation will help build support and raise expectations of what public transit can offer!
That explains so much. I've been so surprised to see families and even kids by themselves waiting at bus stops for hourly buses, something that is very unusual in Minnesota or Wisconsin. It's even unusual the single-family neighborhoods of Madison, WI, which has a lot of great citywide transit usage. I would love to see free transit for those under 18 adopted across the country.
@@AdventureBeeMC BTW this policy is funded by the Climate Commitment Act, Washington's Carbon Tax. Securing the future for youth in more ways than one!
I get a kick at all the families that board the northbound train at the various Washington stations (Long View, Centralia, etc.) to catch a Mariners game. They make a fun day trip out of it. I envy those kids cause it looks like the families are having a lot of fun -- they bring board games and picnic baskets.
I looked into why this isn't the case awhile back. It's purely because ST pays BNSF for access to the rail. They have to pay more to get more frequent routes, so they only prioritize ones with high enough demand for it to be worth it. Would be nice if ST owned the rail! To add insult to injury, there are several stops that the Sounder makes between Seattle and Tacoma that Amtrak Cascades doesn't. Amtrak just drives right through Kent, Auburn, Sumner, and Puyallup and doesn't stop until Tacoma. Everything south and east of Tukwila is underserved as a result. That's a lot of people in those areas. When the Sounder isn't running, the only alternative I'm aware of is the 578 bus. Doable, but not a nice experience, and takes a long time to get where you're going. Trains are so pleasant compared to buses.
@@staind2523 the ol' "but but but there's no demand!" Demand doesn't happen immediately, but there are probably a lot of trips that can't happen because there's no possibility of them. I would have _loved_ to take the Sounder to the state fair this past fall, but the fair is fun, and getting to the 07:00 train at Edmonds station is the opposite of that.
It shouldn’t be so difficult to have an hourly service on this route so people can count on the train as an alternative. That’s how it started in my country and now we have 15-30min intercity trains throughout the country, which means that on certain busy tracks there is a 10min service, almost metrolike. Together with the commuter trains there are even more, especially on four track routes. You should start building trust in people that if they mis a train within an hour there is another train. Reliability is so important for people who consider to switch from car to train.
Comes down to greedy Warren Buffet and BNSF charging an arm and a leg. Also Sound Transit has incompetent mayors from the suburbs wasting money on parking garages instead of frequency.
I ride the Cascades route pretty frequently, usually between my home in Tacoma to Portland. I like it a lot, but it really could be a LOT better. Yes, higher speeds would be nice. However, I think service frequency and reliability improvements are more important at this time. This is what I would do: -Bring the rights of way under public ownership to fast-track improvements and make it cheaper in the long-term. -Build a new passenger terminal in central Olympia and upgrade existing track to accommodate passenger trains. -Run Sounder trains in both directions all day, 7 days per week, between the pie-in-the-sky downtown Olympia station and Everett, using the current Olympia-Lacey Amtrak station as a transfer point. -Improve track infrastructure along the entire corridor to increase comfort and reduce wear and tear on rolling stock. A modest speed improvement from 79 to 90mph will likely follow suit. -Increase frequency from 6tpd to 10tpd between Seattle and Portland, and run 6tpd through from Eugene all the way to Vancouver. The section between Mt. Vernon and Bellingham would be tricky, but if we prioritize passengers over freight, I think it's doable. -Add the stations you mentioned between Vancouver and the border. You're spot-on with that one. -Electrify the whole dang thing for reliability and environmental reasons. If Switzerland can do that reliably over tough terrain, why can't we? We Cascadians have the potential to have a seriously enviable rail corridor. All we need is the political will to make it happen.
@@narglefargle I agree with everything you said, but there’s one thing that I don’t agree with. The part where you said 6 trains per day is quite a lot, considering the whole trip would take about 7 or 8 hours to complete. Of course, an EMU would do the trip faster, but it would still take several hours to complete the trip.
@@nathanborino456 That's normal in Europe with their true high speed trains. And there is more and more routes getting added there all the time, and they're not just night/sleeper trains, either. In example, Paris-Milano. Or Zurich-Zagreb. Wien-Bucharesti. Those are just _some_ of the many different routes that this is a reality of, and yes, they often sell out each run. You're not trying to make the trip lose 3 hours off a 6 hour trip, realistically. That's not the point. Yes, time savings is a important aspect of it, but it is far more than that, and yes, there will always be plenty of folks willing to ride a entire line for 6+ hours if it is cheaper than planes and beats car travel. For the Portland-Eugene segment, it is almost entirely flat, so realistically, speeds easily can be maxed out for most of the segment barring obvious station areas and development/airports. It is the Sound region that is the problem for many reasons, primarily the lack of space needed to tunnel, and said tunnel would have to pretty much perpetually travel under the entire Seattle-Tacoma metro until around Everett, due to heavy development and major space constraints. North of there, other than the small mountains to the south of Bellingham, it too is pretty open and flat to the south end of the Vancouver metro.
Electric trains operate better than diesel, but increasing electricity has been from fracked natural gas (not solar panels or even wind). Gas is the largest energy source for the western power grid, despite illusions. I agree that reliability and fixing the slow spots would make the most difference in the short term ... and federal funds for better trains seem less likely after Jan. 20, 2025.
@@markrobinowitz8473Electric vehicles and trains are still on average less emissive per KM than when powered directly by gasoline or diesel, even if that power is generated with coal. Larger power plants are simply miles more efficient than tiny combustion engines, then that electricity is used in a vehicle with almost negligible losses. Also as you said has reliability benefits, and if you're still worried about the environment, those same vehicles will get cleaner over time as gas fired plants are replaced.
@@planefan082 In reality, gas fired electricity is increasing substantially - due to accelerated fracking. We'll see which geological predictions are correct in terms of depletion, but gas is the largest energy source for electricity generation - even in the west. Emissions aren't the only consideration, availability of power is also a concern, even if depletion is unpopular to discuss.
As a Portlander, my biggest issue with Amtrak Cascades is the lack of late night service for when events get out. I can deal with a 3hr travel times, but having to wait from 23:30 to 07:00 for the next train absolutely sucks.
I've taken Amtrak in the PNW a couple of times and both times we hit delays due to right of way issues. If those could be hammered out and the reliability/frequency of the route increased it'd be a real joy to take this underrated route.
Just build more lanes for the train tracks. Boom, problem solved. If there is a traffic right of way issue, take another lane. Or build a bridge over the train.
@@nicklibby3784 It's traffic delays due to freight trains. BNSF and other freight railroads own most of the rails in the US. They are supposed to allow scheduled passenger trains to travel without delays per federal law, but they ignore the law and make the passenger trains wait for comparatively slow freight.
10:45 They are building a new pre clearance facility in BC for this service, so border crossings should get easier! Amtrak is also working on one in Montreal for the Vermonter extension to Montreal and one in Windsor for an extension of a Wolverine to Windsor for transfers to the Via corridor
Yea, that should eliminate the secondary check at the border. Right now, they have initial pre-clearance in Vancouver, it seems like the new facility will be full-preclearance (like the airport).
Funny you talk about this! I went on a day trip from Vancouver to Seattle yesterday-earlier this week when planning it out, I really wanted to make the Cascades work, but seeing that the train took twice as long as driving and that the only morning trip was already fully booked, I just couldn't justify it. Still, while I was able to do the day trip, 3 hours of driving in both directions was quite the chore. I saw a news article recently talking about true high-speed rail and while it'd be nice, I thought it'd be so pie-in-the-sky that I'd be too old to really appreciate it. Your ideas here sound a lot more feasible and give me hope that I'll be able to pop down to Seattle more easily, rather than having to plan weeks in advance for it. Plus, even 120mph is 50% faster than the absolute fastest I was able to go on the I-5!
A lot of the extra time on the Vancouver-Seattle section is the time spent going through customs, pre-clearing international passengers before even boarding would be better than the current approach.
I traveled to Seattle from Vancouver with Amtrak Cascades just last month! It was definitely different from my experiences in Europe, because the train stopped often and I had to be at the station very early. The views more than made up for it though. I actual had difficulty getting the return tickets, because the train was entirely sold out that day: Swifties travelling to Vancouver for the last concert. When booking the train I was surprised to see that there were only two trains per day and all the rest was buses.
This is a great proposal! I think this upgrade for the Oregon section of the cascades, from Portland to Eugene, in the Willamette Valley would have especially great potential: - The corridor is perfectly suited for rail as it is not very large (112 miles) - It is almost completely flat (unlike most of Oregon) with all the state’s largest cities in the middle - 70% of Oregon's population lives within the Willamette Valley I think the section between Portland and Albany should follow the existing Cascades corridor but the section between Albany and Eugene should try to create a new corridor that includes Corvallis. The corridor would be extremely popular among college students so it is pivotal to connect the 27,000 PSU students in Portland, 33,000 OSU students in Corvallis, and 23,000 UO in Eugene. A brightline-esque service is very possible and should be a politically feasible. The existing right of way between Corvallis and Monroe is actually owned by Benton County (County containing Corvallis). The main obstackes would be to create a new corridor between Corvallis and Albany and Monroe to Junction City but these rights of ways could follow the existing highways in place and are very doable.
@rabbbirumba2397 interesting idea, I hadn't accounted for the college populations across the Willamette Valley. I could definitely see the lines getting a fair bit of use during the sports seasons at those schools. As a side note, this was the opening project for my first playthrough of the game NIMBY Rails, minus the connection to Corvallis, of course. If you've never heard of it, I highly recommend giving it a try, its a lot of fun designing your own rail networks on a real life map of the world
There is no existing right of way from Eugene to Corvallis, it stops in Monroe and doesn’t go all the way. But I agree, that would be a very successful line
Personally, I've always thought that a separate commuter service Corvallis-Junction City-Eugene would be a better way than rerouting Cascades out there. Both bus options add like an hour of travel between EUG and PDX diverting to OSU which is one of the reasons Cascades is so much nicer in the first place.
@@wooglefurf yes you are correct one of the counties owns the row from Eugene to Monroe. That being said I feel it could be possible to build an elevated line following Pacific Hwy W to Junction City, then following the existing rail line to Eugene.
Definitely agree with Reece. You do not need super fast high speed rail for this corridor. Just faster reliable service. We take for granted at how good the GO Train service is for the GTA with respect to North American commuter services. Also a station at White Rock is a must.
If they want faster service some capital improvements will be needed including long passing sidings or additional track. So that would help with the freight train issue. Here in the northeast where the Acela was extended to Boston a third track was added for the freight railroad to still provide service without causing delays to the high speed passenger trains. As noted I would not try for higher high speed service but concentrate on beating normal driving times.
@@walawala-fo7dsthere’s a ton of places where grade crossings could be removed, new segments could be built, turns could be rounded, and double or triple tracking can take place to dramatically improve speeds
@@walawala-fo7ds Most delays to Amtrak on the Seattle/Vancouver portion happen north of the border. BNSF does a good job of keeping Amtrak moving, but the CN is terrible at it. Amtrak has to thread its way through a busy yard to get to Pacific Central Station in Vancouver, and like clockwork, has to stop and wait for a 10,000 ft stack train to clear/depart/be yarded. This adds hours in delays sometimes. Another hurdle is the Fraiser River bridge which multiple subdivisions converge into a single-track swing bridge and that too, adds delays when water traffic is high or the bridge is occupied by a freight train.
I've been working on high speed rail in this region for several months now and what I can tell you is this: WSDOT's vision of 200-250mph (320-400kph) trains is a pipe dream with this geography, but 135-185mph (220-300kph) is feasible and would still offer game-changing travel times of around an hour to 1h15m between the major cities. We don't need to water it down all the way to conventional speeds (90-125mph/145-200kph)
The main issue with going over 125mph is it basically requires electrification. 125mph is pretty much the upper limit for diesel, as that is about the performance limit of diesel engines that comfortably fit into locomotives. A 150mph diesel would require significantly more powerful engines which would be both physically larger and heavier and use significantly more fuel.
@@mrvwbug4423 Well, if any region could justify electrification, it is this one, seeing as hydroelectric power is the backbone of the BC and WA grid (not sure abpout OR, but I imagine them too).
@ There used to be a lot more electrification of the US rail system until the postwar period, especially in the rust belt. A lot of the electrification was ripped out in the late 40s and 50s.
As a regular user, just fixing the kinks in the line and building a third track so we aren't constantly in conflict with freight would make the line very very competitive. Just being able to go 75/80mph the whole time would make the train faster.
On the other hand, if your building new curves and right of way anyway, you are looking at a similar sized project to take a curve from 30 to 70 as from 30 to 150. About the only difference is a few more property acquisitions, but those will only get more expensive as time goes on and you are left with being able to cruise at top speed for much longer.
@sonorioftrill good point, in a lot of cases, its cheaper in the long run to upgrade an alignment to much higher speeds in the first place in order to "future proof" the system. Otherwise, you'll likely have to come back 30-50 years later to straighten the alignment again
This ! I honestly think the cheapest solution would be to simply pay BNSF to not run trains when Amtrak runs. They’d probably need to create additional sidings to make this work but it seems much more feasible than obtaining and building new rails. I also wish they’d run Cascade Express trains which go direct from SEA to YVR (maybe also Bellingham?) Add a couple of express trains and 1-2 more of the 5 stop trains with minimal freight delays and you’d have a pretty solid system that would break the bank (relatively speaking!)
As cool as it would be to have true HSR here, I've held the same opinion that we don't really have the population to support it. But as you said, there are plenty of other smaller improvements that would be worth pursuing. I definitely agree with more stations in BC.
With how long California high speed rail is taking we would have the population to support it if we kept building housing at the rate the Governor wants
Again an amazing video! Simple to understand and with a good goal! In germany, some rail corridors (For example Munich-Augsburg or Hamburg-Berlin) were upgraded for speeds of about 200-250 km/h although they’re not exactly high speed corridors and now, the Karlsruhe-Basel corridor is going to be upgraded
Im surprised you haven't brought up much regarding infra improvements in Canada, especially considering it takes well over an hour to get from Blaine to Pacific Central, and thats before adding time due to the bottleneck that is the Fraser River Swing Bridge (I rode the cascades last summer, and we waited 90m to cross it). A white rock tunnel could help, but i honestly feel way more needs to be done to make Van Seattle competitive before we even begin considering adding infills.
I did the Mount Vernon, WA, to Vancouver trip via Amtrack this summer. The segment from just north of the border into Pacific Central was agonizing. I could have ridden my bike faster than the train took for the last segment. The other major issue is the condition of the coaches. On the return trip, we had to exit two coaches away because they couldn't get the doors in our coach to open, even using the manual override. Safety? Nah. We don't need any safety considerations.
Yeah, if they are serious, this "swing bridge" route has got to be replaced by something else. I'm not sure why they think White Rock would need a tunnel when the route can take the gap of flat land along the Nikomekl but anyways, yeah they need to plan out some track and bridge improvements.
I've taken Amtrak for Vancouver - Seattle twice. Once on the train and once on the bus. On the bus, we stopped at the normal border crossing CBP station. The bus almost left without me because I was the only one (not American or Canadian) who needed extra paperwork. On the train, there was CBP preclearance at the station on the platform before boarding the train, then the train stopped on the border anyway while CBP agents got on and checked everyone's passports.
Remember when we traveled from Prague to Košice by train before Czechia and Slovakia entered the Schengen, pasport control happened on the move, border control get in in Bohumín and left ať Čadca.
I feel like we should have at least one round trip between Vancouver and Eugene. currently, there are no trains doing the full route and I feel like even though Eugene isn’t as big as Portland, it would be nice to have that option for the people who live in Eugene.
They don't because that distance would almost definitely require a crew change. FRA rules put a limit at 12 hours for the crew. Looking at the current schedule the 517 is scheduled into Portland from Vancouver BC at 3:35. The 507 which goes Seattle to Eugene get's into Portland at 5:45, so 2 hours 10 minutes difference. We then take the 507's arrival in Eugene at 8:47 and subtract that 2 hours 10 minutes to get a theoretical arrival time of the 517 at 6:37. It left Vancouver BC at 7:15, but the crew doesn't start right at 7:15 so that ~45 ish minutes is not enough time, especially if any delays occur. So we need to do a crew change, the logical places to do that are Seattle (on a train north) and Portland (on a train south). Congrats, you've just rebuilt the existing schedule while paying for 2 more full crews to add on the Eugene section. Would that be awesome to have a full length train? Yeah. But if you're paying for 2 more full crews you might as well get the most out of them with either a new daily Seattle-Eugene run in each direction or a Portland-Vancouver run in each direction.
100% agree here, this is an attainable goal for the region, and something that would give a real alternative to driving and flying even at 125mph. I can say from using 125mph MARC trains between DC and Baltimore that they would be a game changer.
I just took the Amtrak Cascades from Seattle to Portland for Christmas! Overall the experience was good- much better than driving I-5 in the rainy howling dark. However, the wi-fi was totally broken which was a huge disappointment, and we had to wait 10 minutes for a freight train to cross the Columbia on the way back. The whole trip took about 5 hours, or twice as long as it would have been driving. Overall I'd recommend it, but I still think improvements are necessary if it's going to be a clearly better alternative to driving. Right now it's a tossup.
I think the German solution is actually the best option here. Start by upgrading some of the straighter sections of track to 200 km/h, and the very slowest sections get bypassed by new true HSR sections built for 300 km/h. If you're already doing new-build, then there's no reason to not go all the way. But most of the route doesn't need new built lines, and can make do with upgrades.
Having spent time very recently in Washington State, mostly Bellingham, I've been really surprised and impressed by how much usage the transit gets here compared to Minnesota. Even hourly bus service out to residential neighborhoods in smaller towns seems heavily used. I've seen way more people waiting at bus stops in single family neighborhoods here than I would in suburban Minnesota or just about anywhere else in the US (though I've spent very little time in the Northeast apart from New York and Long Island). There is so much pent-up demand for transit, and we have the interminable, unsolvable congestion on I-5 to thank for that. People also just seem way more comfortable venturing outside when there's a chance of rain, going out for family walks even in moderate rain. I guess the flip side is that Midwesterners are much more likely and willing to go outside for a leisurely walk when it's -10°C than when it's raining.
I took Cascades once. The speed once we crossed into US was OK but the journey from pacific central to Blaine took 1 1/2 hours. It needs a new alignment and a Minimum speed of 100 Miles per hours. They can build the train along the highway meridian. The Passport Control should be moved at the border rather than at Vancouver Pacific central. Add stops along Richmond/Surrey.
One good thing about getting the speed up to 200km/h by picking the low hanging fruits, is that you can strategically leave the higher hanging fruits for later. 200km/h for the majority of the tunnel, except for a few challenging sites will make it easier to argue for upgrading properly. You can't really argue for spending a lot on an upgrade that will save 5 minutes on a 5 hour ride, but 5 minutes on a 3 hour ride is a more significant improvement. And if you've left an old bridge with a 100km/h speed limit, but with 200km/h tracks on both sides, it also makes the argument for a 250km/h bridge easier, as you will actually have a chance to utilize the extra speed.
AGREED! Been saying it for years. 125 mph/200 km/h is good enough for MOST corridors to make trains speed competitive without having to build hugely expensive new greenfield routes ala California HSR which have shown the perils of doing so in a North American context. And even if you wanted to build new lines, the engineering costs are reduced significantly at these speeds than vs 150 mph or higher... If the continent could stitch together a consistent network of services running at these speeds day or night? You could probably slice the number of trips made by car or plane in half... And prevent ever having to add that "just one more lane" to every freeway...
I live in Seattle and take the Amtrak to Portland to visit family probably 10 times a year. The amount of delays that train gets is absurd. It also moves at what feels like is a snails pace. Granted, it’s nice to not have to drive, but still. Let’s pick up the pace! I also personally find the seats to be pretty uncomfortable but YMMV
I ride this once a week! I'm so excited to see you made a video on it. Edit: now that I've watched, I have some thoughts. By far and away, the biggest problem with current cascades service is reliability. Of the top of my head, causes of delay include: * Lift spans over the Willamette or over the Columbia refuse to close due to hot/cold weather * Freight traffic in the way * Passenger train traffic in the single track point defiance bypass * Mechanical issues with the trainsets * Mechanical issues with the tracks * Slow orders due to workers on tracks * Losing signal with PTC Making the service reliable would be huge. The next biggest issue is travel time. Shaving just 20 minutes from Portland to Seattle would make it competitive with driving. Coming in third, for me, is frequency. Granted, I am only riding the Seattle Portland section, but greater frequency would only be a nice to have for me
Truly going to miss the optimistic outlooks and practical suggestions that make this channel feel like sitting around with mates talking about how to make things better rather than the hopless complaining. Thanks dor your channel mate from Australia! Hope you find the time to post here and there. Cheers
The rail infrastructure on the Canadian side of this corridor is a hot mess. The mandate that gives Amtrak priority in the States (and yes, contrary to popular belief, Class 1's _do give_ Amtrak priority) does not exist in Canada. The CN treats the tracks as if they are first come first serve. Amtrak often has to wait for CN trains to clear, be yarded, or depart to arrive at the Pacific Central Station. Those delays can be hours sometimes. Some days you fly right in and land on time. Others, you sit for 3 hours waiting for a 10,000 ft stack train to be cut up and yarded. Another issue is the rail congestion in Metro Vancouver. And getting in via the Fraser River bridge which is one of the only ways into the city and is a massive bottleneck. Waiting your turn at the bridge can cause major delays as well. And finally, track speeds are slow. Topping out at 60 mph for less than half of the run north of the border. North of the bridge max speed is 40 for Amtrak. From Mud Bay to White Rock you have two sections of 60 mph that combine for barely a couple of miles. The rest is 35, including the 15 mph Bridge 127 and a 21 mph head end restriction through White Rock. Running in Canada is slow, congested, and unpredictable. _Source: an Amtrak Seattle engineer._
I got stuck waiting to come in to Pacific Central once for 3 (!) hours because a CN train stalled at the throat going into the rail yard. It was a complete mess. We didn't arrive until after 1AM.
The relatively low population of the PNW not being dense enough to justify the high costs of HSR is something City Nerd pointed out in one of his videos as well, supported by mathematical formulas. But he didn't suggest using hSR (200 kph/125 mph) instead, which you did here. We have the backbone for an improved rail corridor, but for decades the will to build the improvements has been lacking. If Tri Met, Sound Transit, and Metrolink could work togather and assist Amtrak on making this a reality, it would be a boon to the area.
Metro, Amtrak don't own the right of way. there is nothing for them to improve. This is freight companies congested line tracks so passenger rail has no business trying to improve anything. build a proper alignment for passenger rail instead of wasting money paying freight companies for bad track use
@chris51lee Highway expansions will happen anyway. The I5 bridge needs replacement regardless and will happen regardless and 405s widening is completely unaffected by anything going on with passenger rail because it is a regional highway not a destination highway.
Gutted to hear about your departure from TH-cam, but honestly pretty damn glad your last regularly scheduled video is about a project in my backyard, and one that'd pretty fundamentally change our transit network over here on the west coast. Best of luck in the future, and thanks for all the good times!
I love trains but I took this once from Vancouver to Seattle last year and gave up on it. This sounds great, but for now just two things would make this usable: not waiting over an hour at a time for a freight train, and going more than 30km/h on the Canada side. I think those alone could save 2+ hours based on the trip I made.
As a native of the PNW, we really need to sort out the trackage rights and service frequency (for both Sounder and Amtrak) issues. Sadly, it's down to the freight railroads (BNSF & UP) and politicians (Tim Eyman) scuttling those plans.
@walawala-fo7ds Which is weird because everyone wins if they did. Government can improve the track and service and be popular, and the freight companies don't have to pay for track upkeeps anymore. And yet for some reason the freight companies don't want to lobby for it.....
I appreciate your pragmatic approach to urbanism. The main reason I take the Cascade is because driving on I5 is stressful. 125mph train would make it much more worth it!
Yes! An important part of the Tokaido Shinkansen between Tokyo and Osaka is the frequency. For success the Cascades HSR would have to be faster than driving, including waiting for a train.
I don’t know that it needs to be faster. At a certain point many folks will probably sacrifice some time if it means a more pleasant experience. For example, if I have to head into downtown Seattle I’ll usually take the bus not because it’s faster but because I can use the time on the bus to Netflix and chill rather than staring at the bumper in front of me. It takes me an extra 15-20 mins but it’s time better spent. If they can get the travel time to within an hour of driving AND make it reliable I think more people would go for the train. especially given how long the Peace Arch crossing can take.
Great ideas! There is another major pinch point between Seattle and the border. The track through Edmonds for freight and passenger lines is only ONE track forcing both freight and passenger trains to take turns getting through and greatly limiting how many trains can be scheduled to travel that section.
Great video as always, and I appreciate the research you did on the PNW corridor (as well as your lived experiences in metro Vancouver). There are four significant issues with this corridor that weren't addressed in the video: landslides, freight priority, scheduling, and lack of infill stops in the north seattle area. This causes Amtrak north of Everett to be incredibly unreliable and slow, and challenging to use if you want to get to anywhere north of downtown Seattle. It is very common during winter months for the route to be at risk, as much of the route is a single track squeezed between an unstable bluff or cliff and the Salish Sea. Therefor, they often cancel the train and replace it's service with a bus. But if you manage to get on the train, it doesn't take the advertised 2 hours and 26 minutes (which can often take only 1 hour and 20 minutes by car). In 15 years, I've never had the train delayed less than 1 hour. The worst trip I had on Amtrak had a 4-hour delay, which turned a 1hr 20min drive into a more than 6-hour trip (after six hours I gave up waiting for the train to leave the Edmonds station, and instead had someone drive me from Edmonds down to Seattle. I have no idea how long it took the train to go from Edmonds to Seattle, but the passengers probably got a nice view of the sunrise as it was midnight when I stepped off the train). Traffic in Seattle is bad, but traffic on the BNSF line is worse. The frequent Amtrak delays most likely are to give way for passing coal-trains on the single-track sections of the line. Then there is scheduling. There are only two trains per day south of Vancouver BC/Bellingham to Seattle, one in the morning, one in the evening. The morning train leaves at 9:15am, and arrives at 11:45am. Its not a bad time choice, but it definitely makes it impossible to use for a morning meeting in Seattle, and wastes half the day. The other option is the evening, leaving Bellingham at 6:45pm and arriving in Seattle-theoretically-at 9:10pm, in the industrial and stadium district of Seattle. Its not a great time for transit, walking, or biking in SODO at 9:10pm, let alone the more realistic arrival time of midnight (at which Light Rail closes on weekends) or if very delayed 1am (at which Light Rail closes on weekdays). With the evening trip such a challenging option, there is only realistically one somewhat convenient train south each day, the 9:15am train. The last challenge with the corridor is the lack of stations between Edmonds and Seattle. Edmonds isn't a convenient transit hub to begin with, and the distance between those two stations is long. This means if you have to get to somewhere like Shoreline, Northgate, Ballard, or the University of Washington, you have to spend a lot of time backtracking north after your trip south. The last thing I will mention is that while it looks like there is enough space to tunnel through downtown from King Street Station, Sound Transit has been studying it and has almost completely ruled it out for their expansion of Light Rail due to limited space and disruption to the Chinatown International District. Due to ST's findings, I don't think a dedicated passenger rail tunnel north of King Street would be considered by any future agency. The only option I see from King Street Station would be if we traded the existing tunnel with BNSF in exchange for building a dedicated freight tunnel starting much further south and going very deep underground, bypassing the crowded infrastructure and re-emerging north of Downtown near Myrtle Edwards Park.
Seattlite here. I take the Cascades every time I go to visit family in Portland but find myself using intercity buses to Vancouver. The 8:30am-12:30pm Cascades schedule is too long and eats up most of the day. I will say the death of Boltbus and gradual death of Greyhound is a big driver of Cascades recent ridership boost. Greyhound is rapidly disintegrating in the PNW like elsewhere. The Cascades (and Cascades buses) really will be the only way within a few years.
Amtrak Cascades IS a great service. On my last trip down to Portland I wore my Amtrak hat my girlfriend got me for my birthday and got into a great conversation with a couple of the staff (one of them showed me a commemorative pin he got for his service!) and it was awesome hearing their insight and thoughts on how to improve service. You make a really good point on speed - especially given the geography. Landslides can be sorta common along the corridor between Portland and Seattle - which in my experience meant getting onto buses and then going to each individual station along the route. The problem is that now that we've switched over to auto traffic and whatnot, the stations (thinking of the Lacey/Olympia and Centralia/Chehalis stations in particular) are wayyyyyyyyyy off the freeway and it added several hours to the trip. Not sure how to really get around that, unfortunately.
I don't think adding stations is agood idea, at least not for local ridea. If such a service is needed they should add station but run local trains for the local service. That said, if yourealy want to you can do it. The Eurostar from Brussels to London was required to make a stop at Lille but that creates a similar oroblem as when you get on the Eurostar to/from London checks are made at the origin (by UK officers in Europe and Franch ones in London) and Lille is inside Schengen with no passport control. The solution was a specific car for those traveling to Lille so you cannot leave it to go to ather parts of the train. Not a great soliution but it works.
This looks to me like the ideal place to build a high speed line the German way. Build faster sections in the slowest/most congested parts (250kph could probably do), 4-track a few sections, and use local networks to enter the cities. The only "difficult" part to me seems crossing Seattle with really not much space to run new tracks on existing corridors and the new tunnel required.
"Some tunnels" is an understatement. There's a freight line from Eugene to Roseburg that hauls a lot of lumber, but south of there is VERY mountainous and unlikely to attract billions to extend it to Grants Pass. Medford doesn't have that many people and in the unlikely event there's billions for Cascadia rail, Eugene - Portland - Seattle - BC is the priority. Sorry.
I think that would be awesome. It is unfortunate that people really think that there isn’t a place for rail for cities of that size, but there certainly is. I would absolutely find myself in Southern Oregon more often if there was even just a slower rail line out there. Hopefully one day 😎
Love it! I live in portland, commute to Vancouver, WA and I have family near the Tukwila station in the Seattle metro. I use this a lot, but it definitely needs some big upgrades to make it competitive.
I’ve taken the Cascades to Seattle or Portland many times. You are right, top speed not that important to me, but fast enough to beat I-5 though would be good.
I took the train from Sacramento to Vamcouver a few years ago and it was by far the worst public transport I've ever experienced. So much room for improvement.
Ugh, having hourly Sounder trains, especially on weekends, would be an absolute game-changer just by itself. My experiences with ST a few years ago were really underwhelming. You really got the feeling that they lacked ambition.
Very surprised there was no mention of *tilting train technology* which has been successfully deployed in Europe. On the London - Glasgow route (appx 400miles / 640km) it has permitted considerable improvements in speed. *Happy New Year* . Looking forward to 2025's output.
@@ChristopherStevens-s2bAah ... thank you. Is that why they're being withdrawn? (Sorry .... the logic underpinning public transit in North America often escapes me!)
@@TheHoveHeretic ..I really miss them as they were much easier to board and off fro, as the floor level was pretty much at platform level. Those needing accessibility devices like wheelchairs or scooters could easily board the train at station without needing a complicated lift like the current Horizon and forthcoming Venture carriages require. As a senior rider with severe arthritis stairs are a bane. FOr the same reason am pulling for replacing Superliner carriages with single deck ones or possibly a variant of tj Viewiner carriages used in the east. The current design isolates passengers with mobility issues form the rest of the train as they are confined to the small area on eh lower deck by the boarding doors. A bi-level carriage with a ;lower deck the full length of the carriage (such as some European trains (like the bi-level TGV) has).would be another solution. On bard lifts as one proposal I saw included would be a major maintenance headache and fail point (I've seen enough of that on transit buses before the advent of low floor designs). They would also take up space that would be better devoted to seating.
I live in Vancouver and this service is another good example of already having a good alternative to driving in place if only it was run better and the tracks had not been run into the ground for the past 100 years. Through the Lower Mainland the Cascades goes slower than Skytrain.
upgrading sounder would help a lot too since it has tons of connections to buses and ferries, but right now it doesn’t run on weekends and the north line only does 3 trains a day in each direction. There are plans to expand sounder to Olympia which will connect the city to amtrak cascades. but the biggest problem is still the BNSF scenic subdivision along puget sound, There are lots of landslides and BNSF wants to spend the bare minimum to stabilize hills.
Hi Reece. Amtrak Cascades already has pre-clearance in Vancouver. Passengers go through immigration and customs at Pacific Central. At the border the train stops and customs come on to simply do a quick passport.check. I'm guessing because it's a land vehicle they're checking nobody got on the train between Vancouver and the border.
I live in Vancouver Washington and my daughter is attending college in Bellingham. We've visited BC more since she's been going there and Amtrak Cascades is much preferable to getting stuck in the traffic in Everett/Seattle/Tacoma. Sadly she'll graduate before we get the new trains. We'll have to plan a trip to BC once they're completed.
The relative success of the Borealis should open up some states' eyes to good interstate routes, but I am not optimistic unless the right of way and timing issues can be improved between Amtrak and the freight companies.
A *HUGE* issue is that US freight railroads run doublestack container trains, and the height of the doublestack containers make the idea of electrifying the line not very practical (India has tried but only on a few select lines at slow speeds). It would require American freight railroads abandon doublestack containers to accommodate the type of overhead wiring used worldwide currently.
This 100%. The I-5 corridor between Portland and Seattle is such unpleasant experience: it's a (mostly) 3 lane highway with bumper to bumper traffic traveling at 80 mph until you reach Lewis/McCord where it often slows to a crawl through the perpetual highway construction at Tacoma. I-5 is unpleasant from Portland to Medford, as well which might hint at souther expansion of the Cascades. If I'm ever forced to travel to Seattle, I'm taking the Cascades.
South of Roseburg the mountains mean there's never going to be Amtrak Cascades. Better buses, perhaps. Look at the winding, sharp curve existing freight rail on a good map (or in person!). Trains don't like to go up steep hills, and the cost for dozens of miles of tunnels would be ridiculous.
I took the Cascade train back from Seattle to Vancouver on Sunday and it was a way better experience then the bus was from Vancouver to Seattle. I do hope we can get more frequent times in the future and would love it if they could have a stop at Scott road having to pass it then go all the way back to Scott road was a bin irritating
California High Speed Rail is being built, today. It's a great project, and when it is done, at least "Phase 1", it will be a success, but today, still under construction and costing a lot, one sees more clearly the headwind these projects face. HS2 in Britain too. And those are more "high volume" routes. LA - San Francisco, London - Birmingham. I look forward to the day those projects are completed, but I have doubts about what can be done, realistically, for other smaller cities.
Better idea than a Whiterock tunnel... Interchange Station w/ Skytrain @ Braid; New bridge replacing the mess in New West passing over the two little islands south of United Blvd/Braid Existing South Fraser routing until; head due east alongside Colebrook Rd to Cloverdale new "Cloverdale" Station (@ 176) new spur line Cloverdale to Langley main line then heads south along 176th (farmland, cheaper land acquisition) new "South Surrey" Station at 16th/176th cut back to existing line over golf course this accomplishes 1) Whiterock bypass; 2) Commuter Rail from Cloverdale, Langley & South Surrey; 3) Faster route to Seattle; 4) Skytrain interchange @ Braid.
I'm a huge intercity passenger rail advocate, but the logistics of a grade separated, passenger exclusive, (albeit non high-speed) rail system along the Cascades Corridor is staggering. It would require massive investment from federal, provincial, and state governments that just isn't there. I'd love to be proven wrong, but I fear minor incremental improvements are all we will see.
Bravo Reece ! Encore une belle vidéo 👌 En effet, vouloir à tout prix bâtir des lignes à grande vitesse peut nuire à l'objectif final, qui reste le transfert modal de la voiture individuelle au train ! Comme le dit l'adage "le mieux est parfois l'ennemi du bien"
It’s absolutely unacceptable that Cascades isn’t the NE Corridor of the western US. The refusal to implement 125 mph electrified service even within long-term plans is absolutely disgraceful. True high-speed rail doesn’t even need to be considered at this time, just solid electrified intercity service should be the BARE MINIMUM. It’s absolutely abysmal that 125 mph intercity rail and even regional rail are barely being considered across the entirety of the US.
Oh, it can be done, but for safety reasons the tracks have to be grade separated (especially given the many accidents with Brightline trains in Florida). Bring lots of money, because procuring the right of way for such a high-speed train isn't going to be cheap.
This would be really cool. I like the idea of using the passenger rail line for suburban rail service between surrey and vancouver, as well. Skytrain is great, but it would be nice to give people another option for getting straight into downtown Vancouver, and it would take some of the burden off of the expo line.
If you want truly high speed, you have to go electric like what Caltrain did using Stadler KISS train sets that are potentially capable of speeds as high as 200 km/h (124 mph). To do it on the route between Vancouver, BC and Eugene, OR would require grade separated tracks, and be aware that cost is not in a cheap department given eminent domain laws in the USA to get those grade-separated tracks.
@@Sacto1654 but Caltrain is still restricted to 79-80mph, so the primary benefit until further grade separation is just the acceleration after leaving the station. Which for the number of stops caltrain has and the short distance it runs is a lot more significant. electrifying the whole of the cascades would not provide anywhere near that benefit unless it was allowed to run max speed faster.
You can do 200km/h with steam trains, London North Eastern Railway did it in 1935, and there's plenty of examples with diesel like the Class 43 (Intercity 125) which is the fastest diesel in the world, the Class 220/221/222, or the trains used on Brightline.
The Cascades are getting 125 mph capable equipment already with Airo. Without full grade separation they'll be stuck to 110 mph, which diesel mode Airos are easily capable of. Getting slow sections faster and bottlenecks less restrictive is far better bang for the buck. Going from 30 to 50 mph is a 66% gain. Going from 80 to 110 mph is a lot more expensive and only ~35% faster. Don't go faster just by going faster, go faster by not going slow!
The Stadlers CalTrain runs have a max design speed of 110mph, and they do intend to run them that fast once the line is upgraded to support it. The Peninsula Corridor currently has too many grade crossings for it. Their signaling system already supports it with PTC and cab signaling as do most trains in California (nearly all rail lines in California use I-ETMS, which is how Coaster, and Amtrak can run 90mph services on the coast).
Clock based frequencies, moderate speed with comfortable accommodation in the trains makes travel on a line like this be attractive for passengers as many will realise they can use the time constructively by doing work whilst travelling. Laptops and mobile phones are common on longer distance trains in the UK.
I appreciate and like the balance between full Shinkansen and Pseudo-High Speed service, for the sake of making it more realistic and _SLIGHTLY_ more likely governments would actually consider it, at the very least. ...but I still want my utopia with a fully grade-separated Shinkansen >:) That said, I want to make note that the Eugene-Portland segment of the Amtrak Cascades is actually the segment with the most consistent and highest demand on the entire line. People love assuming due to Eugene/Springfield's size, it can't support/makes no sense to include it in the system, when despite it's lack of population, is literally the life line of the line.
I rode the Cascades service from Vancouver to Portland in September and by far the worst part about it is having to take a bus to Seattle if you can't book months ahead. I know busses do the job but it's just not comparable in levels of convenience and comfort as a passenger. The rest of the Trip from Seattle down to Portland was great actually (apart from the weird American boarding procedures). Amtrak really can deliver if you let them.
Railways in the north america should revisit car motorail or partner with rental car companies at stations just outside cities or places of interest (like at major airports). Enabling the use of rail to go to places with convenience of getting a car easily since the destination would not have great public transport
As a native and decade-long user of the Cascade service. The original talgo Buffet cars were absolutely gorgeous... Frankly I would love to see them do nine trains a day full ride between Eugene and Vancouver... And get on time performance nailed . The speed is fine. Especially if they would add a really early morning train in both directions and a very late train in both directions I could leave Salem and if I can get into Seattle by 8 a.m. that would be great for a day trip I could leave Seattle at 8:00 p.m. and sure I get home you know in the morning sometime but I can make a day trip out of Seattle or vice a versa And like you said if you stack in the coast Starlight in the middle of the day functionally you've got 10 trains
All I want is to be able to see a mariners game easily from Portland that’s all lol. Sunday afternoon games are possible, but everything else doesn’t really work schedule-wise.
Thank you so much for your great shows. I learned about so many transit system layouts and features. As for the Cascades, as a Seattle native, I say first things first. Increase the frequency and restore transit connections along the corridor. Tacoma is pathetic with a shrunken system due to budget cuts, for example. At least the fares are affordable unlike the NE Corridor.
Focusing on 125+mph multiple units makes sense on this corridor and I think they should ADD more stops in Vancouver especially but North Seattle and Portland. The easiest time savings are bringing stations 20-30 minutes closer to people, especially suburban people for whom traffic in and out of the city might not be their biggest concern. 3-4 extra stops for a multiple unit is like 7 mins on a trip that’s already 2-3 hours.
Can't speak for Portland or Vancouver(s), but currently the Seattle Link 1 (10min intervals) can get you out to Mountlake Terrace and Lynnwood - obviously not highway fast, but should be a decent workaround in the meantime. Not sure of the math for time savings of having a stop directly on the Amtrak line vs hopping to light rail. Regardless, keeping fewer people driving into/out of Seattle in cars should be a priority. For reference I live in suburban hell on the eastside and always drive to a park-and-ride to take the train into Seattle, and recommend the same to anyone frustrated by trying to navigate Seattle traffic. Travel time is about the same, and a lot less stressful. Can't wait for the Line 2 extensions.
Any North Seattle stations should definitely be weighed against future Link Light Rail development. The Ballard Station is coming, just slowly. Are you asking for an infill station near 145th?
In the Netherlands, an extra stop for an intercity train (with EMUs) takes about 3 minutes. Longer at very busy stops. So 7 minutes for 3-4 stops would be very optimistic. The time loss is larger with a higher maximum speed, and if there is no level boarding (which is the case along the Cascades route, I believe).
HSR in the PHW would be such a great idea, Maybe, even leading to extending down through SF and to LA. Think of all the population centres that would benefit from it, Soon 🤞
I thought the train didn't stop at the border? Last time I took it to Canada I went through customs at the station in Vancouver. This was probably 10 years ago.
Maybe once we have an improved intercity passenger rail in Oregon, we can start looking at getting some out to the coast. Currently, it takes 1.5-2 hours to drive and half the day on the various bus networks.
Look at the freight lines - both the routes that still exist and the ones that have been washed out. None of them are going to have any speed at all. The one from Eugene to Coos Bay has large sections where 25 mph is the speed. Trains don't like steep hills and tight turns. Better buses in those places would be possible, not frequent train service to small towns on the coast.
@@markrobinowitz8473 Yeah well, the state invests almost nothing into supporting these coastal cities' economies. Better bus service is the least they could do, but we're stuck with a hodgepodge of rickety half-busses. I get that the terrain is rugged af, but you gotta invest in an area's development before it can grow.
@@NickCombs The central OR coast has some bus service, the service could be improved. And you can get from the coast to multiple valley towns. 25 mph train service on steep mountain passes isn't going to attract passenger trains, just lumber loads and bulk chemicals. I recommend a drive to follow the existing alignments, it will dissuade anyone from passenger train service to the coast. Logistics matter. Improving valley train routes is where the money is needed, assuming there will ever be funds for this, perhaps after Trump's second regime.
Never encountered two cities that didn't deserve exponential growth in government subsidies for passenger rail. If you want to reduce train times, figure out how to eliminate stops for customs and immigration.
American passenger rail could be increased right now with the stroke of a pen. The power, rolling stock, and rail is all capable right now. The only thing holding the ability to do higher speeds back is the regulation limiting territories without a safety overlay like automatic train stop or cab signals to 79mph. Most locomotives and territories operated by Amtrak now have PTC cut in. PTC should count as a safety overlay, and trains should be able to run at higher speeds.
If they could get the corridor up to 125mph it would be a viable alternative to road and air travel on the route, which is why Alaska Airlines will fight it tooth and nail, because they own the non-car travel market in the PNW. And highway speed limits in Washington are 70mph, but through much of the Portland to Seattle corridor you'd be lucky to be going 60mph due to traffic.
Well done video! Need to increase frequency and reliability (more TRACK CAPACITY). While reducing trip time needs to be a focus (not "top speed"), incremental improvements to allow 90 mph, 110 mph are possible in the near term with affordable investment, and along with improved frequency, will generate needed grassroots support. I SUSPECT that speeds over 125mph will prove to NOT pass a cost:benefit analysis. We need to focus first on improving the service we already have! Thank you for a great video.
It would make sense to see hourly service south of Seattle (30mins with Sounder off peak and 20mins at peak), and every 2hrs north of Seattle to Vancouver (hourly to Everett, but North Sounder will eventually be redundant unless it’s able to be extended to the border to make hourly all day service from the border to Eugene
The limits to speed and headways on the Cascades for most of the corridor is the freight service. The WDOT study goes into great depth about this. To run much faster than the freight on the corridor, you need more places to pass the freight. How much triplication and quadruplication is needed to get speed and frequency eventually drives an argument for a separate corridor. Long term, it seems like strategic bypasses using under-used and abandoned lines, like has been done at Point Defiance in Tacoma.
@@michaelkiesling8148 exactly. Money is best spent in new alignment than ever increasing waste of funds in leasing tracks in a hyper congested freight corridor. Sound transit already pays something like 50 dollars per rider on the Sounder. It is unsustainable
Great! We're getting a rapid rail service from Vancouver to Seattle and Portland, but we can't get a decent commuter rail from Vancouver to the valley! No thoughts towards the present, let alone the future!
125 mph corridors really make a lot of sense in so many closely spaced medium-sized city pairs in North America, especially given our not-so-great track record building true high-speed rail and decent track record for upgrading classic lines for a somewhat reasonable price. This would be a game changer for the Pacific Northwest.
@@louiszhang3050 250km/h (~155 mph) is the maximun at which "commuter" HS trains work and make sense. I'd say that 200 could be very good for such close stops, but if long stretches of flat land exist, they could push for 250 on those sections
@@kowalskidiazdegeras9190Agreed, at least then transition to linear motors might be possible on the same line. I know it's not exactly a 'current' problem in the current west, but linear motors do make sense in a 'dispersed' metro system
125 mph is the sweet spot because it still allows you to have at grade intersections if need be, just with upgraded barriers and gates, which lets face it should have been standard practice along all rail corridors already... Anything more than that you're talking costly grade separation projects often every mile so along the route which drives up costs significantly.. In other words? Welcome to the law of diminishing returns... For 3X the cost you get only a small bump in overall line speeds...
@@kowalskidiazdegeras9190 Just as long as they are grade separated above 150 mph/240 km/h... In fact in most places it's 125 mph/200 km/h... But for rural areas with few overall crossings I agree. Or better yet use Interstate corridors that already are grade separated, then you can run trains even faster with no worries as to interference...
@@stickynorth well, I disagree. Everywhere in Europe, at-grade crossings are being removed, and a line upgrade is a very common excuse to finally have an overpass done. At least in Spain and France, at-grade crossings are only allowed at a maximum of ~100mph. There are literally like 4 level crossings allowed for 125mph in France, and they are literally manned (probably the very last on the country)... so yes, I do consider full grade separation to be important, specially since we've been building fully separated lines for literally a century by now
I'm just glad that all transit (Sounder, Link Cascades, ferries, kc metro, etc) within the State of Washington is free for those under 18. Maybe changing the habits of the next generation will help build support and raise expectations of what public transit can offer!
That explains so much. I've been so surprised to see families and even kids by themselves waiting at bus stops for hourly buses, something that is very unusual in Minnesota or Wisconsin. It's even unusual the single-family neighborhoods of Madison, WI, which has a lot of great citywide transit usage. I would love to see free transit for those under 18 adopted across the country.
@@AdventureBeeMC BTW this policy is funded by the Climate Commitment Act, Washington's Carbon Tax. Securing the future for youth in more ways than one!
I get a kick at all the families that board the northbound train at the various Washington stations (Long View, Centralia, etc.) to catch a Mariners game. They make a fun day trip out of it. I envy those kids cause it looks like the families are having a lot of fun -- they bring board games and picnic baskets.
That's cool! Wish that was true when I was growing up lol
Such a smart idea! Now if only we could improve the education system for them... :(
Oh em gee, please yes more frequent Sounder service. And even weekend service too please. People *do* travel places on not-weekdays.
And not just "commuting" hours. I think Seattle businesses would like better access to people in Tacoma, Lakewood, Everett, etc.
I looked into why this isn't the case awhile back. It's purely because ST pays BNSF for access to the rail. They have to pay more to get more frequent routes, so they only prioritize ones with high enough demand for it to be worth it. Would be nice if ST owned the rail!
To add insult to injury, there are several stops that the Sounder makes between Seattle and Tacoma that Amtrak Cascades doesn't. Amtrak just drives right through Kent, Auburn, Sumner, and Puyallup and doesn't stop until Tacoma. Everything south and east of Tukwila is underserved as a result. That's a lot of people in those areas. When the Sounder isn't running, the only alternative I'm aware of is the 578 bus. Doable, but not a nice experience, and takes a long time to get where you're going. Trains are so pleasant compared to buses.
@@staind2523 the ol' "but but but there's no demand!" Demand doesn't happen immediately, but there are probably a lot of trips that can't happen because there's no possibility of them. I would have _loved_ to take the Sounder to the state fair this past fall, but the fair is fun, and getting to the 07:00 train at Edmonds station is the opposite of that.
It shouldn’t be so difficult to have an hourly service on this route so people can count on the train as an alternative. That’s how it started in my country and now we have 15-30min intercity trains throughout the country, which means that on certain busy tracks there is a 10min service, almost metrolike. Together with the commuter trains there are even more, especially on four track routes. You should start building trust in people that if they mis a train within an hour there is another train. Reliability is so important for people who consider to switch from car to train.
Comes down to greedy Warren Buffet and BNSF charging an arm and a leg. Also Sound Transit has incompetent mayors from the suburbs wasting money on parking garages instead of frequency.
I ride the Cascades route pretty frequently, usually between my home in Tacoma to Portland. I like it a lot, but it really could be a LOT better. Yes, higher speeds would be nice. However, I think service frequency and reliability improvements are more important at this time.
This is what I would do:
-Bring the rights of way under public ownership to fast-track improvements and make it cheaper in the long-term.
-Build a new passenger terminal in central Olympia and upgrade existing track to accommodate passenger trains.
-Run Sounder trains in both directions all day, 7 days per week, between the pie-in-the-sky downtown Olympia station and Everett, using the current Olympia-Lacey Amtrak station as a transfer point.
-Improve track infrastructure along the entire corridor to increase comfort and reduce wear and tear on rolling stock. A modest speed improvement from 79 to 90mph will likely follow suit.
-Increase frequency from 6tpd to 10tpd between Seattle and Portland, and run 6tpd through from Eugene all the way to Vancouver. The section between Mt. Vernon and Bellingham would be tricky, but if we prioritize passengers over freight, I think it's doable.
-Add the stations you mentioned between Vancouver and the border. You're spot-on with that one.
-Electrify the whole dang thing for reliability and environmental reasons. If Switzerland can do that reliably over tough terrain, why can't we?
We Cascadians have the potential to have a seriously enviable rail corridor. All we need is the political will to make it happen.
@@narglefargle I agree with everything you said, but there’s one thing that I don’t agree with. The part where you said 6 trains per day is quite a lot, considering the whole trip would take about 7 or 8 hours to complete. Of course, an EMU would do the trip faster, but it would still take several hours to complete the trip.
@@nathanborino456 That's normal in Europe with their true high speed trains. And there is more and more routes getting added there all the time, and they're not just night/sleeper trains, either. In example, Paris-Milano. Or Zurich-Zagreb. Wien-Bucharesti. Those are just _some_ of the many different routes that this is a reality of, and yes, they often sell out each run. You're not trying to make the trip lose 3 hours off a 6 hour trip, realistically. That's not the point. Yes, time savings is a important aspect of it, but it is far more than that, and yes, there will always be plenty of folks willing to ride a entire line for 6+ hours if it is cheaper than planes and beats car travel.
For the Portland-Eugene segment, it is almost entirely flat, so realistically, speeds easily can be maxed out for most of the segment barring obvious station areas and development/airports. It is the Sound region that is the problem for many reasons, primarily the lack of space needed to tunnel, and said tunnel would have to pretty much perpetually travel under the entire Seattle-Tacoma metro until around Everett, due to heavy development and major space constraints. North of there, other than the small mountains to the south of Bellingham, it too is pretty open and flat to the south end of the Vancouver metro.
Electric trains operate better than diesel, but increasing electricity has been from fracked natural gas (not solar panels or even wind). Gas is the largest energy source for the western power grid, despite illusions. I agree that reliability and fixing the slow spots would make the most difference in the short term ... and federal funds for better trains seem less likely after Jan. 20, 2025.
@@markrobinowitz8473Electric vehicles and trains are still on average less emissive per KM than when powered directly by gasoline or diesel, even if that power is generated with coal. Larger power plants are simply miles more efficient than tiny combustion engines, then that electricity is used in a vehicle with almost negligible losses.
Also as you said has reliability benefits, and if you're still worried about the environment, those same vehicles will get cleaner over time as gas fired plants are replaced.
@@planefan082 In reality, gas fired electricity is increasing substantially - due to accelerated fracking. We'll see which geological predictions are correct in terms of depletion, but gas is the largest energy source for electricity generation - even in the west. Emissions aren't the only consideration, availability of power is also a concern, even if depletion is unpopular to discuss.
As a Portlander, my biggest issue with Amtrak Cascades is the lack of late night service for when events get out. I can deal with a 3hr travel times, but having to wait from 23:30 to 07:00 for the next train absolutely sucks.
THIS.
The fact I have to go find a hotel overnight IN seattle adds a lot to the cost...
I've taken Amtrak in the PNW a couple of times and both times we hit delays due to right of way issues. If those could be hammered out and the reliability/frequency of the route increased it'd be a real joy to take this underrated route.
The inevitable outcome of leasing BNSF tracks and ultimately why nothing will ever change until such time as a new alignment for HSR is built
Do you recall when and where you experienced the delay?
Just build more lanes for the train tracks. Boom, problem solved. If there is a traffic right of way issue, take another lane.
Or build a bridge over the train.
They would need to nationalize the infrastructure.
@@nicklibby3784 It's traffic delays due to freight trains. BNSF and other freight railroads own most of the rails in the US. They are supposed to allow scheduled passenger trains to travel without delays per federal law, but they ignore the law and make the passenger trains wait for comparatively slow freight.
10:45 They are building a new pre clearance facility in BC for this service, so border crossings should get easier! Amtrak is also working on one in Montreal for the Vermonter extension to Montreal and one in Windsor for an extension of a Wolverine to Windsor for transfers to the Via corridor
Yea, that should eliminate the secondary check at the border. Right now, they have initial pre-clearance in Vancouver, it seems like the new facility will be full-preclearance (like the airport).
Funny you talk about this! I went on a day trip from Vancouver to Seattle yesterday-earlier this week when planning it out, I really wanted to make the Cascades work, but seeing that the train took twice as long as driving and that the only morning trip was already fully booked, I just couldn't justify it. Still, while I was able to do the day trip, 3 hours of driving in both directions was quite the chore.
I saw a news article recently talking about true high-speed rail and while it'd be nice, I thought it'd be so pie-in-the-sky that I'd be too old to really appreciate it. Your ideas here sound a lot more feasible and give me hope that I'll be able to pop down to Seattle more easily, rather than having to plan weeks in advance for it. Plus, even 120mph is 50% faster than the absolute fastest I was able to go on the I-5!
A lot of the extra time on the Vancouver-Seattle section is the time spent going through customs, pre-clearing international passengers before even boarding would be better than the current approach.
I traveled to Seattle from Vancouver with Amtrak Cascades just last month! It was definitely different from my experiences in Europe, because the train stopped often and I had to be at the station very early. The views more than made up for it though. I actual had difficulty getting the return tickets, because the train was entirely sold out that day: Swifties travelling to Vancouver for the last concert. When booking the train I was surprised to see that there were only two trains per day and all the rest was buses.
This is a great proposal! I think this upgrade for the Oregon section of the cascades, from Portland to Eugene, in the Willamette Valley would have especially great potential:
- The corridor is perfectly suited for rail as it is not very large (112 miles)
- It is almost completely flat (unlike most of Oregon) with all the state’s largest cities in the middle
- 70% of Oregon's population lives within the Willamette Valley
I think the section between Portland and Albany should follow the existing Cascades corridor but the section between Albany and Eugene should try to create a new corridor that includes Corvallis. The corridor would be extremely popular among college students so it is pivotal to connect the 27,000 PSU students in Portland, 33,000 OSU students in Corvallis, and 23,000 UO in Eugene.
A brightline-esque service is very possible and should be a politically feasible. The existing right of way between Corvallis and Monroe is actually owned by Benton County (County containing Corvallis). The main obstackes would be to create a new corridor between Corvallis and Albany and Monroe to Junction City but these rights of ways could follow the existing highways in place and are very doable.
@rabbbirumba2397 interesting idea, I hadn't accounted for the college populations across the Willamette Valley. I could definitely see the lines getting a fair bit of use during the sports seasons at those schools. As a side note, this was the opening project for my first playthrough of the game NIMBY Rails, minus the connection to Corvallis, of course. If you've never heard of it, I highly recommend giving it a try, its a lot of fun designing your own rail networks on a real life map of the world
As a Eugenian, I would love to see this!
There is no existing right of way from Eugene to Corvallis, it stops in Monroe and doesn’t go all the way. But I agree, that would be a very successful line
Personally, I've always thought that a separate commuter service Corvallis-Junction City-Eugene would be a better way than rerouting Cascades out there. Both bus options add like an hour of travel between EUG and PDX diverting to OSU which is one of the reasons Cascades is so much nicer in the first place.
@@wooglefurf yes you are correct one of the counties owns the row from Eugene to Monroe. That being said I feel it could be possible to build an elevated line following Pacific Hwy W to Junction City, then following the existing rail line to Eugene.
Definitely agree with Reece. You do not need super fast high speed rail for this corridor. Just faster reliable service. We take for granted at how good the GO Train service is for the GTA with respect to North American commuter services.
Also a station at White Rock is a must.
Amtrak Cascades operate on a congested freight line. faster reliable service is impossible.
If they want faster service some capital improvements will be needed including long passing sidings or additional track. So that
would help with the freight train issue. Here in the northeast where the Acela was extended to Boston a third track was added for the freight railroad to still provide service without causing delays to the high speed passenger trains. As noted I would not try for higher high speed service but concentrate on beating normal driving times.
@@walawala-fo7dsthere’s a ton of places where grade crossings could be removed, new segments could be built, turns could be rounded, and double or triple tracking can take place to dramatically improve speeds
@@walawala-fo7ds Most delays to Amtrak on the Seattle/Vancouver portion happen north of the border. BNSF does a good job of keeping Amtrak moving, but the CN is terrible at it. Amtrak has to thread its way through a busy yard to get to Pacific Central Station in Vancouver, and like clockwork, has to stop and wait for a 10,000 ft stack train to clear/depart/be yarded. This adds hours in delays sometimes. Another hurdle is the Fraiser River bridge which multiple subdivisions converge into a single-track swing bridge and that too, adds delays when water traffic is high or the bridge is occupied by a freight train.
A station in White Rock feels painfully obvious
I've been working on high speed rail in this region for several months now and what I can tell you is this: WSDOT's vision of 200-250mph (320-400kph) trains is a pipe dream with this geography, but 135-185mph (220-300kph) is feasible and would still offer game-changing travel times of around an hour to 1h15m between the major cities. We don't need to water it down all the way to conventional speeds (90-125mph/145-200kph)
The main issue with going over 125mph is it basically requires electrification. 125mph is pretty much the upper limit for diesel, as that is about the performance limit of diesel engines that comfortably fit into locomotives. A 150mph diesel would require significantly more powerful engines which would be both physically larger and heavier and use significantly more fuel.
@@mrvwbug4423 A 150 mph diesel is faster than official diesel record (148 mph) achieved by English HST during a test run.
@@mrvwbug4423 Well, if any region could justify electrification, it is this one, seeing as hydroelectric power is the backbone of the BC and WA grid (not sure abpout OR, but I imagine them too).
@@mrvwbug4423 We should've electrified our rail a long time ago anyway.
@ There used to be a lot more electrification of the US rail system until the postwar period, especially in the rust belt. A lot of the electrification was ripped out in the late 40s and 50s.
As a regular user, just fixing the kinks in the line and building a third track so we aren't constantly in conflict with freight would make the line very very competitive. Just being able to go 75/80mph the whole time would make the train faster.
Yes. You don't gain major time savings by going from 80 to 110, you do it by going from 30 to 50 or 70 mph.
On the other hand, if your building new curves and right of way anyway, you are looking at a similar sized project to take a curve from 30 to 70 as from 30 to 150. About the only difference is a few more property acquisitions, but those will only get more expensive as time goes on and you are left with being able to cruise at top speed for much longer.
@sonorioftrill good point, in a lot of cases, its cheaper in the long run to upgrade an alignment to much higher speeds in the first place in order to "future proof" the system. Otherwise, you'll likely have to come back 30-50 years later to straighten the alignment again
This ! I honestly think the cheapest solution would be to simply pay BNSF to not run trains when Amtrak runs. They’d probably need to create additional sidings to make this work but it seems much more feasible than obtaining and building new rails. I also wish they’d run Cascade Express trains which go direct from SEA to YVR (maybe also Bellingham?) Add a couple of express trains and 1-2 more of the 5 stop trains with minimal freight delays and you’d have a pretty solid system that would break the bank (relatively speaking!)
As cool as it would be to have true HSR here, I've held the same opinion that we don't really have the population to support it. But as you said, there are plenty of other smaller improvements that would be worth pursuing. I definitely agree with more stations in BC.
With how long California high speed rail is taking we would have the population to support it if we kept building housing at the rate the Governor wants
Again an amazing video! Simple to understand and with a good goal! In germany, some rail corridors (For example Munich-Augsburg or Hamburg-Berlin) were upgraded for speeds of about 200-250 km/h although they’re not exactly high speed corridors and now, the Karlsruhe-Basel corridor is going to be upgraded
Im surprised you haven't brought up much regarding infra improvements in Canada, especially considering it takes well over an hour to get from Blaine to Pacific Central, and thats before adding time due to the bottleneck that is the Fraser River Swing Bridge (I rode the cascades last summer, and we waited 90m to cross it). A white rock tunnel could help, but i honestly feel way more needs to be done to make Van Seattle competitive before we even begin considering adding infills.
Yeah especially because fraser river delays make the cascades south of the border more unpredictable as well
I did the Mount Vernon, WA, to Vancouver trip via Amtrack this summer. The segment from just north of the border into Pacific Central was agonizing. I could have ridden my bike faster than the train took for the last segment.
The other major issue is the condition of the coaches. On the return trip, we had to exit two coaches away because they couldn't get the doors in our coach to open, even using the manual override. Safety? Nah. We don't need any safety considerations.
Yeah, if they are serious, this "swing bridge" route has got to be replaced by something else. I'm not sure why they think White Rock would need a tunnel when the route can take the gap of flat land along the Nikomekl but anyways, yeah they need to plan out some track and bridge improvements.
OMG Reece! Did you just sneak a Metro Vancouver Sounder into the mix! Brilliant!
I've taken Amtrak for Vancouver - Seattle twice. Once on the train and once on the bus.
On the bus, we stopped at the normal border crossing CBP station. The bus almost left without me because I was the only one (not American or Canadian) who needed extra paperwork.
On the train, there was CBP preclearance at the station on the platform before boarding the train, then the train stopped on the border anyway while CBP agents got on and checked everyone's passports.
Remember when we traveled from Prague to Košice by train before Czechia and Slovakia entered the Schengen, pasport control happened on the move, border control get in in Bohumín and left ať Čadca.
I feel like we should have at least one round trip between Vancouver and Eugene. currently, there are no trains doing the full route and I feel like even though Eugene isn’t as big as Portland, it would be nice to have that option for the people who live in Eugene.
They don't because that distance would almost definitely require a crew change. FRA rules put a limit at 12 hours for the crew. Looking at the current schedule the 517 is scheduled into Portland from Vancouver BC at 3:35. The 507 which goes Seattle to Eugene get's into Portland at 5:45, so 2 hours 10 minutes difference. We then take the 507's arrival in Eugene at 8:47 and subtract that 2 hours 10 minutes to get a theoretical arrival time of the 517 at 6:37. It left Vancouver BC at 7:15, but the crew doesn't start right at 7:15 so that ~45 ish minutes is not enough time, especially if any delays occur.
So we need to do a crew change, the logical places to do that are Seattle (on a train north) and Portland (on a train south). Congrats, you've just rebuilt the existing schedule while paying for 2 more full crews to add on the Eugene section. Would that be awesome to have a full length train? Yeah. But if you're paying for 2 more full crews you might as well get the most out of them with either a new daily Seattle-Eugene run in each direction or a Portland-Vancouver run in each direction.
100% agree here, this is an attainable goal for the region, and something that would give a real alternative to driving and flying even at 125mph. I can say from using 125mph MARC trains between DC and Baltimore that they would be a game changer.
I just took the Amtrak Cascades from Seattle to Portland for Christmas! Overall the experience was good- much better than driving I-5 in the rainy howling dark. However, the wi-fi was totally broken which was a huge disappointment, and we had to wait 10 minutes for a freight train to cross the Columbia on the way back. The whole trip took about 5 hours, or twice as long as it would have been driving. Overall I'd recommend it, but I still think improvements are necessary if it's going to be a clearly better alternative to driving. Right now it's a tossup.
I think the German solution is actually the best option here. Start by upgrading some of the straighter sections of track to 200 km/h, and the very slowest sections get bypassed by new true HSR sections built for 300 km/h. If you're already doing new-build, then there's no reason to not go all the way. But most of the route doesn't need new built lines, and can make do with upgrades.
Having spent time very recently in Washington State, mostly Bellingham, I've been really surprised and impressed by how much usage the transit gets here compared to Minnesota. Even hourly bus service out to residential neighborhoods in smaller towns seems heavily used. I've seen way more people waiting at bus stops in single family neighborhoods here than I would in suburban Minnesota or just about anywhere else in the US (though I've spent very little time in the Northeast apart from New York and Long Island). There is so much pent-up demand for transit, and we have the interminable, unsolvable congestion on I-5 to thank for that.
People also just seem way more comfortable venturing outside when there's a chance of rain, going out for family walks even in moderate rain. I guess the flip side is that Midwesterners are much more likely and willing to go outside for a leisurely walk when it's -10°C than when it's raining.
I think Bellingham has a popular transit system compared to the rest of the NW but that is interesting
I was shocked to learn that Spokane, a city with a metro area population of only 600k, has 8 bus routes with 15 minute headways.
I took Cascades once. The speed once we crossed into US was OK but the journey from pacific central to Blaine took 1 1/2 hours. It needs a new alignment and a Minimum speed of 100 Miles per hours. They can build the train along the highway meridian. The Passport Control should be moved at the border rather than at Vancouver Pacific central. Add stops along Richmond/Surrey.
One good thing about getting the speed up to 200km/h by picking the low hanging fruits, is that you can strategically leave the higher hanging fruits for later. 200km/h for the majority of the tunnel, except for a few challenging sites will make it easier to argue for upgrading properly. You can't really argue for spending a lot on an upgrade that will save 5 minutes on a 5 hour ride, but 5 minutes on a 3 hour ride is a more significant improvement. And if you've left an old bridge with a 100km/h speed limit, but with 200km/h tracks on both sides, it also makes the argument for a 250km/h bridge easier, as you will actually have a chance to utilize the extra speed.
AGREED! Been saying it for years. 125 mph/200 km/h is good enough for MOST corridors to make trains speed competitive without having to build hugely expensive new greenfield routes ala California HSR which have shown the perils of doing so in a North American context. And even if you wanted to build new lines, the engineering costs are reduced significantly at these speeds than vs 150 mph or higher... If the continent could stitch together a consistent network of services running at these speeds day or night? You could probably slice the number of trips made by car or plane in half... And prevent ever having to add that "just one more lane" to every freeway...
as a washintonian that loves the cascades nice vid
I live in Seattle and take the Amtrak to Portland to visit family probably 10 times a year. The amount of delays that train gets is absurd. It also moves at what feels like is a snails pace. Granted, it’s nice to not have to drive, but still. Let’s pick up the pace! I also personally find the seats to be pretty uncomfortable but YMMV
I ride this once a week! I'm so excited to see you made a video on it.
Edit: now that I've watched, I have some thoughts.
By far and away, the biggest problem with current cascades service is reliability. Of the top of my head, causes of delay include:
* Lift spans over the Willamette or over the Columbia refuse to close due to hot/cold weather
* Freight traffic in the way
* Passenger train traffic in the single track point defiance bypass
* Mechanical issues with the trainsets
* Mechanical issues with the tracks
* Slow orders due to workers on tracks
* Losing signal with PTC
Making the service reliable would be huge.
The next biggest issue is travel time. Shaving just 20 minutes from Portland to Seattle would make it competitive with driving.
Coming in third, for me, is frequency. Granted, I am only riding the Seattle Portland section, but greater frequency would only be a nice to have for me
Truly going to miss the optimistic outlooks and practical suggestions that make this channel feel like sitting around with mates talking about how to make things better rather than the hopless complaining.
Thanks dor your channel mate from Australia! Hope you find the time to post here and there.
Cheers
The rail infrastructure on the Canadian side of this corridor is a hot mess. The mandate that gives Amtrak priority in the States (and yes, contrary to popular belief, Class 1's _do give_ Amtrak priority) does not exist in Canada. The CN treats the tracks as if they are first come first serve. Amtrak often has to wait for CN trains to clear, be yarded, or depart to arrive at the Pacific Central Station. Those delays can be hours sometimes. Some days you fly right in and land on time. Others, you sit for 3 hours waiting for a 10,000 ft stack train to be cut up and yarded.
Another issue is the rail congestion in Metro Vancouver. And getting in via the Fraser River bridge which is one of the only ways into the city and is a massive bottleneck. Waiting your turn at the bridge can cause major delays as well. And finally, track speeds are slow. Topping out at 60 mph for less than half of the run north of the border. North of the bridge max speed is 40 for Amtrak. From Mud Bay to White Rock you have two sections of 60 mph that combine for barely a couple of miles. The rest is 35, including the 15 mph Bridge 127 and a 21 mph head end restriction through White Rock. Running in Canada is slow, congested, and unpredictable.
_Source: an Amtrak Seattle engineer._
I got stuck waiting to come in to Pacific Central once for 3 (!) hours because a CN train stalled at the throat going into the rail yard. It was a complete mess. We didn't arrive until after 1AM.
The relatively low population of the PNW not being dense enough to justify the high costs of HSR is something City Nerd pointed out in one of his videos as well, supported by mathematical formulas. But he didn't suggest using hSR (200 kph/125 mph) instead, which you did here. We have the backbone for an improved rail corridor, but for decades the will to build the improvements has been lacking. If Tri Met, Sound Transit, and Metrolink could work togather and assist Amtrak on making this a reality, it would be a boon to the area.
Metro, Amtrak don't own the right of way. there is nothing for them to improve. This is freight companies congested line tracks so passenger rail has no business trying to improve anything. build a proper alignment for passenger rail instead of wasting money paying freight companies for bad track use
How about adding in the cost of avoided highway expansion
@chris51lee Highway expansions will happen anyway. The I5 bridge needs replacement regardless and will happen regardless and 405s widening is completely unaffected by anything going on with passenger rail because it is a regional highway not a destination highway.
Gutted to hear about your departure from TH-cam, but honestly pretty damn glad your last regularly scheduled video is about a project in my backyard, and one that'd pretty fundamentally change our transit network over here on the west coast. Best of luck in the future, and thanks for all the good times!
I love trains but I took this once from Vancouver to Seattle last year and gave up on it. This sounds great, but for now just two things would make this usable: not waiting over an hour at a time for a freight train, and going more than 30km/h on the Canada side. I think those alone could save 2+ hours based on the trip I made.
As a native of the PNW, we really need to sort out the trackage rights and service frequency (for both Sounder and Amtrak) issues. Sadly, it's down to the freight railroads (BNSF & UP) and politicians (Tim Eyman) scuttling those plans.
If London North Eastern Railway could manage 125mph trains in 1935, there is no excuse today for anything slower than that.
North America: Where 100 year old train technology is a dream
That was top whack though. However, 100mph consistently was possible with the late steam era
Chicago to St Louis runs slower today than it did 100 years ago
the excuse is they don't own the freight tracks and freight trains tracks were never designed for that. there are even single track segments 😂
@walawala-fo7ds Which is weird because everyone wins if they did. Government can improve the track and service and be popular, and the freight companies don't have to pay for track upkeeps anymore. And yet for some reason the freight companies don't want to lobby for it.....
Top-tier video - thank you Reece! Loved all the examples to other places that have done this-or-that thing well.
I appreciate your pragmatic approach to urbanism. The main reason I take the Cascade is because driving on I5 is stressful. 125mph train would make it much more worth it!
Yes! An important part of the Tokaido Shinkansen between Tokyo and Osaka is the frequency. For success the Cascades HSR would have to be faster than driving, including waiting for a train.
I don’t know that it needs to be faster. At a certain point many folks will probably sacrifice some time if it means a more pleasant experience. For example, if I have to head into downtown Seattle I’ll usually take the bus not because it’s faster but because I can use the time on the bus to Netflix and chill rather than staring at the bumper in front of me. It takes me an extra 15-20 mins but it’s time better spent. If they can get the travel time to within an hour of driving AND make it reliable I think more people would go for the train. especially given how long the Peace Arch crossing can take.
Great ideas! There is another major pinch point between Seattle and the border. The track through Edmonds for freight and passenger lines is only ONE track forcing both freight and passenger trains to take turns getting through and greatly limiting how many trains can be scheduled to travel that section.
Great video as always, and I appreciate the research you did on the PNW corridor (as well as your lived experiences in metro Vancouver).
There are four significant issues with this corridor that weren't addressed in the video: landslides, freight priority, scheduling, and lack of infill stops in the north seattle area. This causes Amtrak north of Everett to be incredibly unreliable and slow, and challenging to use if you want to get to anywhere north of downtown Seattle.
It is very common during winter months for the route to be at risk, as much of the route is a single track squeezed between an unstable bluff or cliff and the Salish Sea. Therefor, they often cancel the train and replace it's service with a bus.
But if you manage to get on the train, it doesn't take the advertised 2 hours and 26 minutes (which can often take only 1 hour and 20 minutes by car). In 15 years, I've never had the train delayed less than 1 hour. The worst trip I had on Amtrak had a 4-hour delay, which turned a 1hr 20min drive into a more than 6-hour trip (after six hours I gave up waiting for the train to leave the Edmonds station, and instead had someone drive me from Edmonds down to Seattle. I have no idea how long it took the train to go from Edmonds to Seattle, but the passengers probably got a nice view of the sunrise as it was midnight when I stepped off the train).
Traffic in Seattle is bad, but traffic on the BNSF line is worse. The frequent Amtrak delays most likely are to give way for passing coal-trains on the single-track sections of the line.
Then there is scheduling. There are only two trains per day south of Vancouver BC/Bellingham to Seattle, one in the morning, one in the evening. The morning train leaves at 9:15am, and arrives at 11:45am. Its not a bad time choice, but it definitely makes it impossible to use for a morning meeting in Seattle, and wastes half the day. The other option is the evening, leaving Bellingham at 6:45pm and arriving in Seattle-theoretically-at 9:10pm, in the industrial and stadium district of Seattle. Its not a great time for transit, walking, or biking in SODO at 9:10pm, let alone the more realistic arrival time of midnight (at which Light Rail closes on weekends) or if very delayed 1am (at which Light Rail closes on weekdays). With the evening trip such a challenging option, there is only realistically one somewhat convenient train south each day, the 9:15am train.
The last challenge with the corridor is the lack of stations between Edmonds and Seattle. Edmonds isn't a convenient transit hub to begin with, and the distance between those two stations is long. This means if you have to get to somewhere like Shoreline, Northgate, Ballard, or the University of Washington, you have to spend a lot of time backtracking north after your trip south.
The last thing I will mention is that while it looks like there is enough space to tunnel through downtown from King Street Station, Sound Transit has been studying it and has almost completely ruled it out for their expansion of Light Rail due to limited space and disruption to the Chinatown International District. Due to ST's findings, I don't think a dedicated passenger rail tunnel north of King Street would be considered by any future agency. The only option I see from King Street Station would be if we traded the existing tunnel with BNSF in exchange for building a dedicated freight tunnel starting much further south and going very deep underground, bypassing the crowded infrastructure and re-emerging north of Downtown near Myrtle Edwards Park.
Seattlite here. I take the Cascades every time I go to visit family in Portland but find myself using intercity buses to Vancouver. The 8:30am-12:30pm Cascades schedule is too long and eats up most of the day.
I will say the death of Boltbus and gradual death of Greyhound is a big driver of Cascades recent ridership boost. Greyhound is rapidly disintegrating in the PNW like elsewhere. The Cascades (and Cascades buses) really will be the only way within a few years.
Watching this video as I’m on the cascades 😂
Amtrak Cascades IS a great service. On my last trip down to Portland I wore my Amtrak hat my girlfriend got me for my birthday and got into a great conversation with a couple of the staff (one of them showed me a commemorative pin he got for his service!) and it was awesome hearing their insight and thoughts on how to improve service.
You make a really good point on speed - especially given the geography. Landslides can be sorta common along the corridor between Portland and Seattle - which in my experience meant getting onto buses and then going to each individual station along the route. The problem is that now that we've switched over to auto traffic and whatnot, the stations (thinking of the Lacey/Olympia and Centralia/Chehalis stations in particular) are wayyyyyyyyyy off the freeway and it added several hours to the trip. Not sure how to really get around that, unfortunately.
US Customs pre-clearance would speed up service, but then you couldn’t add stations in BC without those also having a US Customs checkpoint.
I don't think adding stations is agood idea, at least not for local ridea. If such a service is needed they should add station but run local trains for the local service.
That said, if yourealy want to you can do it. The Eurostar from Brussels to London was required to make a stop at Lille but that creates a similar oroblem as when you get on the Eurostar to/from London checks are made at the origin (by UK officers in Europe and Franch ones in London) and Lille is inside Schengen with no passport control. The solution was a specific car for those traveling to Lille so you cannot leave it to go to ather parts of the train. Not a great soliution but it works.
There already is preclearance at the Vancouver terminus. I'm not sure why Reece thought there wasn't.
This looks to me like the ideal place to build a high speed line the German way. Build faster sections in the slowest/most congested parts (250kph could probably do), 4-track a few sections, and use local networks to enter the cities. The only "difficult" part to me seems crossing Seattle with really not much space to run new tracks on existing corridors and the new tunnel required.
Biggest problem is having freight trains have priority in Canada. I been held for 2 hour due to freight trains on the tracks leaving Vancouver.
I sincerely wish the Cascade would run south to, at least, Medford! Some tunnels along the way will be needed to straighten the winding route.
"Some tunnels" is an understatement. There's a freight line from Eugene to Roseburg that hauls a lot of lumber, but south of there is VERY mountainous and unlikely to attract billions to extend it to Grants Pass. Medford doesn't have that many people and in the unlikely event there's billions for Cascadia rail, Eugene - Portland - Seattle - BC is the priority. Sorry.
I think that would be awesome. It is unfortunate that people really think that there isn’t a place for rail for cities of that size, but there certainly is. I would absolutely find myself in Southern Oregon more often if there was even just a slower rail line out there. Hopefully one day 😎
I love your voice! Wonderful vocal quality and texture.
yes! i was waiting for you to cover cascadia. washington represent!
O-saka: emphasis on the first syllable!
Funny you mention this- my current research is on HSR in the Cascadia corridor!
Love it! I live in portland, commute to Vancouver, WA and I have family near the Tukwila station in the Seattle metro. I use this a lot, but it definitely needs some big upgrades to make it competitive.
I’ve taken the Cascades to Seattle or Portland many times. You are right, top speed not that important to me, but fast enough to beat I-5 though would be good.
I took the train from Sacramento to Vamcouver a few years ago and it was by far the worst public transport I've ever experienced. So much room for improvement.
Same fare setup for Springfield Line on Amtrak NEC & ConnDOT's Hartford Line service.
Ugh, having hourly Sounder trains, especially on weekends, would be an absolute game-changer just by itself. My experiences with ST a few years ago were really underwhelming. You really got the feeling that they lacked ambition.
Very surprised there was no mention of *tilting train technology* which has been successfully deployed in Europe. On the London - Glasgow route (appx 400miles / 640km) it has permitted considerable improvements in speed.
*Happy New Year* . Looking forward to 2025's output.
@@TheHoveHeretic The Talgo train sets are already tilting.
@@ChristopherStevens-s2bAah ... thank you. Is that why they're being withdrawn? (Sorry .... the logic underpinning public transit in North America often escapes me!)
@@TheHoveHeretic ..I really miss them as they were much easier to board and off fro, as the floor level was pretty much at platform level. Those needing accessibility devices like wheelchairs or scooters could easily board the train at station without needing a complicated lift like the current Horizon and forthcoming Venture carriages require. As a senior rider with severe arthritis stairs are a bane.
FOr the same reason am pulling for replacing Superliner carriages with single deck ones or possibly a variant of tj Viewiner carriages used in the east. The current design isolates passengers with mobility issues form the rest of the train as they are confined to the small area on eh lower deck by the boarding doors. A bi-level carriage with a ;lower deck the full length of the carriage (such as some European trains (like the bi-level TGV) has).would be another solution. On bard lifts as one proposal I saw included would be a major maintenance headache and fail point (I've seen enough of that on transit buses before the advent of low floor designs). They would also take up space that would be better devoted to seating.
3:44 Metrolink does this as well with Pacific Surfliner in LA. Took a train from Simi Valley to Burbank once and it happened to be a Surfliner train.
I live in Vancouver and this service is another good example of already having a good alternative to driving in place if only it was run better and the tracks had not been run into the ground for the past 100 years. Through the Lower Mainland the Cascades goes slower than Skytrain.
I really wish for this, one day, and soon.
upgrading sounder would help a lot too since it has tons of connections to buses and ferries, but right now it doesn’t run on weekends and the north line only does 3 trains a day in each direction. There are plans to expand sounder to Olympia which will connect the city to amtrak cascades. but the biggest problem is still the BNSF scenic subdivision along puget sound, There are lots of landslides and BNSF wants to spend the bare minimum to stabilize hills.
Hi Reece. Amtrak Cascades already has pre-clearance in Vancouver. Passengers go through immigration and customs at Pacific Central. At the border the train stops and customs come on to simply do a quick passport.check. I'm guessing because it's a land vehicle they're checking nobody got on the train between Vancouver and the border.
I live in Vancouver Washington and my daughter is attending college in Bellingham. We've visited BC more since she's been going there and Amtrak Cascades is much preferable to getting stuck in the traffic in Everett/Seattle/Tacoma. Sadly she'll graduate before we get the new trains. We'll have to plan a trip to BC once they're completed.
Fantastic video! I’m also excited for the chargers and ventures!
When ‘one more lane’ becomes ‘one more train’ real improvement is coming
The relative success of the Borealis should open up some states' eyes to good interstate routes, but I am not optimistic unless the right of way and timing issues can be improved between Amtrak and the freight companies.
A *HUGE* issue is that US freight railroads run doublestack container trains, and the height of the doublestack containers make the idea of electrifying the line not very practical (India has tried but only on a few select lines at slow speeds). It would require American freight railroads abandon doublestack containers to accommodate the type of overhead wiring used worldwide currently.
@@Sacto1654 Important point.
This 100%. The I-5 corridor between Portland and Seattle is such unpleasant experience: it's a (mostly) 3 lane highway with bumper to bumper traffic traveling at 80 mph until you reach Lewis/McCord where it often slows to a crawl through the perpetual highway construction at Tacoma. I-5 is unpleasant from Portland to Medford, as well which might hint at souther expansion of the Cascades.
If I'm ever forced to travel to Seattle, I'm taking the Cascades.
South of Roseburg the mountains mean there's never going to be Amtrak Cascades. Better buses, perhaps. Look at the winding, sharp curve existing freight rail on a good map (or in person!). Trains don't like to go up steep hills, and the cost for dozens of miles of tunnels would be ridiculous.
I took the Cascade train back from Seattle to Vancouver on Sunday and it was a way better experience then the bus was from Vancouver to Seattle. I do hope we can get more frequent times in the future and would love it if they could have a stop at Scott road having to pass it then go all the way back to Scott road was a bin irritating
California High Speed Rail is being built, today. It's a great project, and when it is done, at least "Phase 1", it will be a success, but today, still under construction and costing a lot, one sees more clearly the headwind these projects face. HS2 in Britain too. And those are more "high volume" routes. LA - San Francisco, London - Birmingham. I look forward to the day those projects are completed, but I have doubts about what can be done, realistically, for other smaller cities.
Yes, but today you can -- soon -- get high speed from Bakersfield to Merced. From Nowhere to Wooebegone.
Better idea than a Whiterock tunnel...
Interchange Station w/ Skytrain @ Braid;
New bridge replacing the mess in New West passing over the two little islands south of United Blvd/Braid
Existing South Fraser routing until;
head due east alongside Colebrook Rd to Cloverdale
new "Cloverdale" Station (@ 176)
new spur line Cloverdale to Langley
main line then heads south along 176th (farmland, cheaper land acquisition)
new "South Surrey" Station at 16th/176th
cut back to existing line over golf course
this accomplishes
1) Whiterock bypass; 2) Commuter Rail from Cloverdale, Langley & South Surrey; 3) Faster route to Seattle; 4) Skytrain interchange @ Braid.
I'm a huge intercity passenger rail advocate, but the logistics of a grade separated, passenger exclusive, (albeit non high-speed) rail system along the Cascades Corridor is staggering. It would require massive investment from federal, provincial, and state governments that just isn't there. I'd love to be proven wrong, but I fear minor incremental improvements are all we will see.
Napoli Centrale (Naples) - Roma Termini (Rome):
2x trains/hr
230kmph
1h10m travel time
€19
225km; exactly the same distance as Vancouver-Seattle.
No, there are up to 5 high speed trains/hr between Rome and Naples and 1 tph regional trains + some IC trains, at least 11 tpd.
lived in the pnw for 3 years, if this was available i'd have taken it every other weekend
Bravo Reece ! Encore une belle vidéo 👌 En effet, vouloir à tout prix bâtir des lignes à grande vitesse peut nuire à l'objectif final, qui reste le transfert modal de la voiture individuelle au train ! Comme le dit l'adage "le mieux est parfois l'ennemi du bien"
It’s absolutely unacceptable that Cascades isn’t the NE Corridor of the western US. The refusal to implement 125 mph electrified service even within long-term plans is absolutely disgraceful. True high-speed rail doesn’t even need to be considered at this time, just solid electrified intercity service should be the BARE MINIMUM. It’s absolutely abysmal that 125 mph intercity rail and even regional rail are barely being considered across the entirety of the US.
Oh, it can be done, but for safety reasons the tracks have to be grade separated (especially given the many accidents with Brightline trains in Florida). Bring lots of money, because procuring the right of way for such a high-speed train isn't going to be cheap.
Trump should shut down Amtrak, except the NE corridor.
Perhaps then you would have something to complain about.
This would be really cool. I like the idea of using the passenger rail line for suburban rail service between surrey and vancouver, as well. Skytrain is great, but it would be nice to give people another option for getting straight into downtown Vancouver, and it would take some of the burden off of the expo line.
If you want truly high speed, you have to go electric like what Caltrain did using Stadler KISS train sets that are potentially capable of speeds as high as 200 km/h (124 mph). To do it on the route between Vancouver, BC and Eugene, OR would require grade separated tracks, and be aware that cost is not in a cheap department given eminent domain laws in the USA to get those grade-separated tracks.
@@Sacto1654 but Caltrain is still restricted to 79-80mph, so the primary benefit until further grade separation is just the acceleration after leaving the station. Which for the number of stops caltrain has and the short distance it runs is a lot more significant. electrifying the whole of the cascades would not provide anywhere near that benefit unless it was allowed to run max speed faster.
You can do 200km/h with steam trains, London North Eastern Railway did it in 1935, and there's plenty of examples with diesel like the Class 43 (Intercity 125) which is the fastest diesel in the world, the Class 220/221/222, or the trains used on Brightline.
The Cascades are getting 125 mph capable equipment already with Airo. Without full grade separation they'll be stuck to 110 mph, which diesel mode Airos are easily capable of.
Getting slow sections faster and bottlenecks less restrictive is far better bang for the buck. Going from 30 to 50 mph is a 66% gain. Going from 80 to 110 mph is a lot more expensive and only ~35% faster. Don't go faster just by going faster, go faster by not going slow!
The Stadlers CalTrain runs have a max design speed of 110mph, and they do intend to run them that fast once the line is upgraded to support it. The Peninsula Corridor currently has too many grade crossings for it. Their signaling system already supports it with PTC and cab signaling as do most trains in California (nearly all rail lines in California use I-ETMS, which is how Coaster, and Amtrak can run 90mph services on the coast).
Clock based frequencies, moderate speed with comfortable accommodation in the trains makes travel on a line like this be attractive for passengers as many will realise they can use the time constructively by doing work whilst travelling.
Laptops and mobile phones are common on longer distance trains in the UK.
I appreciate and like the balance between full Shinkansen and Pseudo-High Speed service, for the sake of making it more realistic and _SLIGHTLY_ more likely governments would actually consider it, at the very least. ...but I still want my utopia with a fully grade-separated Shinkansen >:)
That said, I want to make note that the Eugene-Portland segment of the Amtrak Cascades is actually the segment with the most consistent and highest demand on the entire line. People love assuming due to Eugene/Springfield's size, it can't support/makes no sense to include it in the system, when despite it's lack of population, is literally the life line of the line.
I think the whole HSR is because of the intent to possibly connect it to the California HSR.
I rode the Cascades service from Vancouver to Portland in September and by far the worst part about it is having to take a bus to Seattle if you can't book months ahead. I know busses do the job but it's just not comparable in levels of convenience and comfort as a passenger. The rest of the Trip from Seattle down to Portland was great actually (apart from the weird American boarding procedures). Amtrak really can deliver if you let them.
i don't live in the USA anymore, but I remember riding via Amtrak & it's kind of relaxin' tbqh, without remotely making the routes electric.
Railways in the north america should revisit car motorail or partner with rental car companies at stations just outside cities or places of interest (like at major airports). Enabling the use of rail to go to places with convenience of getting a car easily since the destination would not have great public transport
As a native and decade-long user of the Cascade service.
The original talgo Buffet cars were absolutely gorgeous...
Frankly I would love to see them do nine trains a day full ride between Eugene and Vancouver...
And get on time performance nailed .
The speed is fine.
Especially if they would add a really early morning train in both directions and a very late train in both directions I could leave Salem and if I can get into Seattle by 8 a.m. that would be great for a day trip I could leave Seattle at 8:00 p.m. and sure I get home you know in the morning sometime but I can make a day trip out of Seattle or vice a versa
And like you said if you stack in the coast Starlight in the middle of the day functionally you've got 10 trains
All I want is to be able to see a mariners game easily from Portland that’s all lol. Sunday afternoon games are possible, but everything else doesn’t really work schedule-wise.
Thank you so much for your great shows. I learned about so many transit system layouts and features. As for the Cascades, as a Seattle native, I say first things first. Increase the frequency and restore transit connections along the corridor. Tacoma is pathetic with a shrunken system due to budget cuts, for example. At least the fares are affordable unlike the NE Corridor.
Focusing on 125+mph multiple units makes sense on this corridor and I think they should ADD more stops in Vancouver especially but North Seattle and Portland.
The easiest time savings are bringing stations 20-30 minutes closer to people, especially suburban people for whom traffic in and out of the city might not be their biggest concern. 3-4 extra stops for a multiple unit is like 7 mins on a trip that’s already 2-3 hours.
Can't speak for Portland or Vancouver(s), but currently the Seattle Link 1 (10min intervals) can get you out to Mountlake Terrace and Lynnwood - obviously not highway fast, but should be a decent workaround in the meantime. Not sure of the math for time savings of having a stop directly on the Amtrak line vs hopping to light rail. Regardless, keeping fewer people driving into/out of Seattle in cars should be a priority.
For reference I live in suburban hell on the eastside and always drive to a park-and-ride to take the train into Seattle, and recommend the same to anyone frustrated by trying to navigate Seattle traffic. Travel time is about the same, and a lot less stressful. Can't wait for the Line 2 extensions.
Any North Seattle stations should definitely be weighed against future Link Light Rail development. The Ballard Station is coming, just slowly. Are you asking for an infill station near 145th?
In the Netherlands, an extra stop for an intercity train (with EMUs) takes about 3 minutes. Longer at very busy stops. So 7 minutes for 3-4 stops would be very optimistic.
The time loss is larger with a higher maximum speed, and if there is no level boarding (which is the case along the Cascades route, I believe).
HSR in the PHW would be such a great idea, Maybe, even leading to extending down through SF and to LA. Think of all the population centres that would benefit from it, Soon 🤞
I thought the train didn't stop at the border? Last time I took it to Canada I went through customs at the station in Vancouver. This was probably 10 years ago.
Maybe once we have an improved intercity passenger rail in Oregon, we can start looking at getting some out to the coast. Currently, it takes 1.5-2 hours to drive and half the day on the various bus networks.
Look at the freight lines - both the routes that still exist and the ones that have been washed out. None of them are going to have any speed at all. The one from Eugene to Coos Bay has large sections where 25 mph is the speed. Trains don't like steep hills and tight turns. Better buses in those places would be possible, not frequent train service to small towns on the coast.
@@markrobinowitz8473 Yeah well, the state invests almost nothing into supporting these coastal cities' economies. Better bus service is the least they could do, but we're stuck with a hodgepodge of rickety half-busses. I get that the terrain is rugged af, but you gotta invest in an area's development before it can grow.
@@NickCombs The central OR coast has some bus service, the service could be improved. And you can get from the coast to multiple valley towns. 25 mph train service on steep mountain passes isn't going to attract passenger trains, just lumber loads and bulk chemicals. I recommend a drive to follow the existing alignments, it will dissuade anyone from passenger train service to the coast. Logistics matter. Improving valley train routes is where the money is needed, assuming there will ever be funds for this, perhaps after Trump's second regime.
Never encountered two cities that didn't deserve exponential growth in government subsidies for passenger rail.
If you want to reduce train times, figure out how to eliminate stops for customs and immigration.
sound is only heard from one side of the headphones
American passenger rail could be increased right now with the stroke of a pen. The power, rolling stock, and rail is all capable right now. The only thing holding the ability to do higher speeds back is the regulation limiting territories without a safety overlay like automatic train stop or cab signals to 79mph. Most locomotives and territories operated by Amtrak now have PTC cut in. PTC should count as a safety overlay, and trains should be able to run at higher speeds.
Maybe if BC and Canada would contribute a tad to the service, it could be upgraded faster......
vancouver - seattle - portland HSR makes a LOT of sense
If they could get the corridor up to 125mph it would be a viable alternative to road and air travel on the route, which is why Alaska Airlines will fight it tooth and nail, because they own the non-car travel market in the PNW. And highway speed limits in Washington are 70mph, but through much of the Portland to Seattle corridor you'd be lucky to be going 60mph due to traffic.
Well done video! Need to increase frequency and reliability (more TRACK CAPACITY). While reducing trip time needs to be a focus (not "top speed"), incremental improvements to allow 90 mph, 110 mph are possible in the near term with affordable investment, and along with improved frequency, will generate needed grassroots support. I SUSPECT that speeds over 125mph will prove to NOT pass a cost:benefit analysis. We need to focus first on improving the service we already have! Thank you for a great video.
It would make sense to see hourly service south of Seattle (30mins with Sounder off peak and 20mins at peak), and every 2hrs north of Seattle to Vancouver (hourly to Everett, but North Sounder will eventually be redundant unless it’s able to be extended to the border to make hourly all day service from the border to Eugene
The limits to speed and headways on the Cascades for most of the corridor is the freight service. The WDOT study goes into great depth about this. To run much faster than the freight on the corridor, you need more places to pass the freight. How much triplication and quadruplication is needed to get speed and frequency eventually drives an argument for a separate corridor. Long term, it seems like strategic bypasses using under-used and abandoned lines, like has been done at Point Defiance in Tacoma.
@@michaelkiesling8148 exactly. Money is best spent in new alignment than ever increasing waste of funds in leasing tracks in a hyper congested freight corridor. Sound transit already pays something like 50 dollars per rider on the Sounder. It is unsustainable
Great! We're getting a rapid rail service from Vancouver to Seattle and Portland, but we can't get a decent commuter rail from Vancouver to the valley!
No thoughts towards the present, let alone the future!