HSR should be built in tandem with new local metros. This way you get off the HSR train and onto a local metro train to access the key features of a city without needing a car. Bakersfield and Fresno are actually large enough for a metro if designed correctly and if HSR was a proper anchor station.
I think one main problem is the extremely suburban nature of all of these cities. Merced and Fresno have the most chance of converting some of that into urbanity near the station. They both also have Amtrak stations within a mile of the planned CAHSR station, so there is potential to grow between. In the future, I could see a light rail or street car line in Fresno doing that. Not sure if Merced is large enough to support that.
@@LucidStew there's a project underway to link the San Joaquins line into the Merced CAHSR station, deprecating the old station on the BNSF line. It's called MITC, it's spearheaded by the SJJPA and Merced is, imo, a little too proud of it for what it is. It's worth noting that I recently brought this up to the mayor of Merced at a town hall and got the old "public transit just doesn't work in the US" treatment. I see this is the start of a discussion, rather than the end, though, as multiple council members expressed agreement with my viewpoint.
Well, California is trying very hard to get cities to create rail and light rail projects, so I could see this happening. Also, I think Bakersfield and Fresno would probably opt for a streetcar.
@@curtthomas8465 Oh, ok, I knew SJJPA was planning to hook up at the Merced station, but I didn't realize they were planning to abandon the existing station.
I fully agree that areas near passenger rail stations should be in walkable areas/areas that have decent transit, but at the same time, if the success of the Brightline Orlando airport station is anything to go by, more people are willing to “park and ride” than people may think.
It's because we're used to it. For example, there's no realistic way to get to the Fresno airport, which is the closest real international airport to Merced, via public transit. I mean, you can wait two hours for a southbound San Joaquins that's as fast as a normal car, then navigate Fresno's bus system with all your luggage out to the airport, but that sounds like a huge PITA and like you'd have to leave five-six hours ahead of your flight instead of just three (an hour to drive and two for security theatre at the airport). Why would I ever voluntarily interface with a transit network that was clearly designed as an afterthought and take twice as long to even get on my plane? Nevermind the fact that it's probably more expensive than driving anyway, and yeah, of course you'd pay for park n ride. We could be doing so much better than that, though.
Plus, it seems like the park and rides are slated to eventually be redeveloped into mixed use after some years in the future. Which I don't think is a terrible idea if we're trying to get people to gradually shift back to liking trains
@@curtthomas8465 or better yet, have a friend/family member drop you off and pick you up, or rideshare. That'd be my go-to, rather than leave my car at the station all day and possibly overnight.
@@notXaragame3542 They should be slated for development from the start. As lucid says in the video, building 3000 parking spaces per station is only going to induce suburban development, and trying to take that parking away for development at some nebulous future time period is only going to mean you have to fight to build what should've been built in the first place.
Brightline’s airport station connects to a very busy international airport increasing connectivity because of that. CAHSR stations in the middle of a field increase connectivity to nowhere except CAHSR.
As much as I hate it, I think it’s fine to have parking in the mean time. These cities don’t really have great mass transit options, so if you want people from around the region to actually use the train (and keep costs down by not building garages), this is what you’re stuck with. On the bright side, these lots can easily be redeveloped in the future (and if the whole project is successful, there should be no shortage of funding for the redevelopment).
I think California should continue pressuring cities along the route to make tram lines. I also think they should sell off unused land or rent it as quickly as possible.
@@shopdog831 much of that had to do with the choice of routing, and where CAHSR could get the tracks to go. In Bakersfield's case, that route was the Locally Generated Alternative pushed for by the city, rather than the other route that would have gone right through the center of the city to the current Amtrak station. Bakersfield apparently has some strong redevelopment plans for the area around the future HSR station, perhaps moreso than any of the other CV cities getting HSR.
@@KRYMauLcompletely out of touch. These projects would not be financially viable for these small, impoverished cities (except maybe Fresno, *maybe*) due to their diffuse development style and lack of density.
Ngl I like the bronze detailing. It gives a retro art deco vibe similar to some of the new skyscrapers in nyc. But yeah the amount of parking is outrageous.
I'm actually working on this right now, getting involved with hounding Merced City Council to develop better public transit and better land use overall, but especially near the station. Merced, for their part, claims that a revitalization effort centered around the station is underway, but I've not heard any specifics. They're probably referring to those transit-oroented development potentials. The station is going to be caddy corner from Costco at 15th and O area. The parking lot areas have floored me. Thanks so much for bringing this up. This is bonkers
Nice. Keep us posted. Merced in particular is frustrating because you only have a gap of 2-3 blocks to close, but its a 4-lane street and huge amounts of parking between. Not exactly the most enticing way to get people to wander in the downtown direction before driving home. Or further out in the future, walking home. I'm sure there would be local opposition, but I think if Merced could shrink 16th St. down to 2 lanes and shift that traffic capacity elsewhere, in addition to getting rid of some 16th St. facing parking, that would go a long way toward tying everything together and making the station work out much better for the city.
@@LucidStew the whole central valley is very, very, very car dependent. Public transit infra here is terrible, particularly between cities. The good news is that, for the most part, folks here aren't really all that car-brained; it's just a fact of life that you need a car to get around the valley, not that many people actually seem to enjoy it. The bad news is that we do have a lot of NIMBYs here. I've never met a group of folks more deathly allergic to urban density than Californians, especially in the central valley. It just means it's going to take consistent effort over a long time.
@@curtthomas8465 I'm from the Inland Empire, which is very much a spiritual cousin to the San Joaquin Valley, but we're kind of like your guys' Ghost of Christmas Future. When people start flooding in, and they already have, especially in Bakersfield, it's going to get miserable without some forward thinking policies. Once everything is built out the wrong way, correcting becomes very difficult.
@@KevinBolsajian I'd love to. Unfortunately, the work I'm doing is as a citizen showing up to city council meetings to give public officials a hard time, not paid work. Best of luck to you.
I think the issue with the parking lots is also partially the fact that building residential and commercial developments isn’t in the legal scope of CAHSRA. it’s up to local municipalities to improve the station areas and there’s certainly not a shortage of land so they have a big opportunity here. but if CAHSRA started seeking out developers to build housing at this stage, many people would (correctly, IMO) view it as a diversion from their stated goal of building a high speed rail line
That's a good point. Hopefully once they switch from construction to operations, we'll see how that works out. Still, I don't think it diminishes the structural problem of these cities being VERY suburban, and the accommodation of parking and ride actually encouraging expansion of that.
@@LucidStew definitely a problem still, I just don’t think one that can be fixed by CAHSRA as they currently exist. hopefully we see a lot more from the cities around the stations in the next couple years that indicate they will be remedying some of these problems
@@LucidStewexpansion will happen no matter what because that is what our species does. The design is meant to increase ridership and reduce people driving from suburban places to suburban places. This is not some little tram line for connecting transit dependent condos or apartments. The cost is way too high and cannot be underutilized by sealing it off to the people that actually live there now who most likely will never be able to not have a car. It is a HSR corridor and should be treated no different than an airport. Providing access to it for transit dependent people is the job of the cities, not CAHSRA. Nothing stops BRT, light rail, and local busses from being the main way transit dependent people get to a station.
@@colinguo5855who are adequately compensated. Those "farmers" are not some small time few acres of land people either, they're insanely wealthy corporate run farms that use more water than all the 40M people living in CA. Perfect example of the exact case where eminent domain should be utilized.
16:25 I hope they keep the bronzed look. Every building is annoyingly white these days, like people are afraid to pick a dadgum color. It's really ridiculous and makes everywhere look like a dentist's office.
I agree. There is a boldness to the use of bronze. Used correctly bronze can make a design feel not just modern but incredibly avant-garde. The great modernist architects knew how to make good use of it.
Great video but I do think you're harsh. First of all, about the "stations in the middle of nowhere". Yes, they are not in ideal places but they can serve a groupnof smaller places that do not justify big investments to bring tje tracks closer to them. From the ,ap I think they do have a potential in the future to attract the nearby monicipalities to develope into the station's direction. Remember that most central stations and corridors that are in the center of the city used to be the edge, or even further out, until they got surrounded by the settelment they served. As for park and ride, I'm not a fan and the number of parking spots is huge they are built in a way that it's easy to develope them into high density housing while eliminating them as time passes. That said, they should work toward good frequent transit to connect the stations to the nearby towns. It's importan to mention that CAHSR cannot do everything on their own and without cooperation from the different municipalities and other local authorities it won't work. Maybe help with transit financing for the first few years will help.
I rode HSR in Spain to Zaragoza. That station was very far from the urban core but a bus ride made it just fine. I prefer SF’s stations of course, but this will work for rural areas.
@@robichaud-carew1.6 mi is not "very far", especially when it's a new station built for the HSR service as the more central stations were inadequate. That said it is near dense urban areas, even if not the "city center" and is connected by local trains, buses and the planned 2 tram line will stop there as well. BTW, this is an example of how you can do this and provide a fast direct connection as on the the Madrid Barcelona-French Boarder the main line bypasses cities like Zaragoza or Lleida with a direct and fast connection to the central station or - if not possible (like Tarragona, where the station is in the middle of no where due to the complexity of a diversion to the city itself, especially with the junction splitting to the Mediterranean corridor) they provide a shuttle to the city and in 2026 the tram should open and connect it as well and there are many that it's still very popular and getting close to 1M a year (Tarragona has ~138k inhabitants) and it does have a car park but only for 630 cars and it's not free (1.75€/h).
I think you’re definitely overreacting a bit about the station designs. They don’t look insanely modern like something you’d find in Chinese HSR stations sure, but I’m honestly down for a more art-deco vibe or whatever tf what they’re going for is called As for the stations themselves, I agree with most of your criticism. Merced, Fresno and Bakersfield seem like the only stations that I could see with successful TOD and viable local transit. With Bakersfield specifically, speaking as a resident I know there’s a concerted push for trying to get more people to live in our Downtown and get a BRT or light rail route along historical streetcar routes that already have good bones. Maybe that will help. I wish we had kept the original station by Amtrak. Also, fun(?) fact: Bakersfield very well might have the first high speed rail adjacent, transit oriented strip club 😭 (Look up Deja Vu Bakersfield)
Good ol' Deja Vu. We have them down here, too. Not like I'm familiar or anything... XD I'm really a bit flummoxed by the Bakersfield station. I was looking at the possibilities at street level, and it just seems like a place that no one from the outside would ever walk to. There's a bike path from the Kern, but that seems like it has limited potential. Maybe the bus setup will be good, but still its sort of a reserved space you need to be transported into, which is weird.
@@LucidStew quick question, are these locations set in stone? I'm just curious if there's still opportunity to move any of them, or if we're well past that point yet.
@@jamalgibson8139 Everything has a Record of Decision and a Final EIS. I suppose its still POSSIBLE to change, but the ball is rolling toward design and construction now.
The Bakersfield station location is part of the Locally Generated Alternative that was pushed for by the city and approved by CHSRA. The original route did take HSR through the city to the current Amtrak station. Apparently Bakersfield does have plans to redevelop the area around the future station for TOD and more walkability, perhaps more so than any of the other CV cities getting HSR.
@@ChrisJones-gx7fc I'm curious why they wouldn't want to interconnect with the amtrak station? It seems like a no-brainer, regardless of whatever redevelopment efforts they're going through.
Park and ride has to be garages only in my opinion. Easier to build high (especially since I imagine park n ride will be popular and gets cars off the roads!!) than have surface (yuck!) lots which are wastes of space. Shame seeing small businesses get kablooied, but hopefully there are good plans (LOL) to fix that in the future.
given most of the surface parking areas are listed as potential future TOD, I'd say it's a certainty that those will be redeveloped, leaving space for a parking structure at each station. The Central Valley is very car-dependent and likely will remain so, so these stations need to address that. Hopefully with the introduction of HSR and better transit options to get to and from the stations, as well as TOD around them, that'll encourage more people to drive less and use transit more.
@@ChrisJones-gx7fc Agreed! Park and ride is the first step. Afterwards you can better map where people are going and prove demand to better build out metro services to improve transit.
Thanks for posting this important criticism of the project. I know it's tough to be a critical voice in this space, because people don't like their ideas to be criticized, but it's important to be objective when seeing how these projects are actually playing out. No matter how good of an idea CAHSR may be, there are still many issues to be addressed, and building 13k parking spaces absolutely deserves to be criticized. I will say that I think your pessimism about TOD being built is unwarranted, though I understand where it comes from. I think that urban development it's actually on the upswing, and by the time this actually gets under construction we'll see better developments in the area. But the fact that they even thought that building 3k spaces per station was a good idea at this stage in the project shows that there's still a big fight ahead of us.
I think that TOD will happen in most of these places over time. Some may take quite some time, like Madera. And some, if people live there they might come to regret it, like Bakersfield. My main point in dismissing the TOD was that due to way these cities are structured, even if you do manage to build some density around the stations, you still have vast amounts of suburban areas that will feed that parking space need. I also think, since that's the case, most of the stations will probably also make that worse over time once Central Valley is connected to elsewhere.
@@LucidStew Totally fair assessment. I hope that as urban development takes a more prominent role in the cultural zeitgeist that we can move cities towards being more sustainable, but that might just be me in my little urbanist bubble. There's definitely a lot of work that needs to be done to get there, and videos like this help illustrate how good ideas can still lead to poor outcomes if we're not careful. Hopefully more criticism about the huge amounts of planned parking will come out and we can get these cities to plan this out better, but yeah, as far as being drivers of suburban sprawl, there's definitely huge potential if the cities aren't careful (which they likely won't be).
I've though about if California's High Speed Rail was just gonna be a park and ride scheme. I never realized that it was gonna be this bad though. I really hope that the cities will utilize this once in a lifetime opportunity and use this system to densify there cities and build up around these stations. Great video and presentation, cant wait to see more!
Yeah, you have to figure there is going to be a good amount of parking, it's California! But the whole reason I made the video is because the amount they're planning really surprised me even with the expectation that there would be a lot. I already knew some of the stations were less than ideal, but looking into it more for this video the treatment for Merced and Bakersfield were particularly disappointing. Hopefully local governments can get more in tune with integrating these stations into their cities rather than just hosting them.
A bunch of apartments is also not a destination. If you want a destination then put HSR stations at Universal studios, Disneyland, coastal resorts, and casinos. Smack one right at Yosemite national park too. HSR functions as the backbone, not the only and final means of transport. It operates more like an airport and not like a bus line.
personally feel like your hate for Kings-Tulare is a bit overkill given that kind of station is actually not that uncommon elsewhere as far as HSR stations go, Aix-en-Provence TGV in France is the best example since it's 13km(8mi) from the city center of the city it's supposed to serve and in the middle of literal woods, it's only connected to the outside world by a literal highway crossing underneath, albeit it's a far better setup imo to serve the role of a park and ride station but considering how busy it is don't see how Kings-Tulare can't even see a fraction of that (if phase 1 is ever completed), Americans don't seem to be against the concept of P+R considering Brightline Florida gets by fine with their Orlando station at the airport though probably shouldn't be doing that in prime downtown land like in Merced or Fresno which I agree are very dissapointing to see
The push-back I'm getting so far on Kings/Tulare is that similar ideas exist elsewhere, but I'm not really hearing why it isn't a bad idea there as well.
@@LucidStew I mean no one is saying that P+R stations are the gold standard and something that should be getting built everywhere, but it's a tool in the tool box in transit planning which has its optimal use cases, in the the Aix-en-Provence TGV case (similarly in betweeen population centers of modest size) the alternative is just not have a station there as you can't do TOD in the woods above a highway and diverting the RoW to pass through a city of 140k makes no financial sense especially considering you'd have to tunnel under it in this case, given it's well used I'd argue it was the right call which imo driving to a HSR station still beats just driving to your destination by quite a bit, plus if the California planners have their way it's supposed to be augmented by the Cross Valley corridor which would give a rail link to neighbouring cities and an alterantive to driving besides busses (though surprise it's not going to be there when the station opes which is dumb)
Aix-TGV was not supposed to exist. SNCF wanted to build a Cote d'Azur branch to its Marseille LGV Med. The branch would have paid for itself in 20 years but passed near Aix and faced local opposition. Building the LGV Med in the densely populated Rhone valley was hard enough and SNCF agreed to the requests of Aix politicians who wanted a station not a LGV. It receives about 3.5 million passengers annually, equivalent to Amtrak's ridership at Chicago Union Station or on its Acela service. P+R and HSR work very well together but most people drive or catch a bus to Aix-TGV in order to board a TGV going to Paris, 455 miles away, or further away to CDG airport, Belgium, Spain or Germany. For shorter trips like the ones offered by CAHSR most French car owners will just drive.
@@alaindumas1824 valid points and wasn't aware of the political nuance that allowed the station to come into existence, agree that for the Initial operating segment it probably won't be very attractive to use but if phase one opens it absolutely can compete with trips to the Bay area (~350km, 4h+ by car ) and isn't terrible for LA (~200km, 2-3h+ by car depending on traffic) plus avoiding LA or Bay area traffic is a pretty attractive proposition by itself which from what I can tell is much worse than what you get on French autoroutes, the ticket price is most likely going to be deciding factor tbh
CAHSR needs to use these stations as an opportunity to build up the urban fabric in the area. Residential, mixed use with shops. We don't need or want massive parking lots! Great video, buddy ❤
I made this video because I was honestly surprised. I was going over it for Stew's News and was really taken aback by just HOW MANY parking spaces they have planned. I hope they come up with something better before the implement.
I think Fresno has a good chance of realizing the transit oriented potential of a system like this, if it can redevelop and revitalize. Same with Merced, if they can link the station in a pedestrian friendly way to the existing downtown area. Madera and Kings/Tulare are bad ideas as far as I'm concerned. Bakersfield, I think the locals blew it with this as the "Locally Preferred Alternative".
They probably couldn't no one wants to live somewhere just because a long distance train happens to be there. One can see this fact in stations on the northeast corridor.
… but not yet! Fresno isn’t SF, but give them time. At this point I just want the damn rail I don’t care to waste time about what happens around it yet
Park and ride is not a bad thing in the right areas. Many of the areas the train runs threw have urban sprawl with the only way to get there is by driving. There best option is to drive a short way, hop on the train for rest of the trip. Keeps thousands of cars out of traffic jams. And TOD works in some areas but still wont for everybody. Many people dont want apartments style homes. They want that single family home for a quiter life. Giving them options to cut car time significantly is a win win. Keeps people out of cars in busy areas.
If you're talking about 3,000 parking spaces, doesn't that then become a busy area? Seems like you're just shifting the inconvenience from one area to another. And then with some of these intended to be near downtown walkable spaces, isn't the traffic of 3,000 cars a detriment, neutralizing whatever win you may gain by encouraging density around the station?
@LucidStew yes and no. If it's not in a downtown core, then park and ride is ideal. Especially if it's near major roadways. Having TOD with parking there is ideal. For the poeople that live in the burbs but want a fast way to get into work or travel. Great for getting people out of traffic jams saving on idling time and opening up space for truck traffic on the highway. Now in urban cores no. Having limited parking is ideal there. U already have high development with the jobs. Getting people there and out quickly is the key. With development adding more homes and jobs. So not much in the way of parking is needed. Commuter trains work best in this route as it's geared to shorter trips, from the burbs to downtowns. While HSR is more like plane travel from point to point imo
3:34 I personally disagree that if the parking lots get converted into TOD (and they should), that all of the parking would need to be replaced with an expensive parking structure. I hope (and maybe i’m being too optimistic) that if central valley cities get to the point of major TOD around their high speed rail stations, they would also at that point have decent enough local transit to take people to the station. maybe in the end all they’ll need is a small parking lot and a drop off area.
I think they very suburban nature of these cities will force it. Buses are realistically the only solution there and there are a lot of people who live in the suburbs that don't want to ride the bus.
Personally, I think they should create a TOD with a garage in the middle similar to how they do park n rides in Europe. Also, I think they continue pressuring cities into investing into light rail transit.
There should be underground parking requirements. if it's expensive to build, there won't be as much parking, and our cars shouldn't act to expand the walking radius.
Ngl, i kinda dig the bronze accordion look. Its so ugly it swings back into endearing somehowXD i think the huge parking lots are an unfortunate necessity to help ease away from the present near total car dependency- hopefully it will get infilled away as the area becomes more desirable and densified
Perhaps one can affectionately think of the bronze accordion look as reminiscent of the Sandworm's of Dune or the Shai-Hulud. Who says these designs are not futuristic!!!
As for the hanford station, there is a planned regional rail system, it's called cross valley corridor, it would connect hanford, CAHSR, visalia, and a couple other cities. Ironically it's the station I have the most interest in. Since it's the cross roads of CAHSR and a regional rail system, and with nothing around it makes it perfect for a new city to pop up, like California forever except good.
This is the best goddamn video I’ve ever seen 😂. I’m still on board with HSR. When we stop funding freeways and have an actual dedicated funding stream for projects like this, these compromises won’t have to be made anymore. But yea welcome to America 🇺🇸
I think your parking lot hell criticisms are good, but I don't agree that the aesthetics are that bad. They look like some of the more enjoyable museums to actually spend time in. Not everything needs to be so modern that it looks out of date 2 years after its built.
They mentioned in the CAHSR board meeting that SR 204 is going to be put on a road diet. I think CEQA's website says it going to be reduced to two lanes with bike lanes added. I could be mistaken.
seems to me they are heavily future proofing these for at leastr a century of population growth. with that in mind i dont really mind an overallowance of P&R, those surface lots can be developed at a later date as their land value rises beyond parking
The problem though is that its not good growth. It's going to induce even more sprawl, which is our main functional issue in this state to begin with. Plus I think the expectation that people are going to move out there in droves is somewhat overblown. It's not the greatest place in the world. The part of California I live in is similar in climate. It's downright miserable in summer and the air quality sucks because the smog and dust pushed in from the coast gets trapped by the mountains. Its the type of place your kids are going to try to find a way out of once they grow up.
Park-and-ride lots exist as a way for public agencies to do land banking and to sell and/or lease land for transit-oriented development. With T.O.D., the parking is NOT reconstituted!
The demand for parking at the station is going to come from the surrounding suburban areas. Building some apartments around the station will not diminish the demand for parking.
Man, I want this project to be successful SO BADLY, but they ain't making it easy. The idea of renting a car upon arriving in Bakersfield should be absurd to anyone who considers it. Hopefully the need for more transit connections at these stations becomes obvious sooner rather than later, and things like the Cross Valley Corridor at Kings-Tulare will get the attention they deserve.
Goodness, I somehow didn't comprehend how useless the Madera and Kings/Tulare stations are, how small of a city Merced is, and how poorly the Bakersfield station integrates with its city. This whole thing will add up to a large, extremely expensive commuter rail line for Fresno. Ridership will be incredibly low.
it's not looking good, phase 1 should be a demonstration of the vision for this project, and the station locations plus the planned development around them makes it seem like every stop in the central valley is going to drop you off in a wasteland. I can't imagine central valley residents opting to take this train over a car ride to the neighboring cities. Most of the value comes from connecting north and south california...
The way it works out in the shorter term should be interesting to watch. San Joaquins is one of the busier Amtrak routes, so they WILL have plenty of passengers day 1. I think Fresno has real potential when they get out of the Central Valley. Merced they're shooting themselves in the foot somewhat, which stinks because its going to be an important transfer hub for potentially decades. Bakersfield seems like a very poor choice. And then Madera and Kings/Tulare, I think I said it all in the video. :D
Most Costcos are a huge waste of land. The one in central San Francisco has a parking garage, which works fine. Imagine the housing possibilities, as well as the solar and wind potential they're already squandering.
Or just leaving arable land alone and allowing food production to continue there. TOD should be preserving the farmland around cities NOT expanding into it.
So in Fresno there's 2500 parking spots for bicycles.... and I'm sure they've done their research and concluded there are 2500 bike riders that just happened to need a HS train to Bakersfield and Modesto?! I'm impressed! 😂
The bike racks were probably a requirement in order to qualify for some federal or state money. The Feds and states are notorious for slipping touchy feel good projects into grant requirements.
There is a massive difference between a station in the city (even if it is in the outskirts) and one in a few kilometers (or miles away). Shared stations for more than one city are a terrible idea, you need to choose one on none. They should reconsider some of those station locations.
You have a local service that runs between all 3 locations. People don't tend to use HSR every day, so that's a fine solution, since it leaves the opportunity to have a more pedestrian layout around the station.
the Fresno entrance reminds me of the entrance to the newly built station at Brent Cross West in Greater London, UK- so I guess this a trend in station design right now
Little different, but at the same time it has a look that is equally dated with the glass cladding and the exposed industrial-type beam work that was popular... 15 years ago!
@@LucidStew Architectural design is not something that follows a linear progression like conventional technology. New and contemporary designs are not necessarily more "modern" than designs from 50+ years ago. Some of the most dated looking shit is the stuff being built right now designed by some clown architect who just happens to think that's what the future will look like.
@@brianwithoutay2291 No one said architecture needs to follow a linear progression. However, perpetuating the same styles for two decades is no progress at all.
I do think that a lot of people in the central valley will benefit more from park and ride, as extensive as it may be. This would especially benefit those who may seek work in the bigger cities. I do agree that transit oriented development is a must, but with the nature of these smaller California cities that do not have robust public transit, park and ride seems to be the most viable option for its citizens. I think developing shuttle/bus/streetcar routes for the stations seems like a logical next step, and then scaling back the amount of parking and replacing with different developments in the future, once there is enough growth and usage of the HSR and the routes to get to the station. This might take like 50 years to get there i guess.
I realize people think others are going to commute in droves from the Central Valley out, but something like Fresno-San Jose on a workday basis would cost around $1000 or more a month and if you're parking and riding to do that, you still need to pay for a car on top of that.
6:24 Seems a bit short sighted that CAHSR did not take into account the additional overpass to accommodate that business when designing the AVE 12 Overpass, so they will have to spend extra money to close it down again and add another bridge.
Probably due to the phasing. They don't need that second track and platform until V2V is connected, and they probably didn't want to pay upfront for a structure that was doing nothing for 15-20 years.
i don't think there's anything wrong with kings tulare when i visited italy and rode the high speed train there was a similar station on the outskirts of a smaller city that was surrounded by basically nothing. Not all of the high speed trains stopped there bc it was lower traffic but it gave that city a connection to the big cities
The city of Hanford was given a grant to develop the area between Hanford and the Kings station making it easier to access for residents. I think it does make sense to connect Kings and Tulare counties especially since Tulare has world wide agriculture interests and visitors come from all over the globe for the Tulare Farm Show.
I get that the Central Valley may not have as much transit. But come on, at least make half of those lots TOD. I would easily take the large ugly garage for plenty of TOD around the station. 'specially since IOS is gonna need some places for people to go, why not have those places be at the stations?
"potential future" TOD. Even still, due to structural issues, that will be mostly useless aside from Merced and Fresno, since those stations are actually located near currently denser development.
@@lecho0175 they don't use planes for commuting either. With remote work here to stay, the typical 9-5 5-day work week could be on its way out, replaced by something like going to the office 2-3 times per week. That makes the idea of living much further from the office more appealing, if one has the means to reach it quickly and with ease, such as HSR. For Bay Area tech jobs, that could mean you live out in the Central Valley, say Fresno or Merced areas as an example, and for the days going to the office in San Jose, rather than drive Highway 152 you instead drive or take transit to the local HSR station, hop on an HSR train to San Jose, get to the office via transit or taxi/rideshare, get the work done then take HSR back home in the evening, being able to work on the train the whole time. I'm sure many who have that option in the countries HSR exists in do that, in addition to using HSR for their regular travel needs when it's the best option.
@@mickeygraeme2201 That is not a bad point. The "private investment" windfall that the CAHSR plan has always included still has not materialized. At this point they're hoping that will happen once Merced-Bakersfield exists as a demonstration.
@@LucidStew While that is possible I wouldn't be so sure. Most rail lines don't have a particularly large amount of TOD even when they are fully running and I think people forget that. The NEC in USA and High speed 1 in england show this. Most bus Lines in California move more people daily than the city airport. Long distance journeys are just not that common for most people.
Yes, the situation of the Kings Tuare station is bad, but there’s really nothing the California high-speed rail authority could do about that, and they don’t deserve the blame for it. It’s not their fault that Hanford foolishly refused to allow the station to be built in there city and still largely opposes the project. It’s not all bad though the planned Cross Valley Corridor could someday make the station accessible by transit allowing more people access, and reducing parking requirements. Complaining about a problem that the CA HSR Authority doesn’t have the authority to fix is not going to help. They’re doing the best that they can. A better approach would be to instead advocate for the timely completion of the cross valley corridor project.
@@LucidStew I do agree that more videos on this topic are need. AmpereBEEP and Banks Rail have made a few decent segments on this topic, but nothing the I consider a proper full video exists. But, while I'm passionate about this topic and enjoy discussing it's complexities, I don't believe I have the necessary expertise to produce the video myself. I lack the necessary expertise in transportation logistics, and governmental policies to produce the kind of video this topic truly deserves. This topic is also outside the scope of my own channel. Perhaps it would be a good topic for you to cover in the future. I felt a bit disheartened by your response, I perceived it to be a bit dismissive. When I shared my thoughts on the topic, I was hoping for a meaningful exchange of ideas, but your comment seemed to redirect the conversation in a way that made me feel like my input wasn't valued. I wanted to share how your response made me feel, because having positive and constructive communication is important to me. Additionally, I don't think I know enough about the Cross Valley Corridor specifically to make a video on the topic. My comment was somewhat surface level and repetitive, and it represents the entire extent of my knowledge on the subject. Nonetheless, I'm still open to discussing the topic further if you're interested
@@MasonJarGaming I don't have the expertise either. Expertise is not really necessary to start a conversation on a topic you're interested in. I'm mainly responding to the "I don't think you should do this, you should do that" portion of your original comment, realizing it's much easier, but less effective to tell other people what they should do than it is to do it yourself.
I think the reason for the Madera station is for people coming in from SF & heading into Sacramento, Madera is the first easy place to have the 2 lines connect together instead of carrying people further into Fresno to transfer up north. I don't think that's a great argument but I assume that's the reason why it exists.
I think one part that should be kept in mind in regards to the location, is being realistic. Yes, many main stations here in Europe are quite close to downtown and that’s a big selling point over airports. But it’s not like they are literally on Main Street and many of them weren’t even in the city when they were built. The cities just had a few decades to grow around and towards then. Building a station 3-4 blocks away from downtown is pretty close to perfect if you ask me. Any position where you could realistically walk to the main square/ street is good and locations further out can still be ok, depending on the connections. I visited Japan last year and the HSR stations of Osaka and Hiroshima both require about 10 stations of subway/ streetcar travel to get to downtown. I’ve also traveled to the old German capital of Bonn a few times last year and their Highspeed station (Bonn/ Siegburg) is even a 30min tram ride away from the center in a completely different small city on the other side of the Rhine. Sure it’s much less convenient then in many other cities, but it’s still a useful station. Dedicated long distance stations can be a bit further out then main stations with a lot of regional/ commuter traffic, because those are much more time sensitive to a few minutes more or less then a 2,5h+ trip.
Merced IS in a great the location. The complaint here is that they are then making that location worse by surrounding it with parking and disincentivizing people from engaging with the downtown area due to the inconvenient and uninviting walk that would entail
@@LucidStew Yeah, I've arrived in cities all around Europe by train and the experience of disembarking and leaving the station really can't be overstated. Much like what people have said about the old Penn Station in NYC, how people used to enter the city like royalty. I'd also like to see a prewar level of respect paid to the architecture and landscaping. I hate to see such a great opportunity squandered. Maybe they need to get together with those billionaires wanting to build a city from scratch.
The Madera station location is shocking - especially when there already seems to be a good rail right of way that goes right through the heart of downtown. I also don't mind the copper steampunk accordion aesthetics for the station canopies 😄
Having stations near or between some of these towns may be the best solution in the long term, since the land around the stations can have whole street grids configured with density and walkability in mind from square one. You don't really need parking to get from these adjacent towns either, if they have buses. Eventually there could be a rail link between all 3 towns. Really, if they make a nice enough area, given the adoption of work from home, the areas around these stations could become very nice. The weather is ideal for such new cities. This makes me think of the city some billionaires are trying to start from scratch just north of San Francisco.
The land around these stations is farm land. In the case of Hanford, you also have a lot of dairies out there. Summers get very hot in the San Joaquin Valley. The air is poor quality and its dusty and hazy out there. It's not some sort of undiscovered paradise.
Mixed feelings. From a European perspective, city centre stations are much better to rejuvenate those centres but can be expensive to carve out the space. The ‘parkway’ style stations do often exist too, especially by smaller centres. Your hope is that you are cutting out long car journeys at the cost of a bit of induced short car journey. Someone can drive to their local station to commute by train into a distant larger city where they can’t afford to live or work otherwise. As others have posted, the ideal is to have good public transport into said mid-sized towns so that those centres can also benefit.
I think there's a location factor at play here. Being so close to Silicon Valley, you will probably have a lot of work from home people who would take the train in to work only when they have to. This would turn out quite nice if they do things right.
Oh absolutely agree that it will expand sprawl, I don't buy into how high speed rail will eliminate it. However, I do think that these areas will probably grow. I would imagine that area where it's kind of all agriculture would eventually be like a small town area. Like a downtown area with mixed use density. So I tend to think it's both. It will definitely create more density around. Probably the train itself. But it will also sprawl at the same time. Either way from an environmental standpoint, it will still be better for people to ride trains than to drive cars.
One thing I didn't bring up in the video that this brings up, and we often hear from farmers in the Central Valley when they get blamed for drought and things like this is that we're not talking about deserts here, but productive farmland that grows our food. So, the potential for housing to replace even more food producing land is also an issue up for debate.
@@LucidStew yes, I watching a video about how silicon valley types want a new town can't remember where in California, it's all farmland. But many of the farms don't want to sell. In the video they are being accused of Nimbys, and of course say they don't want to be Nimbys. We do need housing but we also need farmland. I myself grew up watching development in my hometown it's not easy, going from rural to suburbia. So I feel for them. It's a delicate balance, I love urbanists content and agree with most things. I have to say I'm a little bit of a 'Nimby' myself. I just think we're going to end up with a food crisis and the housing crisis will be small fries. * California forever All the other hand I do at least support at least trying to have better urbanism.
If you look at the project just as an real estate developement, making the central valley one big suburb for LA and SF, the project doesn't seem so unlikely anymore. At least that's the motivation behind a lot of rail-projects here in europe. Just think of all the housing you can build on these farms.
I’m honestly not that concerned because at least the surface parking area can be redeveloped. Obviously this isn’t ideal but the project is already well over budget so I feel like they just took the cheapest option.
Perhaps. Many of these are not a big deal in terms of where the parking lots will be, but I think Merced in particular they are going to take out a lot of small business when they could have consolidated things a little and expanded the footprint in the future
I will predict, Madera will initially start with a lot of service and than over the following decade, it will be cut down further and further, because most people will go to Fresno as Fresno will likely get a lot more service (maybe every 2. train or something). In the end, Madera may get like 4 trains a day or something
It’s so baffling that these small cities in the Central Valley are getting true high speed rail before the NEC. When the first section opens, you can bet conservative commentators are going to be looking at ridership and comparing to costs - but the ridership will increase 10x (at least - I don’t know what the projections are but that seems reasonable) once SF + LA are connected. What seems strange (as well)…I would expect there to be MORE park and ride’s in the Central Valley stations in the initial stage - with people coming from Bay Area and such to head down to So Cal-ish (and vice versa). I would reckon they would need LESS parking once the project is scaled up and complete and service is extended to the full catchment area. 🤷🏻♀️ Madeira Stn could be a major ToD greenfield growth centre in future? Beyond that seems very odd. And I imagine it being skipped on most runs. Fresno, and to a lesser degree Bakersfield, could use this as a chance to catalyze some urban redevelopment and get some higher order transit connecting to the HSR. There could be discounts on HSR tickets for folks who take public transit to the station. I could definitely BRT working in these cities, perhaps a tram line on a right of way if there is adequate ridership. They need to figure out they’re building a system of transportation- and integrate the HSR into the broader urban transportation network. These plans definitely do NOT do that.
I think they figure a significant percentage of travel south utilizing CAHSR on the route will show up via San Joaquins or ACE. During the board meeting presentation for this powerpoint, it sound to me like Bakersfield actually WANTS this area to be a walled city, and that they plan to stuff all of their dense, high rise future development in there. Sounds like a recipe for disaster, but I guess we'll see over time.
when japan built out their shinkansen many stations were "in the middle of nowhere" as well. As long as ToD happens, its a safe bet to not tear up all of downtown for the hsr, and instead let the development grow the station and downtown together.
All good points, and I'm saying this largely just to counteract my own CAHSR-criticism fatigue, but stations in the middle of nowhere (ie. 5-10 miles from small-to-medium sized, even sprawly population centers) can work as catalysts for more centralized development. For example, see Valence TGV station on the high-speed line from Paris to Marseille: it's basically like Kings/Tulare in that it's halfway between two small towns (with populations of 32k and 66k; metro population, extremely generously defined, is apparently 250k). Valence TGV also has a regional rail line that runs perpendicular to high-speed trains, as well as a smattering of local and regional bus services. It also has about 1900 parking spots, with more to be added next year. It doesn't sound amazing, and I can tell you from experience that the station isn't pretty or grandiose. You don't feel like you're anywhere when you're there. But SNCF, the French national operator, says the station saw a bit over 3 million travelers (or trips? unsure) in 2022. And just based on Google Street View and satellite imagery, you can see quite a bit of development that's sprung up between the two adjacent towns. The station itself is integrated into a "business park" (some offices, some logistics facilities, budget hotels, etc), but you can also see quite a bit of newish activity popping up all around, further away from the station, still between the two towns. And the station being outside of town allows stopping TGV services to stop here instead of at Valence's legacy train station, which used to significantly slow down total trip times (between eg. Paris and Marseille) as fast trains had to snake through the dense urban core. I think the point of these sorts of stations is to buy the political support of regions and municipalities that clearly don't warrant proper HSR service but will have to consent, on some level, to HSR infrastructure passing through them. Obviously, I have no idea if these stations will ever recoup their capital cost, but clearly that's not their purpose. And I don't know if the Valence example translates to the Central Valley, because obviously the political buy-in argument presupposes that remote regions and municipalities understand the value of HSR and would want in on the game - which makes sense in France or Spain (where these systems have existed for a while and their benefits are obvious and widely recognized, and construction costs are slightly saner) but might not make sense in the US (where uninformed rail- and transit-bashing is a popular politico-media pastime, and costs are ridiculously high). But I feel like some form of political buttering-up like e.g. Kings/Tulare or Valence TGV will be necessary in most parts of the US that might some day see substantial new HSR infra.
I should say - the "potential future TOD" is pure cope and we should ignore it everywhere but Merced and Fresno. Particularly hilarious at Kings/Tulare and in Bakersfield. Don't think that diminishes the overall argument though!
I feel like while those compare on the surface in terms of distance, they don't in reality. You're comparing a station next to a quaint French village and ultimately between two larger, drop-dead gorgeous medieval cities, with an obvious tourist draw, to Hanford here.
@@LucidStew Fair point re tourism in the Rhone valley, though I still don't think the comparison is entirely irrelevant. And while I'm sure Hanford ain't all that, I do take issue with Valence and/or Romans-sur-Isere being put on such a high pedestal, though maybe our differences there are a reflection of my overexposure to Europe and your overexposure to California. Villena AVE station in southern Spain might be a better parallel: also in the middle of nowhere; near-ish two (even smaller) small towns; minimal if any tourism value; literally no transit connection, just a parking lot; Wikipedia says it used to be criticized as the least-used station on the AVE network. But if its construction (c. EUR 11 mil in 2012 money) was needed to buy off local political leaders et al, ultimately allowing that branch of the Madrid-Levante line to 1) exist and 2) be a little more useful to a remote region, as well as moving those towns into the commuter belts of previously distant major cities, isn't it maybe good that the station was built? Or inconsequential at worst? I think the point that resonates with me most is that by building car access facilities you're potentially putting cars on the road that wouldn't have been there otherwise. But on net do we expect these stations to make adjacent Central Valley towns even more sprawly and car-dependent, or maybe marginally less so? I agree these designs are symptoms of pathological suburbanization but I don't think they'll cause even more of it (ie. this doesn't seem like a "trains that subsidize suburbia" situation to me). One thought experiment here: assuming Spanish or French construction costs, would we still deem Kings/Tulare and Madera pointless? Because if yes, then the criticism should be of North American costs, not these specific stations. (I know you've voiced some of that before as well, so please don't take this personally, but just, y'know ... legitimate-CAHSR-criticism fatigue, wanting to see it just get done, etc).
Either way; still a good video, keep it up, love your work, you know the spiel. And let us know if we can financially support your work in any way (comments where I suggest specific platforms keep getting auto-deleted, v annoying)
The LGV-Med on which Valence-TGV sits was supposed to recoup its sizable investment in about 20 years and has not disappointed. Valence-TGV was a small part (91 million) of the 4.5 billion (in 2003 Euros) bill. Its existence was never in doubt. SNCF's dictum is that speed is 80% of the ridership. People will take the TGV if it is much faster than driving and are flexible in regard to how they will get to the station. The hard part is to build the HSR line with its strict requirements in terms of curvature and the potential for local opposition. Once you manage to thread that needle, the stations locations, architecture or development nearby are almost irrelevant.
How about looking at existing train stations for comparison? The LIRR Ronkonkoma station has 6100 parking spaces. How about looking at airports without geographic constraints? In the Big Blue parking structure alone at Detroit Metro Airport, there are 6700 parking spaces. On-site parking totals 19000 spaces.
Ahhhhhhhhhhh. America still hasn't learned. I think the reason why they don't include the stations in the aerial shots is because it would look like a black hole of asphalt. The choice of surface parking lots is especially egregious as it feels almost as if they're trying to nuke the walkshed as much as possible. Seriously, the Bakersfield station is a joke. It's over half a mile of just parking lots and parking lots only. There's some potential for connecting rail services (e.g. to the towns and cities east of Hanford)
park and ride is an okay short term solution for high speed rail in my opinion nonetheless, I think it‘s good to recognize that CAHSR and similar projects are far from perfect and need to be questioned with good intentions and while continuing to insist on their completion
I'm gonna hold in most of my thoughts on your video because I am already fully aware of your disdain for this agency. What I will say is, just like many other cities with railways like this, TOD will come and I think many of these parking lots will only be placeholders. Also, these are just renderings. I'll be excited to be more critical once the final designs come out. So yes, you are overreacting. It isn't an anomaly to build railway stations outside city centers. Valence TGV in France, Reggio Emilia Mediopadana and Napoli-Afragola railway stations in Italy are other good examples of stations not residing in the city centers.
Right, someone else used Valence as an example. Go look at what that area is like and then compare it to wasn't going on outside of Hanford. That Napoli-Afragola station isn't even the same situation. It's arguably in a bad spot, but its only a mile from the center of the town there, only 6 miles from Naples, and the area is gorgeous and not a dusty farm town.
@@LucidStew Makes no difference. Neither of them are in the center of a city. And regardless, all these complaints you have were already negotiated when they first came up with the route, so I don't see the big deal getting pissed about it now. And anyway, the city of Hanford is not even that far from THAT railway station. In this country, we should probably be a little more grateful that we're at least getting some semblance of a high speed railway given how terrible this country has been at even getting these things started. Until we have a government that is actually 100% friendly on these things, we have to take what we can get.
Yes and in quite a few of these situations (Bakersfield) in particular the cities lobbied to have CHSR take a more peripheral route. Not sure it's even a problem but I find that trying to fault CHSR for those decisions without regard for the political forces shaping the route selection is totally misguided. Nothing exists in a vacuum and the CHSRA is not some supreme identity that has power to make all decisions by divine will.
@@TheRailwayDrone It makes a world of difference in draw and desire to preserve by avoidance, but if you're determined to ignore the differences, then of course it doesn't make a difference. "we have to take what we can get" no, we don't. We, The People, can demand and vote.
These station locations will doom the project, with Madeira being the worst of them. The stations should be in the heart of the cities, and there shouldn’t be any parking other than drop off. I guess I’ll have to move to Tokyo if I want to ever have efficient transportation. It seems America will never get its shit together.
They're likely planning to build new cities around the station. If they were in town the design would be constrained, like you can see around the stations that are in town. It would be easy enough to get their by bus.
Hanford was already given a grant to develop the area to connect the area with the Kings Station. Hanford has already broke ground on the new bus station closer to the HSR station.
Ah, now local politics ger involved. EVERYBODY wants a station. So, to meet politicians demands (my town or I'll veto funding bills) they will be stations in a lot of town with lots of stops. Bye, bye hi-speed?
@@billlong8385 According to the current plan, only trains that stop at every station will stop at Merced. For many people, driving to Merced station or driving to Madera station will make little or no difference.
I agree the architecture sucks. The number of parking spaces sounds like it is on the somewhat over kill side (roughly half to a third more then what is at a WMATA outlying Metrorail station), Vast acres of asphalt for parking should be replaced with parking structures with ground level commercial or even placing the parking structure above the station head house and platforms. See WMATA Hyattsville Crossing Metrorail station.
Weird that pedestrians and bicycles are combined, as the distance/reach is way different. Also when combining them it's impossible to determine the amount of bike racks needed. Also, they are repeating the same mistakes Europe and other places made in the last century, by not having entrances near the end of the platforms. In particular for Merced it would be great to have an entrance in the direction of downtown. Also it might be a mistake having side platforms in Merced and Madera as it's not unlikely that people will change between trains at least at times when there isn't a great service on all three legs of the triangle connecting to SF.
Great video! Holy Crap is there a ton of open air parking. I can't imagine there will be very much need for parking, let alone for rental cars, for at least a decade or more until there is a connection to San Jose. I also seriously doubt that the need for so much parking is justified even when the entire line is open from LA to SF. Fresno's airport only has about 900 spaces. I am disappointed by the overabundance of parking. These downtowns already have an oversupply of open parking lots that haven't been full for 30+ years. A parking garage would at least save space and keep the stations from being so isolated from their downtowns. I don't like the station designs (I imagine the Bay Area and So Cal stations will look much better) but I do like that the Merced station entrance has a treatment that has a rustic or "Sierra" feel to it since it is a gateway to Yosemite. I wonder why the other stations don't get a distinguishing feature for their station entrances. Fresno, to me, should have a California-Mediterranean feel to it like it's Amtrak station or it's iconic downtown water tower. Bakersfield has an oil and country music heritage. Kings/Tulare is ranch country. These cities have been economically stagnant or in decline since the late 1970s. In fact, Fresno's skyline has barely changed since then (w the exception of new gov't buildings). Fresno's downtown, however, does have a large number of mid-century buildings (office buildings, theaters, and dance halls) because of that which are architectural gems. I don't know why Kings/Tulare station is where it is. The Amtrak station is in downtown Hanford although I really think the station should've been in Visalia and should've generally followed the UP or Hwy 99 alignment from Bakersfield, only acquiring property where the geometry dictated it. This would've saved a lot of money and lawsuits over all the land they had to take in the farmlands. There is a "plan" (I don't know how real it is) for a commuter railroad along the RR ROW that roughly parallels Hwy 198 between Visalia and Huron and perhaps Porterville. This could be a good non-car way to get from Visalia to the station, leaving their cars in Visalia. There is also an abandoned RR ROW from Porterville (via Visalia) through Dinuba Reedley and Sanger to downtown Fresno that would also make a good commuter corridor. I think Madera was added later on. The Madera location is between the city of Madera and spread out Madera Ranchos community to the east. I imagine that the Madera HSR station will stimulate suburban housing to close the gap between southern Madera city and Madera Ranchos and the planned communities on the northern side of the San Joaquin River. There is no way to cross the river from Hwy 41 to 99, so the Madera Co corridor will likely fill in via Ave 12. This station would be about 8 miles from Fresno's Herndon Ave (11 miles by road). It's a weird station to get to from Hwy 99, meaning I guess it could be used by North Fresno residents who are loath to drive to downtown Fresno.
Thanks for the great comment. Merced is particular I find the parking disappointing for a number of reasons outlined in the video. It seems a lot already exists in the area and they have to get rid of a not insignificant number of local businesses just to make room for lots that will likely end up largely empty most of the time. I like your idea of the stations having more of a local character. The unified design kit would also be fine, imo, if the kit were any good. :D I'm also aware of the cross-valley connector through the Kings/Tulare station, but I really doubt it will cut down on vehicle traffic much. It will almost surely take longer than driving and be less convenient, so most people will probably still drive. The current Madera station is the end point of the initial 119 mile construction segment. Merced as an initial Central Valley segment was then added onto that. The current station site is even worse than this proposed one, so I don't blame SJJPA for moving it, but there have to be better options closer to the city. Maybe out by where Avenue 15 crosses the tracks, but unfortunately that debate is over at this point.
@@LucidStew thanks and I agree. Although I'm not sure that it's reasonable to expect rail transit to cut down on traffic because that has never happened in any meaningful way. Freeway widenings induce more traffic, it's safe to say that rail transit does the same thing. The fact that traffic is still as bad as before rail is a promise that just can't be lived up to and becomes another argument against it. Interesting fact, the Hanford Amtrak station has more boardings (182,140/yr) than the Merced one does (133,715) and about half the boardings as the Fresno station 369,118). The Madera station averages only about 75 boardings a day according to Amtrak California 2019 numbers. Also the Fresno-Bakersfield city-pair ridership is the 9th busiest in Amtrak California and the only one in the top 10 outside of trips originating in the Bay Area or Los Angeles (LA-San Diego is #1). Total transit time isn't the only consideration. Cost is also part of the equation. A $10 transit ride may take 20 min longer but it can save over the cost of parking at the station for a week. I almost always ride the Amtrak San Joaquins from the Bay Area to Fresno to visit family. It takes about an hour longer than driving but it's only $26 each way and with no stress of driving. To me, it's an easy tradeoff. I prefer to look at rail transit as increased mobility and opportunity for those who would most benefit from it as well as providing an option for those with the choice. This increased mobility is a positive for the economy as more people have more opportunity for education, healthcare, and jobs. As they say, a rising tide lifts all boats.
This makes me feel very dismal about the future of US transit, but maybe I am just too naive. Maybe California will turn into a litany of urbanist islands surrounding the HSR stations... lol. (I genuinely try to be positive, but these stations make that so gd hard)
Some weird choices there. Is it possible that they are anticipating development around the new stations, and that's why they are building them in relatively empty areas?
Yeah, I think that's the general idea. I really don't see it happening in a big way except in Merced and Fresno. Fresno especially is poised to fully take advantage of the situation. I leave Bakersfield out because while there is room for development directly around the station, its so isolated and in such a weird part of town, it seems like its influence wont expand much beyond the site.
Instead of doing a bunch of flat surface parking why not build up? two parking garage buildings that can be built right up against the station, multiple stories with ramps straight to the station. Why level building to make a parking lots half a mile away destroying local business?
The way I interpret it is that surface lots are cheaper as place holders. As the TOD is built, consuming the surface lots, they will build parking structures to replace them. I'm not sure if they will do all of this incrementally, or build all of the surface parking lots at once. Hopefully they spare as many local small businesses as possible for as long as possible.
All of this looks like they just asked the guys in the highway-monster building department to envision trains. The walk out of Madera station looks like it leaves you abandoned. These renders feel like they’re setting the whole thing up for failure. Would be more excited to complain about a lack of parking over making more black burning hot vacant lots that are no good for the environment.
It sounds like initially most of these will be fallow until the expansions, which could take a VERY long time. And that also brings up the issue of having to let this land sit there doing nothing in the meantime, or perhaps they will improve it only as needed.
The central valley HSR stations are all just an afterthought. Nobody is coming from there, or going to there. They are just passing through on the way to somewhere better. Sadly, the phase 1 plan doesn't include anywhere people actually want to travel to/from.
your criticques are all valid. *however* ill take what i can get. build it, and maybe eventually with all the state level housing policy changes, the TOD will happen too. For what its worth, i like the gold accordion design :D
I think the more likely case is some state officials will note that the system isn't making money and they will start renting out the parking spaces to developers.
Seems they could save a lot of money and acquisition related legal issues by just ignoring parking. The idea of having lots of big lots given over to public car storage has always seemed crazy to me. Now we have not only kiss+rides but Lyft and Uber: it's a waste of space.
I can understand some, but this seems like A LOT given the mission. It just feels like we're conveniently shifting the problems that plague the coastal areas into the inland areas rather than looking for real, structural solutions for the state as a whole.
Idk how Hanford keeps managing to take all the train stations from Visalia... Kings County has a population of 150k vs Tulare County who is approaching 500k. Makes no sense.
The original routes were closer to SR99. They switched because they concluded that would be too expensive. This is ironic given all the trouble they've had with land acquisition out in the middle of the valley.
How much land around these stations is owned by CAHSR? I'd think greenfield developments like this could go a long way to help pay for expanded development.
There should be no parking (except for handicap) at these stations except for maybe Kings/Tulare, take a damn uber if you're that scared of the bus. Agree with another commenter that if we really feel the need for parking, we can build a garage.
I think the reason these are marked for parking is because they haven't found any developers. I imagine once they get developers it will be different. This seems to be the case with most of the TODs in California.
sounds like you really want HSR to fail. Even BART and Caltrain provide parking in the suburban communities they serve. Communities that already have significantly better transit connections than these 4 central valley cities CHSR will initially serve. Parking lots are both easy to build and easy to tear up. There is plenty of time for CHSR to work those details out in a phased approach consistent with the phased construction of the ROW.
Pretty good job going over the plan. The project has had its setbacks, but it has made progress and worked with what they had. why there is a bunch of weird things in the plan. Lots of decent has been created in bako so now less and less people want to see this project completed. So the question becomes do we stop this project since it takes up most of the states capital? Then shift the money to state water projects now that so cal is in another water war?
I can tell you the short term is not looking good. Trump is up 3 points in the polls and it looks possible for Republicans to regain control of the Senate and retain the House, so that is dismal in terms of federal funds. In about the same time span as a 2nd Trump administration, California is supposed to run something like $160 billion in the red. The CAHSR budget for next year is finally decent, but the rest of the decade isn't looking too hot right now.
@LucidStew maybe we'll see, but Newsom doesn't even want this project, sure he takes credit when it looks good, but it's not what he wanted, called it Browns legacy train. But also I think it was from Dan Richards told him to F.O. when Newsom was L.T. government. after hunting in Montana. I like Dan for that plus he stuck up for the little guy amd freedom.
@@ericepperly9517 For sure. I was actually just thinking about this earlier today. A politician is going to back something as far as they think it is expedient for them, and Newsom has hardly stuck his neck out for CAHSR. It's pretty telling that California politicians aren't even willing to close the $5-8 billion Bakersfield-Merced gap. They're certainly not going to get behind the project to the tune of $90 billion.
@LucidStew well the project isn't fully funded anyway. it's likey the project will stop when cap and trade runs out for the C.V. LA and SF already spend 100% of their cap n trade. Now with inflation, I see more spending with less progress. I figure it will be like HWY 58, a centennial project.
No, you're not overreacting, looks like everything is designed intentionally to cause a lot of undesirable outcomes, on some level. Besides the stations are the most dated, awkward, selfconsciously dull... with concrete supports... Why not just use the existing station in Fresno. It looks like they're raised the ground level to block part of the trackside facade. Amazing.
@@LucidStew It looks pretty generously sized. Reminds me of the '50s and '60s when they started blatant one-upsmanship against themselves, developers - we had a couple of high rise apartment buildings in NJ about ten years apart. Newer one still makes the older look crappy right next to it. If that's their intention they won't succeed, without burying it.
The purpose of CAHSR's central valley stations isn't to move the area away from cars - it's to contain the cars on the cheaper real estate there and keep them out of the expensive real estate in LA and SF. That is also coincidentally what Park and Rides do best, and mirrors the setup that airports have (which is what HSR truly competes against instead of driving).
@@jmlinden7 It's a way to do things, but it's not really a good way. Airports have many problems, especially in the amount of land they consume for their activities, or the overall environmental impact of air travel.
let's not forget that the largest parking lot operation west of the Mississippi is BART. BART is gradually converting some of that parking to TOD but it is a system that essentially operates as a Park & Ride for the more suburban communities of the Bay Area. Many BART stations of course provide no parking at all as they are located in a downtown core. A system as large and sprawling as BART will take on many forms and I think it's not unreasonable to expect the same for CHSR.
I think the stations of the least populated cities should have been planned to open after the trunk line was finished, in order to prioritize main stops first
I made a similar argument in an earlier video. Hard to disagree with it here. It should probably just be Bakersfield to Fresno to start, but they need that transit connection at Merced.
My first thought is not about the parking but what about all those rental cars!!! Do that many people really ride the San Joaquin and hop off looking for a rental cars? My second is how much money (and embarrassment) could be saved by NOT building the Madera stop. That train should be full speed at Avenue 12, not crawling to a stop.
Plus, if you're going to drive all the way to that frickin' field, another 15 miles to Fresno probably isn't an issue. Because its clear that we're totally ok with the entire region driving to any station.
@@LucidStew the drive time along 99 from Madera to the station will be about the same as those coming from NE Fresno. I believe the biggest mistake being made is that the train didn’t go out towards Fresno State / Clovis where the majority of the users live. A park and ride lot in the slums of downtown Fresno is not a commuter solution.
@@Db_traveler At least in downtown there is the possibility of developing some real transit oriented living that would lessen the impact of the station in regards to spreading sprawl. It will probably take some time to catch on, but a lot of elements are there to make it happen. While I can appreciate the appeal of hooking up with Cal State and the airport, I'm not sure how that would reasonably work.
I've had several people inform me of this and every station that I have heard of in this regard is near a very beautiful part of the country with just jaw-dropping scenery within 5-10 miles with historical structures, towns, and villages you would genuinely not want to disturb. So, if that's the case, maybe still not the best choice logistically, but a bit more excusable.
Britain's HS2 demonstrates how difficult building HSR is. Finding a commercially viable market, avoiding extensive tunneling, environmental lawsuits and politician vetos, is a little miracle. Germany spent slightly more on her NBS lines than France on her LGVs. Unlike Germany, SNCF went for speed and did not mind P+R stations. As a result, TGV ridership is double ICE's. Ticket sales cover 60% of LGV construction costs as opposed to maybe 1% in more populated Germany. TGV ridership is long distance. Short trip HSR can be successful as shown by the 115 km Beijing-Tianjin HSR but the Central Valley towns lack Beijing or Tianjin's population (23 and 14 million) and subway networks serving the HSR stations. There lies the problem, not in the station design which is reasonable.
@@alaindumas1824 But you must understand that the main dilemma here is not how to optimize ridership on a high speed rail line that doesn't even exist. The dilemma is how to stop the spread of suburban sprawl, which is the structural cause of transportation problems in California.
@@LucidStew CAHSR is being built because Californians voted to support its construction. I would think sprawl is best addressed through zoning regulation and that is not what the 2008 vote was about. In regard to high speed rail, mass transit or urbanism, successes like the Tokaido or LGV Sud-Est clear the way for other projects in the public mind. Empty trains because the market is not there send the opposite message. In my opinion, CAHSR started by the Central Valley segment because it was easiest and cheapest, not because it had any commercial potential.
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HSR should be built in tandem with new local metros. This way you get off the HSR train and onto a local metro train to access the key features of a city without needing a car. Bakersfield and Fresno are actually large enough for a metro if designed correctly and if HSR was a proper anchor station.
I think one main problem is the extremely suburban nature of all of these cities. Merced and Fresno have the most chance of converting some of that into urbanity near the station. They both also have Amtrak stations within a mile of the planned CAHSR station, so there is potential to grow between. In the future, I could see a light rail or street car line in Fresno doing that. Not sure if Merced is large enough to support that.
@@LucidStew there's a project underway to link the San Joaquins line into the Merced CAHSR station, deprecating the old station on the BNSF line. It's called MITC, it's spearheaded by the SJJPA and Merced is, imo, a little too proud of it for what it is.
It's worth noting that I recently brought this up to the mayor of Merced at a town hall and got the old "public transit just doesn't work in the US" treatment. I see this is the start of a discussion, rather than the end, though, as multiple council members expressed agreement with my viewpoint.
Well, California is trying very hard to get cities to create rail and light rail projects, so I could see this happening. Also, I think Bakersfield and Fresno would probably opt for a streetcar.
@@curtthomas8465 Oh, ok, I knew SJJPA was planning to hook up at the Merced station, but I didn't realize they were planning to abandon the existing station.
China: NO SHIT SHIRLOCK
I fully agree that areas near passenger rail stations should be in walkable areas/areas that have decent transit, but at the same time, if the success of the Brightline Orlando airport station is anything to go by, more people are willing to “park and ride” than people may think.
It's because we're used to it. For example, there's no realistic way to get to the Fresno airport, which is the closest real international airport to Merced, via public transit. I mean, you can wait two hours for a southbound San Joaquins that's as fast as a normal car, then navigate Fresno's bus system with all your luggage out to the airport, but that sounds like a huge PITA and like you'd have to leave five-six hours ahead of your flight instead of just three (an hour to drive and two for security theatre at the airport). Why would I ever voluntarily interface with a transit network that was clearly designed as an afterthought and take twice as long to even get on my plane? Nevermind the fact that it's probably more expensive than driving anyway, and yeah, of course you'd pay for park n ride.
We could be doing so much better than that, though.
Plus, it seems like the park and rides are slated to eventually be redeveloped into mixed use after some years in the future. Which I don't think is a terrible idea if we're trying to get people to gradually shift back to liking trains
@@curtthomas8465 or better yet, have a friend/family member drop you off and pick you up, or rideshare. That'd be my go-to, rather than leave my car at the station all day and possibly overnight.
@@notXaragame3542 They should be slated for development from the start. As lucid says in the video, building 3000 parking spaces per station is only going to induce suburban development, and trying to take that parking away for development at some nebulous future time period is only going to mean you have to fight to build what should've been built in the first place.
Brightline’s airport station connects to a very busy international airport increasing connectivity because of that.
CAHSR stations in the middle of a field increase connectivity to nowhere except CAHSR.
As much as I hate it, I think it’s fine to have parking in the mean time. These cities don’t really have great mass transit options, so if you want people from around the region to actually use the train (and keep costs down by not building garages), this is what you’re stuck with. On the bright side, these lots can easily be redeveloped in the future (and if the whole project is successful, there should be no shortage of funding for the redevelopment).
I think California should continue pressuring cities along the route to make tram lines. I also think they should sell off unused land or rent it as quickly as possible.
They could have made the station closer to the town there supposed to be serving so you wouldn’t need to go as far
@@shopdog831 much of that had to do with the choice of routing, and where CAHSR could get the tracks to go. In Bakersfield's case, that route was the Locally Generated Alternative pushed for by the city, rather than the other route that would have gone right through the center of the city to the current Amtrak station. Bakersfield apparently has some strong redevelopment plans for the area around the future HSR station, perhaps moreso than any of the other CV cities getting HSR.
@@KRYMauLcompletely out of touch. These projects would not be financially viable for these small, impoverished cities (except maybe Fresno, *maybe*) due to their diffuse development style and lack of density.
@@KRYMauLAgreed
Ngl I like the bronze detailing. It gives a retro art deco vibe similar to some of the new skyscrapers in nyc. But yeah the amount of parking is outrageous.
The Brooklyn Tower is a cool looking building, but at least its a MODERN take on deco...
I'm actually working on this right now, getting involved with hounding Merced City Council to develop better public transit and better land use overall, but especially near the station. Merced, for their part, claims that a revitalization effort centered around the station is underway, but I've not heard any specifics. They're probably referring to those transit-oroented development potentials. The station is going to be caddy corner from Costco at 15th and O area.
The parking lot areas have floored me. Thanks so much for bringing this up. This is bonkers
Nice. Keep us posted. Merced in particular is frustrating because you only have a gap of 2-3 blocks to close, but its a 4-lane street and huge amounts of parking between. Not exactly the most enticing way to get people to wander in the downtown direction before driving home. Or further out in the future, walking home. I'm sure there would be local opposition, but I think if Merced could shrink 16th St. down to 2 lanes and shift that traffic capacity elsewhere, in addition to getting rid of some 16th St. facing parking, that would go a long way toward tying everything together and making the station work out much better for the city.
@@LucidStew the whole central valley is very, very, very car dependent. Public transit infra here is terrible, particularly between cities. The good news is that, for the most part, folks here aren't really all that car-brained; it's just a fact of life that you need a car to get around the valley, not that many people actually seem to enjoy it. The bad news is that we do have a lot of NIMBYs here. I've never met a group of folks more deathly allergic to urban density than Californians, especially in the central valley. It just means it's going to take consistent effort over a long time.
@@curtthomas8465 I'm from the Inland Empire, which is very much a spiritual cousin to the San Joaquin Valley, but we're kind of like your guys' Ghost of Christmas Future. When people start flooding in, and they already have, especially in Bakersfield, it's going to get miserable without some forward thinking policies. Once everything is built out the wrong way, correcting becomes very difficult.
Can you get me a job? Im an environmental engineering student, about to graduate from UCLA. Thx!
@@KevinBolsajian I'd love to. Unfortunately, the work I'm doing is as a citizen showing up to city council meetings to give public officials a hard time, not paid work. Best of luck to you.
Steampunk is good actually.
Even from that standpoint, these designs are completely devoid of whirling gears and vacuum pumps.
@@LucidStew There's a steampunk metro station in Paris that's really nice, gears included.
@@Jay-jq6bl sweet. I need to look into that.
I think the issue with the parking lots is also partially the fact that building residential and commercial developments isn’t in the legal scope of CAHSRA. it’s up to local municipalities to improve the station areas and there’s certainly not a shortage of land so they have a big opportunity here. but if CAHSRA started seeking out developers to build housing at this stage, many people would (correctly, IMO) view it as a diversion from their stated goal of building a high speed rail line
That's a good point. Hopefully once they switch from construction to operations, we'll see how that works out. Still, I don't think it diminishes the structural problem of these cities being VERY suburban, and the accommodation of parking and ride actually encouraging expansion of that.
@@LucidStew definitely a problem still, I just don’t think one that can be fixed by CAHSRA as they currently exist. hopefully we see a lot more from the cities around the stations in the next couple years that indicate they will be remedying some of these problems
@@LucidStewexpansion will happen no matter what because that is what our species does. The design is meant to increase ridership and reduce people driving from suburban places to suburban places. This is not some little tram line for connecting transit dependent condos or apartments. The cost is way too high and cannot be underutilized by sealing it off to the people that actually live there now who most likely will never be able to not have a car. It is a HSR corridor and should be treated no different than an airport. Providing access to it for transit dependent people is the job of the cities, not CAHSRA. Nothing stops BRT, light rail, and local busses from being the main way transit dependent people get to a station.
Seriously, I don’t understand why anyone would be against this project.
I know, right? 😂
The only people I think would be the farmers who see the government take their land.
@@colinguo5855And they're the biggest reason why it's so damn expensive.
cost
@@colinguo5855who are adequately compensated. Those "farmers" are not some small time few acres of land people either, they're insanely wealthy corporate run farms that use more water than all the 40M people living in CA. Perfect example of the exact case where eminent domain should be utilized.
16:25 I hope they keep the bronzed look. Every building is annoyingly white these days, like people are afraid to pick a dadgum color. It's really ridiculous and makes everywhere look like a dentist's office.
I pick fire engine red! :)
I agree. There is a boldness to the use of bronze. Used correctly bronze can make a design feel not just modern but incredibly avant-garde. The great modernist architects knew how to make good use of it.
I actually like the bronze look. I'm tired of the white Apple store look.
No, please don't say that. Can we find another color that is neither? :D
At least if the project isn’t finished, they can still use the Bakersfield station as a federal prison. Nobody’s getting out of there on foot
I smell a Michael Bay film...
the bronze station design is dope wdym 😭😭
You guys have me 😭with this bronzed look support 😭
Great video but I do think you're harsh.
First of all, about the "stations in the middle of nowhere". Yes, they are not in ideal places but they can serve a groupnof smaller places that do not justify big investments to bring tje tracks closer to them. From the ,ap I think they do have a potential in the future to attract the nearby monicipalities to develope into the station's direction. Remember that most central stations and corridors that are in the center of the city used to be the edge, or even further out, until they got surrounded by the settelment they served.
As for park and ride, I'm not a fan and the number of parking spots is huge they are built in a way that it's easy to develope them into high density housing while eliminating them as time passes. That said, they should work toward good frequent transit to connect the stations to the nearby towns. It's importan to mention that CAHSR cannot do everything on their own and without cooperation from the different municipalities and other local authorities it won't work.
Maybe help with transit financing for the first few years will help.
I rode HSR in Spain to Zaragoza. That station was very far from the urban core but a bus ride made it just fine. I prefer SF’s stations of course, but this will work for rural areas.
@@robichaud-carew1.6 mi is not "very far", especially when it's a new station built for the HSR service as the more central stations were inadequate. That said it is near dense urban areas, even if not the "city center" and is connected by local trains, buses and the planned 2 tram line will stop there as well.
BTW, this is an example of how you can do this and provide a fast direct connection as on the the Madrid Barcelona-French Boarder the main line bypasses cities like Zaragoza or Lleida with a direct and fast connection to the central station or - if not possible (like Tarragona, where the station is in the middle of no where due to the complexity of a diversion to the city itself, especially with the junction splitting to the Mediterranean corridor) they provide a shuttle to the city and in 2026 the tram should open and connect it as well and there are many that
it's still very popular and getting close to 1M a year (Tarragona has ~138k inhabitants) and it does have a car park but only for 630 cars and it's not free (1.75€/h).
I think you’re definitely overreacting a bit about the station designs. They don’t look insanely modern like something you’d find in Chinese HSR stations sure, but I’m honestly down for a more art-deco vibe or whatever tf what they’re going for is called
As for the stations themselves, I agree with most of your criticism. Merced, Fresno and Bakersfield seem like the only stations that I could see with successful TOD and viable local transit. With Bakersfield specifically, speaking as a resident I know there’s a concerted push for trying to get more people to live in our Downtown and get a BRT or light rail route along historical streetcar routes that already have good bones. Maybe that will help. I wish we had kept the original station by Amtrak.
Also, fun(?) fact: Bakersfield very well might have the first high speed rail adjacent, transit oriented strip club 😭 (Look up Deja Vu Bakersfield)
Good ol' Deja Vu. We have them down here, too. Not like I'm familiar or anything... XD I'm really a bit flummoxed by the Bakersfield station. I was looking at the possibilities at street level, and it just seems like a place that no one from the outside would ever walk to. There's a bike path from the Kern, but that seems like it has limited potential. Maybe the bus setup will be good, but still its sort of a reserved space you need to be transported into, which is weird.
@@LucidStew quick question, are these locations set in stone? I'm just curious if there's still opportunity to move any of them, or if we're well past that point yet.
@@jamalgibson8139 Everything has a Record of Decision and a Final EIS. I suppose its still POSSIBLE to change, but the ball is rolling toward design and construction now.
The Bakersfield station location is part of the Locally Generated Alternative that was pushed for by the city and approved by CHSRA. The original route did take HSR through the city to the current Amtrak station. Apparently Bakersfield does have plans to redevelop the area around the future station for TOD and more walkability, perhaps more so than any of the other CV cities getting HSR.
@@ChrisJones-gx7fc I'm curious why they wouldn't want to interconnect with the amtrak station? It seems like a no-brainer, regardless of whatever redevelopment efforts they're going through.
Park and ride has to be garages only in my opinion. Easier to build high (especially since I imagine park n ride will be popular and gets cars off the roads!!) than have surface (yuck!) lots which are wastes of space. Shame seeing small businesses get kablooied, but hopefully there are good plans (LOL) to fix that in the future.
given most of the surface parking areas are listed as potential future TOD, I'd say it's a certainty that those will be redeveloped, leaving space for a parking structure at each station. The Central Valley is very car-dependent and likely will remain so, so these stations need to address that. Hopefully with the introduction of HSR and better transit options to get to and from the stations, as well as TOD around them, that'll encourage more people to drive less and use transit more.
@@ChrisJones-gx7fc Agreed! Park and ride is the first step. Afterwards you can better map where people are going and prove demand to better build out metro services to improve transit.
Parking lot -- ballpark $2,000/car. Parking deck -- ballpark $25,000/car
Thanks for posting this important criticism of the project. I know it's tough to be a critical voice in this space, because people don't like their ideas to be criticized, but it's important to be objective when seeing how these projects are actually playing out. No matter how good of an idea CAHSR may be, there are still many issues to be addressed, and building 13k parking spaces absolutely deserves to be criticized.
I will say that I think your pessimism about TOD being built is unwarranted, though I understand where it comes from. I think that urban development it's actually on the upswing, and by the time this actually gets under construction we'll see better developments in the area. But the fact that they even thought that building 3k spaces per station was a good idea at this stage in the project shows that there's still a big fight ahead of us.
I think that TOD will happen in most of these places over time. Some may take quite some time, like Madera. And some, if people live there they might come to regret it, like Bakersfield. My main point in dismissing the TOD was that due to way these cities are structured, even if you do manage to build some density around the stations, you still have vast amounts of suburban areas that will feed that parking space need. I also think, since that's the case, most of the stations will probably also make that worse over time once Central Valley is connected to elsewhere.
@@LucidStew Totally fair assessment. I hope that as urban development takes a more prominent role in the cultural zeitgeist that we can move cities towards being more sustainable, but that might just be me in my little urbanist bubble. There's definitely a lot of work that needs to be done to get there, and videos like this help illustrate how good ideas can still lead to poor outcomes if we're not careful.
Hopefully more criticism about the huge amounts of planned parking will come out and we can get these cities to plan this out better, but yeah, as far as being drivers of suburban sprawl, there's definitely huge potential if the cities aren't careful (which they likely won't be).
I've though about if California's High Speed Rail was just gonna be a park and ride scheme. I never realized that it was gonna be this bad though. I really hope that the cities will utilize this once in a lifetime opportunity and use this system to densify there cities and build up around these stations. Great video and presentation, cant wait to see more!
Yeah, you have to figure there is going to be a good amount of parking, it's California! But the whole reason I made the video is because the amount they're planning really surprised me even with the expectation that there would be a lot.
I already knew some of the stations were less than ideal, but looking into it more for this video the treatment for Merced and Bakersfield were particularly disappointing. Hopefully local governments can get more in tune with integrating these stations into their cities rather than just hosting them.
Parking lots? seriously? Lets make sure this is a destination free destination
A bunch of apartments is also not a destination. If you want a destination then put HSR stations at Universal studios, Disneyland, coastal resorts, and casinos. Smack one right at Yosemite national park too. HSR functions as the backbone, not the only and final means of transport. It operates more like an airport and not like a bus line.
personally feel like your hate for Kings-Tulare is a bit overkill given that kind of station is actually not that uncommon elsewhere as far as HSR stations go, Aix-en-Provence TGV in France is the best example since it's 13km(8mi) from the city center of the city it's supposed to serve and in the middle of literal woods, it's only connected to the outside world by a literal highway crossing underneath, albeit it's a far better setup imo to serve the role of a park and ride station but considering how busy it is don't see how Kings-Tulare can't even see a fraction of that (if phase 1 is ever completed), Americans don't seem to be against the concept of P+R considering Brightline Florida gets by fine with their Orlando station at the airport though probably shouldn't be doing that in prime downtown land like in Merced or Fresno which I agree are very dissapointing to see
The push-back I'm getting so far on Kings/Tulare is that similar ideas exist elsewhere, but I'm not really hearing why it isn't a bad idea there as well.
@@LucidStew I mean no one is saying that P+R stations are the gold standard and something that should be getting built everywhere, but it's a tool in the tool box in transit planning which has its optimal use cases, in the the Aix-en-Provence TGV case (similarly in betweeen population centers of modest size) the alternative is just not have a station there as you can't do TOD in the woods above a highway and diverting the RoW to pass through a city of 140k makes no financial sense especially considering you'd have to tunnel under it in this case, given it's well used I'd argue it was the right call which imo driving to a HSR station still beats just driving to your destination by quite a bit, plus if the California planners have their way it's supposed to be augmented by the Cross Valley corridor which would give a rail link to neighbouring cities and an alterantive to driving besides busses (though surprise it's not going to be there when the station opes which is dumb)
Also the Cross Valley Corridor, when built, will offer a car-free way to access the Kings station.
Aix-TGV was not supposed to exist. SNCF wanted to build a Cote d'Azur branch to its Marseille LGV Med. The branch would have paid for itself in 20 years but passed near Aix and faced local opposition. Building the LGV Med in the densely populated Rhone valley was hard enough and SNCF agreed to the requests of Aix politicians who wanted a station not a LGV.
It receives about 3.5 million passengers annually, equivalent to Amtrak's ridership at Chicago Union Station or on its Acela service. P+R and HSR work very well together but most people drive or catch a bus to Aix-TGV in order to board a TGV going to Paris, 455 miles away, or further away to CDG airport, Belgium, Spain or Germany. For shorter trips like the ones offered by CAHSR most French car owners will just drive.
@@alaindumas1824 valid points and wasn't aware of the political nuance that allowed the station to come into existence, agree that for the Initial operating segment it probably won't be very attractive to use but if phase one opens it absolutely can compete with trips to the Bay area (~350km, 4h+ by car ) and isn't terrible for LA (~200km, 2-3h+ by car depending on traffic) plus avoiding LA or Bay area traffic is a pretty attractive proposition by itself which from what I can tell is much worse than what you get on French autoroutes, the ticket price is most likely going to be deciding factor tbh
CAHSR needs to use these stations as an opportunity to build up the urban fabric in the area. Residential, mixed use with shops. We don't need or want massive parking lots! Great video, buddy ❤
I made this video because I was honestly surprised. I was going over it for Stew's News and was really taken aback by just HOW MANY parking spaces they have planned. I hope they come up with something better before the implement.
I can’t believe they haven’t learned from the low ridership of BART and other services in CA. The parking is insane 🤦♂️
Those stations could a mix residential commercial havens but no.
I think Fresno has a good chance of realizing the transit oriented potential of a system like this, if it can redevelop and revitalize. Same with Merced, if they can link the station in a pedestrian friendly way to the existing downtown area. Madera and Kings/Tulare are bad ideas as far as I'm concerned. Bakersfield, I think the locals blew it with this as the "Locally Preferred Alternative".
@@LucidStew oh 100%. Nimbys kill so many projects that long term would help them and solve a lot of their problems/complaints.
They probably couldn't no one wants to live somewhere just because a long distance train happens to be there. One can see this fact in stations on the northeast corridor.
I think it's more like they haven't sold the land yet.
… but not yet! Fresno isn’t SF, but give them time. At this point I just want the damn rail I don’t care to waste time about what happens around it yet
the casino jokes are spot on
Park and ride is not a bad thing in the right areas. Many of the areas the train runs threw have urban sprawl with the only way to get there is by driving. There best option is to drive a short way, hop on the train for rest of the trip. Keeps thousands of cars out of traffic jams. And TOD works in some areas but still wont for everybody. Many people dont want apartments style homes. They want that single family home for a quiter life. Giving them options to cut car time significantly is a win win. Keeps people out of cars in busy areas.
If you're talking about 3,000 parking spaces, doesn't that then become a busy area? Seems like you're just shifting the inconvenience from one area to another. And then with some of these intended to be near downtown walkable spaces, isn't the traffic of 3,000 cars a detriment, neutralizing whatever win you may gain by encouraging density around the station?
@LucidStew yes and no. If it's not in a downtown core, then park and ride is ideal. Especially if it's near major roadways. Having TOD with parking there is ideal. For the poeople that live in the burbs but want a fast way to get into work or travel. Great for getting people out of traffic jams saving on idling time and opening up space for truck traffic on the highway.
Now in urban cores no. Having limited parking is ideal there. U already have high development with the jobs. Getting people there and out quickly is the key. With development adding more homes and jobs. So not much in the way of parking is needed.
Commuter trains work best in this route as it's geared to shorter trips, from the burbs to downtowns. While HSR is more like plane travel from point to point imo
3:34 I personally disagree that if the parking lots get converted into TOD (and they should), that all of the parking would need to be replaced with an expensive parking structure.
I hope (and maybe i’m being too optimistic) that if central valley cities get to the point of major TOD around their high speed rail stations, they would also at that point have decent enough local transit to take people to the station. maybe in the end all they’ll need is a small parking lot and a drop off area.
I think they very suburban nature of these cities will force it. Buses are realistically the only solution there and there are a lot of people who live in the suburbs that don't want to ride the bus.
@@LucidStew I can definitely see that, only time will tell.
Personally, I think they should create a TOD with a garage in the middle similar to how they do park n rides in Europe. Also, I think they continue pressuring cities into investing into light rail transit.
There should be underground parking requirements. if it's expensive to build, there won't be as much parking, and our cars shouldn't act to expand the walking radius.
@@nevermindful Or they should just pressure the cities to remove minimum parking requirements.
Ngl, i kinda dig the bronze accordion look. Its so ugly it swings back into endearing somehowXD i think the huge parking lots are an unfortunate necessity to help ease away from the present near total car dependency- hopefully it will get infilled away as the area becomes more desirable and densified
Way to stay positive about the aesthetics! :)
Perhaps one can affectionately think of the bronze accordion look as reminiscent of the Sandworm's of Dune or the Shai-Hulud. Who says these designs are not futuristic!!!
As for the hanford station, there is a planned regional rail system, it's called cross valley corridor, it would connect hanford, CAHSR, visalia, and a couple other cities. Ironically it's the station I have the most interest in. Since it's the cross roads of CAHSR and a regional rail system, and with nothing around it makes it perfect for a new city to pop up, like California forever except good.
This is the best goddamn video I’ve ever seen 😂. I’m still on board with HSR. When we stop funding freeways and have an actual dedicated funding stream for projects like this, these compromises won’t have to be made anymore. But yea welcome to America 🇺🇸
I think your parking lot hell criticisms are good, but I don't agree that the aesthetics are that bad. They look like some of the more enjoyable museums to actually spend time in. Not everything needs to be so modern that it looks out of date 2 years after its built.
I can agree that these designs do look like something out of a museum. :)
Great video. I think you heaped maybe 7% of the scorn these station sites and designs deserved.
They mentioned in the CAHSR board meeting that SR 204 is going to be put on a road diet. I think CEQA's website says it going to be reduced to two lanes with bike lanes added. I could be mistaken.
Fantastic video
seems to me they are heavily future proofing these for at leastr a century of population growth. with that in mind i dont really mind an overallowance of P&R, those surface lots can be developed at a later date as their land value rises beyond parking
The problem though is that its not good growth. It's going to induce even more sprawl, which is our main functional issue in this state to begin with. Plus I think the expectation that people are going to move out there in droves is somewhat overblown. It's not the greatest place in the world. The part of California I live in is similar in climate. It's downright miserable in summer and the air quality sucks because the smog and dust pushed in from the coast gets trapped by the mountains. Its the type of place your kids are going to try to find a way out of once they grow up.
Tulare? Madera? Bakersfield? 🤨 Nobody is going to ride this thing.
Park-and-ride lots exist as a way for public agencies to do land banking and to sell and/or lease land for transit-oriented development.
With T.O.D., the parking is NOT reconstituted!
The demand for parking at the station is going to come from the surrounding suburban areas. Building some apartments around the station will not diminish the demand for parking.
Man, I want this project to be successful SO BADLY, but they ain't making it easy. The idea of renting a car upon arriving in Bakersfield should be absurd to anyone who considers it. Hopefully the need for more transit connections at these stations becomes obvious sooner rather than later, and things like the Cross Valley Corridor at Kings-Tulare will get the attention they deserve.
Goodness, I somehow didn't comprehend how useless the Madera and Kings/Tulare stations are, how small of a city Merced is, and how poorly the Bakersfield station integrates with its city. This whole thing will add up to a large, extremely expensive commuter rail line for Fresno. Ridership will be incredibly low.
it's not looking good, phase 1 should be a demonstration of the vision for this project, and the station locations plus the planned development around them makes it seem like every stop in the central valley is going to drop you off in a wasteland. I can't imagine central valley residents opting to take this train over a car ride to the neighboring cities. Most of the value comes from connecting north and south california...
The way it works out in the shorter term should be interesting to watch. San Joaquins is one of the busier Amtrak routes, so they WILL have plenty of passengers day 1. I think Fresno has real potential when they get out of the Central Valley. Merced they're shooting themselves in the foot somewhat, which stinks because its going to be an important transfer hub for potentially decades. Bakersfield seems like a very poor choice. And then Madera and Kings/Tulare, I think I said it all in the video. :D
Most Costcos are a huge waste of land. The one in central San Francisco has a parking garage, which works fine. Imagine the housing possibilities, as well as the solar and wind potential they're already squandering.
Or just leaving arable land alone and allowing food production to continue there. TOD should be preserving the farmland around cities NOT expanding into it.
So in Fresno there's 2500 parking spots for bicycles.... and I'm sure they've done their research and concluded there are 2500 bike riders that just happened to need a HS train to Bakersfield and Modesto?! I'm impressed! 😂
Who knows where they got that. When it opens, a top priority is going to be filming this field of 5% full bike racks.
The bike racks were probably a requirement in order to qualify for some federal or state money. The Feds and states are notorious for slipping touchy feel good projects into grant requirements.
There is a massive difference between a station in the city (even if it is in the outskirts) and one in a few kilometers (or miles away). Shared stations for more than one city are a terrible idea, you need to choose one on none. They should reconsider some of those station locations.
You have a local service that runs between all 3 locations. People don't tend to use HSR every day, so that's a fine solution, since it leaves the opportunity to have a more pedestrian layout around the station.
Competition is on: will CHSR implode or finish before HS2 in the UK? Place your bets
Depends what you mean by finished in both respects
it feels like hating on Bakersfield is a state pastime for us
Could be worse. They could be Lodi.
the Fresno entrance reminds me of the entrance to the newly built station at Brent Cross West in Greater London, UK- so I guess this a trend in station design right now
Little different, but at the same time it has a look that is equally dated with the glass cladding and the exposed industrial-type beam work that was popular... 15 years ago!
@@LucidStew Architectural design is not something that follows a linear progression like conventional technology. New and contemporary designs are not necessarily more "modern" than designs from 50+ years ago. Some of the most dated looking shit is the stuff being built right now designed by some clown architect who just happens to think that's what the future will look like.
@@brianwithoutay2291 No one said architecture needs to follow a linear progression. However, perpetuating the same styles for two decades is no progress at all.
I do think that a lot of people in the central valley will benefit more from park and ride, as extensive as it may be. This would especially benefit those who may seek work in the bigger cities. I do agree that transit oriented development is a must, but with the nature of these smaller California cities that do not have robust public transit, park and ride seems to be the most viable option for its citizens. I think developing shuttle/bus/streetcar routes for the stations seems like a logical next step, and then scaling back the amount of parking and replacing with different developments in the future, once there is enough growth and usage of the HSR and the routes to get to the station. This might take like 50 years to get there i guess.
I realize people think others are going to commute in droves from the Central Valley out, but something like Fresno-San Jose on a workday basis would cost around $1000 or more a month and if you're parking and riding to do that, you still need to pay for a car on top of that.
6:24 Seems a bit short sighted that CAHSR did not take into account the additional overpass to accommodate that business when designing the AVE 12 Overpass, so they will have to spend extra money to close it down again and add another bridge.
Probably due to the phasing. They don't need that second track and platform until V2V is connected, and they probably didn't want to pay upfront for a structure that was doing nothing for 15-20 years.
i don't think there's anything wrong with kings tulare when i visited italy and rode the high speed train there was a similar station on the outskirts of a smaller city that was surrounded by basically nothing. Not all of the high speed trains stopped there bc it was lower traffic but it gave that city a connection to the big cities
I really don’t think that station deserves all the hate it gets. The station will be more accessible after the planned Cross Valley Corridor is built.
I think you're spot on with your conclusions. The future California's Central Valley is going to look much like its past
The city of Hanford was given a grant to develop the area between Hanford and the Kings station making it easier to access for residents. I think it does make sense to connect Kings and Tulare counties especially since Tulare has world wide agriculture interests and visitors come from all over the globe for the Tulare Farm Show.
Things will develop around the rail line. That's how it's worked for older rail projects throughout history
I get that the Central Valley may not have as much transit. But come on, at least make half of those lots TOD. I would easily take the large ugly garage for plenty of TOD around the station. 'specially since IOS is gonna need some places for people to go, why not have those places be at the stations?
"potential future" TOD. Even still, due to structural issues, that will be mostly useless aside from Merced and Fresno, since those stations are actually located near currently denser development.
@@lecho0175 they don't use planes for commuting either.
With remote work here to stay, the typical 9-5 5-day work week could be on its way out, replaced by something like going to the office 2-3 times per week. That makes the idea of living much further from the office more appealing, if one has the means to reach it quickly and with ease, such as HSR.
For Bay Area tech jobs, that could mean you live out in the Central Valley, say Fresno or Merced areas as an example, and for the days going to the office in San Jose, rather than drive Highway 152 you instead drive or take transit to the local HSR station, hop on an HSR train to San Jose, get to the office via transit or taxi/rideshare, get the work done then take HSR back home in the evening, being able to work on the train the whole time.
I'm sure many who have that option in the countries HSR exists in do that, in addition to using HSR for their regular travel needs when it's the best option.
Have you considered that this was offered to developers as TOD and they said hell no.
@@mickeygraeme2201 That is not a bad point. The "private investment" windfall that the CAHSR plan has always included still has not materialized. At this point they're hoping that will happen once Merced-Bakersfield exists as a demonstration.
@@LucidStew While that is possible I wouldn't be so sure. Most rail lines don't have a particularly large amount of TOD even when they are fully running and I think people forget that. The NEC in USA and High speed 1 in england show this. Most bus Lines in California move more people daily than the city airport. Long distance journeys are just not that common for most people.
Yes, the situation of the Kings Tuare station is bad, but there’s really nothing the California high-speed rail authority could do about that, and they don’t deserve the blame for it. It’s not their fault that Hanford foolishly refused to allow the station to be built in there city and still largely opposes the project.
It’s not all bad though the planned Cross Valley Corridor could someday make the station accessible by transit allowing more people access, and reducing parking requirements.
Complaining about a problem that the CA HSR Authority doesn’t have the authority to fix is not going to help. They’re doing the best that they can. A better approach would be to instead advocate for the timely completion of the cross valley corridor project.
Ok. I look forward to your video on that subject.
@@LucidStew I do agree that more videos on this topic are need. AmpereBEEP and Banks Rail have made a few decent segments on this topic, but nothing the I consider a proper full video exists. But, while I'm passionate about this topic and enjoy discussing it's complexities, I don't believe I have the necessary expertise to produce the video myself. I lack the necessary expertise in transportation logistics, and governmental policies to produce the kind of video this topic truly deserves. This topic is also outside the scope of my own channel.
Perhaps it would be a good topic for you to cover in the future.
I felt a bit disheartened by your response, I perceived it to be a bit dismissive. When I shared my thoughts on the topic, I was hoping for a meaningful exchange of ideas, but your comment seemed to redirect the conversation in a way that made me feel like my input wasn't valued. I wanted to share how your response made me feel, because having positive and constructive communication is important to me.
Additionally, I don't think I know enough about the Cross Valley Corridor specifically to make a video on the topic. My comment was somewhat surface level and repetitive, and it represents the entire extent of my knowledge on the subject. Nonetheless, I'm still open to discussing the topic further if you're interested
@@MasonJarGaming I don't have the expertise either. Expertise is not really necessary to start a conversation on a topic you're interested in. I'm mainly responding to the "I don't think you should do this, you should do that" portion of your original comment, realizing it's much easier, but less effective to tell other people what they should do than it is to do it yourself.
Thanks, well done.
I think the reason for the Madera station is for people coming in from SF & heading into Sacramento, Madera is the first easy place to have the 2 lines connect together instead of carrying people further into Fresno to transfer up north.
I don't think that's a great argument but I assume that's the reason why it exists.
I think one part that should be kept in mind in regards to the location, is being realistic. Yes, many main stations here in Europe are quite close to downtown and that’s a big selling point over airports. But it’s not like they are literally on Main Street and many of them weren’t even in the city when they were built. The cities just had a few decades to grow around and towards then.
Building a station 3-4 blocks away from downtown is pretty close to perfect if you ask me. Any position where you could realistically walk to the main square/ street is good and locations further out can still be ok, depending on the connections. I visited Japan last year and the HSR stations of Osaka and Hiroshima both require about 10 stations of subway/ streetcar travel to get to downtown. I’ve also traveled to the old German capital of Bonn a few times last year and their Highspeed station (Bonn/ Siegburg) is even a 30min tram ride away from the center in a completely different small city on the other side of the Rhine. Sure it’s much less convenient then in many other cities, but it’s still a useful station. Dedicated long distance stations can be a bit further out then main stations with a lot of regional/ commuter traffic, because those are much more time sensitive to a few minutes more or less then a 2,5h+ trip.
Merced IS in a great the location. The complaint here is that they are then making that location worse by surrounding it with parking and disincentivizing people from engaging with the downtown area due to the inconvenient and uninviting walk that would entail
@@LucidStew Yeah, I've arrived in cities all around Europe by train and the experience of disembarking and leaving the station really can't be overstated. Much like what people have said about the old Penn Station in NYC, how people used to enter the city like royalty. I'd also like to see a prewar level of respect paid to the architecture and landscaping. I hate to see such a great opportunity squandered. Maybe they need to get together with those billionaires wanting to build a city from scratch.
The Madera station location is shocking - especially when there already seems to be a good rail right of way that goes right through the heart of downtown.
I also don't mind the copper steampunk accordion aesthetics for the station canopies 😄
Having stations near or between some of these towns may be the best solution in the long term, since the land around the stations can have whole street grids configured with density and walkability in mind from square one. You don't really need parking to get from these adjacent towns either, if they have buses. Eventually there could be a rail link between all 3 towns. Really, if they make a nice enough area, given the adoption of work from home, the areas around these stations could become very nice. The weather is ideal for such new cities. This makes me think of the city some billionaires are trying to start from scratch just north of San Francisco.
The land around these stations is farm land. In the case of Hanford, you also have a lot of dairies out there. Summers get very hot in the San Joaquin Valley. The air is poor quality and its dusty and hazy out there. It's not some sort of undiscovered paradise.
The "last mile problem" is always an issue for long distance mass transit. But with some of these stations, it's more like "last 5 or last 10 mile".
Mixed feelings. From a European perspective, city centre stations are much better to rejuvenate those centres but can be expensive to carve out the space. The ‘parkway’ style stations do often exist too, especially by smaller centres. Your hope is that you are cutting out long car journeys at the cost of a bit of induced short car journey. Someone can drive to their local station to commute by train into a distant larger city where they can’t afford to live or work otherwise. As others have posted, the ideal is to have good public transport into said mid-sized towns so that those centres can also benefit.
I think there's a location factor at play here. Being so close to Silicon Valley, you will probably have a lot of work from home people who would take the train in to work only when they have to. This would turn out quite nice if they do things right.
Oh absolutely agree that it will expand sprawl, I don't buy into how high speed rail will eliminate it.
However, I do think that these areas will probably grow. I would imagine that area where it's kind of all agriculture would eventually be like a small town area.
Like a downtown area with mixed use density. So I tend to think it's both. It will definitely create more density around. Probably the train itself. But it will also sprawl at the same time.
Either way from an environmental standpoint, it will still be better for people to ride trains than to drive cars.
One thing I didn't bring up in the video that this brings up, and we often hear from farmers in the Central Valley when they get blamed for drought and things like this is that we're not talking about deserts here, but productive farmland that grows our food. So, the potential for housing to replace even more food producing land is also an issue up for debate.
@@LucidStew yes, I watching a video about how silicon valley types want a new town can't remember where in California, it's all farmland. But many of the farms don't want to sell. In the video they are being accused of Nimbys, and of course say they don't want to be Nimbys.
We do need housing but we also need farmland. I myself grew up watching development in my hometown it's not easy, going from rural to suburbia. So I feel for them. It's a delicate balance, I love urbanists content and agree with most things. I have to say I'm a little bit of a 'Nimby' myself. I just think we're going to end up with a food crisis and the housing crisis will be small fries.
* California forever All the other hand I do at least support at least trying to have better urbanism.
If you look at the project just as an real estate developement, making the central valley one big suburb for LA and SF, the project doesn't seem so unlikely anymore. At least that's the motivation behind a lot of rail-projects here in europe. Just think of all the housing you can build on these farms.
Kind of inconvenient that people need to eat, though.
@@LucidStew Americans are way over fed with calories. Is cheap food/corn/wheat grown in these parts or is it more expensive vegetables or whatever?
I’m honestly not that concerned because at least the surface parking area can be redeveloped. Obviously this isn’t ideal but the project is already well over budget so I feel like they just took the cheapest option.
Perhaps. Many of these are not a big deal in terms of where the parking lots will be, but I think Merced in particular they are going to take out a lot of small business when they could have consolidated things a little and expanded the footprint in the future
I will predict, Madera will initially start with a lot of service and than over the following decade, it will be cut down further and further, because most people will go to Fresno as Fresno will likely get a lot more service (maybe every 2. train or something). In the end, Madera may get like 4 trains a day or something
It’s so baffling that these small cities in the Central Valley are getting true high speed rail before the NEC. When the first section opens, you can bet conservative commentators are going to be looking at ridership and comparing to costs - but the ridership will increase 10x (at least - I don’t know what the projections are but that seems reasonable) once SF + LA are connected.
What seems strange (as well)…I would expect there to be MORE park and ride’s in the Central Valley stations in the initial stage - with people coming from Bay Area and such to head down to So Cal-ish (and vice versa). I would reckon they would need LESS parking once the project is scaled up and complete and service is extended to the full catchment area. 🤷🏻♀️
Madeira Stn could be a major ToD greenfield growth centre in future? Beyond that seems very odd. And I imagine it being skipped on most runs.
Fresno, and to a lesser degree Bakersfield, could use this as a chance to catalyze some urban redevelopment and get some higher order transit connecting to the HSR. There could be discounts on HSR tickets for folks who take public transit to the station. I could definitely BRT working in these cities, perhaps a tram line on a right of way if there is adequate ridership. They need to figure out they’re building a system of transportation- and integrate the HSR into the broader urban transportation network.
These plans definitely do NOT do that.
I think they figure a significant percentage of travel south utilizing CAHSR on the route will show up via San Joaquins or ACE.
During the board meeting presentation for this powerpoint, it sound to me like Bakersfield actually WANTS this area to be a walled city, and that they plan to stuff all of their dense, high rise future development in there. Sounds like a recipe for disaster, but I guess we'll see over time.
Are these designs finalized or space for public comments?
Not finalized. They are just starting the design phase.
when japan built out their shinkansen many stations were "in the middle of nowhere" as well. As long as ToD happens, its a safe bet to not tear up all of downtown for the hsr, and instead let the development grow the station and downtown together.
All good points, and I'm saying this largely just to counteract my own CAHSR-criticism fatigue, but stations in the middle of nowhere (ie. 5-10 miles from small-to-medium sized, even sprawly population centers) can work as catalysts for more centralized development. For example, see Valence TGV station on the high-speed line from Paris to Marseille: it's basically like Kings/Tulare in that it's halfway between two small towns (with populations of 32k and 66k; metro population, extremely generously defined, is apparently 250k). Valence TGV also has a regional rail line that runs perpendicular to high-speed trains, as well as a smattering of local and regional bus services. It also has about 1900 parking spots, with more to be added next year.
It doesn't sound amazing, and I can tell you from experience that the station isn't pretty or grandiose. You don't feel like you're anywhere when you're there. But SNCF, the French national operator, says the station saw a bit over 3 million travelers (or trips? unsure) in 2022. And just based on Google Street View and satellite imagery, you can see quite a bit of development that's sprung up between the two adjacent towns. The station itself is integrated into a "business park" (some offices, some logistics facilities, budget hotels, etc), but you can also see quite a bit of newish activity popping up all around, further away from the station, still between the two towns. And the station being outside of town allows stopping TGV services to stop here instead of at Valence's legacy train station, which used to significantly slow down total trip times (between eg. Paris and Marseille) as fast trains had to snake through the dense urban core.
I think the point of these sorts of stations is to buy the political support of regions and municipalities that clearly don't warrant proper HSR service but will have to consent, on some level, to HSR infrastructure passing through them. Obviously, I have no idea if these stations will ever recoup their capital cost, but clearly that's not their purpose. And I don't know if the Valence example translates to the Central Valley, because obviously the political buy-in argument presupposes that remote regions and municipalities understand the value of HSR and would want in on the game - which makes sense in France or Spain (where these systems have existed for a while and their benefits are obvious and widely recognized, and construction costs are slightly saner) but might not make sense in the US (where uninformed rail- and transit-bashing is a popular politico-media pastime, and costs are ridiculously high). But I feel like some form of political buttering-up like e.g. Kings/Tulare or Valence TGV will be necessary in most parts of the US that might some day see substantial new HSR infra.
I should say - the "potential future TOD" is pure cope and we should ignore it everywhere but Merced and Fresno. Particularly hilarious at Kings/Tulare and in Bakersfield. Don't think that diminishes the overall argument though!
I feel like while those compare on the surface in terms of distance, they don't in reality. You're comparing a station next to a quaint French village and ultimately between two larger, drop-dead gorgeous medieval cities, with an obvious tourist draw, to Hanford here.
@@LucidStew Fair point re tourism in the Rhone valley, though I still don't think the comparison is entirely irrelevant. And while I'm sure Hanford ain't all that, I do take issue with Valence and/or Romans-sur-Isere being put on such a high pedestal, though maybe our differences there are a reflection of my overexposure to Europe and your overexposure to California.
Villena AVE station in southern Spain might be a better parallel: also in the middle of nowhere; near-ish two (even smaller) small towns; minimal if any tourism value; literally no transit connection, just a parking lot; Wikipedia says it used to be criticized as the least-used station on the AVE network. But if its construction (c. EUR 11 mil in 2012 money) was needed to buy off local political leaders et al, ultimately allowing that branch of the Madrid-Levante line to 1) exist and 2) be a little more useful to a remote region, as well as moving those towns into the commuter belts of previously distant major cities, isn't it maybe good that the station was built? Or inconsequential at worst?
I think the point that resonates with me most is that by building car access facilities you're potentially putting cars on the road that wouldn't have been there otherwise. But on net do we expect these stations to make adjacent Central Valley towns even more sprawly and car-dependent, or maybe marginally less so? I agree these designs are symptoms of pathological suburbanization but I don't think they'll cause even more of it (ie. this doesn't seem like a "trains that subsidize suburbia" situation to me).
One thought experiment here: assuming Spanish or French construction costs, would we still deem Kings/Tulare and Madera pointless? Because if yes, then the criticism should be of North American costs, not these specific stations. (I know you've voiced some of that before as well, so please don't take this personally, but just, y'know ... legitimate-CAHSR-criticism fatigue, wanting to see it just get done, etc).
Either way; still a good video, keep it up, love your work, you know the spiel. And let us know if we can financially support your work in any way (comments where I suggest specific platforms keep getting auto-deleted, v annoying)
The LGV-Med on which Valence-TGV sits was supposed to recoup its sizable investment in about 20 years and has not disappointed. Valence-TGV was a small part (91 million) of the 4.5 billion (in 2003 Euros) bill. Its existence was never in doubt.
SNCF's dictum is that speed is 80% of the ridership. People will take the TGV if it is much faster than driving and are flexible in regard to how they will get to the station. The hard part is to build the HSR line with its strict requirements in terms of curvature and the potential for local opposition. Once you manage to thread that needle, the stations locations, architecture or development nearby are almost irrelevant.
What shocked me the most is the access of some of the stations for pedestrians and bikes.
How about looking at existing train stations for comparison?
The LIRR Ronkonkoma station has 6100 parking spaces.
How about looking at airports without geographic constraints?
In the Big Blue parking structure alone at Detroit Metro Airport, there are 6700 parking spaces. On-site parking totals 19000 spaces.
Ahhhhhhhhhhh. America still hasn't learned.
I think the reason why they don't include the stations in the aerial shots is because it would look like a black hole of asphalt.
The choice of surface parking lots is especially egregious as it feels almost as if they're trying to nuke the walkshed as much as possible. Seriously, the Bakersfield station is a joke. It's over half a mile of just parking lots and parking lots only.
There's some potential for connecting rail services (e.g. to the towns and cities east of Hanford)
park and ride is an okay short term solution for high speed rail in my opinion
nonetheless, I think it‘s good to recognize that CAHSR and similar projects are far from perfect and need to be questioned with good intentions and while continuing to insist on their completion
I'm gonna hold in most of my thoughts on your video because I am already fully aware of your disdain for this agency. What I will say is, just like many other cities with railways like this, TOD will come and I think many of these parking lots will only be placeholders.
Also, these are just renderings. I'll be excited to be more critical once the final designs come out. So yes, you are overreacting. It isn't an anomaly to build railway stations outside city centers. Valence TGV in France, Reggio Emilia Mediopadana and Napoli-Afragola railway stations in Italy are other good examples of stations not residing in the city centers.
Right, someone else used Valence as an example. Go look at what that area is like and then compare it to wasn't going on outside of Hanford. That Napoli-Afragola station isn't even the same situation. It's arguably in a bad spot, but its only a mile from the center of the town there, only 6 miles from Naples, and the area is gorgeous and not a dusty farm town.
@@LucidStew Makes no difference. Neither of them are in the center of a city. And regardless, all these complaints you have were already negotiated when they first came up with the route, so I don't see the big deal getting pissed about it now. And anyway, the city of Hanford is not even that far from THAT railway station.
In this country, we should probably be a little more grateful that we're at least getting some semblance of a high speed railway given how terrible this country has been at even getting these things started. Until we have a government that is actually 100% friendly on these things, we have to take what we can get.
Yes and in quite a few of these situations (Bakersfield) in particular the cities lobbied to have CHSR take a more peripheral route. Not sure it's even a problem but I find that trying to fault CHSR for those decisions without regard for the political forces shaping the route selection is totally misguided. Nothing exists in a vacuum and the CHSRA is not some supreme identity that has power to make all decisions by divine will.
@@brianwithoutay2291 Who faulted the CAHSRA?
@@TheRailwayDrone It makes a world of difference in draw and desire to preserve by avoidance, but if you're determined to ignore the differences, then of course it doesn't make a difference. "we have to take what we can get" no, we don't. We, The People, can demand and vote.
They continue to shoot themselves in the foot OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN.
These station locations will doom the project, with Madeira being the worst of them. The stations should be in the heart of the cities, and there shouldn’t be any parking other than drop off. I guess I’ll have to move to Tokyo if I want to ever have efficient transportation. It seems America will never get its shit together.
Madera and Kings/Tulare are terrible. Fresno and Merced are pretty good, though.
Why aren’t those stations in town. We spent way too much to have these stations in fields.
La. Bakersfield. Fresno. Madera. Done.
They're likely planning to build new cities around the station. If they were in town the design would be constrained, like you can see around the stations that are in town. It would be easy enough to get their by bus.
Madera???
Hanford was already given a grant to develop the area to connect the area with the Kings Station. Hanford has already broke ground on the new bus station closer to the HSR station.
They should put NO parking lot at Merced Station. Anyone who wants to park and ride can use Madera Station instead.
Ah, now local politics ger involved. EVERYBODY wants a station. So, to meet politicians demands (my town or I'll veto funding bills) they will be stations in a lot of town with lots of stops. Bye, bye hi-speed?
@@billlong8385 According to the current plan, only trains that stop at every station will stop at Merced. For many people, driving to Merced station or driving to Madera station will make little or no difference.
I agree the architecture sucks. The number of parking spaces sounds like it is on the somewhat over kill side (roughly half to a third more then what is at a WMATA outlying Metrorail station), Vast acres of asphalt for parking should be replaced with parking structures with ground level commercial or even placing the parking structure above the station head house and platforms. See WMATA Hyattsville Crossing Metrorail station.
Weird that pedestrians and bicycles are combined, as the distance/reach is way different. Also when combining them it's impossible to determine the amount of bike racks needed.
Also, they are repeating the same mistakes Europe and other places made in the last century, by not having entrances near the end of the platforms. In particular for Merced it would be great to have an entrance in the direction of downtown.
Also it might be a mistake having side platforms in Merced and Madera as it's not unlikely that people will change between trains at least at times when there isn't a great service on all three legs of the triangle connecting to SF.
Great video!
Holy Crap is there a ton of open air parking. I can't imagine there will be very much need for parking, let alone for rental cars, for at least a decade or more until there is a connection to San Jose. I also seriously doubt that the need for so much parking is justified even when the entire line is open from LA to SF. Fresno's airport only has about 900 spaces.
I am disappointed by the overabundance of parking. These downtowns already have an oversupply of open parking lots that haven't been full for 30+ years. A parking garage would at least save space and keep the stations from being so isolated from their downtowns.
I don't like the station designs (I imagine the Bay Area and So Cal stations will look much better) but I do like that the Merced station entrance has a treatment that has a rustic or "Sierra" feel to it since it is a gateway to Yosemite. I wonder why the other stations don't get a distinguishing feature for their station entrances. Fresno, to me, should have a California-Mediterranean feel to it like it's Amtrak station or it's iconic downtown water tower. Bakersfield has an oil and country music heritage. Kings/Tulare is ranch country. These cities have been economically stagnant or in decline since the late 1970s. In fact, Fresno's skyline has barely changed since then (w the exception of new gov't buildings). Fresno's downtown, however, does have a large number of mid-century buildings (office buildings, theaters, and dance halls) because of that which are architectural gems.
I don't know why Kings/Tulare station is where it is. The Amtrak station is in downtown Hanford although I really think the station should've been in Visalia and should've generally followed the UP or Hwy 99 alignment from Bakersfield, only acquiring property where the geometry dictated it. This would've saved a lot of money and lawsuits over all the land they had to take in the farmlands. There is a "plan" (I don't know how real it is) for a commuter railroad along the RR ROW that roughly parallels Hwy 198 between Visalia and Huron and perhaps Porterville. This could be a good non-car way to get from Visalia to the station, leaving their cars in Visalia. There is also an abandoned RR ROW from Porterville (via Visalia) through Dinuba Reedley and Sanger to downtown Fresno that would also make a good commuter corridor.
I think Madera was added later on. The Madera location is between the city of Madera and spread out Madera Ranchos community to the east. I imagine that the Madera HSR station will stimulate suburban housing to close the gap between southern Madera city and Madera Ranchos and the planned communities on the northern side of the San Joaquin River. There is no way to cross the river from Hwy 41 to 99, so the Madera Co corridor will likely fill in via Ave 12. This station would be about 8 miles from Fresno's Herndon Ave (11 miles by road). It's a weird station to get to from Hwy 99, meaning I guess it could be used by North Fresno residents who are loath to drive to downtown Fresno.
Thanks for the great comment. Merced is particular I find the parking disappointing for a number of reasons outlined in the video. It seems a lot already exists in the area and they have to get rid of a not insignificant number of local businesses just to make room for lots that will likely end up largely empty most of the time.
I like your idea of the stations having more of a local character. The unified design kit would also be fine, imo, if the kit were any good. :D
I'm also aware of the cross-valley connector through the Kings/Tulare station, but I really doubt it will cut down on vehicle traffic much. It will almost surely take longer than driving and be less convenient, so most people will probably still drive.
The current Madera station is the end point of the initial 119 mile construction segment. Merced as an initial Central Valley segment was then added onto that. The current station site is even worse than this proposed one, so I don't blame SJJPA for moving it, but there have to be better options closer to the city. Maybe out by where Avenue 15 crosses the tracks, but unfortunately that debate is over at this point.
@@LucidStew thanks and I agree. Although I'm not sure that it's reasonable to expect rail transit to cut down on traffic because that has never happened in any meaningful way. Freeway widenings induce more traffic, it's safe to say that rail transit does the same thing. The fact that traffic is still as bad as before rail is a promise that just can't be lived up to and becomes another argument against it.
Interesting fact, the Hanford Amtrak station has more boardings (182,140/yr) than the Merced one does (133,715) and about half the boardings as the Fresno station 369,118). The Madera station averages only about 75 boardings a day according to Amtrak California 2019 numbers.
Also the Fresno-Bakersfield city-pair ridership is the 9th busiest in Amtrak California and the only one in the top 10 outside of trips originating in the Bay Area or Los Angeles (LA-San Diego is #1).
Total transit time isn't the only consideration. Cost is also part of the equation. A $10 transit ride may take 20 min longer but it can save over the cost of parking at the station for a week. I almost always ride the Amtrak San Joaquins from the Bay Area to Fresno to visit family. It takes about an hour longer than driving but it's only $26 each way and with no stress of driving. To me, it's an easy tradeoff.
I prefer to look at rail transit as increased mobility and opportunity for those who would most benefit from it as well as providing an option for those with the choice. This increased mobility is a positive for the economy as more people have more opportunity for education, healthcare, and jobs. As they say, a rising tide lifts all boats.
This makes me feel very dismal about the future of US transit, but maybe I am just too naive. Maybe California will turn into a litany of urbanist islands surrounding the HSR stations... lol. (I genuinely try to be positive, but these stations make that so gd hard)
Some weird choices there. Is it possible that they are anticipating development around the new stations, and that's why they are building them in relatively empty areas?
Yeah, I think that's the general idea. I really don't see it happening in a big way except in Merced and Fresno. Fresno especially is poised to fully take advantage of the situation. I leave Bakersfield out because while there is room for development directly around the station, its so isolated and in such a weird part of town, it seems like its influence wont expand much beyond the site.
It would make sense to me if they dedicated first floor of the station for small shops and second floor for the platform
Instead of doing a bunch of flat surface parking why not build up? two parking garage buildings that can be built right up against the station, multiple stories with ramps straight to the station. Why level building to make a parking lots half a mile away destroying local business?
The way I interpret it is that surface lots are cheaper as place holders. As the TOD is built, consuming the surface lots, they will build parking structures to replace them. I'm not sure if they will do all of this incrementally, or build all of the surface parking lots at once. Hopefully they spare as many local small businesses as possible for as long as possible.
All of this looks like they just asked the guys in the highway-monster building department to envision trains. The walk out of Madera station looks like it leaves you abandoned.
These renders feel like they’re setting the whole thing up for failure.
Would be more excited to complain about a lack of parking over making more black burning hot vacant lots that are no good for the environment.
It sounds like initially most of these will be fallow until the expansions, which could take a VERY long time. And that also brings up the issue of having to let this land sit there doing nothing in the meantime, or perhaps they will improve it only as needed.
The central valley HSR stations are all just an afterthought. Nobody is coming from there, or going to there. They are just passing through on the way to somewhere better.
Sadly, the phase 1 plan doesn't include anywhere people actually want to travel to/from.
They should design for future light rail transfers imo
your criticques are all valid. *however* ill take what i can get. build it, and maybe eventually with all the state level housing policy changes, the TOD will happen too. For what its worth, i like the gold accordion design :D
Going by the comments, the gold accordion might stay in. 😭
@@LucidStew take solace that the eventual sf station (Salesforce) is pretty much the color you want and it’s already built! 😂
I think the more likely case is some state officials will note that the system isn't making money and they will start renting out the parking spaces to developers.
Based Park and ride. Now they are useful to working people and not just college hippies.
Seems they could save a lot of money and acquisition related legal issues by just ignoring parking. The idea of having lots of big lots given over to public car storage has always seemed crazy to me. Now we have not only kiss+rides but Lyft and Uber: it's a waste of space.
I can understand some, but this seems like A LOT given the mission. It just feels like we're conveniently shifting the problems that plague the coastal areas into the inland areas rather than looking for real, structural solutions for the state as a whole.
@@LucidStew I would think huge amounts of parking wouldn't have very much effect on ridership, but I'm sure that'd be their reasoned response.
Idk how Hanford keeps managing to take all the train stations from Visalia... Kings County has a population of 150k vs Tulare County who is approaching 500k. Makes no sense.
The original routes were closer to SR99. They switched because they concluded that would be too expensive. This is ironic given all the trouble they've had with land acquisition out in the middle of the valley.
How much land around these stations is owned by CAHSR? I'd think greenfield developments like this could go a long way to help pay for expanded development.
The land in the plans. CAHSR is not a real estate development project.
There should be no parking (except for handicap) at these stations except for maybe Kings/Tulare, take a damn uber if you're that scared of the bus. Agree with another commenter that if we really feel the need for parking, we can build a garage.
I think the reason these are marked for parking is because they haven't found any developers. I imagine once they get developers it will be different. This seems to be the case with most of the TODs in California.
Some day you will be able to take the Cross Valley Corridor to the kings station.
sounds like you really want HSR to fail. Even BART and Caltrain provide parking in the suburban communities they serve. Communities that already have significantly better transit connections than these 4 central valley cities CHSR will initially serve. Parking lots are both easy to build and easy to tear up. There is plenty of time for CHSR to work those details out in a phased approach consistent with the phased construction of the ROW.
Pretty good job going over the plan. The project has had its setbacks, but it has made progress and worked with what they had. why there is a bunch of weird things in the plan. Lots of decent has been created in bako so now less and less people want to see this project completed. So the question becomes do we stop this project since it takes up most of the states capital? Then shift the money to state water projects now that so cal is in another water war?
I can tell you the short term is not looking good. Trump is up 3 points in the polls and it looks possible for Republicans to regain control of the Senate and retain the House, so that is dismal in terms of federal funds. In about the same time span as a 2nd Trump administration, California is supposed to run something like $160 billion in the red. The CAHSR budget for next year is finally decent, but the rest of the decade isn't looking too hot right now.
@LucidStew maybe we'll see, but Newsom doesn't even want this project, sure he takes credit when it looks good, but it's not what he wanted, called it Browns legacy train. But also I think it was from Dan Richards told him to F.O. when Newsom was L.T. government. after hunting in Montana. I like Dan for that plus he stuck up for the little guy amd freedom.
@@ericepperly9517 For sure. I was actually just thinking about this earlier today. A politician is going to back something as far as they think it is expedient for them, and Newsom has hardly stuck his neck out for CAHSR. It's pretty telling that California politicians aren't even willing to close the $5-8 billion Bakersfield-Merced gap. They're certainly not going to get behind the project to the tune of $90 billion.
@LucidStew well the project isn't fully funded anyway. it's likey the project will stop when cap and trade runs out for the C.V. LA and SF already spend 100% of their cap n trade. Now with inflation, I see more spending with less progress. I figure it will be like HWY 58, a centennial project.
No, you're not overreacting, looks like everything is designed intentionally to cause a lot of undesirable outcomes, on some level. Besides the stations are the most dated, awkward, selfconsciously dull... with concrete supports... Why not just use the existing station in Fresno. It looks like they're raised the ground level to block part of the trackside facade. Amazing.
On that subject, weirdly, the original station is to form some sort of set piece for the entrance plaza. Speaking of wastes of space...
@@LucidStew It looks pretty generously sized. Reminds me of the '50s and '60s when they started blatant one-upsmanship against themselves, developers - we had a couple of high rise apartment buildings in NJ about ten years apart. Newer one still makes the older look crappy right next to it. If that's their intention they won't succeed, without burying it.
They need to sell to some developer and have parking be in the middle ala a European park and ride.
The purpose of CAHSR's central valley stations isn't to move the area away from cars - it's to contain the cars on the cheaper real estate there and keep them out of the expensive real estate in LA and SF. That is also coincidentally what Park and Rides do best, and mirrors the setup that airports have (which is what HSR truly competes against instead of driving).
So you're saying it benefits rich people and shifts that burden to the lower classes?
@@LucidStew i mean, sure, but you could say the exact same thing about airports
@@jmlinden7 It's a way to do things, but it's not really a good way. Airports have many problems, especially in the amount of land they consume for their activities, or the overall environmental impact of air travel.
@@LucidStew Yes HSR stations are better than airports in various ways, but they still primarily serve the rich, just like airports do.
let's not forget that the largest parking lot operation west of the Mississippi is BART. BART is gradually converting some of that parking to TOD but it is a system that essentially operates as a Park & Ride for the more suburban communities of the Bay Area. Many BART stations of course provide no parking at all as they are located in a downtown core. A system as large and sprawling as BART will take on many forms and I think it's not unreasonable to expect the same for CHSR.
I think the stations of the least populated cities should have been planned to open after the trunk line was finished, in order to prioritize main stops first
I made a similar argument in an earlier video. Hard to disagree with it here. It should probably just be Bakersfield to Fresno to start, but they need that transit connection at Merced.
My first thought is not about the parking but what about all those rental cars!!! Do that many people really ride the San Joaquin and hop off looking for a rental cars?
My second is how much money (and embarrassment) could be saved by NOT building the Madera stop. That train should be full speed at Avenue 12, not crawling to a stop.
Plus, if you're going to drive all the way to that frickin' field, another 15 miles to Fresno probably isn't an issue. Because its clear that we're totally ok with the entire region driving to any station.
@@LucidStew the drive time along 99 from Madera to the station will be about the same as those coming from NE Fresno. I believe the biggest mistake being made is that the train didn’t go out towards Fresno State / Clovis where the majority of the users live. A park and ride lot in the slums of downtown Fresno is not a commuter solution.
@@Db_traveler At least in downtown there is the possibility of developing some real transit oriented living that would lessen the impact of the station in regards to spreading sprawl. It will probably take some time to catch on, but a lot of elements are there to make it happen. While I can appreciate the appeal of hooking up with Cal State and the airport, I'm not sure how that would reasonably work.
What's wrong with "Steampunk Train Stations?"
They're kind of lame for a REAL steampunk theme, though...
Seems like CAHSR may have learned the worst lessons from French high speed station design- stations in the middle of nowhere
I've had several people inform me of this and every station that I have heard of in this regard is near a very beautiful part of the country with just jaw-dropping scenery within 5-10 miles with historical structures, towns, and villages you would genuinely not want to disturb. So, if that's the case, maybe still not the best choice logistically, but a bit more excusable.
Britain's HS2 demonstrates how difficult building HSR is. Finding a commercially viable market, avoiding extensive tunneling, environmental lawsuits and politician vetos, is a little miracle. Germany spent slightly more on her NBS lines than France on her LGVs. Unlike Germany, SNCF went for speed and did not mind P+R stations. As a result, TGV ridership is double ICE's. Ticket sales cover 60% of LGV construction costs as opposed to maybe 1% in more populated Germany.
TGV ridership is long distance. Short trip HSR can be successful as shown by the 115 km Beijing-Tianjin HSR but the Central Valley towns lack Beijing or Tianjin's population (23 and 14 million) and subway networks serving the HSR stations. There lies the problem, not in the station design which is reasonable.
@@alaindumas1824 But you must understand that the main dilemma here is not how to optimize ridership on a high speed rail line that doesn't even exist. The dilemma is how to stop the spread of suburban sprawl, which is the structural cause of transportation problems in California.
@@LucidStew CAHSR is being built because Californians voted to support its construction. I would think sprawl is best addressed through zoning regulation and that is not what the 2008 vote was about.
In regard to high speed rail, mass transit or urbanism, successes like the Tokaido or LGV Sud-Est clear the way for other projects in the public mind. Empty trains because the market is not there send the opposite message. In my opinion, CAHSR started by the Central Valley segment because it was easiest and cheapest, not because it had any commercial potential.