Dispute may derail arrival of high-speed trains in D-FW
Posted Wednesday, May. 11, 2011
By Gordon Dickson
gdickson@star-telegram.com
ARLINGTON -- Just as the effort to bring high-speed rail to Texas is gaining steam, a dispute over what kind of service to bring to the state and where to build the stations threatens to derail the project.
Tarrant County Commissioner Gary Fickes is among those who favors 200-mph trains on elevated tracks -- possibly on right of way along Texas 360 in Arlington -- to one station at Dallas/Fort Worth Airport. From there, a passenger could hop on a train and be in Houston in about 80 minutes, stopping only a few times to pick up passengers along the 250-mile journey.
Such a system would cost much more than other proposals but could be privately funded, and would be better for the state long term, Fickes argues. A Japanese company has already moved to Texas to put together a bullet-train proposal. "I don't want to spend $5 billion to $10 billion for something that will fail, when we could do something better that could last us 100 years," Fickes said. He is chairman of the Texas High Speed Rail and Transportation Corp., which for several years has tried to align political and business forces to get a bullet-style train system built in the state.
But other North Texas officials favor improving existing freight rail lines so they could serve not only D/FW Airport, but also the downtowns of Fort Worth and Dallas, and foster new development in the city centers. Today, passenger trains in the populated areas can go no more than 79 mph in freight corridors, but with several billion dollars of improvements, supporters believe that they could achieve speeds of up to 150 mph.
The downtown-centric plan is favored by officials in Fort Worth and Dallas and endorsed by the Regional Transportation Council, the region's official planning body, which will discuss the issue today in Arlington. Either type of train service could meet the definition of high-speed rail. "Our previous mayor, the current mayor and the next mayor has made a decision that we want this rail coming to Union Station [in downtown Dallas], and I believe Fort Worth is in a similar situation," said Dallas Councilman Ron Natinsky, regional council chairman and a Dallas mayoral candidate.
Recent progress
Texas is many years behind other states in developing high-speed rail, but it has made progress in recent months. The Texas Department of Transportation created a rail division and is pursuing a broad plan to eventually connect North Texas to Austin, Houston, San Antonio and cities in neighboring states such as Oklahoma City and Little Rock.
On Monday, U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced that $15 million had been awarded to Texas for design of a high-speed rail line connecting Dallas-Fort Worth to Houston. It was part of a $2 billion program that included the redistribution of money initially awarded to Florida for development of a high-speed-rail line from Tampa to Orlando.
In Texas, the Transportation Department has initiated a study of high-speed rail from Oklahoma City to South Texas, following the route used by Amtrak's Heartland Flyer and Texas Eagle, both of which stop each day in Fort Worth. The agency received a $5.8 million high-speed-rail grant last year and is taking the initial steps toward modeling ridership and analyzing the impact of such a project.
Ruffled feathers
Last month the regional council approved its Mobility 2035 plan that called for high-speed-rail stations to be built in downtown Fort Worth and Dallas, meaning that at least temporarily, the plan for bullet-style trains serving a single station at D/FW Airport won't be pursued.
That ruffled the feathers of Fickes and others who think that council members acted hastily, without giving them a chance to explain the benefits of the other option. A Japanese company, JR Central Railway, has set up shop in Texas and plans to submit a proposal to build the high-speed-rail line from D/FW to Houston with private-sector funding, said Fickes, who added that he has met with the group several times.
Lone Star High Speed Rail believes that the D/FW-to-Houston line can be built without federal or state funding, although the cooperation of government agencies would be needed for planning, environmental review and any right of way crossing public property. The idea would be to build a rail service that is paid for by passengers, said Robert Eckels, a former Harris County judge and president of Lone Star High Speed Rail.
But regional council members noted during a high-speed rail committee meeting last week that, although they've heard rumors for several years about the private sector's interest in a D/FW-to-Houston line, they've never actually seen a document spelling out the details and commitments. "Our plan is to welcome whoever rings our doorbell," said Michael Morris, North Central Texas Council of Governments transportation director.
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