Posted on: September 10, 2024, 05:18h.
Last updated on: September 10, 2024, 05:18h.
Brightline West this week released renderings of the interiors of its proposed high-speed rail trains from Las Vegas to Southern California. The renderings were released in conjunction with Monday’s announcement that the cars will be built by German-based Siemens Mobility in Horseheads, an Upstate New York town of 20,000 people by the Pennsylvania border.
“Siemens’ investment in Upstate New York will lay the foundation for the next chapter of our nation’s transportation future,” US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement.
Production is expected to begin in 2026, after Siemens builds its manufacturing facility. Brightline West selected Siemens in May, after a multi-year bidding process conducted among multiple global competitors.
“Millions of annual riders between Las Vegas and Southern California stand to benefit from the train sets to be built in Upstate New York, and I know the local community will benefit as well,” said Federal Rail Administration Administrator Amit Bose in a statement.
Brightline West’s American Pioneer 220 trains will travel up to 186 mph along a 218-mile route from Las Vegas to Rancho Cucamonga, Calif. that follows the Interstate 15 corridor. This will serve as built-in advertising for the service to commuters stuck in frequent jams on the busy freeway.
The trains will stop in Ivanpah, Apple Valley, and Hesperia before Rancho Cucamonga, where passengers can connect with light rail to travel the 37 additional miles east to downtown LA.
Can it Stay on Track?
Brightline hopes to have trains operating in time for the Summer Olympics in Los Angeles in 2028. In April, US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg came to Las Vegas to ceremoniously break ground on the project and insist that this timeline was still accurate.
However, back in March, Casino.org interviewed a UNLV engineering professor and high-speed rail expert who had serious concerns about the potential construction obstacles ahead.
Money Train Not There Yet
Brightline also still has yet to account for about half of its $12 billion budget. It already received $6.5 billion from the Biden administration, including a $3 billion grant from federal infrastructure funds and approval to sell another $2.5 billion in tax-exempt bonds. And the company received federal authorization in 2020 to sell $1 billion in similar bonds.
In addition, though the trains will cut the four-hour drive across the Mojave Desert in half, Brightline founder Wes Edens told the L.A. Times that his company will eventually charge more than $400 per round trip ticket.
Figuring in an hour for light rail, that’s still more than twice as long as an average flight from LA to Las Vegas, at a roundtrip price of $75 more than flying.
Numerous high-speed rail projects have failed in the US, where driving is cheaper and population centers farther apart than in Europe, where high-speed rail is commonplace and profitable.
However, Brightline West is now the furthest that any of them has ever gotten to actually leaving a station.
