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 The Texas Central Railway Company plans to use private investment
and Central Japan Railway bullet train technology to run a line
between two of the largest U.S. cities. Company officials say
service could begin in 2021.
"If we can’t do it in Texas, I don't know where in the United States
you could do it," said Richard Lawless, chairman and chief executive
officer of Texas Central Railway, a private company set up about
four years ago to build high-speed rail.
Lawless said the project, which has been estimated to cost $10
billion, will be financed through a combination of debt and equity.
Backers of the service contend that if they can get their line
built, it will show the benefits of high-speed service and could
help jump-start other projects that have languished.
Dallas and Houston are separated by about 240 miles (390 km), a
distance seen by advocates as optimal for high-speed rail. More than
50,000 people currently commute by car and plane between the cities
on a weekly basis.
 Travel time on trains capable of speeds of 205 mph would be under 90
minutes. Texas Central Railway said fares will be lower than average
airfares between the cities.
While proponents have long pointed to high-speed rail a fast, safe,
reliable and environmentally friendly way to move people - and while
Japan, France and other countries have had high-speed lines for
decades - plans in the United States over the past half century have
faced major political and financial challenges.
When President Barack Obama laid out plans in 2009 to commit
billions of dollars to high-speed rail, Republican governors in
several states pushed back, saying it would be wasteful spending.
Democrats have contended that Republicans wanted to score political
points by derailing Obama's stimulus plans.
POLITICAL HURDLES
On paper, at least, the Texas project looks promising.
The line would run through mostly rural, flat areas that would not
require tunneling or long bridges, making engineering easier and
keeping construction costs more predictable.
And political leaders in the business-friendly state have backed the
project. The Republican-controlled legislature has welcomed the
rail's private funding, and has a history of supporting
company-backed projects to build hundreds of millions of dollars of
toll roads.
The state has over 500 miles of toll roads, according to its
Transportation Department, that were largely financed by private
companies that share a portion of the revenue generated by tolls.
Most were built during Republican Governor Rick Perry's 14 years in
office.
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Still, some skeptics say too little government involvement could be
the project's Achilles' heel.
"The biggest issues that will have to be confronted is that no
high-speed rail system in the Western world has been built without
significant government subsidies," said Yonah Freemark, creator of
the Transport Politic website, which examines transport
infrastructure projects.
Getting a project built requires a long-term political commitment,
Freemark added, which has been difficult to find in a bitterly
partisan country. A previous high-speed rail plan in Texas died in
the 1990s under what many saw as political pressure from a major
airline.
The biggest high-speed rail project in the works is in California,
which is decades away from completion. It faces a myriad of
engineering challenges and legal battles to build 800 miles of
track, linking cities from San Diego to Sacramento.
A groundbreaking ceremony is set for Jan. 6 to lay the first track
in Fresno to connect to Bakersfield. The two cities, separated by
about 110 miles, have a combined population about 60 percent smaller
than Houston's.
Under projected time lines, by the time that first segment in
California is complete, the Texas project will have been up and
running for a year.
Lawless figures his company will show the way.
"Until and unless someone builds and operates such a high-speed
train in the United States on a true, dedicated corridor, no one in
the United States is going to understand what it is all about," he
said.
(Editing by Douglas Royalty)
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