3 New Kids on the Block at Texas Central Rail

3 New Kids Joined Texas Central Rail this week:

New CFO: Lori Wilcox
- 25 years in accounting and finance
- formerly senior vice president and CFO for Balfour Beatty’s Central region
Managing Director of Deisgn Build Program: Doug Jones
- 38-year veteran of the construction industry
- formerly with Balfour Beatty Construction
Managing Director of External Affairs: Holly Reed
- 25 years with AT&T
- formerly AT&T’s regional vice president of external affairs

$40 M additional Funding to Central TX High Speed Rail

Japan Overseas Infrastructure Investment Corporation for Transportation & Urban Development (JOIN) has agreed to contribute $40 million in funding for Texas Central Partner’s high speed rail.

Texas Central funding to date? $75 million from Texas based investors

Total Estimated cost for the Dallas to Houston segment? $10 to $12 billion for the 240 miles

Texans Against High-Speed Rail, an opposition group, wants: An assurance that no taxpayer funding will go to the project.

…

New High Speed Rail Group Forms to Bring Golden State to the Silver Mines. 9 Quick Facts. No State Dollars.

What’s the new high speed rail project? High Speed Rail from Los Angeles to Las Vegas

What group is behind the project? Nevada High-Speed Rail Authority

9 Facts to Know about the Project:

It has an exclusive relationship with XpressWest ( a Las Vegas based company)
no state dollars are pledged or committed
NV Governor’s Office of Economic Development is engaged in the project
zero-emissions train
cuts in half the time of the travel to 80 minutes
tickets will cost less than $100…

2015 House Interim Charges. 7 Committees. Funding. Tollroads. Self Driving Cars. Rail. Ports.

Transportation

Funding | Tollroads | THE INTERIM CHARGES

Appropriations: funding that accurately address transportation needs
County Affairs: private roadways from 2015’s Prop 5; is it undue competition between industry and counties or expand it?
Elections: local bond elections
Homeland Security & Public Safety: commercial motor vehicle violations, motor vehicle “two steps, one sticker”
Judiciary & Civil Jurisprudence: examine the Texas Lemon Law
Transportation: roadway flows…

High Speed Rail Activism. Regional Planning Committee.

Which regional planning committee meeting is drawing the attention of activists? An Ellis County Sub Regional Planning Commission (“391 commission”) on Thursday November 19th at the Ennis National Bank Event Center

What issue is the regional planning committee hearing? High speed rail

Which activists are engergizing their base? Texas TURF & Texans Against High-Speed Rail

San Antonio to Laredo High Speed Rail. New Plan. 5 Key Points.

Projected path will be San Antonio to Laredo to Monterrey
Will carry passengers
Will also carry cargo
State Representative Richard Raymond has signaled confidence in the plan
Congressman Cuellar has had talks with TXDOT and officials in Nuevo Leon, Mexico

KGNS | Richard Raymond, Henry Cuellar making rail line project a reality

8 Reasons Texans Against High Speed Rail Oppose It. Courtesy of A&M

High speed rail will take the same amount of time to get to Houston or Dallas in door-to-door travel time
Does not solve roadway traffic congestion
high speed rail “solid embankment may interrupt agricultural operations”
high speed rail solid embankment may interupt migration patterns of local wildlife”
” disrupt the peace and quiet for families used to living in rural areas”
Negatively impact rural proeprty values
taxpayer subsidies
impair private property rights

The Battalion…

The Other High Speed Rail. Missed Deadlines. Over Budget. 5 Warning Signs.

The Los Angeles Times in a special piece dove deep into the California high speed rail project and found it likely over budget & late.

5 reasons why:

No Settled Route. The deadline for phase 1 is 2022, and there is no set route throught the mountains. To connect L.A. and S.F. via high speed rail will require 36 miles of tunnels into the mountains.
Rising Costs. The 1st phase, according to a confidential 2013 report, is 31 % over budget. The state has not used the state’s main project…

Trend: Hyperloops. Pods. Coming to Austin. Economic Development Looking

What, the Jetson’s have arrived in Austin? personal rapid transit pod proposal is making the rounds in Austin.

What proposal? its a 5 year old study that has been in the hands of the conomic development community that focuses on pod transportation in and around UT

Funding Options? Richard Garriott, USA PRT Inc., the group behind the Austin proposal, says private funding.

What’s the initial build cost? < $100 million

Austin Business Journal | Austin’s futuristic rapid transit pod…

Hyperloop Contest at Texas A&M. Who. What. Where. Why.When. How high Speed Rail is Involved.

Who? Elon Musk

What? Hyperloop design challenge , featuring US Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx, who supports high speed rail & issued a report that high speed rail will be instrumental in US transportation by 2045.

Where? Texas A&M

When? January 28 & 29, 2016

Why? The A&M “qualifying teams will get a chance to test the pods on a one-mile test track at the SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, Calif. in June 2016.”

How does high speed rail factor into this? In addition to…