Passenger Trains > Announcing Formation of the New York & Chicago Railroad

I don't know if it was a pie I just saw in the sky, or a flying pig. Either way...

http://www.nychicagorr.org/PressRelease.html

Announcing Formation of the New York & Chicago Railroad

Two enterprising Chicago high speed rail advocates are announcing formation
of project to build a 220 mph line connecting Chicago to New York, and other
cities located on the Northeast Corridor. Mike Lee and Charles Paidock are
recruiting individuals from across the transportation community to develop
plans, specifications, and secure private/public funding for this project.
While they are supportive of associations that foster passenger train
travel, or short local high speed lines within a state, the two prefer to
focus instead on getting down to building a real railroad in the way that
hasn't been seen in a over a hundred years.

Charles Paidock said: "Putting little high speed lines here and there is ok,
but all you're actually doing is just putting in another commuter line, and
improving public transit. And I've seen all sorts plans for regional
networks, but nobody except us apparently has a map of the United States. It
only makes sense to have a route connecting these two major metropolitan
areas."

The construction of a railroad from New York, to Pittsburgh, and then on to
Chicago was actually proposed in 1907. Approval was granted for
construction, but there was an economic panic later that year, and the start
of World War I made financing the project doubtful, so it never was built.
The two largest railroads in the United States at the time, the Pennsylvania
and the New York Central, later ran competing passenger trains along
different routes between New York and Chicago, attracting sizeable numbers
of passengers, until the advent of superhighways and airlines.

Mike Lee added that: "We can offer travel times equivalent to airlines. I
also would like to emphasize that the railroad is to be electrified it's
entire length, and using off-the-shelf technology presently found elsewhere
in the world. This isn't an experiment. And keep in mind that America
presently has a 97% oil-reliant transportation system. True electric HSR,
when applied properly, is a superior substitute for gas guzzling, polluting
airplanes."

The will be a program, open to the pubic, with a powerpoint presentation
outlining the project on Saturday, April 2, 2011, at 8:00 PM, at the College
of Complexes, the "Playground for People Who Think," which meets at the
Lincoln Restaurant, 4008 N. Lincoln Ave, in Chicago. Other events are
planned to recruit and solicit support, including distribution of literature
at National Train Day on May 7th at Union Station. This will be followed
with a week of meetings with various Congressional senators and
representatives, whose districts are along the proposed route, the following
week in Washington, D.C.

The question which instantly comes to my mind is "Why via Pittsburg?" That makes it a mountain railroad, doesn't it, elevating construction costs? Why not via Albany, Buffalo and Cleveland, using existing rights-of-way?

SpeederDriver Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The question which instantly comes to my mind is
> "Why via Pittsburg?" That makes it a mountain
> railroad, doesn't it, elevating construction
> costs? Why not via Albany, Buffalo and Cleveland,
> using existing rights-of-way?


You missed their whole point. This is not supposed to follow any existing anything. It's a whole new concept, connecting the two endpoints, and the h*** with intermediate points.

"...nobody except us apparently has a map of the United States. It only makes sense to have a route connecting these two major metropolitan areas."

And nobody except them has a piece of string to stretch out over that map...

Whatever...

i would think EL right of way or some other dormat or quiet right of ways would be logical. buy 4 or 9 used 757's and equal this new capacity quite easily.

That only makes sense if they actually intend to build a railroad, not just grovel to Obama or LaHood or the states to get consultant and paper-shuffling fees.

Calling Bidhitter -- this is tailor-made for inclusion in his investment portfolio.

>>>You missed their whole point.

No, I didn't miss that. I was mearly making the point that going any way except Albany makes this a mountain railroad. If you're going to engineer anything through those mountains for 220 miles per hour, it's going to cost a huge amount of money. OTOH, building via Albany is basically flat, and has existing rights of way, probably with sufficient room available to squeeze in two tracks.

You might also get the benefit of electricity in place to upgrade the entire CSX mainline from Chicago to Selkirk.

So MY point is that building a brand new railroad through the Pennsylvania mountains is maybe not such a good idea. Via Albany, it was 60 miles longer. At 220, that's 15 minutes.

And the $ to make this happen will come from where exactly?

These two individuals sound as if:

1) they are multi-billionaires and will be using/risking their own funds to make this happen (something no country has seen seen since the days of Vanderbilt) and are simply gracious enough to be informing us of some pre-determined and shovel-ready project about to start;

or, more likely,

2) they want me (and you) to turn over our meager resources and and some point will be making the pitch to write the check made out to them.

Reality check time. Buyer beware.

John Webb
Trinidad, CA

They gonna build a bridge over or tunnel under Ohio?

Their little "NYC" logo on the home page seems to infringe the New York Yankees' trademark. Why not the Cubs, too?

http://www.nychicagorr.org/index.html

Seeing how they spent 15 minutes making the website, I imagine they photocopied the route of the broadway limited for their "all new route."

IMO this website should have been launched April 1st

Can you say "New York-Chicago Air Line?"
Nick

SpeederDriver Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The question which instantly comes to my mind is
> "Why via Pittsburg?" That makes it a mountain
> railroad, doesn't it, elevating construction
> costs? Why not via Albany, Buffalo and Cleveland,
> using existing rights-of-way?

Why via Pittsburgh? So passengers can step off the train, have supper and an Iron City beer and then reboard to continue their journeys to Chicago or New York.

Speaking of the web site....

It's also interesting to note that they picture GCT as the New York origination point....

How you go due west into Pennsylvania from GCT?

This whole story sound preposterous. Nobody in their right minds would waste money on a venture like this. If they are "Billionaires" they won't be for long. It would take a trillion dollars to do a venture like this. This is just some smoke and mirrors and it will never even get to the planning stage. That is my 2 cents worth.

Surprised the presentation isn't on April 1st.??

Bob

The time when a private concern could acquire that amount of ROW ended about the time my great-great grandmother told my great grandfather that he was old enough to use the potty.

Oh, yeh...where the first item reads, "open to the pubic" is NOT a typo.

It is a direct copy/paste from http://www.nychicagorr.org/PressRelease.html

I could have sworn, there goes that pie again...

That website puts me in giggles. Anyone here going to that meeting?

Oops. Posted on the wrong forum. Should be the Model Railroading forum???

Paul Bernath
Crawford, NE