New video from prolific High Speed Rail Youtuber "Lucid Stew" about Cascadia High Speed rail, which sketches out the details of a new hypothetical route between Eugene and Vancouver, BC. What do you think of this route?
I can't quibble with the content (it all holds water) and it's a good promotional summary of the topic.
The whole sponsored thing is a bit "ick", but whatever, newspapers aren't what they once were! And it's a nice counter to the regressive, anti-HSR editorials recently published in the Seattle Times.
The initial 2017 study looked at the cost recovery ratio for various numbers of round trips on the new HSR line. Looks like the sweet spot is around 12 to 24 roundtrips, and it slowly starts dropping off after that.
Then the 2019 business case analysis moved forward with two scenarios, of 21 and 30 roundtrips. So the 30 roundtrips mentioned in the Microsoft-sponsored Seattle Times article is certainly the high end, but not outside the realm of possibility.
In the scenarios in this chart, note that most of the options include a mix of local and express trains, so a town like #BellinghamWA might only get 12 trips per day.