Antiplanner hooks up with the John Locke Foundation, authors a report on why North Carolina should not build high-speed rail:
Yet the (Federal Railroad Administration) has no estimates how much high-speed rail will ultimately cost, who will ride it, who will pay for it, and whether the benefits can justify the costs. A realistic review shows that high-speed rail will be extremely costly and will add little to American mobility or environmental quality.
…..Upgrading the nearly 400 miles of North Carolina tracks in the FRA plan to run trains at 110 mph would cost taxpayers more than $1.3 billion, or nearly $150 for every North Carolina resident. Subsidizing passenger trains over those routes will cost close to $25 million per year. Yet the average North Carolinian will take a round trip on such trains only once every 27 years.
Full disclosure: I’m taking Amtrak to the QC tomorrow for the first time since, well, I can’t remember. But it was less than 27 years ago.
