Wow, for some reason this week seems to be HSR Denier Week in the media. First we had Daniel Goldberg's moronic argument as to why California's passenger rail system is perfect just the way it is. That was a blog post on a relatively small newspaper's site, and came and went pretty quickly.
Late this week, however, a much bigger piece of HSR denial hit the national media in the form of an AP article by Deborah Hastings that was carried in the San Jose Mercury News, the Chicago Tribune, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, among other major papers. The article, titled "Billions for high speed rail; anyone aboard?" gives considerable space to letting noted HSR denier Joseph Vranich space to attack high speed rail without rebuttal. So it's our job to provide what Deborah Hastings wouldn't - facts.
But this country has never built a high-speed "bullet" train rivaling the successful systems of Europe and Asia, where passenger railcars have blurred by at top speeds nearing 200 mph for decades.
Since the 1980s, every state effort to reproduce such service has failed. The reasons often boil down to poor planning and simple mathematics.
This is simply not true. As her own article shows, the actual reason is simple and singular: the United States has not shown the political leadership necessary to see HSR projects through to completion, largely because passenger rail has for the last 50 years been starved of funding in favor of roads and airports.
California is the only state with an active project, and its proposed cost is more than five times the stimulus amount. The $42 billion plan is far from shovel ready—it's still seeking local approvals—but it's farther down the track than any other state with an outstretched hand for a slice of Obama's high-speed pie.
It doesn't help that Hastings steadfastly refuses to point to the role of Republican HSR opponents in killing these projects. Jeb Bush played the leading role in 2004 in killing Florida's project, and George W. Bush did the same while Texas governor in the mid-1990s. Southwest Airlines' opposition to the Texas project also played a significant role.
After misleading readers about the fate of HSR in Texas and Florida Hastings then lets Vranich spew some HSR denial:
"In virtually no way does the Acela Express perform near overseas standards," says author Joseph Vranich, a former Amtrak public affairs spokesman and president of the High Speed Rail Association. In 2004 he wrote a highly critical book titled, "End of the Line: The Failure of Amtrak Reform and the Future of America's Passenger Trains."
He's equally unimpressed with the federal stimulus money.
"Here's what's going to happen: The (Obama) administration will issue these funds in dribs and drabs—to this project and that project—and the result will be an Amtrak train from Chicago to St. Louis that takes maybe 15 minutes off the travel time."
Current Amtrak travel time between the two cities is about five hours, 30 minutes.
Nobody expects Obama's HSR stimulus to all by itself produce true high speed rail in this country. But if it is accompanied by a real national strategy - and Obama's budget plans suggest he is interested in doing that - then the HSR stimulus can help initiate that project, which is all anyone ever expected anyway.
Trying to make American trains run faster will always go off the rails, Vranich says, as long as planners keep trying to recreate overseas systems. "We're not Europe. We're not Japan. We're looking at shorter travel times, through population densities that are much higher."
Wait a minute. I thought the flaw with HSR in California and the US is that we had too little population density for the ridership to be there. Now the flaw is that we have too much?
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On Tuesday, an article in the Hollister Freelance discussed the HSR project from the perspective of Gilroy and the cities that will be in the catchment area of the planned stop there. The piece is timely, since the High Speed Rail Authority will host a project-level EIR/EIS scoping meeting in Gilroy this week (cp. heads-up at the end of this post):
Thursday, March 26
3-7pm
Hilton Garden Inn, Ballroom A, 6070 Monterey Road, Gilroy
Spokeswoman Zoe Richmond said her employer gets "very skittish" about freight trains running in close proximity to high speed rail, whose equipment is very light, [very] fast and carries [lots of] passengers. A UP train derailed and spilled coal onto an [adjacent] light rail line in [Littleton, Colorado on 11 December of 2007, causing the light rail train to derail as well. None of the 30 passengers on board was injured but] Mz Richmond characterized the incident Richardson as "too close for comfort", adding that safety is her company's primary concern.
She also raised concerns about continued access to the existing customer base and winning new business, because freight trains cannot easily and safely cross high speed rail lines at grade. It would be counterproductive if bullet trains ended up forcing freight onto the state's and the nation's roads.
In the same vein, Joseph Thompson, a transportation lawyer in south Santa Clara county claimed that CHSRA had not yet clarified how it would cross UPRR's tracks between Santa Clara (where they run west of UPRR's Alviso line) and Pacheco Pass, well east of Gilroy. He asserted that "Union Pacific's eminent domain trumps High Speed Rail's" because it had been delegated by Congress and President Lincoln.
The sections of concern are south SF-Gilroy, south Fresno-Merced, the northern approach to Tehachapi Pass, Mojave-Palmdale in the Antelope Valley and part of the Inland Empire route for the phase II spur to San Diego. The Merced-Sacramento section and the "HST/commuter overlay" that is "under consideration" would also raise concerns. All told, roughly 50% of the entire preferred HSR route requires appropriate agreements with UPRR.
Note that while the PCJPB owns the Caltrain ROW, the terms of the 1991 contract with SP - which UPRR acquired in the context of a merger a few years later - give UPRR limited but perpetual trackage rights and 30-minute windows during which it may run its trains "at commuter speeds". For more details, please see Clem Tillier's posts Freight on the Peninsual, Port Pork and Memorandum of Understanding. Legally, CHSRA only needs to deal with the PCJPB, but the latter needs to ensure UPRR's rights are upheld in the process. That could put Caltrain in the middle of a dispute between CHSRA and UPRR, so it should insist on three-way negotiations for issues related to operational safety.
Now, let's examine the concerns raised above in reverse order:
Re 3: In the 19th century, Congress declared that privately owned for-profit railroads were performing a public service by moving goods and passengers around the country. To that end, Congress delegated to them strictly limited powers of eminent domain for the purpose of expanding the public service. In practice, that referred to widening rights of ways, acquiring land for new turnoffs, sidings, yards etc. The idea was to protect railroads against speculators and other landowners who could otherwise exact extremely high prices because railroad alignments must meet certain minimum radii, maximum gradients etc.
The delegation of eminent domain was not intended to allow railroads to prevent competition or other public services from being delivered. Since Nov 4 2008, California HSR is arguably a public service in development. It is therefore not immediately clear that UPRR's powers of eminent domain would trump those of the state of California, let alone those of Congress. However, it is extremely unlikely that anyone will seek eminent domain against UPRR anyhow, even for air or ground rights needed to cross. The objective should be to negotiate in good faith.
Re 2: For now, CHSRA, Caltrain and others are drafting plans that ensure existing freight operations can continue unhindered. In practice, that may mean the monopoly dispatcher for a given corridor may need to instruct one or more bullet trains to slow down or stop to give a freight train the opportunity to cross over to the non-HSR tracks via a diamond. Alternatively, the split of HSR and regular tracks could be defined such that most freight movements are anyhow unaffected. For the remainder, one option would be grade separation between the HSR tracks and freight spurs off the main line. Another, possibly cheaper alternative would be to pay UPRR and its customer to stop using a given spur.
Re 1: UPRR has been in business for 146 years, during which time they've forgotten more about freight railroad operations than CHSRA can ever hope to learn. In particular, they are fully aware of the risk of derailments, which is very small but non-zero. Since US-style heavy freight trains can be up to a mile long, the engineer in charge of a train may not even notice the derailment of a single truck on a single car at first. Indeed, major derailments involving cars tipping or toppling over and fouling adjacent track are quite rare. Usually, a train can be brought to a full stop long before that happens.
UPRR's concern relates to the early detection of a derailment event and, to sending early warning to the operator of the service on the adjacent track - preferably via computer-to-computer messaging to avoid delays related to human-to-human interactions. Time is of the essence because a bullet train traveling at 300km/h can take 40 seconds to come to an emergency stop (less if traveling at e.g. 200km/h). During this time, it can cover well over a mile. With CHSRA planning up to 12 trains per hour each way (esp. on the network's trunk line in the Central Valley), the probability that a bullet train traveling at high speed would be within 60 seconds of the site of a freight rail derailment could be as high as 40% during peak travel periods. That's if the freight train has already derails, a very low probability event.
The upshot is that even if the bullet train's automatic/European/positive train control system were notified of a derailment on an adjacent track and applied the emergency brakes immediately, there would still be a high residual risk of a follow-on collision if the derailed freight train were to foul the bullet train tracks. If that were to happen at significant relative speed, the result could be catastrophic loss of life.
It is a fairly pathological scenario but one that is at least theoretically possible. In general, engineers define a hazard as the product of the probability of occurrence and the damage done. Indeed, Burlington North Santa Fe (BNSF) has not raised a red flag on this issue (at least not in public), perhaps because it perceives the hazard as much lower than UPRR does.
In any event, UPRR published a press release on June 4, 2008, giving notice that it had had no discussions with CHSRA on operational safety in two years and no interest in selling any of its ROW. Mehdi Morshed, the authority's senior engineer, responded with a terse press release of his own, stating that HSR would not share track with UPRR freight trains and citing the excellent safety record of HSR elsewhere in the world (cp. Union Pacific's HSR Games). Note that the circumstances of the 1998 Eschede disaster in Germany had nothing to do with freight trains and everything to do with the hubris of Deutsche Bahn's engineers - it is simply not germaine to the issues raised by UPRR.
That does not mean there is no hubris on CHSRA's part here. US freight railroads are private companies that must pay property taxes on their rights of way, while their competition - the trucking industry - gets a heavily subsidized ride on the nation's highways. Considering US freight rail operators are for-profit corporations, it is not surprising that they should try to make do without expensive active safety systems and keep maintenance overheads on their infrastructure and rolling stock as low as possible without compromising safety in the existing operational context. UPRR does not want to increase its cost of operations just to accommodate high speed rail.
In other words, if CHSRA wants to have any chance of sticking close to its preferred route, it will need to sit down with UPRR and discuss safety concerns regarding derailments in the California context. Unless and until UPRR's engineers are satisfied that these concerns are being taken seriously and adequate measures to keep the hazard acceptable are feasible, the business managers will not be willing to offer any part of the ROW. Moreover, they may raise a red flag with FRA even if no land is transacted. Considering a mile-long heavy freight train traveling at 70mph represents a vast amount of kinetic energy, the civil engineering approach ("add more concrete") may not be sufficient to prevent track fouling in the event of a freight train derailment.
Similar concerns apply to a freight train derailing and hitting a support column for HSR on an aerial structure or, fouling an open trench containing HSR tracks.
FRA has already done some work regarding the aerodynamic interactions between Amtrak Acela Express and freight trains on adjacent tracks. The largest impact was on empty, tall freight cars passed at a relative speed of 110mph. At higher speeds, the response was less pronounced in spite of the greater load pulses at the bow and stern of the passing train because those pulses also lasted less long. The aerodynamic shape of the Acela meant its interactions were less severe at 150mph than those produced by conventional Amfleet trains at 125mph. In any event, the interactions were not considered severe enough to cause a freight train to derail.
The inverse problem, i.e. the serious derailment of an HSR train - mercifully an extremely unlikely event, even in an earthquake (cp. Shake, Rattle and Roll) - could set the scene a follow-on accident with an approaching freight train. However, since there will be far fewer freight trains and they travel at lower speeds, this hazard is a secondary concern. Besides, life is risk, there is no such thing as 100% perfect safety in the transportation sector. The cost of safety measures has to be commensurate with the hazard reductions they achieve.
If CHSRA has not yet done so, it might want to consider hiring a recently retired senior US railroad operations manager with an engineering background, specifically to reach a technical understanding and mutual comfort level with UPRR. Worst case, CHSRA may find UPRR unreceptive even after good faith efforts to address safety concerns. If CHSRA can secure a brand-new ROW that is sufficiently removed from UPRR's, e.g. in the San Jose-Gilroy section, it might well still be possible to proceed without having to redo that portion of the program EIR/EIS.
Plan B?
Otherwise, the only remaining option would be to select a route that minimized or eliminated statewide interactions between UPRR and the high speed rail system, even if BNSF remains willing to share its own ROW in the Central Valley. The most significant impacts would be on the way out of the Bay Area, on the detour via Palmdale, on the spur up to Sacramento and, on the spur through the Inland Empire - four major aspects of the planned network.
Nevertheless, a solution would be possible, at least for the starter line, see the following map. Please note that the alignment implementation details (at grade vs. below grade) are only valid for the section west of Tracy.
For argument's sake, I've assumed an HSR-capable link across the San Franciso Bay at Dumbarton will prove infeasible because of the Don Edwards National Wildlife Refuge. However, I have assumed an arrangement acceptable to all parties will be found for the entire Caltrain ROW but not for the section down to Gilroy where more freight trains operate. Under that specific set of assumptions, the south bay HSR station would probably have to be moved from SJ Diridon to SantaClara/SJC to secure run-through tracks to the I-880 median. The HSR tracks would cross underneath UPRR's Alviso line and skirt the vast Newhall yard VTA has reserved for BART to the east. It would make sense to reserve part of that yard for additional HSR platforms and/or a yard, especially since it would lie one level below the BART facilities.
The next problem would be crossing over to Pleasanton/Livermore. The BART extension to Fremont Warm Springs and beyond means that CHSRA's Altamont variations based on a route through Niles are no longer feasible. Instead, the most likely option would be to tunnel underneath CA-262 and all the way across to Haynes Gulch (Calaveras Road). Six miles long, it would only just be legal to construct this without a third service/escape bore. At least the Calaveras, perhaps even the Hayward fault would need to be crossed underground. Fortunately, approaching Sunol from the south means the new route could bypass both Pleasanton and Livermore by tunneling across to El Charro Rd, one of the alignments being considered for the BART extension to Livermore. The HSR alignment might need to remain underground to cross under both the UPRR Altamont Pass line and Livermore municipal airport. The lakes near El Charro Rd might have to be drained, at least during construction. I'm not sure what they are used for.
HSR would continue east in the I-580 median, deviating only once to keep the alignment sufficiently straight for high speed service. In the interest of keeping express line haul time down, the Tracy station would end up in the I-205 median, well north of downtown. Beyond it, the CA-120 median and sections across farmland would connect the new route to the BNSF alignment just south of Escalon. Modesto would be served at E. Briggsmore, Merced county at Castle Airport with a possible detour around the Merced town.
The BNSF ROW through Fresno is not straight enough for high speeds, even if adequate noise mitigation measures could be found. It might make more sense to construct a western bypass for HSR/BNSF/Amtrak (3-4 tracks) through farmland and, to run a new DMU-based light rail service on the old BNSF ROW through town. This would deliver passengers from downtown to basic "beet field" HSR stations near Gregg and Bowles that would each be served by 50% of the trains originally slated to stop in downtown Fresno.
Unfortunately, even with all these measures, switching to Altamont implies a line haul penalty of 8-10 minutes for SF-LA express trains, relative to Pacheco Pass. To compensate, the detour via Palmdale would have to be sacrificed (cp. Future's So Bright...) in favor of the technically more challenging but already studied alignment across the Grapevine, past Lake Castaic Wildlife Preserve. For LA county, this sacrifice would presumably not be acceptable unless at least Ontario airport were well served by HSR as early as possible - not an easy proposition if UPRR refuses to co-operate (cp. Quo Vadis: LA- San Diego).
Conclusion: CHSRA had better get into UPRR's good graces, or the entire project could potentially face massive changes to the route, with the fate of some portions (e.g. Stockton - Sacramento) unresolved. The relevant sections of the program EIR/EIS would then have to be re-done, setting the project back by several years. In particular, simply buying land from someone other than UPRR but very close to its ROW may not be sufficient: UPRR could still raise a red flag with FRA if it feels its concerns regarding integrated operational safety and by extension, liability for accidents and loss of revenue, are not adequately addressed.
On Monday the Ventura County Star ran a good article on high speed rail. That prompted on Daniel Goldberg, who writes a blog for the VC Star's website, to write one of the silliest pieces of HSR denial I've ever seen. Even though it's absurd on its face, it's worth deconstructing these arguments which are likely to be with us for some time, especially as contentious debates over HSR implementation continue.
Goldberg starts with:
On Monday's front page there was an article about $8 billion in stimulus funds that might be allocated to high speed rail. My initial response was "why can't we stop wasting money?" The high speed rail debate has been going on for years, I think if it really was worth it, we would have dont it by now.
Obviously Goldberg has no clue about how major infrastructure projects are designed and permitted in this country, nor is he aware that we were supposed to vote on this in 2004 but Arnold Schwarzenegger insisted on delaying the vote for HSR bonds to 2006, and then to 2008.
Yes, building the fancy train set might create some jobs, but what about the long run.
Does he assume the train will vanish after 10 years? That it's got some sort of Mission: Impossible self-destruct system? In fact the HSR system will be a central part of California's long-term economic strategy, providing jobs and savings for decades to come. One estimate was that 450,000 jobs would be created by 2030 by the system - nothing to sneeze at.
Our state is already equipped with airports in every major city. And most minor cities also have small airports.
This is more of the usual "air travel means trains aren't necessary!" nonsense we usually see from HSR deniers, people who have probably never actually used some of these small airports. Many, like San Luis Obispo airport, are seeing declining passenger levels and carriers are abandoning the small airports in droves. Of course, peak oil means that the cost of flying will continue to rise - $49 fares from SF to LA will be a thing of the past in 2018.
Furthermore, let us not forget about our current rail system. Besides the Metrolink accident that occurred late last year, the current system works. Trains run daily all over the state and in an efficient manner. This brings me to the old saying, "If its not broken, don't fix it." Lets hope the wiseguys up in Sacramento subscribe to it.
Obviously Goldberg has never actually used a passenger train in California. They run daily, and are efficient given their enormous constraints. But they are wholly inadequate to the task of meeting California's overall transportation needs in the way they can and should. It shouldn't take 12 hours to get from SF to LA via train. It shouldn't even take an hour to get to LA from Santa Ana on a train. California's passenger trains, especially the intercity trains, have attracted a lot of riders and dedicated supporters, but I doubt any of them would say that the present situation is adequate or acceptable.
Especially given the need to boost non-oil based forms of travel, for environmental, economic, and energy reasons. But then I'm guessing Goldberg doesn't believe in global warming either.
He concludes his ill-informed rant:
Back to the $8 billion at hand. I am plenty sure it can be used for a better purpose. What about all those teachers who were just laid off or buying books for students. I imagine it would be better to invest the stimulus money into education rather than on infastructure, and especially for infastructure we DO NOT NEED.
And in the actual version, the "DO NOT NEED" is in a much bigger font than the rest of the text, as if we're too stupid to understand that's his point without being shouted at.
As to the issue of other needs, like schools - we've actually discussed that very issue before, back in May 2008, and ironically based off another ill-informed bit of HSR denial that ran in the Ventura County Star.
The points are still valid today. HSR isn't taking money from schools. The state contribution comes from general obligation bonds, paid out over 30 years at what's probably going to be an annual cost of around $600 million (and that's the higher end of the estimate). Our K-12 schools, however, face a $9 billion cut this year.
If you want to fix our schools, we need to raise taxes. There's no way around it.
But the issues go deeper. Why is California's budget in a mess? For 30 years now we have had a structural revenue shortfall - in other words, for the last 30 years we have not raised enough tax revenue to pay for our basic needs. The solution to this is NOT to turn to bonds - a structural problem needs a structural solution, and bond debt isn't such a solution.
Bonds are properly used to build long-term infrastructure. To pay for ongoing costs like education, we need more tax revenue.
Further, the economic crisis - what I believe to be a Depression, but what many are now calling the Great Recession - is sending tax revenues into the tank. That economic crisis is largely due to the effects of high oil prices on an economy based on sprawl and automobile commuting. If we want to recover from this crisis, grow the economy, generate new tax revenues, and pay for schools, then we need to get off of oil NOW. High speed rail helps get us there.
Unfortunately, HSR deniers refuse to acknowledge any of this, and that means they and their silly arguments will be with us for many years to come.
Note from Robert: Bruce McF has been generous enough to allow us to post this excellent discussion of the Transbay Terminal trainbox and track issues that he wrote. In addition to the link to his own site he gave below, he posted it over at the European Tribune as well, where as usual there is a good discussion on this.
One piece of information is that in California, when one public authority has the funding for sufficient staff and another doesn't, and it comes to a fight, it is considered fair game for the staffed up authority to toss up spin and red herrings and biased analyses, confident that the other authority does not have the capacity to answer promptly.
Late on in the piece is the technical guy from the Transbay Terminal (TBT) project putting in all sorts arguments against changing the design of the TBT "train box", without concern or regard for whether the arguments would be considered fair or impartial by a disinterested third party. He compared:
the station stopping time at a through platform to the station stopping time at a terminal platform;
the terminal turn-around for a regional rail service running between San Jose and San Francisco with a long distance rail service for a train that arrived from Anaheim/LA (or even, in Stage 2, San Diego); and
the number of services on single routes in Japan and Europe with the number of services for the main northern terminal for multiple routes in California
He wasn't the only one with tricks up his sleeve ... one of the Senators asked after the terminal capacity at Anaheim. The answer, by the way, was six platform tracks for what is supposed to be the secondary Southern Terminus when the full system is complete ... two more than the TBT proposes for HSR, at what is supposed to be the primary Northern Terminus.
How many HSR services should be allowed for?
On the other hand, the California High Speed Rail Authority (CAHSRA) seems to be making claims that are difficult to support. They seem to have asked for an ability to support 12 trains per hour (tph), with 40 minute platform dwell times, claiming that they need 9 to 10 platform tracks.
First, the basic math ... 12tph with 40 minute platform dwells, inclusive of headways, is 8 platforms.
More fundamentally, though, where are 12 trains per hour coming from? That is a technical requirement for through stations, because the HSR line is designed to permit trains to pass at five minute intervals, and along the line, you cannot allow one service to block the next in line.
For the terminal station, the question is the number of services that might start or end at the station. For the California HSR system:
LA and the Bay is the backbone transport market for the HSR system ... there could well be demand for one LA/Anaheim Express and, half an hour later, one LA/San Diego Express
Running Express Routes drops off very useful trip pairs, so there will be demand for a Semi-Express, and the likelihood is that the hour that supports two Bay/LA Express services will support a Bay/LA/San Diego Semi-Express.
The Central Valley will be within three hours by an all-stops HSR to both LA and the Bay ... and within two hours of one, the other, or both. So in addition, one all-stations LA/Anaheim HSR service per hour providing access to and from the CV ... bearing in mind that while this is a smaller transport market, the HSR will grab a larger share of the total market
So this is 4 trains per hour ... 1 train per hour on four distinct services ... without even considering a Fresno special, or a spur at Mojave for Las Vegas.
And when the 400 seat single level, single set trains start filling up, its better for building ridership to increase frequency than to increase capacity. 2 LA/Anaheim Expresses per hour, split the all-stops CV into Express Fresno then all-stops to LA and all-stops to Fresno and Express to LA, and a mix of Express LA/San Diego and Express to LA then all stops to San Diego, and we are already at 6tph.
Twelve trains per hour may be aiming too high, but six trains per hour clearly risks aiming too low.
Given the massive cost of building more capacity after the original foundation has been laid, the capability for eight (8) HSR trains per hour seems to be a perfectly reasonable expectation for the primary northern terminus for the system.
Following the trail of red herring
Now, when someone deploys deceptive comparisons and unbalanced comparisons, I have a reflex reaction ... a pile of red herring is normally used to cover something up.
And that something seems to be is a design flaw.
The TBT "train box" includes two "tail tracks", allows trains to get off the platform, either for overnight parking or for non-passenger operations like restocking and cleaning, without using up space in the tunnel.
What this means in theory is a train can arrive at an arrival platform, unload passengers (which is a very quick operation, since trains have far fewer passengers per door than airplanes), move to the tail platform to make room for the next train, get trach unloaded, seats needing deep cleaning looked after, food and beverage restocked, and then get move to the departure platform.
And the TBT tunnel access is designed with three tracks, which eliminates all sorts of potential bottlenecks:
Both Caltrain and HSR services arrive in the TBT on the central track
A Caltrain service departs from the Caltrain island platform using the "inner" tunnel track, which opens up the platform for an arriving Caltrain service
After the departing Caltrain service has left, the arriving Caltrain service switches over to the "inner" track to get to the Caltrain island platform
HSR services run directly to the central arrival island
Passengers depart the HSR services, the train goes to the tail track for restocking and to clear the platform for the next service, from the tail track to the departure platform, then depart using the "outer" tunnel track
This is a system that allows three different islands to be accessed with little interference, because only two islands receive incoming trains, and because each type of service has its own dedicated departure track ... so they can arrive in sync, dwell in station for different lengths of time, and leave on their own schedule.
In particular, it allows the HSR trains to be in the station for over 40 minutes, while only occupying the platforms for 30 minutes each, raising the capacity of four platforms from six trains per hour to eight trains per hour.
This also makes it easier to organize efficient movement of passengers, since passengers are either leaving or arriving at each HSR platform ... there isn't a the problem of departing passengers getting in the way of arriving passengers.
With this approach, 4 platform tracks support 8 trains per hour ... which is to say, adequate to the needs of the planned HSR system with enough spare capacity to allow for some growth.
The Design Flaw
The design flaw ... for supporting 8tph, that is ... may not jump out at you, but its in the picture, taken from the 2003 "locally preferred option" design for the TBT Environmental Impact Report. The right hand side is the tunnel from the present end of the rail line. The left hand is the turn to the tail tracks.
Now, the HSR platforms have to be designed for long trains ... once the capacity is filled with 8 car, 400 seat trains, they can be extended to 16-car, 800 seat trains, and then by moving to bi-level trains, 1400 seat trains. That means a 1,320 foot long platform. That means that the bottom two islands are for the HSR and the top island is for Caltrain. The bottom two platforms need to be stretched a bit, and the middle one straightened somehow ... but the TBT technical person said that that had been fixed up.
So, stepping through the pictured design:
Counting access tracks, three tunnel tracks split up to make six platform tracks. So far, so good.
For Caltrain to operate as described above, a switch will have to be added so Caltrain services can get from the middle tunnel track to the "inner" tunnel track which leads to the Caltrain platform. And since the outbound train has to leave the Caltrain platform before the inbound train can arrive, that will work just fine.
The two Caltrain platform tracks are connected directly to the Caltrain exit track, so that will work just fine.
For the HSR trains to operate as described above, the central island is the arriving platform, connected directly to the tunnel track that brings trains in. That will work just fine.
That leaves the bottom island as the departing platform. The two platform tracks at this island are connected directly to the HSR exit track, so that will work just fine.
And the tail tracks ... are not connected to the bottom platform track. Instead, the bottom platform track comes to a dead end. That is not just fine. Indeed, assuming that the TBT has the staff that they likely know all of this already, that might be what the pile of red herring is supposed to cover up.
What can be done to straighten up the mess? One approach is to swap the Caltrain platform from top to bottom ... and trim a substantial piece from the front (right hand side) of the bottom platform. In fact, trim enough from the front that the switch between the two platform tracks is after the single tunnel track has rounded the corner.
Note that this is just a rough sketch
Trimming off the front of the bottom island allows the middle island to straighten up. Straightening up the middle island allows the top island to straighten up.
The middle island can be straightened up a bit by extending the tail track directly from the middle platform, with switches connecting the top island, which gives more room before the platform track must bend to form the rail track..
This might not be enough for 1320 ft. of straight platform, but it'll be a lot closer ... and, after all, the CAHSRA is probably overstating how much straight platform they need, since the platform only needs to be straight for the passenger car portion. A little bit of bend for the driver cars at the front and rear of the train can be tolerated. If this can get 1200 ft.. of straight platform with a 60 ft. curved part on either side, that certainly seems like it ought to be OK.
So, if both sides are wrong, who is going to admit it?
The question that puzzles me the most is not the technical one ... as tight a squeeze as it may be ... but the political one. The TBT authority have made public claims that present a picture of basically being ready to go, except for the fantastical demands of the CAHSR authority. The CAHSR authority has made fallen into the trap of making an ambit claim that they will have to strain to support ... but if that costs them the political argument, the fact that the TBT train box is an inadequate design is likely to be lost in the collapse.
The only player that strikes me as having the opportunity to say, "wait a minute, here's a fix that won't cost all that much to implement" is Caltrain. But ... under the solution above, they are giving up a 900 ft. platform, connected to the tail tracks, for what could end up being a 800 ft. platform, with only one connection to the tail track, and that connection only available when the closest HSR platform track is empty.
To Be Continued ...
Anyway, that's the puzzle. But there's another possibility ... one which might be of more appeal to Caltrain ... so I am going to end this with an ellipses.
The California High Speed Rail Blog is a creation of Robert Cruickshank. The articles posted here are the opinion of their respective authors and no other entity. To contact Robert, send an email to his last name at gmail dot com.
On Tuesday, an 
