Hey people in Washington State, have you written to WSDOT to ask them to revise their Amtrak Cascades long term plans to include faster travel times? Comments close on April 18, so please write now!
@alan I wrote and just submitted an approximately 1,700-word assessment of the Amtrak Cascades Service Development Plan Preliminary Alternatives, specifically on Bellingham and Whatcom County impacts.
@alan Lolz. ... Beyond the medicore top speeds others have been stressing, for Bellingham and Whatcom County, I worry that a lack of rail corridor improvements in British Columbia will continue to hamper the reliability of southbound trains south of the U.S.-Canada border, despite the increased number of roundtrips and limited track improvements at Custer, Ferndale, South Bellingham and the BNSF Delta Yard in Everett. ...
@alan While I realize expanding rail capacity between Ballard and Everett and Bellingham and Blanchard is challenging due to topography, the lack of track improvements across the Skagit Valley, where trains could hit top allowable speeds, is disappointing. That means Bellingham gets stuck with sluggish service on slow tracks.
@alan Also, the Seattle-Vancouver, B.C. corridor is hamstrung by the slow, frustrating single-track chokepoint crossing the Snohomish River Delta near Everett, but the WSDOT Amtrak Cascades Service Development Plan doesn't address that.
@alan For Bellingham and Whatcom County, Preliminary Alternative A is mediocre with 2 train roundtrips replacing the 2 existing bus connections. The trip frequency to/from Bellingham and Seattle is, essentially, a wash.
Alternative B is a bit better with 5 roundtrips serving Bellingham-Seattle. Alternatives C & D are a bit better with 6 roundtrips serving Bellingham-Seattle.
@alan And for Bellingham, Alternative E isn't much of an improvement on Alternatives C & D. Instead of all trains starting/ending in Vancouver, B.C. as envisioned with Alternative E, I think it's in Bellingham's interest to have a few train trips start/end here, so they avoid some of the previously mentioned rail corridor issues in Canada, particularly at the Fraser River Bridge. We need more reliable southbound trains!
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