I've been following this "other" LA-LV project on and off, and I popped over to the website half-expecting to see a derelict with no updates in six months or something like that. To my (rather pleasant) surprise, the site is still active, and if anything it seems to be moving along quickly:
http://www.vegasxtra...train-blog.html
The tl;dr of this and one of their linked press bits from a Las Vegas news station is that they've been hiring staff over the summer, got a regulatory approval from the state of Nevada back in the spring, and they're looking to renovate the Amtrak station in Las Vegas and use Fullerton as their southern terminus.
Another interesting thing: I pulled up their stock info, and the stock has actually spiked pretty substantially over the last few weeks (and they've apparently been able to raise more from loans than just stock sales lately...which I think is a good sign).
Finally, of import, some non-barking dogs:
1) There is no talk of operating agreements with UP or BNSF (they'll probably be using the tracks of both) for the (currently planned) twice-weekly service.
2) The twice-weekly plan is actually pared back, I believe, from the plans I recall seeing earlier to "ramp up" the service over a few years. I believe it started at once/twice a week and steadily expanded to have a lot more frequencies.
3) Relating to #2, there is physically no way that their ridership projections can work out with only two round trips per week unless they're planning to jam about 10,000 people onto a single train. The two million or so that are projected comes to about 5600 per day over a year.
My guess here is that DX has more or less "scared them down" from a ramp-up (since if they were to see a massive surge in ridership, it would likely be followed by a collapse once DX gets up and running).
In practical terms, I can't tell if the project is actually viable at this stage, but they seem to be getting money from somewhere, since they managed to raise about $1.2m last quarter.
Edit: Ok, I think I mixed up this with the very-much-dead Z-Train proposal, which I rather recall deriding (either in my own mind or on here) as a circus on wheels.
http://www.vegasxtra...train-blog.html
The tl;dr of this and one of their linked press bits from a Las Vegas news station is that they've been hiring staff over the summer, got a regulatory approval from the state of Nevada back in the spring, and they're looking to renovate the Amtrak station in Las Vegas and use Fullerton as their southern terminus.
Another interesting thing: I pulled up their stock info, and the stock has actually spiked pretty substantially over the last few weeks (and they've apparently been able to raise more from loans than just stock sales lately...which I think is a good sign).
Finally, of import, some non-barking dogs:
1) There is no talk of operating agreements with UP or BNSF (they'll probably be using the tracks of both) for the (currently planned) twice-weekly service.
2) The twice-weekly plan is actually pared back, I believe, from the plans I recall seeing earlier to "ramp up" the service over a few years. I believe it started at once/twice a week and steadily expanded to have a lot more frequencies.
3) Relating to #2, there is physically no way that their ridership projections can work out with only two round trips per week unless they're planning to jam about 10,000 people onto a single train. The two million or so that are projected comes to about 5600 per day over a year.
My guess here is that DX has more or less "scared them down" from a ramp-up (since if they were to see a massive surge in ridership, it would likely be followed by a collapse once DX gets up and running).
In practical terms, I can't tell if the project is actually viable at this stage, but they seem to be getting money from somewhere, since they managed to raise about $1.2m last quarter.
Edit: Ok, I think I mixed up this with the very-much-dead Z-Train proposal, which I rather recall deriding (either in my own mind or on here) as a circus on wheels.
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