Aren't you the same guy that said they should run slow poke trains from Vegas to LA similar to what they're doing in Florida. Yet that same private Florida company chose 300 km/hr trains for the Vegas route. So much for advanced educated based analysis.

Sometimes it just takes common sense to get a GENERALIZED idea of what's transpiring. People want fast otherwise we wouldn't have microwaves and Mcdonalds or quantum computing. The faster something is the greater the attraction. If SJs can carry a million people then "COMMON SENSE" tells us HSR can carry significantly more riders. Fares will be set accordingly using "COMMON SENSE". And yes there are systems of equations that can model this; don't they teach how to set these up in high school Alg II? And has any transportation system ever correctly predicted a fare structure that endured the test of time. The plan clearly states that the SJ Authority will subsidize any shortcomings, shortcomings which will come in less than what they currently are paying for the SJs. To achieve the maximum ridership the SJ will adjust fares according seeing how this is only a piece of a larger system with no where near the expectations as the completed 500 mile system.

If more connecting stations are added up north then ridership will, by "COMMON SENSE", add more riders, no studies necessary.

But the big picture is being lost here. Voters approved prop 1A and they're going to get as close a variation as possible, irrespective of implementation. The public signed off on 200 mph electric trains, nothing else. And big picture and prop1a says, until the 500 line is completed, this 171 mile segment is to be part of a statewide system with intermediate beneficial use.

BOB2 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> LES Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Currently over a million SJ riders per year for
> > Merced-South. Adding the new ACE stations and
> > service will induce greater ridership.
> Valley's
> > current population increases will ensure more.
> > System should be good for at least 2 million
> post
> > pandemic.
> >
> > An Observer Wrote:
> >
> --------------------------------------------------
>
> > -----
> > > I hate to go back to asking dumb questions,
> but
> > > why would someone want to ride to Bakersfield
> > from
> > > Merced? Ride to college in Merced when you've
> > got
> > > a perfectly good school in Bakersfield or
> vice
> > > versa? Business trip to Merced, for ????
> Going
> > to
> > > Bakersfield to discuss the sale of oil leases
> > in
> > > Merced? The mall in Merced is shutting down
> so
> > you
> > > need to go to Bakersfield to shop?
>
>
> We don't have to "guess" at potential
> ridership....
>
> We actually have fifty years of "observations" to
> provide us actual "time series" data, on
> riderhsip, and ridership changes from more
> frequent service, from faster or slower service,
> from fare changer. And, we have the underlying
> data on changes in population demographics,
> income, education, age, and other variable that
> affect travel demand.
>
> You see we didn't start with a million trips on
> that segment, but added services, populations
> changed, there were fare changess, and reliabilty
> improvements, and folks factored those into their
> travel mode choice decision making, and we got
> there over time....
>
> So we could actually use that data to "model" the
> likely changes in ridership, from shorter travel
> times, or more frequent service levels, and from
> various proposed fare levels, and make "estimates"
> using that kind of "data", about the liklihood of
> increased (or decreased) travel demand from these
> proposed changes in rail travel times and proposed
> fare levels.
>
> We do actually "know" that travel "costs", like
> the fares, do have a significant impact on the
> propensity to travel by various modes. And, we
> do know that if HSR fares need to be 3 or 4 times
> higher to cover the much higher marginal costs per
> mile to operate "super" high speed service, that
> it would very likely have a negative effect on
> ridership. An example would be, that if the price
> of gasoline doubled or tripled, would you be more
> or less likely to travel more....? And no, these
> weren't the hardest economics courses I had to
> take....
>
> Since travel time from SFO to LA was the only
> planning and design parameter that has been used
> to design and build this utter fiasco, that kind
> of in depth analysis to determine what those
> "trade offs" would be between construction costs,
> operating costs, and fares to determine the cost
> most effective rail option to serve the greatest
> numbers of potential riders, at an operating cost,
> and fare level when we were planning the "runaway
> money train", and after twenty years, it would
> appear we still have not really done so....