Plans For Passenger Rail Into Las Vegas

There is talk of two plans to build a passenger railroad into Las Vegas. I guess no one is talking about reviving the old Amtrak route, since that involves Union Pacific rights of way, and Union Pacific has a history of being non-cooperative. Both proposed railroads parallel I-15 across the Mojave and go into Las Vegas, but that's where the similarities end.

One proposal is, of course, the maglev train which would cost billions and travel from Las Vegas to Anaheim, via Ontario. At Anaheim passengers could potentially transfer to the future California high-speed rail.

The other plan is one put forward by DesertXpress which is a private company (good) proposing to build a railroad with NO government subsidies (very good!) using off-the-shelf technology (good) from Las Vegas to Victorville (FAIL!). The Las Vegas Sun has an article comparing the two proposals.

When I first heard of DesertXpress's idea to terminate at Victorville, I assumed they must also be proposing some cool bus system or light rail or similar to connect from Victorville into Los Angeles. But no. Their proposed solution to get you from downtown Los Angeles (or Anaheim) to Victorville is to get in your car and drive. Due to traffic congestion and the climb over the Cajon pass half of your travel time from LA to Vegas can easily be spent just getting to Victorville. Once you've gotten out into the free and open spaces of I-15 across the Mojave, will you really want to park at Victorville and take a train the rest of the way? Maybe. Maybe not. Depends on price and scheduling. Depends on whether you'd like to start drinking in Victorville or wait until you get to your hotel.

Basically, the DesertXpress concept is simply a Las Vegas commuter train to their newest bedroom suburb: Victorville.

To assist the geographically-challenged, here's a map highlighting Las Vegas (upper right) and Los Angeles and Anaheim (lower left). You can see where Victorville sits out in the desert. Ontario is the small red dot.

The main reason they give for not extending the DesertXpress route to Anaheim or Union Station in Los Angeles is the difficulty of negotiating the steep Cajon Pass on steel rails, which would be no problem for a maglev. Now when they say Cajon Pass is a problem for them, I assume they mean they couldn't negotiate Cajon Pass at their proposed 150 MPH. Obviously, regular railroad trains can get over the Cajon Pass. You'll see several of them creeping up or down the winding route any time you drive that way. Or, it could be that Union Pacific controls that narrow right-of-way and won't share.

As for connecting to the future California high-speed rail, DesertXpress says this: "The DesertXpress line could be extended over approximately 50 miles to interface with the inter-modal facility planned in Palmdale on the voter-approved California High Speed Rail Project." It's only 50 miles more of desert. Why not just plan to make it a Las Vegas-Palmdale train from the very start? At least then it looks like it makes a little sense. Maybe they're scared of the San Andreas fault which runs along that 50 miles.