Seattle, Vancouver, and Portland Work Together for High-Speed Rail
Photo: discovery.org
Us folks in Cascadia finally might be able to satisfy our sporadic urges for dim-sum in Vancouver, seafood in Seattle, or Voodoo Doughnuts in Portland. On June 9th, Mayors of Seattle, Vancouver BC, and Portland came together to sign a pact pooling high-speed rail efforts and funds between the three cities.
With the rise of a Cascadia high-speed rail corridor it looks like in not too long, we will be able to quickly make stops from city to city without waiting in traffic, stopping at borders, or making pit-stops for your friends who forgot to use the John before they left…
Oh and besides facilitating inter-state and inter-country hopping, it is also most definitely green growth.
[Source: Seattle Transit Blog]
[Via: Vancouver Observer]
I love this photo!!
So they are meeting semi-annually…at that rate, we’ll have “high speed” service in about 50 years.
You know what they say…better late than never
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Also the provision states that this is their at-least required meeting where they come together. It doesn’t mean reps/planners from different cities will be unable to meet in between to discuss. Also development of rail in each respective city will occur simultaneously and the meets will only be a place to discuss convergence.
Wesley,
You many many optimistic assumptions about public agencies cooperating across both state and international borders. The reality is, in these dire budgetary times, these elements are going to be pretty low on the totem pole. Look at california for instance, they pass a bond to fund initial planning and design of HST and it’s having trouble just getting out of the station, pardon the pun.
Terd,
I’m not familiar with the issues CA is having. Do you have a link? I would like to take a look maybe post on it.
I agree, transportation improvements sometimes seem to take a back seat for the politico masses and there is always a lot of red tape to cut before getting things going. Transit agencies usually get railed (pardon my pun this time…) with other immediate issues as well and it hinders progress as well.
All in all, I love the idea of what they are trying to do and think it will improve the status quo. Now, next year, 5 years from now, 50 years from now, however slow improvement makes me a happy camper.