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The entire Texas triangle has millions upon millions of residents and is worth well over a trillion dollars. How there is no high speed rail connecting them already is hard to believe. Hopefully this project starts something great in Texas and the rest of the country!

Always makes me mad to see so many people fight HSR. It would be great for Dallas and Houston but no, we have to take them to court for everything. We live in such a backward country

Texas Central station in Dallas is directly south of the Amtrak Union Station and lies nearby to the underconstruction subway line through the Convention Center. It would be one stop away from transfering to every local, regional, and national rail line Dallas has to offer.

ive always wondered why we focused so much on developing our own technology when we could just pay the Japanese, who have been doing this successfully, to do it for us. Glad these investors made the smart decision

Southwest Airlines filed a lawsuit against the Texas HSR project in the 1990s, and was at least partly responsible for it getting shut down.

I’m happy rail transit is gaining steam in the US now. It’s much needed, and will benefit a lot of people! 😊

I hope this project will have an successful end :)! We need more train tracks, like they have in the EU!

As someone who frequently makes the 8+ hour round trip drive between houston and dallas to see family, I fully support this. It would be nice to just be able to shoot back and forth on a train instead of putting wear and tear on my car and having to dedicate a whole day to driving

We need to take all money being used for highway expansion in our country and divert it to building out our national rail network -- high speed, low speed regional, suburban rail, subway, and tram... We need to get up to the the world standard for rail, and need to ditch our horrible system of car-centrism as fast as we possibly can.

Just as in Calif.. The land owners are holding out for ridiculous amounts for their property and then grabing legislatiors who are being supported by oil interests , to stop the train because it's costing too much. Cutting off their noses to spite their faces snd doing their state and the country harm. Narriw minded people always get in the way of progress. If they spent as much time and money making sure their own legislators were doing their jobs ,representing their constituents, as they do with these tactacs , this country would be a much better place then it is now.

As a professional driver in the limo and ride share business for the last twenty years getting people to and from HSR would be the least of your problems. This would be a boom for rideshare drivers and a lot less complicated than picking up and dropping off at the airport. Most people use rideshare going to and from the airport and a lot of people don’t really like to park at the airport because it’s to complicated and expensive and would be just what the business travelers are looking for so you can scratch that problem off of your list.

It’s good to see high speed rail grow to outside of the northeast in the us, hopefully it’ll pave the way for more high speed rail in the future!

I hope they build one out in West Texas, make it easier to cross the state, I'm excited for the possibilities of the future.

USA should've had high speed rail a long time ago

I think there should a public-private venture to make Texas Central go on a continuous loop in the Texas Triangle hitting all the major metros. That would be cool if you could go to the main metros around Texas traveling mostly at 205 miles per hour.

I'm surprised you haven't covered the Brightline in florida and California/ Nevada. In Florida, this is a prime example of how a privately owned, operated and funded hsr can look like. The one in California and Nevada is in the early stages, but is moving full speed ahead. Good presentation Thanks Bob

I hope this expands beyond Texas. The Shinkansen single-handedly makes the US feel like a third world country - it really changes your concept of transportation and urban planning

This is where high speed rail makes sense in ths US, replacing car traffic on maybe 300 mile or less routes.

(Was initially just a reply but I wrote too much so I'll copy it here too lol). Here are some indirect benefits rural towns can benefit from the Texas high speed rail. First, lesser congestion in highway. Because of this, bulk and agricultural products from rural towns can be delivered to ports and cities much faster, thus bringing profit to farmers and other businesses bigger and faster. Next, the Texas high speed rail will be 100% electrified. This is very significant since when you reduce the number of cars that runs on the freeway, the fuel that is supposed to be used by cars can instead be used somewhere like farms and mines fueling trucks and other machinery at a cheaper price due to lower demand. Another benefit would be the significant cut in co2 emissions. Because of this, air quality will significantly improve in the rural towns due to lesser cars. If air quality improves, this usually boosts the quality and quantity of crops, and these rural towns can become major tourist destinations due to the cleanliness of air and the scenery. If folks from urban towns realize this, tourism and businesses can sprung up in these rural towns. And if that happens, they might even build infill stations in the said town to facilitate the ever-growing traffic. If you don't believe me, look up the Taiheiyō Belt of Japan, which I think is where the Texas HSR based some insights upon. The Taiheiyō Belt is an urban corridor similar to the Northeast megapolis of the US. Although you could argue that access to the ocean is a huge factor to the development, if you ask local or read data, they will say another reason, the High-speed rail line or Shinkansen. Because of this, residents of Tokyo and Osaka, 2 cities that are 500 kilometers or 310 miles, travel between the 2 cities usually occur less than 3 hours compared to a car trip of over 6 hours. It's this long because of the mountainous terrain of Japan. But look at the Texas HSR corridor, it's mostly flat, the most ideal terrain for a HSR. Who knows, the Texas HSR might even run 400 to 500 kph or 250 to 310 mph due to the idealness of the terrain.

The problem with HSR is that the connecting cities both need to have a good rail and other public transport means because not everyone on I-45 is going from one downtown to the other and honestly their final destination could be miles away from wherever the stations connect.

After living in Germany, Korea and visiting Japan many of times, I always wonder how are we SOOOOO behind on this type of transportation. I would literally just go to Dallas for lunch with friends and come back that some day. I know people that live in Katy that have a longer driving to work than 90 mins .

For those interested, the project has started back up with investors from Fort Worth (Early 2024). Now, the proposed origin of the High-Speed Rail will start in Fort Worth (Texas' largest rail passenger using city), go east to Dallas, and then head south to Houston

Let’s get it! We need this. Make it happen 😬

Landowners: "I am going to sue this company into oblivion with the hopes of shutting them down for good" also landowners: "Why isn't this company giving us any updates after we sued them, nearly shutting them down for good?"

As someone who travels to Houston every month or so it might work. It has to be priced at a point that it is cheaper tan driving as well. It currently costs 60-70 dollars in gas to go round trip. So tickets would have to be appropriately priced. Also factor in the cost of getting from the train station to where I need to go in Houston, which is close to the hobby airport. Houston is a city designed for having a car and not having one in Houston is extremely inconvenient. This sounds like a good idea, but if its priced similarly to amtrack prices in the northeast, ill probably consider taking my car anyway out of the convenience factor when I am in Houston.

Loving the in depth research and visualisation as always 😊

How to get a quick choo choo in US 1. Reduce military budget by 200 billion 2. Hire Japanese and European contractors 3. Use funds to build everything. No need for private funds 4. Purchase all lands immediately. 5. Throw vast amounts of manpower and funds thus creating a local industry and providing jobs 6. Improve local public transit to increase ridership 7.??? 8. Profit

One of the biggest opponents of high speed passenger rail is the airlines. There is enough air and rail passengers to support both modes of travel, plus utilizing high speed rail for mail and package delivery will enable mail and packages to be delivered within hours with same service. Texas may not get this mode of travel for a long time due to backward thinking.

The highspeed rail has to be intergrated with a good public transit network and carsharing

It's hilarious to see how many Americans fight against the improvement of their own country. Even if you are (and forever will be) a driver, this is good for you. It will take cars off the road meaning less traffic to fight with everyday. Remember, the very best places in the world to drive are also the best places for public transit and none of them are in the US.

People will also take Uber or have someone drop them off at the train station. Not everybody will need to drive and park at the station. My son and I will definitely use it frequently here in Nw Houston.

I clicked on the video because the thumbnail shows Japan's maglev, the fastest train in the world which is now under testing and ready to run from 2027!

Some of the benefits to HSR is that it would allow more people to attend events in different cities. The weather related incidents at the airports are ridiculous. You get constant flight delays, then you have to wait for the planes that got stuck up in the air to land and then the delayed flights have to leave, no more pilots issues because the pilots flew to many hours or didn’t show on time if at all and the number one issue when your flight is delayed is that the airlines keep stalling you knowing full well that that flight is never going to leave and then it’s a mad scramble for everyone to have to try to find a hotel near the airport or sleep at the airport. Some people even catch rideshare to different cities to try and catch a different flight. The benefits of HSR far exceed the cons because the roads have reached their maximum limits and adding lanes are to expensive and have to be maintained and it’s pointless because they just add to the congestion and usually cost the drivers more money because you have to pay to use those extra lanes. If you could find a way to make it cost efficient you could have a direct express train and a commute train for those who would rather commute than drive farther beyond the city limits but that would have to be studied. But on the event side this would benefit both cities because their is always something going on in both cities and Dallas and Houston areas are both growing faster than any other city and HSR will be the answer to the transportation problem.

Great video! Love how you shared all the details of the project.

No high speed rail connects two sprawling urban areas with no practical public transit. Since people will still need to drive to the train, then drive from the train to their destinations, they will simply drive the whole trip. Houston and Dallas both need to build practical (high frequency, high density) local transit before it will be practical to use public transit to connect the two metros.

I would ride it I live in Houston and it sounds like a fun trip.

I think the first step of this project should be making Houston and Dallas more pedestrian and bicycle friendly. Then the funding of this mega project should come from the US government and Texas government. The biggest obstacles of this project are the car and plane lobbies.

I'm surprised this project doesn't include additional park & ride stations. A lot of people will be going from where they live in the suburbs to the centre of the other city. That works in both directions of course so you'd have one park & ride stop about 10 to 15 miles south of Dallas and another about 10-15 miles north (or outside) of Houston. Extra stops do add time to the journey but it's not much - about 5 minutes per stop. These are particularly successful in the UK and in some cases they lead to a lot of new development around the park & ride station. I guess whoever builds the railway could cash in on that too? The other thing I'm surpirsed at is the planned service frequency. 1 train per hour off peak? That's not enough for turn-up-and-go kind of travelling. You need at least 2/hr. If you can't fill em with enough people then make the trains shorter. Overall you'd still generate more traffic for the railway.

The only way I see this being practical for Dallas and Houston is if they switch it to be the Dallas, Waco, Austin, San Antonio, Houston high speed rail. That would only increase its size slightly adding a bit of a outward bow shape towards the other 3 cities, but it would drastically increase potential riders. 30 billion dollars for only 2 cities is kind of insane. Even if it cost 40 billion dollars if it connected 4 major cities and 1 mid sized city with Waco it may just be worth it.

High speed rail projects, in Texas especially, need to go the extra mile and locate their stops within the urban core. The main advantage of taking HSR over flying is that you go from city center to city center, without all the airport logistics at each end of the journey. Cutting costs by putting the stations in the suburbs diminishes this and kneecaps the line's ability to compete with Southwest Airlines (who have actively opposed Texas HSR for decades) and even just driving.

On the entire United States Eastern seaboard, I-95 suffers the same congestion troubles between Boston Massachusetts and Jacksonville Florida. A bullet line i would call, the United States Atlantic bullet line would be perfect if built from Boston Massachusetts to Jacksonville Florida. This line would move millions of americans up and down the entire United States Eastern seaboard every year. This would not only free up heavy congestion on i-95 and ease the frustrations of many who sit stranded at airports due to cancellations and delays during the holidays and travel seasons, but would also improve infrastructure and economic growth. Traveling at speeds of up to 200 to 225 plus, the Atlantic bullet line would stop in one or two cities in each state it travels through. I drive to Jacksonville Florida from Lancaster Pennsylvania every year and it takes me about 12 to 13 hours. Making the same trip in an EV would take 4 to 5 hours longer due to all the sitting times and limited range. But with this highspeed train set, i could make the 829 mile trip in just 4 to 6 hours instead of 12 to 13 hours. You damn right i would park my car and take the train, wouldn't you? Highspeed bullet train technology is something the mighty United States of America should of had decades ago and yet for decades all they ever did is talk about it. It's a shame that the country who put a man on the moon to jump around and pick up rocks at a cost of billions just has no intrest in improving infrastructure and economic growth by putting highspeed bullet train technology on the ground. Many americans who swear by electric vehicles and yet turn away the idea of obtaining highspeed bullet train technology which is also (fully electric). But California is atleast trying to make an effort to introduce highspeed bullet trains with the California highspeed rail project. I hope that one day a bullet train line will be installed in the eastern seaboard but till then, highspeed bullet trains and maglev super train technology is the new american dream. Hats off to you Japan and China and the rest of the far more advanced countries of the far east and Europe. Texas all i hear is talk. I will believe it when i see it.....

you know why the HSR in japan was already successful by the time it started? there was already a very broad network of public transportation in every city in the toukaidou sen.

As a texan i cant wait for the rail line

I'll give it a 0% chance of happening by 2026 for the following reasons a think tank summarized: (1) the continually escalating costs of building and operating high-speed rail, (2) the limited and declining pool of potential ridership from 5M to 1.4M annually; (3) Texas Central’s status as a zombie company, and (4) the lack of federal or state support for Texas Central’s project. The company: Texas Central, saw its board members resign, it's delinquent in paying property taxes and property owners along the route haven't been paid association dues. Its Twitter has now fallen silent, there are no updates and some legal challenges remain.

There IS NO heart of downtown in Dallas and Houston. Just like people who FLY between those two cities, they rent a car. Or car sharing companies spring up. Seriously what's more American than an entrepeneur seizing an opportunity to rent or carshare vehicles to high income business travelers. This line is SUCH a no-brainer... but maybe that's the problem... no brains.

One more advice guys. New york -los Angeles 350kmh what a rentable touristic trip. That would be the roller coaster of adults and the living book to the children. 12 hours from coast to coast? Amazing. In a uniquely developed and landscaping dotted country like USA that would be the Apple(brand) of the rails .how many Americans would pay for a seat everyday? I'm telling you.

Their biggest problem outside of the legal challenges was funding. They struggled to raise anywhere near what they needed after the court battles started. The other problem is transportation connections in the destination cities: I think it would have a better chance in another decade or so, if transportation networks within Dallas and Houston are improved

My only issue with the rail, is ok it saves me about 1.5-2hours compared to driving, but now I am in another city with no car, and don’t expect me to want to bus around or pay more $$$ for Uber’s everywhere…

San Antonio to Austin to Dallas to Houston with stops in temple, Victoria, and the bravos valley. Also a line connecting El Paso to San Antonio with a stop in San Angelo and midland.

While many of the new hsr-networks around the US sound great, I fear that because literally every state has a different system, the network will be a nightmare to combine into a national network...

Great Video! Very detailed and informative

As someone who lives in Houston and takes I-45 to Oklahoma a few times a year, I have never made the drive in less than four hours.

I think the first step before this is to build a railway infrastructure within the cities first which would benefit the cities a ton anyway then connect the two cities and then repeat with the other big cities in America and connect them all via high-speed rail

The United States as a whole is so far behind on getting High Speed Rails as an option to travel instead of by plane or car. It's a multi-trillion dollar project that needs to happen and it would significantly reduce the need to drive everywhere if you knew that it would cut the times in half that way and there's always someone who will give you an Uber drive somewhere or a bus ride to the general area of choice.

Just get it done Texas👍

I love how the state government won't give any money to hsr as they think that rail will only work if privately funded, yet just approved 85 billion in state PUBLIC funds towards roads.

(1) I think it would be good to develop a high-speed railroad in the United States with a yen loan (guarantor is the US government). (2) If the United States introduces Japanese high-speed railroads (Shinkansen, Linear Shinkansen) and Japan purchases American fighter planes, planes, missiles, and resources, I think it will circulate.

Why is building high-speed rail so expensive in the US? In Western Europe or Asia they're building high-speed rail networks for a couple billion that cover the vast amount of their countries. I can understand the US being more expensive by a few billion. Workers here make more, corps here want bigger profits, and this is privately funded and not state-owned. But it's so baffling how infrastructure in the US is 10-20x more expensive, the work isn't state of the art, and the completion times are horrendous. What exactly is inflating the cost so damn much?

So would the train be called the Shinktexan?

Nice, I love me some good high quality japanese rails

I love the initiative but I feel the bullet train will soon be obsolete, why not go all the way and develop a mag lev system, or even a hyper loop type of transport?

From a convenience standpoint, The proposal is screwed up. In it's current passenger only configuration, it will never be built.

I can't wait until this project is complete 👍😍

The Texas Triangle will be here one day mark my words.

Things I want in the Texas high speed rail system: -Destinations to Austin, San Antonio, Galveston, Corpus Cristi, etc. -All stations must have Bucc-EE’s.

It will never happen. They have talked about a HSR between San Antonio and Dallas, then Dallas-Houston, then Houston-San Antonio for 25 years. Every time everyone gets excited and the proposed route is announced. SA to DFW with a stop in Austin, Waco and Temple… then every small town along the way gets upset on why they don’t get a stop. After explaining a train that goes 120+ mph needs 5 miles to get up to speed and 5+ miles to slow down the train can’t stop every 15 miles and still be efficient. Plus with SouthWest Airlines having $49 flights between the three city pairs the train would need to be faster than 2.5 hours and $49 to be worth it.

Next up: Fort Worth - Waco - Austin - San Antonio - Corpus Christi - Brownsville?

If they even manage to break ground on a high-speed rail between Dallas and Houston by 2026 I'll be shocked.

One minor detail.... Texas TGV was killed by the airlines...

The stations need to be downtown and a high populated suburb on the way

You know what's insane? I graduate from college in oklahoma RIGHT BEFORE THIS SHIT OPENS. im from houston so i couldve easily used this thing to go home for a long weekend. A 4 hour drive to dallas is nothing if i get to avoid i45. Albiet dallas would still be a pain in the ass but id have to go through it anyway.

It's pretty sad how such a rich place depends on benevolent corporations to invest and build what should be public transit.

California hsr is at least being built. This is just really quiet V and weird right now

I hope it gets done someday I enjoyed it.

The problem: you’re in the destination city, you don’t have a car, public transit isn’t very good. Do you start wishing you’d just driven your car there? I’m walking distance from one of the new sections of Brightline tracks in Florida, a bit south of Stuart. I have to cross the tracks to get to most things. There are no plans for there to be a Brightline station within 30 miles of me. Say I want to go to Orlando or Miami by train. Will Brightline provide bus service to the two stations nearest me? (It might help if they do.) It’s the lack of other infrastructure that has me skeptical about these ventures. In my case, Brightline doesn’t seem to want my business, and I’m dubious about how to get around at my destination.

It's all good until a tornado outbreak runs across the line & destroys it.

I was with you until "km" and "kph". What is this gibberish - every American watching this

Let me know when they break ground and actually start building.... I have heard about this for ten years now.... I am still waiting. I used to live in Kansas City. They started talking about light rail back in the 1970s. They finally after 50 years have a 2 mile stretch open. They are adding another five miles within 2 years. Let me know when it is finished. The US is so backward when it comes to rail transportation as compared to the rest of the world.

The main problem I see is when you get to Houston, at the current destination, you will be dropped off on the most congested highway in the state of Texas. There is no local train connection there and the buses are horrible here. The buses and trains are only available in the city limits of Houston and suburban areas they are unavailable. The intersection is where Hwy 610, IH 10, Hwy 290, Hwy 59, IH 45 all come together. The majority of population lives in the suburbs and where I live it would take an hour to get to that location from where I live. But then again I would have to cross the train tracks somewhere along the way and I’m not sure if that would add additional time to my commute to that location. I’m sure the car rental businesses will be thrilled to have new a new location to open in. They brag about no security checks to get on train. In Texas, that is just inviting our mentally unstable population to go kill a large group of people. Trapped on a train going 200mph would be easy pickings for someone wanting to kill a large group of people. In Texas, as you know, we love our guns and anyone can buy them here. No where in Texas is it really safe anymore. Shootings at schools, malls, workplaces, etc.. are common here. One thing to note IH 45 is not the only way to Dallas. Most of the traffic on IH 45 is 18 wheeler trucks traveling out of the port located in Houston that’s why I never travel on IH 45. I’ve ridden on high speed trains in other countries but population density there is considerably higher than in Texas with additional stops not just one in the middle of nowhere. Huntsville has 7 prison units with a population larger the town itself. College Station is an hour away and so you will need some way to get back and forth. By the time this thing ever gets built I think $30 billion is a low bid.

Correct me if I'm wrong, Indonesia has built the world's first high-speed railway established in the Southern Hemisphere, named Whoosh!

It’s interesting it’s privately funded. It’s good in a sense that they will likely be more efficient, make less useless stops, and built much faster. However, high speed rail isn’t traditionally a profit making business, it’s more of a utility like a highway. A lot of routes do not make money. I wonder if ticket prices will therefore be quite high.

The French just got on with the job. No greedy lawyers! The sparsely populated regions of France are similar to Texas. But you don't have public transport infrastructure at either city. Urban America was born on the car.

We are like 40 years behind on our trains 😅

The problem is the way infrastructure is funded in the USA. In most countries around the world the government funds and builds infrastructure. It simply happens unlike in the USA which is filled with half finished projects and lots of empty talk.

I wish it connects Dallas - Austin- San Antonio- Houston.

HSR is supposed to connect cities yet they skipped over Waco, College Station, Bryan and Waxahachie just to save maybe ~5 miles on the route from Dallas to Houston. This is why I can’t take all these new HSR proposals in the US seriously, they always just focus on linking points A and B and ignore C through Z, which would basically destine them to failure if they were to get built

How there is no major rail connection between these cities yet is absolutely bonkers. The US is such a backward country.

seeing a Shinkansen in Texas would make me ridiculously giddy. how cool would that be? like holy shit! I grew up in the Dallas area and I would definitely go back to visit and take the mo'fuckn Texas Shinkansen, yee haw (even if it's to stinky Houston lol)! I hope I get to see a decent U.S. Shinkansen network in my lifetime.

I live just outside of Dallas County. This is the first time I've heard about the plan. It must b e a secret.

So yet another case of rich land owners suing public works projects out of existence... yay Texas!!! Out of curiosity, why not run the rail near /between the highway? Sure it'll require additional work on the highway but seems like an easy way to get around needing to use eminent domain, I'm not familiar with Texas geography though maybe there's elevation changes that make it impractical

I've heard some idea of a future branch from Brazoa valley to Austin and San Antonio. I also wonder if there could be a future extension from Dallas to Ft. Worth to connect with the existing Amtrak line (which is pathetic, but perhaps with some more connections, it could be improved in the future.)

ELON MUSK, Should invest in this.

Looking forward to this being a reality. Hopefully eventually it gets new management, and hopefully they bring it to union station

Sorry guys ...is this a Texan pranks ? 😂😂😂😂😅😅😅😅

You would think the airlines have hourly shuttles the way Eastern Airlines did to LGA, DCA and BOS? $30B is a huge amount money for one project.

There is no such thing as a 100% privately funded passenger train and never will be.

We are hopeful that this project will be successful, but our only concern is traffic in the cities. Even if HSR is completed, there will be traffic congestion in the city if all traffic beyond it is by car. On the other hand, public transportation in Dallas and Houston is poor compared to the rest of the countries where HSRs are located. Considering the population size of both cities, the development of a subway or elevated rail system should be considered.

I don’t see this happening in Texas. It only works for East Coast areas.

Id suspect big oil, car companies, and airlines all behind the fight, handling legal fees and everything for land owners. They'll fight tooth and nail against this.