Will Texas Really Get a Bullet Train?

Plans for a high-speed train between Dallas and Houston are becoming more and more real as passenger rail projects around the nation gain steam, reports Benjamin Schneider in Bloomberg CityLab. Texas Central, the authority overseeing the project, says the project would use Japanese Shinkansen technology, a type of high-speed rail not yet available in the United States.

“The 240-mile Dallas to Houston corridor, with a stop in the Brazos Valley serving Texas A&M University, is ideal for high-speed rail,” according to Amtrak’s Senior Vice President for High-Speed Rail Development Programs Andy Byford. But the project would cost upwards of $30 billion and require the acquisition of private property. Meanwhile, the state has remained silent on any level of financial support.

Hopes for the project, which was first proposed in 2009, grew last year when Amtrak and Texas Central announced they are ‘exploring’ a partnership that would have Amtrak operate the future line. “How, exactly, Texas Central and Amtrak would work together remains unclear.” A 2017 Texas law outlaws using state funds for privately operated high-speed rail, but Schneider points out that “It’s not clear whether an Amtrak-led but partially privately funded project would be barred from funding under this law.”