Wahoo… an investment for the future with electric commuter rail

Last night the board voted on the decision to do Electric rail or Bio Diesel. Electric won (Wahoo!!) I think it will be cleaner, less pollution, and allow us for more options in terms of powering the lines for the future. Do it right the first time has always been my favorite plan. Plus, and of course I am only offering my opinion, the possibility of electric gives us future choices for how we generate the electricity we need. Solar, wind or something else may be the future power source that runs across these lines. I like possibilities.
Here is the article for you to read from today’s Rocky Mountain News..

It’s electric, boogie woogie: RTD says no diesel to DIA or Arvada

By Kevin Flynn, Rocky Mountain News

July 24, 2007

The RTD board tonight bowed to political pressure and financial reality, dropping talk of converting two FasTracks corridors to diesel-powered cars instead of electric.

Some board members a few months ago believed FasTracks, which is $670 million over its $6.2 billion budget, could save up to $200 million by changing rail projects to Denver International Airport and to Arvada and Wheat Ridge from electric commuter rail to diesel.

It adds about $4 million per mile to electrify a rail line.

But faced with staff research that showed the upfront savings would be overwhelmed by the higher operating costs of a diesel system, the few board members left who supported going diesel joined their colleagues in voting 13-0 to stick with the current arrangement. The DIA line is expected to be completed in 2014; the Arvada line in 2015.

If that wasn’t enough, 26 speakers led of by Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper unanimously urged the board to back the communities’ choices. No one spoke up for using diesel cars; many of the speakers demanded RTD abandon current plans to use diesel power on two other FasTracks lines, Northwest Rail to Boulder and Longmont, and North Metro to Commerce City and Thornton.

“Pretty firmly, the whole city has come down on the side of EMU,” Hickenlooper told the board. EMU is the acronym for the self-propelled passenger cars called Electric Multiple Units. “When you take the long view, it’s the right choice.

Mayor Ken Fellman of Arvada and Mayor Jerry DiTullio of Wheat Ridge joined Hickenlooper in endorsing the use of electricity. Residents who live near the proposed lines also told the board their concerns over pollution, noise and keeping promises to voters.

The selection of an all-diesel system would save RTD $89 million in construction costs, mostly because it wouldn’t have to build overhead electric lines.

But financial consultants on privatizing the construction and operation of FasTracks lines have told RTD that it could actually be $184 million less costly to build an electric system on the Gold Line to Wheat Ridge and East Corridor to DIA. That’s because operating costs are less than diesel, and if financing is privatized, RTD would reap the savings in the first year.

Diesel is the stronger candidate to serve the other two heavy-rail commuter corridors in the program, the Northwest Rail to Boulder and Longmont and the North Metro Corridor to Commerce City and Thornton.

Because those trains will run farther and less frequently, the savings of going electric are reduced.

It would take 20 years of running electric on those routes to make up the difference in construction costs.

RTD board member Lee Kemp, the primary backer of going to diesel, said public sentiment and staff analysis changed his mind, but he would fight any move to convert the other two commuter rail corridors, initially planned for diesel, to electric.

Planners on the Northwest Rail corridor, for example, said if RTD had to pay to electrify the line to Boulder and Longmont, there would only b enough money to get the train built from Denver to Louisville, and no farther.

Plus this gives us a good update on the train to DIA. 2014 may be a long way out but at least it is coming.