Quote:
Originally Posted by hammersklavier
The real question is, why are they only planning for a max speed of 79mph in the first place?
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There are federal regulations that limit speed to 79 mph unless certain track improvements are done including, I believe, elimination of all manual switches and electronic sensors providing the exact location of all trains to dispatchers and fail-safe controls on trains that bring them to a stop if they erroneously go through a signal they should not have.
To quote Wikipedia, which may put it better than I can, "Passenger trains are limited to 59 mph and freight trains to 49 mph on track without block signal systems. Trains without "an automatic cab signal, automatic train stop or automatic train control system" may not exceed 79 mph." (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_l...d_States_(rail) ).
I don't believe the existing rolling stock has these systems and it may be that either AMTRAK doesn't have the money to install them or the freight railroads don't want to spend the money limiting the speed of all trains using the same rails.
In any case, retrofitting all this equipment will take lots of money and time, but it can and should be done--gradually. I'm guessing 79 mph for the line in question is not the ultimate goal, simply the initial goal.