(The following story by Gordon Dickson appeared on the Fort Worth Star-Telegram website on September 9, 2010.)
ARLINGTON, Texas — While extending high-speed rail to North Texas promises to be an expensive, complicated process, area leaders generally agree that the first order of business should be to connect the tracks to Dallas-Fort Worth Airport, which would serve as a regional high-speed hub.
Downtown areas such as Fort Worth would eventually get connections, too.
Texas and other states are competing vigorously for federal high-speed rail funding, and states are responsible for mapping out the intercity connections — San Antonio to Fort Worth, for example. But within each metro area, regional planning groups will figure out local issues such as station and track locations.
In North Texas, Regional Transportation Council members so far favor bringing a high-speed rail line northward along the Texas 161/360 corridor in the Arlington-Grand Prairie area to CentrePort on the airport’s south side. A Trinity Railway Express commuter line already operates at CentrePort.
Bigger Skylink
A D/FW Airport official on Thursday laid out options for getting high-speed rail from CentrePort into the airport’s terminal area. Among them:
Run high-speed rail to the rental car center on the airport’s south side, and convert the center into a transit hub.
Build a new version of SkyLink — the airport’s people mover — as far south as CentrePort.
Build an overhead high-speed rail line up the west side of D/FW’s airfield, and intermingle high-speed rail with a planned commuter rail hub at Terminals A and B.
“They’re all doable. It’s just a matter of the dollars involved,” said Jim Crites, D/FW Airport executive vice president of operations.
RTC members talked at length about the importance of making such a system as customer-friendly as possible so that residents of, say, Marshall in east Texas could take the train directly to an airport terminal to catch a flight.
But RTC chairman Ron Natinsky of Dallas and others were concerned about the potentially prohibitive cost.
“To me, the rental car center is an overlooked asset that might be a good short-term solution while we work on it long-term,” he said. “Maybe the long-term solution is a ‘SkyLink B’ that goes along the unsecured side of the terminals.”
Saying goodbye
Next step is to explore ways to extend high-speed rail to other regional hubs, such as downtown Fort Worth and Dallas, said RTC high-speed rail subcommittee chair and Cedar Hill Mayor Rob Franke.
In other action, the RTC:
Said goodbye to RTC member Paul Wageman, the long-time chairman of the North Texas Tollway Authority who is stepping down this month. Wageman, known for consuming coffee at all hours of the day, was presented with a parody coffee card guaranteeing him unlimited cups of java anytime he wants to return and visit RTC.
Heard an update about the RTC’s legislative agenda. RTC members indicated they’re not ready to visit with lawmakers and talk about their priorities in Austin. For example, they still haven’t agreed among themselves whether the tollway authority or Texas Department of Transportation should be in control of toll managed lanes in the medians of nontoll freeways, such as those being built as part of the DFW Connector project in Grapevine.