Rail Transportation

DART Survey Results Show Riders Are Pretty Decent Transit Planners

The results are in from a survey we told you about earlier this month in which DART riders about things like frequency and what the agency could do better as it preps its latest 10-year plan. Turns out, the riders did a really good job. On the frequency question, the one where only one of the choi ... More >>

One Day Soon, Dallas May Be Less Likely to Blow Up in a Fiery Oil Train Crash

Freight trains that everyone says are way too old to still be working keep carrying more and more gallons of volatile crude oil through busy cities. What could possibly go wrong? Explosions. And do Unfair Park readers live in the path of these potential explosion sites? Probably. Dallas, like most ... More >>

Hey Suburbs, We Thought You Thought Gated Communities Were Cool

Culture is the most confusing thing. In today's Dallas Morning News, a state representative from a northern suburb is quoted objecting to a proposal for tolled lanes on U.S. Highway 75, the main road north from the city, saying, "We'll basically be a gated community." Wait. I thought that was what ... More >>

Oil Industry Might Not Be Correctly Labeling Train Tank Cars Carrying Crude, Senators Say

After a frack job is complete, can we be certain that the energy industry is taking care to ship the oil as safely as possible? Two United States senators are gently questioning that as a series of crude oil train explosions have made the news. On December 30, a crude oil train operated by Fort Wo ... More >>

Trains Carrying Oil Keep Exploding, but Will the Energy Lobby Allow More Regulation?

Freight trains are the little engine that could of the transportation industry, really janky-looking and slow but refusing to die. In fact, the freight train industry is doing better than ever in states sitting on top of shale, enjoying a massive increase in business thanks fracking. There are over ... More >>

Should Restaurants Ban E-Cigarettes?

There's a crackdown on e-cigarettes in the works. While the health risks of pulling on a battery-powered nicotine stick are still unknown, policy makers are moving to regulate them. The U.S Department of Transportation has already grounded e-cigarettes on airplanes and Amtrak won't let them on train ... More >>

North Texas Senators Beg TxDOT Not to Screw Up This High-Speed Rail Thing

Texas Central Railway's plan, announced almost a year ago now, to build a high-speed rail line linking Houston and North Texas has hit a not altogether unexpected complication: inter-city squabbling over where the bullet train will stop. In Mobility 2035, its long-term vision for transportation in ... More >>

DART Scales Back Expansion Plans in Hopes of Improving Current System, Upping Ridership

When DART last sat down to update its long-range plan in 2006, the agency was thinking big. With the recession still beyond the horizon, planners envisioned 86 additional miles of rail and 121 miles of new bus routes. Since then, the agency has added the bus routes, opened up the Green Line (making ... More >>

The Widow of Gary Stouffer, Marine Killed in Veterans Day Train Crash, Sues Union Pacific

In 2010, Gary Stouffer was on a resupply mission in Afghanistan when the vehicle he was riding in was hit by a blast from an improvised explosive device. The explosion left the 37-year-old Marine with PTSD, traumatic brain injury, and anxiety disorders to go with the compression fractures in his nec ... More >>

Kasey Chambers On The Songs She Couldn't Fit In Her Storybook

Just over a year ago, we caught up with Australian singer-songwriter Kasey Chambers as she was touring behind her excellent LP, Little Bird. That album not only showcased original material, but a return to the folk-rock form she used to become a '90s country darling.

That Dallas-Houston Bullet-Train Proposal Needs More Money Before it Can Start Costing Money

There was a lot of buzz back in May when a group led by the Central Japan Railway Co. and former Harris County Judge Robert Eckels announced plans to raise $10 billion in private funds to establish a bullet train linking Dallas and Houston. TxDOT, too, has been looking at high-speed rail, and is in ... More >>

DCTA's Friday Night Service Is Back On

See also: On the loss of Friday night service Last month, we wrote about the Denton Country Transit Authority implementing changes to its A-Train light rail service, which connects downtown Denton to the DART Green Line in Carrollton. One of the higher profile changes approved by the DCTA board in ... More >>

DART Celebrates 250 Million Rail Rides by Making Man Late to Work, Probably Hiking Some Fares

When the 3-year-old and I took the DART train to free day at the Nasher on Saturday, little did I know we were on the cusp of history. Ridiculously early this morning, some 36 hours after we stepped off the train, DART accosted feted one Don Johnson as the 15-year-old light rail system's 250 million ... More >>

Kevin Roden on the Loss of Friday Night A-Train Service: "It's Not a 'Fiscally Responsible' Argument. The Money is There."

That pop you heard May 24 was the sound of a bubble bursting, one full of potential for expanded night service on the A-Train, Denton County's commuter train service. The bullies holding the pin were the Denton County Transit Authority (DCTA) board, who voted 6-5 to kill Friday night service instead ... More >>

If Amtrak and TxDOT Can Swing It, You'll Be Able to Take Train From Dallas to Shreveport

​Saw that AP piece this morning about how Amtrak and the Texas Department of Transportation are looking at connecting Dallas-Fort Worth to Shreveport-Bossier City, which would involve inserting a stop at the Trinity Railway Express's CentrePort/DFW Airport station. But the piece isn't clear: Shoul ... More >>

Train Museum CEO Says Rolling Stock Will Leave Fair Park For Frisco in Late April

Via.LaPrelle says the Big Boy's move in April has prompted calls from all over the world.​Got a call this morning from Bob LaPrelle, president and CEO of the Museum of the American Railroad, which, as you're well aware by now, is due to roll out of Fair Park to its new digs in Frisco. I'd left him ... More >>

Read TxDOT's Rationale For Need For High Speed Rail Between Houston, DFW (Or ... Not?)

Click to enlarge potential routes for high-speed rail routes between Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston.​On Tuesday we noted that the Texas Department of Transportation is looking for a firm to ID would-be routes for a high-speed rail line between Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth, using $15 million in Fed ... More >>

With $15 Mil From Feds, TxDOT Is Seeking Bids for Dallas-to-Houston High-Speed Rail Study

​It's been quite some time since last we discussed the long-proposed high-speed rail line between Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston, which Jennifer Moczygemba, who oversees the Texas Rail Plan at the Texas Department of Transportation, called in April "definitely a priority" for TxDOT. This morning, s ... More >>

Choo-Choo Goes Boo

Transportation News is Bad, But the Future's So Bright, I Gotta Wear Shades

​Straws in the wind: 1) Rick Perry, toll czar of Texas, still pushing private highways; 2) DART a dismal failure; 3) North Texas Tollway Authority still run by the good old boys. This could all be good. You know where we need to wind up with all this? A toll road from Dallas up to Lake Texoma ... More >>

Feds Roll Out $15 Million to Begin Studying Feasibility of DFW-to-Houston High-Speed Rail

​About a month back we looked at docs the Texas Department of Transportation submitted to the Federal Railroad Administration in the hopes of landing some federal money dough for that loooooong-discussed Dallas-Fort Worth-to-Houston high-speed rail line. Long story short: The state wanted $18 mill ... More >>

What's Wrong with DART? The Suburbs.

​No, no, no -- not that same old crap again about how we need to get more suburbs to join Dallas Area Rapid Transit, our regional rail system. The suburbs are what's wrong with DART. Screw the suburbs. Dallas needs to quit DART and let the suburbs go build their own damn rail system. There's ... More >>

Dallas, The Next Portland! You Too, Fort Worth!

Via.​No, seriously. Says so right here, on the DC Streetsblog site, where today they're handing out best-and-worst-of-2010 nods. Something to do with streetcars and bike lanes and Dallas Area Rapid Transit's Green Line expansion. Well, all right. To the kudos!We give our 2010 Streetsie for The Nex ... More >>

Denton's A-Train Bows to Music Scene Demands

U.S. Department of Transpo Forks Over $5.6 Mil to Study OKC-to-DFW High-Speed Rail Line

U.S. Department of Transportation​This morning, as expected, U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood passed out $2.4 billion in funding to 54 high-speed rail projects in 23 states. Among the recipients: the Texas Department of Transportation, which'll take home $5.6 million intended to allow a fu ... More >>

Mayor Tom: "Dallas Is At the Heart of What is Happening in the U.S. Economy Today."

Chris Heinbaugh​On the other side is the final dispatch from Chris Heinbaugh, Mayor Tom Leppert's chief of staff, who's among the traveling party wrapping up that trade mission to Spain and France. The quote in the headline comes from the release that follows, in which Leppert says the Euros are r ... More >>

Under Madrid With Mayor Tom, or: How a Tunnel in Spain May Hint at Dallas's Rail Future

Chris HeinbaughA postcard from Mayor Tom and the Dallas delegation from the tunnel in which they spent part of their first day in Madrid​Funny thing: Yesterday, in the comments below, longtime Friend of Unfair Park Montemalone asked this about the Dallas delegation's trade mission to Europe: "I wo ... More >>

Unwrapping the "Lead Gift" That'll Help Move Museum of American Railroad Outta Fair Park

​At right, that's Amtrak's Texas Eagle -- or, at least, the coach car and first-class sleeping car that pulled into the Museum of the American Railroad at Fair Park yesterday. It's part of what the museum calls "its long-standing partnership with Amtrak to re-introduce the benefits of rail travel ... More >>

Bullet Train With Butterfly Wings: More on Plans for Dallas-to-Houston High-Speed Rail

​On Tuesday we got our sneak peek at Central Japan Railway Company's presentation to Houston transportation officials intended to get 'em revved up about high-speed rail linking Dallas and Houston (and points in between). This morning, Culturemap Houston provides this lengthy follow-up: interviews ... More >>

About That Dallas-to-Houston Bullet Train ...

​About a year ago there was some big back-and-forthing over the viability of a high-speed rail connecting Dallas and Houston. But since then, we've heard next to nothing. Except: Our sister paper in Houston directs our attention this morning to news of a Monday-morning meeting during which Yoshiyu ... More >>

Hop Aboard The Houston-to-Dallas High-Speed PowerPoint on Display Yesterday

From the presentation given yesterday to Harris County officials concerning a Dallas-Houston-etc. high-speed rail line​Back to that Houston-to-Dallas bullet train for a second ...Erik Noriega, manager of communications for the Greater Houston Partnership, was kind enough to send me Central Japan R ... More >>

Railroad Museum in Fair Park Gets a Prized Piece, And It's Headed Straight to Frisco

​Once upon a time, the City Attorney's Office had hoped to get the Museum of the American Railroad outta Fair Park by August 1. But that was way back in February -- before the myriad court hearings and legal filings that ultimately led to Judge Martin Hoffman setting a January 2011 trial date in t ... More >>

All Aboard

From OKC to Fort Worth, Heartland Flyer's Cow Fat Test Run Gets Nod in U.K.

​Meant to point this out last week, when I first saw the story on Salon. But now it's made its way to the U.K. -- this story of the little train that could ... run on cow fat, that is, all the way from Oklahoma City to Fort Worth every single day. (Though "with stops along the way in Norman, Purce ... More >>

Richard Allen on Logistics Hub's Chapter 11: "It's a Good Project. It's Just a Timing Issue."

Richard Allen​Over the last year, whenever I have spoken with Richard Allen, CEO of The Allen Group, he has been open at times, guarded at others. But I have to say today, when he and I talked about his entry into Chapter 11 bankruptcy, he sounded better than he has in some time -- more confidant ... More >>

Yet Another Argument Against a High-Speed Rail Line Connecting Dallas and Houston

​Speaking of traffic ... Megan McArdle, former Economist now at The Atlantic, is the latest to take up the issue of a hypothetical high-speed rail line between Dallas and Houston, which ain't on the government's to-do list but oh well it's fun to argue anyway. This morning she more or less makes t ... More >>

More Arguing Over Viability of Hypothetical Dallas-Houston High-Speed Rail Link

​Earlier this month, Harvard economic pro Ed Glaeser wrote a series of pieces for The New York Times's Economix blog in which he argued that a high-speed rail line between Dallas and Houston wouldn't be economically viable. (Keep in mind, this was all hypothetical, since the Obama administration's ... More >>

According to UNT Profs, DART's the "Economic Engine Making Dallas a World-Class City"

Click to expland the image if you actually want to peek at DART's 2030 Transit PlanThis morning at Dallas Area Rapid Transit HQ, president Gary Thomas lauded the rail expansion as "on time and under budget," and presented a new study by professors at the University of North Texas's Center for Econom ... More >>

Food For Thought 4.24.09

"Literally freight cars full of salt have been removed from these products gradually over time." (Robert Earl of the Grocery Manufacturers Association, responding to calls by the New York City Health Department for the food processing industry and city restaurants to reduce salt levels in their prod ... More >>

McCain's Talking "Texas T-Bone"

Is Fort Worth-Based BNSF Trying to "Intimidate Its Critics"?

LEGO A couple of local items of interest, courtesy nonprofit Public Citizen. After the jump, another Chantix chant, but first up, the D.C.-based consumer advocacy group's involved in some federal litigation in Tarrant County, where Fort Worth-based Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway is trying to ... More >>

Birth Defects

Critics blame poisons from the tie plant for severe birth defects

American Toxic

The railroad tie plant that gave birth to tiny Somerville may now be killing the town, residents claim

Boxcar Willies

Increasing train traffic rattles nerves and homes in Fort Worth

Highwaymen

San Antonio conservatives and a professional road warrior try to hijack a DART rail election