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Future Fests as of Fall 2015/Winter 2016


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#1 KevinKorell

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Posted 11 October 2015 - 01:40 PM

It's now Fall, so a fresh thread on what might happen in our ever changing future.

 

With regard to Fests in the summer, as indicated in our last thread, between the summers of 2016 and 2017 the plan is either a revisit to the Dallas area, or a circular West Coast swing trip.    I'll discuss the West Coast shortly.

 

Dallas I am still watching for projected opening dates.  The pieces of the puzzle still needing to come online within the near future are the second phase of the modern Dallas Streetcar, and the South Oak Cliff extension of the DART Blue Line to University of North Texas.  Both are currently projected to happen sometime in 2016.  If they will both be in revenue service before July 2016, this would be a go.  We however know how opening dates can slip, but then DART has been pretty good at sticking to their plans once announced.   Should Dallas happen, there are several scenarios that can be added to this trip as extra modules, since a simple Chicago-Dallas-Chicago trip with one full day and parts of 2 others would result in a little less time than we normally spend travelling during these events.  Here is a list of ideas that can be added to the week:

 

  • Side trip to Oklahoma City (adds one day and allows riding the Heartland Flyer)
  • 24 hour stopover in Little Rock (adds one day and lets us ride Rock Metro Streetcar)
  • Longer trip towards Dallas via Kansas City and St. Louis (adds two days, allows riding new KC Streetcar and St. Louis Metrolink light rail)

 

The above can be single choices added onto a basic Dallas trip, or we can mix and match adding more than one of the above elements.  At any rate, besides the 2016 openings, new to us since 2005 we still have the entire Green and Orange Lines, the Blue Line extension to Downtown Rowlett from Garland, the A-Train commuter rail to & from Denton, and possibly the APT People Mover in Las Colinas in Irving.

 

A new West Coast swing was suggested as well.  Overall it would feature revisits to Seattle, Portland, and Los Angeles (but not the Bay Area other than passing through), rides on the Coast Starlight and Cascades, and new transit lines that were not yet running when we last visited.    New to us in Seattle since 2010 would be the University LINK light rail extension and the First Hill Streetcar line, both yet to open but should be before mid-2016.  (Unfortunately the Lakewood extension of Sounder is currently not possible to do on a simple out and back trip.)  In Portland, the new MAX Orange Line to Milwaukie and the two loops that constitute the Central Loop would give us some streetcar riding as well -- more than we were able to do in 2010.  In Los Angeles, since our 2009 visit the Gold Line now goes to East L.A., and on the other end will be open beyond Pasadena to Azusa by this Spring. Also the Expo Line Phase 1 has been in service several years, but by Spring it will be joined by Phase 2 which runs to Santa Monica within sight of the Pacific Ocean.

 

For the West Coast I worked out two scenarios, one clockwise and one counter-clockwise.  Both would result in 10 days out from Chicago and back to Chicago afterwards, so those on the east coast would add whatever time is necessary from there.  The clockwise option would be to take the westbound Southwest Chief CHI-LAX, 1 full day and part of another in Los Angeles, northbound Coast Starlight LAX-PDX,  about a half day of MAX & Streetcar  with the other half the Cascades to Seattle, a day riding trains in Seattle, ending with boarding the eastbound Empire Builder SEA-CHI.  Counter-clockwise, the activity would begin with a westbound trip CHI-SEA on the Empire Builder, finishing the arrival day by riding streetcar & LINK in Seattle, Cascades to Portland, half a day of travel in MAX & Streetcars in Portland, with the other half boarding the southbound Coast Starlight PDX-LAX, and then 2 full days in Los Angeles, the end of the second one being the boarding of the eastbound Southwest Chief LAX-CHI.  That is a nutshell.   While I have worked out what we would do in each city, all my scenarios are based on weekday travel. Obviously during a 10-day trip there will have to be weekend travel sometime in one of the cities we visit. The dates have not yet been chosen either.

 

Again I am well aware of the desire to reserve and book Amtrak travel using the redemption rules that expire January 23rd.  I share that wish.  Since it is not possible to know without a doubt that I have the time off from work I usually take, I hope to make a formal announcement around New Years.... both whether this will be Dallas or the West Coast, and which of the options related to each that will work best for us. In the meantime between now and the end of 2015 we can discuss what can work best for us in all regards.

 

As for other summer trips,  we still also have a Houston-New Orleans trip, that would take in round trip travel on both the City of New Orleans and Sunset Limited, and the 3 light rail lines in Houston as well as the newer streetcar lines in New Orleans (as well as the one we missed riding in 2011).  In Houston, by 2018 we should have the Green Line completed as planned, and there should be more available to ride in New Orleans as well.  

 

We also want to consider a revisit to Florida.  Since the Florida RailFest in 2008, the TECO Line Streetcar in Tampa has been extended a few blocks, SunRail has come into existence and should have its Phase 2 segments online, TriRail has been re-extended back to the Miami Airport station, Miami Metro Rail Orange Line has been built also to the Airport station,  MIA Mover has been built between the Airport Station and the airport itself, and Amtrak Silver Service should finally be extended to that same Airport station location by then from its current Hialeah terminus.  In serious discussion is also a Coastal Link parallel TriRail line up to Jupiter, and the rerouting of some of some trains on the legacy TriRail line to a downtown Miami station rather than the airport.   Finally, All Aboard Florida should be in service by then.

 

Moving to winter meets, it is almost certain that we will get together in the New York area in January 2016.  The announcement has now been made, and it will be New York Area RailFest 2016.  Do plan on the Martin Luther King holiday weekend, and at very least Saturday and Sunday activities that will include NJT's Princeton Branch, Long Island Railroad to Port Washington & back, the entire nyc7.jpg  subway between Flushing and Manhattan (including the newest segment to Hudson Yards), a Metro North round trip to North White Plains (White Plains turnback if outbound train is late), three Amtrak trip segments that can still earn 100 points apiece, and some Brooklyn subway riding to and from Nathan's for lunch over two different routes.  I'll know more about whether a Friday evening activity is possible closer to the time.

 

We will take the winter events as they come and not plan too far ahead, since not much is happening on those fronts.  Someday perhaps there will be a streetcar to ride in Washington, DC.  They built it, but two January fests have passed without us being able to partake of it.


Edited by KevinKorell, 14 November 2015 - 11:53 PM.
Announcement was made for NYRF, refined text here.


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#2 pennyk

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Posted 11 October 2015 - 02:02 PM

thank you for your diligence



#3 saxman

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Posted 11 October 2015 - 05:42 PM

Just a thought about the west coast trip. With the current way of redeeming points, going there would be better, since traveling farther on the current system is the best bang for your buck (points) redemption. Since Dallas is a lot closer, we wouldn't get as much value in the old point system. And I definitely would like to finish out the old point system with a bang, by taking a nice long west coast trip. And when better to use them, than for an OTOL fest. Waiting until 2017, we'd have to save up a lot more points to get to the west coast.

 

With that said, for a Dallas trip, I vote for a Heartland Flyer turn. Isn't Oklahoma City about to build a streetcar line too? I know nothing about it.



#4 KevinKorell

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Posted 11 October 2015 - 06:50 PM

Chris,

 

Good points.

 

One thing I neglected to mention again above was that I had several Texas trips planned.  I'd like to also get to Austin to ride its Metrorail (Cap Metro to Leander), and that might warrant another trip to the state as well to accommodate whatever of those above options we don't get to on the next Texas trip (even though they involve Oklahoma, Missouri, and Arkansas!!).

 

As for your question about Oklahoma City, the target opening date for what will be Phase 1 is 2018, and second phase won't open until 2021. That would mean it would not be ready in time for a 2016 or 2017 visit.  The schedule of the Heartland Flyer, with an evening arrival in OKC and a morning departure, doesn't allow much time to ride said streetcar, unless we get there on time and the streetcar has evening hours.  At any rate, another argument for doing the West Coast trip first and this part of the country later -- 2017 or even 2018.  Or go to Dallas in 2017 and save the OKC option for a subsequent visit in another year.



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#5 KevinKorell

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Posted 24 November 2015 - 12:20 PM

Here is where current thinking lies regarding the Summer of 2016.

 

Unless something changes drastically, Dallas appears to be off the table for 2016 and thus a good candidate for 2017.  The reason is that the Blue Line extension to University of Northern Texas is not expected to open until December 2016.  That said, Dallas is known to announce opening dates well in advance, but since they haven't yet, an opening of this segment before next summer appears to be a far fetched idea.

 

So in narrowing choices down to a fest on the West Coast, there is still a number of possible 10-day periods within the usual 2 weeks we do this, and there are the clockwise and counter-clockwise options as well.   Counter-clockwise seems to be preferred, for a very good reason in that the eastbound Southwest Chief is more likely to make same-day connections in Chicago than the eastbound Empire Builder.  So doing Seattle first, then Portland, then Los Angeles will get the most attention as I try to decide the best schedule for us to follow.

 

The bad news in this, something that may later resolve itself, is that right now many hotels currently show either no vacancy or expensive rates.  We ran into this issue with Charlotte in 2013, but the problem worked itself out when inventories were updated at the beginning of a month or a quarter and cheaper rooms were released for sale.  If hotels remain too expensive or unavailable in downtown locations, there may be cheaper options in suburban locations that are near rail lines we would be riding anyway.  Portland and Seattle have clusters of hotels near their respective airports (both served by light rail).  The Los Angeles area has hotels spread out in many outlying locations such as Long Beach, El Segundo (near LAX Airport), Burbank, Chatsworth, Pasadena, Hollywood, and Universal City (all near rail transit), and the newest location will be Arcadia, right off the Gold Line extension to Azusa that opens in early March.



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#6 steve4031

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Posted 24 November 2015 - 12:30 PM

The high speed line from Orlando to Miami is do to open in 2017 iirc. This would be an interesting addition to a Florida fest.

Edited by steve4031, 24 November 2015 - 12:34 PM.


#7 KevinKorell

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Posted 24 November 2015 - 12:40 PM

The high speed line from Orlando to Miami is do to open in 2017 iirc. This would be an interesting addition to a Florida fest.

We discussed Brightline on the most recent Sunday chat session.  It may end up being cost prohibitive for  some, and there will also  be concern about connections from the endpoint at Orlando Airport to anything else.  We shall see how they end up pricing one way & round trips.  Of course any Florida trip would also include SunRail (whose future planned phases probably won't be open to completion before 2018), and Miami where we can ride the new Metrorail Orange Line to the airport station, the Miami Mover between that station and the airport proper, and whatever shakes out with routing TriRail into the same downtown terminal as Brightline and possibly a new TriRail Coastal Link on the FEC line closer to the ocean.



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#8 jis

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Posted 26 December 2015 - 02:06 PM

The high speed line from Orlando to Miami is do to open in 2017 iirc. This would be an interesting addition to a Florida fest.

Brightline will open between Miami and West Palm Beach in mid to late 2017. Orlando International Airport will be late 2018 at the earliest.

 

Best known estimates for fares suggests that in 2020 Miami - Orlando fare would be something like $95 in standard class and $145 in business class. If all you want to do is ride it from WPB to OIA the fare would be around $66 in standard class. And if all you want to do is just ride it for a bit, standard class fare from MIC to FLL would be something like $11 in standard class.

 

The Poinciana extension of SunRail (Phase IIA) which is fully funded is now slated for completion and inauguration at the earliest in Dec 2017.

 

We are keeping our fingers crossed and hoping that the Deland extension (Phase IIB) gets funded this coming year. Some are now saying that the OIA extension (Phase III) might get built before the Deland extension though there is no funding application in the works yet for it for the $200+ million needed for it. But it certainly is a very key link between OIA and Brightline on the one hand and SunRail and Amtrak on the other, in Orlando.



#9 KevinKorell

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Posted 26 December 2015 - 03:00 PM

But it certainly is a very key link between OIA and Brightline on the one hand and SunRail and Amtrak on the other, in Orlando.

It's a key link provided that SunRail will think outside the box and run trains that meet most BrightLine arrivals and departures, including running on weekends, something they don't do now except for rare events.

Perhaps we pencil in Florida for another Fest in summer of 2019, as that would be the soonest to take advantage of the completion and opening of BrightLine to Orlando and potentially the SunRail extensions.

Edited by KevinKorell, 26 December 2015 - 06:43 PM.
Added thought about fest


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#10 jis

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Posted 30 December 2015 - 12:11 PM

I doubt that Phase III to Airport will be completed by 2019, unless of course a miracle happens. However, there is Lynx bus connection from Sandlake Road to the airport and limited connection from Amtrak Station to the airport.

 

Phase III planning suggests that there would be at least hourly and perhaps half hourly service between the airport and downtown throughout the day since it can be partially financed out of airport funds apparently. The usual problem is finding operating money. But of course, we'll see. Meanwhile, if the circulator Monorail/Maglev/whatever actually gets built out to the airport as planned, that might be available to get to Sandlake Road by 2019 too. But again, ... we'll see what happens.

 

But notwithstanding all those uncertainties, I think planning a trip to Florida in 2019 for now at least makes sense. There will continue to be additions end extensions of rail service and LRT lines through the years, and if we wait for the last one to finish, we'll never have a chance for a trip to materialize.






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