Abstract
Geospatial technology is a useful tool when identifying land corridors for transportation networks. The primary transit corridor between Los Angeles, CA and Las Vegas, NV is Interstate-15, approximately a four-hour automobile trip without traffic. Virgin Trains USA LLC proposes an alternative means of travel by constructing a high-speed railway along Interstate-15 connecting Las Vegas and Victorville, CA. This study uses least-cost path analysis to propose an optimized alternative corridor for Virgin Trains’ proposed high-speed railway through a system facilitated road and rail accessibility analysis. Previous research using least-cost path and accessibility methodologies evaluated the results of proposed high-speed railway corridors and the system facilitated accessibility changes by visually inspecting deviations from a planned corridor using single or multiple cost criteria as inputs for a weighted cost surface. However, robust analyses of previous least-cost path studies’ corridors are lacking. This proof-in-concept study proposes a less costly corridor through least-cost path analysis and measures the social impact on the stakeholders of a high-speed railway transportation system through system facilitated accessibility. This study’s proposed alternative corridor is 31% shorter than Virgin Trains’ planned corridor and system facilitated accessibility to Las Vegas, NV is increased in 99.74% of Los Angeles County’s census tracts. These results support this study’s position that geospatial technology can support transportation planning in a comprehensive method that considers the transportation corridor and benefits its stakeholders.
Highlights
Virgin Trains USA (VT) has begun the process of securing U.S Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) approval to construct its newest high-speed railway (HSR) between Las Vegas, NV and Victorville, CA
Whether VT aims to reduce traffic congestion throughout I-15 or provide more access between Los Angeles (LA) County and Las Vegas is not clear. This incites the following questions: how would VT justify a multibillion dollar transportation project? has VT robustly designed the selected corridor and measured its accessibility impact to the users of the transportation system? With the impacts to the stakeholders and users of the VT HSR project in mind, this paper provides an optimized alternative least-cost path (LCP) HSR corridor to contrast against the VT planned corridor and determine which is more optimal
analytical hierarchy process (AHP) involves a series of calculations that begins with the construction of a pairwise comparison matrix (PCM)
Summary
Virgin Trains USA (VT) has begun the process of securing U.S Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) approval to construct its newest high-speed railway (HSR) between Las Vegas, NV and Victorville, CA. The VT HSR corridor will be constructed alongside of Interstate-15 (I-15) and will travel 90 minutes, non-stop from Victorville to Las Vegas Boulevard across from the South Premium Outlets [1], approximately three miles southwest of McCarran International Airport. If a privatized entity or local/federal government can wade through the complex decision matrices that exist in transportation planning and propose a corridor between two places, it is still unlikely that the corridor will be established due to financial feasibility or other socio-economic factors.
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