LETTER: Do the math on Brightline numbers

In your article about Brightline’s Las Vegas-Southern California train, one sentence caught my eye: “At full build-out Brightline expects its system to transport 11 million one-way passengers per year.” Earlier, the article said there would be 10 train sets built. Also mentioned was that each set could carry 434-450 passengers. So from there, we have everything we need to do the math. It isn’t good.

Eleven million one-way passengers comes to 30,137 passengers per day. Assume each train carries 400 passengers. So there would have to be 75 train trips each day to hit 11 million in one year. That’s a tad more than three departures every hour, 24 hours a day. Imagine 400 people showing up at 3 a.m. on a Tuesday. In Las Vegas. And in Southern California. And every other day of the week, every week, for the whole year.

Allowing 30 minutes to unload, and another 30 to load, means each train would need at least 3 hours and 10 minutes to complete one trip. So each train set could complete only 7.5 trips per day. Which would be a total of 75 trips for all 10 sets of trains, exactly what would be needed. Brightline’s expectations are wildly optimistic and dependent on everything operating perfectly and never breaking down. I’m left wondering what they think people will be willing to pay not to drive their cars, ride a bus or fly on a plane.