North Coast Hiawatha - Big Sky Passenger Rail Authority (BSPRA)

I'm taken with the image of a butte with a pit in the middle, that from above it would look a little like a half a bagel -- flat with sheer drop-off at the edges and a bumpy decline in the middle

This Times essay, part of a series that has gone on for many years, has nothing whatever to do with passenger rail beyond this tangential Fair Use quotation:

“I don’t want to own a house by myself,” I said to my partner of four years as we discussed the benefits of owning property in Bozeman, Mont., our increasingly unaffordable mountain town. “We have to try to make this work.”

Now I must wonder if, on the strength of this quotation, that Bozeman is becoming "North Aspen", that this passenger train initiative can justify having a "Corridor" along the NP in Southern Montana.

Hey, while we're at it, how about a "Harlo Corridor" centering around that booming metropolitan area of Harlowton. Wow, "four a day" originating in Roundup and continuing through to Two Dot. Never mind having to relay some 150 miles of "my MILW's" track.

Bozeman is indeed becoming a north Aspen and it has changed dramatically in the last decade. Perhaps if it were up to par, the NP would be a good reroute of the Builder from Sandpoint to MSP as it does travel through bigger cities.

But most of the folks I know in Bozeman are riding in on United nonstop in three hours. That's kind of hard to beat even if you consider it's an extra hour at O'hare for security and 90 minutes to OHare some days.

Wow Mr. Dunville, is that town becoming big time - at least since I ever had reason to be near it.

Two UA nonstops ORD-BZN on real planes, plus one more AA on a puddle jumper.(plus connections through DEN or DFW) means they are "on the map".

Oh well, maybe that gal who wrote the essay can find a stream of "cat ladies" to keep her mortgage paid up and she can make a fat profit down the road. Of course, she appears to be more concerned about what to pay tomorrow than anything else.

Exactly. There's a reason they call such people jet-setters.

Whatever the growth in that class of Montana residents, they aren't relevant to the North Coast Hiawatha.

Don't forget Montana State U. is in Bozeman. 17K students. I believe colleges represent a decent market of students/staff/football spectators who enjoy train travel.

Visited once; very cute town and nice campus.

Missoula, home to Univ. of Montana, is also on the NCH route.

Bozeman might become a stop for the many intermediate stations especially in winter. Quit thinking of a route's end points as the only passenger potential.

I don't think anybody here thinks of those trains as endpoint trains. I think we are indeed critical of Washington for thinking that way. But it's worth putting even midpoints of this concept in perspective:

Currently the builder is 2200 miles, 46 hours.
A Spokane-Bozeman trip on the NCL is about 400 miles, so 8 hours at 50mph.

The longest trains in the EU, which are well over the norm there, are the Caledonian and SJ North Pole train
Those are respectively 571 and 873 miles or 11 and 18 hours.

At no point between Seattle, Portland, and MSP does the Builder or prospective NCL service a population center greater than metro Spokane's 250,000 people, and most are well under 50,000. Although there is major tourist attractions such as Glacier and Bozeman, not everybody wants to add 2 days of travel to either end of their trip. Finally consider the fare structure: A round trip first class from O'hare is about $900-1000 for mid-september. A roomette round trip is about $1400. A bedroom round trip is about $2600. Coach is $250 but that requires 27 hours in a coach seat, plus ampizza in the cafe.

So what we are proposing, even taken as a short-haul or regional solution (which is a good concept) is still longer than all but the longest trains in the EU and serves no population center such other than Spokane.

Also for perspective, a Bozeman-Spokane plane is $500 round trip and 4-5 hours. That's probably where a regional service might be competitive is if Amtrak is $300 round trip at 8 hours, especially for those that don't live right in Bozeman. But if that's what we are making of this, it should be a regional Bozeman-Spokane train, not a long haul to Chicago.

I vote we call it the Longmire express, wasn't that show just over the border in Wyoming?