The company has designed light-rail systems for San Francisco, Boston, Pittsburgh, Denver, San Diego, Portland, Sacramento, Houston, Salt Lake City, Los Angeles and St. Louis.
“I was the project manager for the phase-one light-rail system in St. Louis,” says Frank Guzzo, Siemens director of business development for its western division.
Let’s start with the differences between light-rail and streetcar systems.
“Streetcars are really designed to be a circulator of people at relatively low speeds of 20 to 30 miles per hour where they connect points of interest in a downtown core,” Guzzo says. “They’re generally four-axle cars. They’re physically smaller, and the amenities are set up so they’re not going to provide the kind of ride for people to be on there for 30 minutes. And they don’t have luggage racks.”
While streetcars can be speeded up, “at the end of the day you’ve just got a lightweight vehicle with a low power propulsion system,” Guzzo says. “It’s like buying a Yugo. Eventually it will make the trip, but it won’t be what you want to do.”
Streetcar starter line supporters are contemplating going with heavier track beds so light-rail cars could be substituted later.
Now here’s a shocker.
“The corridor for a light-rail system and a streetcar system isn’t going to be that much different,” Guzzo says. “The rolling stock is about 10 percent of the cost, so I don’t know how people can say if I go with a streetcar it’s going to be that much different. Looking at the big picture, the cost has to do with infrastructure. It’s about a million dollars a mile for both, 1 million to 1 1/2 million for a double-track system.”
The $1 billion question: Have any major metropolitan customers explored going with a light-rail starter system and opted out for a less expensive streetcar system?
“No, I can tell you flat out that’s never happened,” Guzzo says. “If the funding is tight they’ll scale the system back; they’ll put in a starter line, then grow the system. … What they talk about is streetcars for an enhancement to light rail. They don’t substitute one for the other. … Light rail is used as a means for growing from a starter line outward. You don’t normally grow a streetcar system.”
Poco alert
Classic country rock aficionados be advised: A rare regrouping of the band Poco is in the works, complete with Rusty Young, Paul Cotton and “special guest” Richie Furay. It goes down Nov. 30 at Liberty Hall in Lawrence.
“It will be a very special evening because very rarely do Richie and Poco get together,” promoter Kelly Kriegh says. “Richie will do a 45-minute opening set with his daughter, Jesse Furay Lynch, and they’ll do some Buffalo Springfield songs as well as his own stuff. Then when he comes on with Poco, they’ll do all their signature stuff like ‘Kind Woman’ and ‘Good Feelin’ to Know.’ ”
Might there be some late ’60s/early ’70s groupies in the audience?
“There could be a few,” Kriegh says. “I got an e-mail from someone flying in from England to see the show, because Ticketmaster wouldn’t send his tickets out of the country.”
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