VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – That trip to Seattle or Portland would look a lot better through the window of a train barrelling down a high speed rail corridor at about 300km/h.

As California begins construction of a bullet-train line linking Los Angeles and San Francisco, there is a renewed push to build a high-speed link through Cascadia.

The strip from Portland to Seattle to Vancouver was designated as a future high-speed rail corridor by the US government in the 1990s and current long-range plans in Washington State would see passenger trains running at a respectable 180km/h along many sections by early next decade.

But the group “Cascadia High Speed Rail” believes separated tracks along sections of existing right-of-ways, highway corridors, and through tunnels can be made a reality within 20 years, allowing electric trains to run along the 500km stretch at up to 300km/h.

Rudy Niederer with CHSR admits the mega project would cost billions of dollars and there may be little political appetite for that kind of infrastructure spending in the Pacific Northwest. But he believes the economics do work out over the very long term, pointing to European models.

“Specifically in Switzerland, where people are starting to abandon cars for the trains. They are on time, they are efficient … and they are filling up. They are running in the black. That will happen here in America as well once we provide high speed rail,” Niederer tells News1130.

The Oregon group envisions an initial rail link from Portland to Everett, Washington with further expansions north to Vancouver and south to Eugene.