Case Studies Examining High Speed Rail Station Location Decisions From an International Perspective

As U.S. states are planning and designing for future nationwide and regional high-speed rail (HSR) services, an important issue to consider is where to locate stations. Station location determination is critical not only because it influences the perceived utility of the HSR services and can greatly influence ridership, but also due to its impact upon the local and regional transportation mobility, land use, and urban economic development. The main purpose of this paper is to provide information to HSR planners, engineers, and decision-makers in the U.S. on the practices of other countries in locating HSR stations. This paper examines HSR stations in several of the earliest countries which built HSR infrastructures: France, Spain, and Japan, to analyze how HSR station locations were selected, as well as the applicability of those methodologies in the planning process for the United States.