Development of a Multi-Criteria Decision Method for High-Speed Rail Corridor Evaluation

High-speed intercity passenger rail projects are very complex and require many years of planning and environmental activities before construction can begin. Given the complexity of planning and environmental reviews associated with high-speed intercity passenger rail corridor planning, a systematic approach for high-level screening of various alternative routings for proposed high-speed rail corridors is desired. In this context, this paper proposes a multi-criteria decision-making framework to assist high-speed rail planners with the preliminary screening and ranking of potential high-speed rail corridors. The proposed framework is applied to the question of ranking 13 alternative routings for connecting the South Central and Gulf Coast federally-designated high-speed rail corridors located in Texas. Attributes that are incorporated in the decision framework include population, travel demand, capital costs, land use and environmental impacts, and engineering suitability. While the multi-criteria decision-making framework developed in this paper cannot be used to completely replace the environmental review process and formal alternatives analysis, it can be used by planners as a tool for preliminary screening or ranking of proposed high-speed rail corridors for detailed analysis. Sperry, Mueller, Hunter-Zaworski 2