More than one year after a ceremonial groundbreaking, real shovels appear to be hitting the dirt for Brightline West, the $12-billion high-speed rail line intended to connect Las Vegas and Southern California.

Multiple published reports point to road closures in the Las Vegas area tied to preliminary work on the project, which will run 218 miles from the Vegas Strip to Rancho Cucamonga along a right-of-way parallel to the I-15 Freeway. Construction advisories produced by Brightline West indicate that field investigations and other activities have been underway within both Nevada and California.

Work at the Las Vegas station site was recently captured by YouTuber Lucid Stew, who noted that activities involved the construction of a box culvert for drainage purposes due to a dry streambed which cuts through the site.

Brightline West proposed system mapBrightline West

The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports that heavy construction for the project is targeted to begin before the end of 2025, assuming that the final components of financing can be completed. Brightline West was awarded $3 billion by the Biden administration, and has also secured $3.5 billion through private activity bonds.

When construction commences, the corridor is to be built in nine phases over a period of approximately four years.

At completion, trains on Brightline West would run at speed of up to 200 miles per hour, making for an overall two hour and ten minute trip, with an intermediate stop in Apple Valley.

Rendering of Rancho Cucamonga StationBrightline West

Privately-built Brightline West starts to make progress as the California high-speed rail project, long underway, runs into political headwinds. The Trump administration has clawed back more than $3 billion granted to that project, which has seen its estimated price tag balloon and its anticipated opening date pushed far into the future. 

While Brightline may have a connection to the larger Los Angeles passenger rail system through its terminus at Rancho Cucamonga, which would rise next to the Metrolink stop serving that city, a direct route into Los Angeles Union Station would require some coordination with California high-speed rail. The proposed High Desert corridor would provide a connection from Apple Valley to Palmdale, where Brightline would be able to make use of as-yet unbuilt high-speed rail tracks heading toward Burbank, Los Angeles, and eventually Anaheim.

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