High-Speed Train Links Proposed : Transportation: A two-state panel studying a Las Vegas-Los Angeles line will also look at a rail network for the Southwest.

WASHINGTON — An ambitious long-term plan to develop high-speed train routes linking major Southwest cities--including Los Angeles, Anaheim, San Diego, San Francisco, Phoenix and Las Vegas--will be considered by a special two-state commission next week.

“We envision an eventual network of trains” operating at speeds up to 300 m.p.h. among the major centers of the Pacific Southwest region, California Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar) told a U. S. Senate subcommittee Tuesday.

Katz appeared before the surface transportation subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. The panel was soliciting testimony on the role that the federal government should play to encourage construction of high-speed trains through research and development, tax incentives and enforcement of safety standards.

Advocates, including Gilbert E. Carmichael, administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration, touted the potential of advanced rail technologies to ease overcrowded freeways and airports, reduce pollution and transport riders between congested urban centers.

Katz is chairman of the California-Nevada Super Speed Train Commission, which is studying a proposed high-speed route from Las Vegas to either the northeast San Fernando Valley or Anaheim.

The commission’s efforts reflect increasing interest across the country to build such systems after two decades in which the West Germans, French and Japanese have moved ahead in a technology that was introduced by two American scientists in 1971.

Besides the proposed California-Nevada system, other high-speed rail projects are in progress in Florida, Ohio and Texas.

Private investors could begin construction in Florida next year of a $600-million, 17-mile West German magnetic levitation rail link between Orlando Airport and Walt Disney World, Carmichael told the subcommittee.

The Western system appears to be the next furthest along, officials said. Construction is expected to begin in 1993 and be completed in 1998.

The $4-billion “gambler’s special” would connect Las Vegas to a Southern California terminus--either Anaheim, or Sylmar or Mission Hills in the Valley. The Valley route would include Palmdale Air Terminal in the Antelope Valley; the Anaheim route could also include separate commuter service through San Bernardino County.

The 16-member bistate commission is expected to announce its decision on a route Oct. 27. A consultant’s report released earlier this month gave Anaheim a strong advantage based on projected ridership.

At the same session, the commission will be presented with a non-binding proposal to develop additional high-speed lines linking 10 population centers throughout California with Las Vegas, Reno and Phoenix.

The system plan, as well as each leg of the proposed rail lines, would have to be approved by the respective state legislatures.

“It’s a concept that the bistate commission is considering adopting as its long-range goal,” said commission Executive Director Paul Taylor, who drew up the proposal. “It always helps to know where you’re headed when you start something.”

The commission decided to take the step even though its mandate is limited to attracting a private entity to develop a high-speed train between the Las Vegas area and Southern California, Taylor said.

The commission will be dissolved at the end of 1991 unless the two state legislatures extend it. The long-range plan could take as many as 50 years to implement, Taylor said.

The commission’s adoption of the broader plan might be intended to blunt the dismay of municipalities excluded from the first leg. The long-term plan includes stations in Los Angeles and the Antelope Valley as well as Orange County and the Inland Empire.

The cities of Anaheim, Los Angeles and Palmdale have tried to persuade the commission to locate the terminal in their back yards. Legislative approval of the decision is required because the train would be built on Interstate 15 right of way most of the way to Las Vegas.

Taylor said the long-range plan was not an attempt to enhance the credibility of the original train route, which was the brainchild of Las Vegas gambling interests seeking to bring in larger numbers of patrons.

“I doubt that’s what the commission had in mind,” Taylor said. “Actually, the forecast for increased earnings in the two economies is greater for California than for Nevada.”

Amtrak, which is government subsidized, operates all U. S. intercity rail passenger trains. Most of its trains average 79 m.p.h., although its Metroliners can reach 125 m.p.h. France’s TGV has a top cruising speed of 187 m.p.h.; West Germany’s experimental magnetic levitation train can go 256 m.p.h.