Here's What An American High Speed Rail Network Could Look Like (See the map)

Business Insider ^ | 02/06/2013 | Alex Davis

[Sgt_Schultze]

Somewhere, Willie Green is smoking a cigarette after achieving his personal shangri-la.

[Sgt_Schultze]

Trains are Old Tech

You're forgetting we're dealing with a group of folks who are trying to pass off windmills as the energy future of America.

[Blood of Tyrants]

Triple that $500 billion estimate and you will be about halfway there.

[Road Glide]

“the several states are HUGE compared to Japan; there are wide-open spaces (low population density) all around;”

Wonder what it’s like hitting a deer at 300mph?

By the way, I’ve hit plenty of deer with Amtrak engines going 70+mph — big bang. Even at that speed, if they get into the undercarriage, they can tear open a brake pipe or air hose and stop the train. Can’t imagine what a strike at 200+mph is going to do.

Going back to around 2001, on its very first trip with the press aboard, the Amtrak Acela train hit a deer, which stopped and temporarily disabled the train. Broke an air pipe on the head end. They got it going again, however... jes’ a little late!

[Dogbert41]

And how many years have they plugged up a simple oil pipeline that actually could be considered a National Security interest?

[truth_seeker]

Currently I can drive 30 minutes to Orange County airport, and fly to Seattle in two hours.

Or I can take Amtrak, whereby it takes 38 hours, not counting the trips to the terminals at each end.

If I book a week ahead, the plane is less costly than the train.

That is of course if the trains run the entire distance. Not long ago, I recall noting that Amtrak used buses to fill in certain “gaps” in their system.

I have nothing against trains. Used them a bit in Europe.

So I advised family members to use SoCal to Flagstaff, where a few had travel needs.

Guess what? Two separate families had AWFUL experiences using this route. Nobody who had done it, will do it again.

Old West Germany was about the size of Oregon. In 40 years, Germany has TRIPLED the kilometers of Autobahn.

I doubt they have tripled the kilometers of high speed rail.

If I want to ride from Santa Ana to San Francisco on the train, I CANNOT because the trip requires a BUS ride from downtown Lost Angeles to Bakersfield.

That kind of idiocy is precisely what the planners intend to subject users of this high-speed scheme to, for decades.

The TRUE goal of this high speed scheme is stealing tax money, for diversion to unions’ pensions, favored contractors, politicos’ campaign contributions, etc.

I’d like to think it different. This country once won WWII in under 4 years.

Today we couldn’t build a national train scheme in under 30 years, and it would bankrupt us, if honest math survived that long.

[LRoggy]

“RE: Why would I spend 3 days on a train when I can go coast to coast in 8 hours on a plane?

Takes me only 5 hours to fly from NY to LA.”

Don’t forget: One hour to get through the TSA molestation, one hour to get the I-Phone back from the TSA agent that stole it and one hour to find the luggage that was re-routed to another conveyor belt . . .

[Dr. Sivana]

I don’t like the Luddism argument against trains.

Understood. I certainly allowed for U.S. trains to be used for freight, and that certain highly traveled routed (NE corridor, and maybe LA-LV-SF) could work. I was mainly railing (pun intended) against the folks who pretend that high speed rail is the wave of the future. Heck, I remember comic book ads for Cheerios describing the high apeed rail in Japan during Expo 70 or whatever it was. Mag Lev might be interesting, but then supercondiuctivity would make LOTS of things interesting. In any event, the rail infrastructure is a fixed expense that doesn't allow easy changes of schedules as demand changes from summer to winter and from decade to decade. Planes and buses get to add and remove buses as demand changes. Trains have to go where the rails are.

Hoffman Estates? with its country clubs? Hmm. Guess people are a little too good there to drive a short distance to one of the stations on Metra’s Milwaukee District West line to ride the train to Union Station.

I mentioned Hoffman Estates, not thinking of it as being in the same class as Evanston or Kenilworth in terms of household wealth. Okay, our mythical traveler(s) go to the Elgin station (15 minutes), and on Sunday morning the trains run every two hours. Plus, it takes (per Metra schedule) an 1 hour 15 minutes to get to Union Station due to the 20 STOPS it has to take along the way. So, you save most of the Chicago parking fees, but tack on an extra 45 minutes riding THE WRONG way, plus, if you want to get to St. Louis by 11:00AM for the noon kickoff, you are now talking about taking the 5:55AM train (leave at 5:30AM or so), assuming it gets to Chicago in time for the connecting train. Going direct by car means leaving at 7:00am. The high speed rail needs to have few stops in order to remain high speed, but one of the advantages of rail vs. air is the ability to make stops at all. To me, Hoffman Estates is a spot on the highway with numerous big corporate centers (Sears, Motorola nearby). I can use my area, Rockford, and the argument becomes even stronger. Metra doesn't even come out here. I'd have to take the Van Galder bus, going 1:45 THE WRONG WAY. Their buses, at least, move out more frequently than the Metra. I see high-speed passenger trains as a limited, niche solution. It works best in zones that are too long or inconvenient to drive for many, but not long enough to be unable to offset the different types of inconveniences offered by air travel. This means centralized cities: NYC and DC rather than Denver and Dallas. This also means few stops between cities that tend to have business with each other. The fact is, few in Chicago have a NEED to go to Cleveland. Maybe some folks in Cleveland have a need to go to Chicago, but running empty trains half the time ain't an answer either.

So, the Boston, Providence, New Haven, NYC, Newark, Philly, Baltimore, DC route makes good sense, as all the cities are in a line, and the traffic moves both ways, especially between NYC and DC. I would be hard-pressed to think of a way to fill those routes in the midwest or southeast. Even NYC to Miami is not a practical run for most folks, except flight allergic retirees, many of them bringing their cars.

Long haul trains should stress their advantages. They should accomodate smokers with dedicated cars with separate ventilation and smokers to work them. More Wifi, more electrical outlets. But they won't be able to get people on board for where they don't want to go.

[OneWingedShark]

>> “the several states are HUGE compared to Japan; there are wide-open spaces (low population density) all around;”
>
> Wonder what it’s like hitting a deer at 300mph?

Well, I would assume that the rail/carriage would be suspended, like a monorail’s.

> By the way, I’ve hit plenty of deer with Amtrak engines going 70+mph — big bang. Even at that speed, if they get into the undercarriage, they can tear open a brake pipe or air hose and stop the train. Can’t imagine what a strike at 200+mph is going to do. Going back to around 2001, on its very first trip with the press aboard, the Amtrak Acela train hit a deer, which stopped and temporarily disabled the train. Broke an air pipe on the head end. They got it going again, however... jes’ a little late!

Interesting to know you can still feel the deer on a more conventional train, it’s kinda interesting.

[cunning_fish]

>>>If you’re going to do it, do it like Japan were EVERY RAIL LINE IS PRIVATIZED.<<<
In US condition it won’t ever bring any profit. Fast trains and infrastructure are super expensive to built and maintain. Japan is little and has a lot of people to take a ride and still tickets are pretty expensive and I’m not sure if this line is really profitable. Europe is pretty densely populated and small but still these railways subsidized heavily.
In Russia, China these railways are owned by state-controlled monopolies. It probably cost taxpayers and customers thrillions in both government handouts and costs added to other services from these companies.
Airlines might look as more expensive per passenger under rough analysis but it is much more flexible and for that reason much less costly on practice.
Train services aren’t going well right now in US because of more flexible trucking beating it. It won’t be any better with fast trains.

[Democrat_media]

Private railroads are not socialism imo.

However public railroads, high speed rail ,public buses , public anything is socialism and growing socialism is the problem in America and the world

Obama is doing a huge push with billion$ in printed money to push this socialist high speed rail , here is a column by Will that explains more of the piece of crap communist Obama’s plan

http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2011/02/27/high-speed-to-insolvency.html

[stuartcr]

Public anything, is socialism?

[Democrat_media]

Yes practically, public schools a total failure and students are now almost inmates

public housing a total disaster.

public transportation = socialism

government ownership = socialism

private ownership = capitalism = freeedom = individual rights = liberty = living your life as you want to

This is what democrats want to take away our individual rights and freedom and that is socialism

[KevinDavis]

At least it will take hours by plane instead of days by train..