9 ms·

(Being a Chinese grew up in Canada, and now working/living in the Bay) In my opinion, most people in the valley or in North America still refuse to give up th

by xbeta 10y ago

(Being a Chinese grew up in Canada, and now working/living in the Bay) In my opinion, most people in the valley or in North America still refuse to give up their lifestyle. They look for something like self-driving cars, all electric-powered "personal" vehicle to invest. And those still drive on the same road/interstates/highway infrastructure and don't give you the benefits compare with high-speed rails. They don't recognize the real priorities - how to transport millions people everyday efficiently, cost-effectively, and most environmentally friendlies. They also don't recognize local economy, local businesses thrive with these connected network. It is proven to be the case in China and Japan. High-speed rail network is what people want - to get from point A to point B quickly. It's not something even the most efficient self-driving car with the best MPG electric-powered vehicle can scale for millions of people everyday. Instead of investing into some new technologies, they seem like they refuse to take decades of proven technology and just use it in US (high-speed trains were first invented in Japan in the 60s) But as I understand very well in the culture here, the politics, the corruption, and the oil/automative conglomerate will never make this happen for the actual good for the people. I would without a doubt to say the US is in its downfall as it didn't pick the priorities to fix the root of the problem.

adventured 10y ago
The US is in fact ascendant, not in decline. You're using the rail example to imply downfall, and yet the US economy has embarrassed the Japanese economy the last 25 years. In the mid 1980s, the US and Japan nearly had the same GDP per capita; very soon the US will have twice the GDP per capita of Japan. You're implying rail is so beneficial to economic growth, and let's say I agree with that: and yet the US has been embarrassing most of Europe on economic growth for the last 20 years (Germany's economy hasn't expanded in ten years for example). If you were right, US GDP per capita should be far lower than the EU or Eurozone, when the exact opposite is the case. Germany has a GDP per capita of the poorest US states (it's nearly on par with West Virginia currently). France nearly has the GDP per capita of Puerto Rico. I don't believe your premise has any legs to stand on based on the facts. The real implication here is that the US would be staggeringly far ahead if it corrected some of its obvious flaws.
- skybrian 10y ago
  I'm not sure GDP per capita makes sense for this comparison when ownership is distributed so unequally in the US. Taking the mean is basically dividing up wealth equally and that's not what happens. What is there about the German standard of living for typical citizens that compares unfavorably to the US? How can this be measured? No single number works, but I would suggest looking at medians ahead of means.
  - aninhumer 10y ago
    There are some Median Wealth figures on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_per_adult https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_pe... The US apparently has about half the median wealth of many European countries, although notably not Germany, which is comparable to the US on this metric. But I'm not sure how meaningful this is or what factors might be affecting the numbers. (And I'm not even exactly sure what's being measured.)
    - flukus 10y ago
      Not sure how seriously that can be taken either. Australia is so high but most of that wealth is in over inflated property values.
      - NamTaf 10y ago
        That's a symptom of broken governmental policy, not so much imaginary value. People still need to buy houses for them to sell, so it's not like the property bubble isn't backed by real money. It's just that people are placing disproportionate value on property over other investments. For example, say your house went from 400k-500k in a year. For it to be 500k you still have to find a seller. Yes, there's a degree of paper value there however it's paper value only because other properties are selling for that. If you were to somehow remove property from being bought and sold, the money would just go into other investments. There is no way that 'most' of that wealth is wealth on paper in the form of property. The reality is that Australian wages are very high comparitively. Australia is a wealthy nation.
ytruytr 10y ago
A lot of the political pushback in the US is two major factors: 1) Rail systems are almost never profitable. The US, at least in spirit, doesn't like government subsidies. An investment in high speed rail entails paying taxes for it for many years or perhaps forever. 2) The US is much more rural than other developed countries. The land area compared to the population is huge compared to Europe/China/Japan. You almost need a car to get around because there's so much open space. Things are too far apart in many cases to make public transport realistic. Also, since nearly everyone has a car already the need for a rapid mode of transport is mostly met. Yeah it sucks in the big cities but a lot of the people that work there live far enough away that any rail system built would never reach their homes anyways. You do see big public transport networks in places with extremely high density like New York, which has a similar density to most countries with well developed systems. The notable exception I can think of to the trend is Russia, which has a lot of public transport compared to population density. This can probably be explained by a history of being a communist country as well as the relative lack of personal cars due to lower income and limited access to trade with countries that manufacture automobiles
- dmix 10y ago
  > The US, at least in spirit, doesn't like government subsidies. The US gives $0.6 trillion / yr in energy subsidies, about 70% of which goes to oil. Which reduces the cost of cars and trucks.
  - adventured 10y ago
    Where are you getting the $420 billion per year in oil subsidies? US oil companies pay among the highest corporate income tax rates on the planet. Their taxes far exceed subsidies they receive. $600 billion by comparison is the size of the US military and $420 billion is larger than the sales of Exxon + Chevron + Conoco + Occidental + EOG + Anadarko combined. It's an absurd claim.
    - dmix 10y ago
      I was quoting Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_subsidies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_subsidies > The study found that "China was the biggest subsidizer in 2013 ($1.8 trillion), followed by the United States ($0.6 trillion), and Russia, the European Union, and India (each with about $0.3 trillion)." > The study found that oil, natural gas, and coal received $369 billion, $121 billion, and $104 billion (2010 dollars), respectively, or 70% of total energy subsidies over that period. Apologies, it seems fossil fuels get 70%. Not just oil.
ghaff 10y ago
Many people do indeed want to get from Point A to point B quickly. That's why there are around 75,000 plane flights per day. There are very few city pairs in the US with the potential volume to justify high speed rail. There already is high speed-ish rail travel in the Northeast and it's very popular. But, for example, even if you could magically offer 6-8 hour train service between New York and Chicago, relatively few people would take it given that flying would be significantly faster.
- ajmurmann 10y ago
  I think your point is generally valid for the US. However, Chicago-NYC might be a bad example, since it actuality might be viable. The Shinkansen goes ~200mp/h and thus would be able to go back and forth in 4-5hrs. Given that trains are less weather dependent, can drop you off on there middle of the city rather than the outskirts and don't come with the same security theater you probably come out with a comparable time frame and more reliability on that connection. Things like connecting the west coast to anything but itself are completely unviable though because of the reasons you gave.
  - ghaff 10y ago
    NYC to Chicago goes through a (smaller) continental divide though (the Appalachians) [ADDED in what's also a pretty built-up area of the country]. So HSR is problematic on that route. It's about a 20 hour trip today so cutting that by 2/3rds would be a significant achievement but probably still wouldn't be enough to make it interesting. The somewhat controversial LA to San Francisco route through the Central Valley may make sense. We'll see in 15 or 20 years or whatever. Unfortunately LA is pretty spread out so you don't get the same downtown to downtown advantages that trains in the Northeast have. The route that probably would have the biggest potential benefit is speeding up the Northeast Corridor to the point where Boston to DC was more practical vs. flying. Amtrak is apparently doing some upgrades but decided that the most aggressive improvements weren't cost-justified.
    - niftich 10y ago
      The Allegheny Front, where the continental divide runs between Altoona, PA and Frostburg, MD, wouldn't be a particular challenge for HSR, because they're good at hillclimbing, and the mass of the trainset is nothing like loaded coal trains or intermodal double-stack trains which currently frequent this area. LGV Sud-Est has 3.5% grades, for example; the Pennsylvania Railroad (now Norfolk Southern) Gallitzin-Horseshoe Curve-Altoona stretch is 1.85%, B&O (CSX) Sand Patch Grade further south is 2%. Rather, overcoming the general ruggedness of the terrain is the greatest expense. Slower railroads can meander along rivers, but a HSR needs large sweeping curves (with large radii), requiring expensive fills or cuts or viaducts. Some tunnels would be needed to cross some of the linear ridges, just like the Pennsylvania Turnpike (and the predecessor railroad that used the same right-of-way) did. In fact, it's likely that an alignment would closely parallel the turnpike, as the landscape gets significantly more rugged south of Maryland or north of I-80. A gentler route following the Empire Corridor (roughly, NYC->Albany->Buffalo) may be cheaper to construct, but would be considered a "detour" by a casual observer -- and the expense of the NYC->Albany portion may not make it worthwhile. Sadly, it's not very likely that such a Mid-Atlantic-to-Chicago passenger-only railway could be economical to construct and operate. US infrastructure costs routinely run much higher than the international average for comparable projects, and even the as-the-crow-flies distance (1100+ km, 700+ miles) between NYC-Chicago puts it too far out of HSR's ideal range, even in countries where people actually ride trains.
ascotan 10y ago
>>>I would without a doubt to say the US is in its downfall as it didn't pick the priorities to fix the root of the problem. The US is in a downward spiral because we didn't build a government funded $2 trillion bullet train? Are you serious? >>>High-speed rail network is what people want - to get from point A to point B quickly. Wrong. What people want is to telecommute. I don't want to get shoved into a bullet train every morning.
edblarney 10y ago
"In my opinion, most people in the valley or in North America still refuse to give up their lifestyle." You should try living in Europe. There is no lifestyle to give up by using trains! ... so long as they are made correctly. Imagine if there were fairly high speed trains that connected SF, SJ, outside the bay - and LA? And the stations were easy to access through subways/quick trains? So many fewer people would drive. Having to deal with the BS of a car, be stuck in traffic, drive everywhere - is not a lifestyle advantage. :) Once you have easy access to good subways/trams/high-speed trains - you likely don't want to drive unless you have to.
MarkMc 10y ago
> The ultimate goal is to have 45,000km of high-speed track. Zhao Jian of Beijing Jiaotong University, who has long criticised the high-speed push, reckons that only 5,000km of this will be in areas with enough people to justify the cost. Do you agree with this 5,000km figure? If not, what figure would you choose?

by xbeta 10y ago

adventured 10y ago

The US is in fact ascendant, not in decline. You're using the rail example to imply downfall, and yet the US economy has embarrassed the Japanese economy the last 25 years. In the mid 1980s, the US and Japan nearly had the same GDP per capita; very soon the US will have twice the GDP per capita of Japan. You're implying rail is so beneficial to economic growth, and let's say I agree with that: and yet the US has been embarrassing most of Europe on economic growth for the last 20 years (Germany's economy hasn't expanded in ten years for example). If you were right, US GDP per capita should be far lower than the EU or Eurozone, when the exact opposite is the case. Germany has a GDP per capita of the poorest US states (it's nearly on par with West Virginia currently). France nearly has the GDP per capita of Puerto Rico. I don't believe your premise has any legs to stand on based on the facts. The real implication here is that the US would be staggeringly far ahead if it corrected some of its obvious flaws.

skybrian 10y ago
I'm not sure GDP per capita makes sense for this comparison when ownership is distributed so unequally in the US. Taking the mean is basically dividing up wealth equally and that's not what happens. What is there about the German standard of living for typical citizens that compares unfavorably to the US? How can this be measured? No single number works, but I would suggest looking at medians ahead of means.
- aninhumer 10y ago
  There are some Median Wealth figures on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_per_adult https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_pe... The US apparently has about half the median wealth of many European countries, although notably not Germany, which is comparable to the US on this metric. But I'm not sure how meaningful this is or what factors might be affecting the numbers. (And I'm not even exactly sure what's being measured.)
  - flukus 10y ago
    Not sure how seriously that can be taken either. Australia is so high but most of that wealth is in over inflated property values.
    - NamTaf 10y ago
      That's a symptom of broken governmental policy, not so much imaginary value. People still need to buy houses for them to sell, so it's not like the property bubble isn't backed by real money. It's just that people are placing disproportionate value on property over other investments. For example, say your house went from 400k-500k in a year. For it to be 500k you still have to find a seller. Yes, there's a degree of paper value there however it's paper value only because other properties are selling for that. If you were to somehow remove property from being bought and sold, the money would just go into other investments. There is no way that 'most' of that wealth is wealth on paper in the form of property. The reality is that Australian wages are very high comparitively. Australia is a wealthy nation.

ytruytr 10y ago

A lot of the political pushback in the US is two major factors: 1) Rail systems are almost never profitable. The US, at least in spirit, doesn't like government subsidies. An investment in high speed rail entails paying taxes for it for many years or perhaps forever. 2) The US is much more rural than other developed countries. The land area compared to the population is huge compared to Europe/China/Japan. You almost need a car to get around because there's so much open space. Things are too far apart in many cases to make public transport realistic. Also, since nearly everyone has a car already the need for a rapid mode of transport is mostly met. Yeah it sucks in the big cities but a lot of the people that work there live far enough away that any rail system built would never reach their homes anyways. You do see big public transport networks in places with extremely high density like New York, which has a similar density to most countries with well developed systems. The notable exception I can think of to the trend is Russia, which has a lot of public transport compared to population density. This can probably be explained by a history of being a communist country as well as the relative lack of personal cars due to lower income and limited access to trade with countries that manufacture automobiles

dmix 10y ago
> The US, at least in spirit, doesn't like government subsidies. The US gives $0.6 trillion / yr in energy subsidies, about 70% of which goes to oil. Which reduces the cost of cars and trucks.
- adventured 10y ago
  Where are you getting the $420 billion per year in oil subsidies? US oil companies pay among the highest corporate income tax rates on the planet. Their taxes far exceed subsidies they receive. $600 billion by comparison is the size of the US military and $420 billion is larger than the sales of Exxon + Chevron + Conoco + Occidental + EOG + Anadarko combined. It's an absurd claim.
  - dmix 10y ago
    I was quoting Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_subsidies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_subsidies > The study found that "China was the biggest subsidizer in 2013 ($1.8 trillion), followed by the United States ($0.6 trillion), and Russia, the European Union, and India (each with about $0.3 trillion)." > The study found that oil, natural gas, and coal received $369 billion, $121 billion, and $104 billion (2010 dollars), respectively, or 70% of total energy subsidies over that period. Apologies, it seems fossil fuels get 70%. Not just oil.

ghaff 10y ago

Many people do indeed want to get from Point A to point B quickly. That's why there are around 75,000 plane flights per day. There are very few city pairs in the US with the potential volume to justify high speed rail. There already is high speed-ish rail travel in the Northeast and it's very popular. But, for example, even if you could magically offer 6-8 hour train service between New York and Chicago, relatively few people would take it given that flying would be significantly faster.

ajmurmann 10y ago
I think your point is generally valid for the US. However, Chicago-NYC might be a bad example, since it actuality might be viable. The Shinkansen goes ~200mp/h and thus would be able to go back and forth in 4-5hrs. Given that trains are less weather dependent, can drop you off on there middle of the city rather than the outskirts and don't come with the same security theater you probably come out with a comparable time frame and more reliability on that connection. Things like connecting the west coast to anything but itself are completely unviable though because of the reasons you gave.
- ghaff 10y ago
  NYC to Chicago goes through a (smaller) continental divide though (the Appalachians) [ADDED in what's also a pretty built-up area of the country]. So HSR is problematic on that route. It's about a 20 hour trip today so cutting that by 2/3rds would be a significant achievement but probably still wouldn't be enough to make it interesting. The somewhat controversial LA to San Francisco route through the Central Valley may make sense. We'll see in 15 or 20 years or whatever. Unfortunately LA is pretty spread out so you don't get the same downtown to downtown advantages that trains in the Northeast have. The route that probably would have the biggest potential benefit is speeding up the Northeast Corridor to the point where Boston to DC was more practical vs. flying. Amtrak is apparently doing some upgrades but decided that the most aggressive improvements weren't cost-justified.
  - niftich 10y ago
    The Allegheny Front, where the continental divide runs between Altoona, PA and Frostburg, MD, wouldn't be a particular challenge for HSR, because they're good at hillclimbing, and the mass of the trainset is nothing like loaded coal trains or intermodal double-stack trains which currently frequent this area. LGV Sud-Est has 3.5% grades, for example; the Pennsylvania Railroad (now Norfolk Southern) Gallitzin-Horseshoe Curve-Altoona stretch is 1.85%, B&O (CSX) Sand Patch Grade further south is 2%. Rather, overcoming the general ruggedness of the terrain is the greatest expense. Slower railroads can meander along rivers, but a HSR needs large sweeping curves (with large radii), requiring expensive fills or cuts or viaducts. Some tunnels would be needed to cross some of the linear ridges, just like the Pennsylvania Turnpike (and the predecessor railroad that used the same right-of-way) did. In fact, it's likely that an alignment would closely parallel the turnpike, as the landscape gets significantly more rugged south of Maryland or north of I-80. A gentler route following the Empire Corridor (roughly, NYC->Albany->Buffalo) may be cheaper to construct, but would be considered a "detour" by a casual observer -- and the expense of the NYC->Albany portion may not make it worthwhile. Sadly, it's not very likely that such a Mid-Atlantic-to-Chicago passenger-only railway could be economical to construct and operate. US infrastructure costs routinely run much higher than the international average for comparable projects, and even the as-the-crow-flies distance (1100+ km, 700+ miles) between NYC-Chicago puts it too far out of HSR's ideal range, even in countries where people actually ride trains.

ascotan 10y ago

>>>I would without a doubt to say the US is in its downfall as it didn't pick the priorities to fix the root of the problem. The US is in a downward spiral because we didn't build a government funded $2 trillion bullet train? Are you serious? >>>High-speed rail network is what people want - to get from point A to point B quickly. Wrong. What people want is to telecommute. I don't want to get shoved into a bullet train every morning.

edblarney 10y ago

"In my opinion, most people in the valley or in North America still refuse to give up their lifestyle." You should try living in Europe. There is no lifestyle to give up by using trains! ... so long as they are made correctly. Imagine if there were fairly high speed trains that connected SF, SJ, outside the bay - and LA? And the stations were easy to access through subways/quick trains? So many fewer people would drive. Having to deal with the BS of a car, be stuck in traffic, drive everywhere - is not a lifestyle advantage. :) Once you have easy access to good subways/trams/high-speed trains - you likely don't want to drive unless you have to.

MarkMc 10y ago

> The ultimate goal is to have 45,000km of high-speed track. Zhao Jian of Beijing Jiaotong University, who has long criticised the high-speed push, reckons that only 5,000km of this will be in areas with enough people to justify the cost. Do you agree with this 5,000km figure? If not, what figure would you choose?