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The alternative to being stuck in traffic for hours is flying. A major problem with train systems in the United States (and this is both short and long haul) i

The alternative to being stuck in traffic for hours is flying. A major problem with train systems in the United States (and this is both short and long haul) is that almost the entire country is sprawl - built around the automobile. In dense environments (China and the north-east coast of the US (which has Acela), it's great to take a train into the core -- you beat traffic and are near your destination. In sprawling environments (like most of CA), the benefit of ending up in the core is so much less (possibly even negative). Lower probability you are near your destination. And if you need to drive, now you are in a much worse situation (higher car rental prices due to high land values, you are stuck in traffic trying to leave the urban core, etc.). In other words, even if you had a train, most individuals still will prefer driving (you have a car with you) or flying (faster than trains) -- killing the ROI on building the train in the first place.

toephu2 7y ago
Interesting, from https://www.amtrak.com/acela-train https://www.amtrak.com/acela-train: "Superior comfort, upscale amenities and polished professional service at speeds up to 150 mph, Acela offers hourly service downtown to downtown during peak morning and afternoon rush hours between New York, Washington, DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia and other intermediate cities, as well as many convenient round-trips between New York and Boston."
- kaishiro 7y ago
  “And at only five times the cost of a Jetblue shuttle from JFK to Logan!” Having lived between NY and Boston for most of my life, and being a massive fan of trains, I am always so disappointed this isn’t a more realistic option.
tyfon 7y ago
Flying easily adds 1-3 hours to the trip just for bullshit and boarding and stuff so there is a certain distance where the high speed trains are faster. It's also way more comfortable and relaxed. I prefer train over driving when I'm going somewhere too.. well until I discovered lane assist functions in modern cars that is :) But I can't yet work while driving so I guess the train wins in overall productivity. Flying is also a massive hit to the environment so I try to minimise it. So far I've avoided three roundtrips with planes and driven my car instead, but I've had to fly twice when going Oslo->Helsinki->Oslo.. I should probably have driven there too but for this instance time was of the essence.
- noetic_techy 7y ago
  Exactly. We would be better off disrupting the BS of air travel then building out train networks. I've often dreamed of a world that comes to its senses and realizes that adding all the extra bull to flying hasn't done any good and there was a consistent effort to eliminate it all. Imagine if flying was as easy as getting on a train or bus. Buy a pass. Sign up for a slot on a flight online. Show up DIRECTLY to the gate (your are pre-cleared by TSA and AI verified your face on exit of the vehicle). Someone else or some automated car mover parks your car, drop your bag off IMMEDIATELY on a conveyor belt and forget about it (let some AI system handle its tracking and tagging), then just board with a valid pass. No lines, no checkin process, no bag tagging, per-screened, no fuss. In your seat within 5 minutes of exiting your car. Similar experience on the backend. You exit, grab your bag quickly (not sure how this would work, mass bag pile or some tech to quickly exfiltrate your bag from the plane), then get on a shuttle to a rental car center or bus/taxi/uber center to wherever you are going. Or some automated car mover retrieves your car from a parking garage and has it ready for you outside. Maybe even has your bags carried by drone to it quickly.
  - jdnenej 7y ago
    That does nothing about the fact that flying is destroying our environment and emits greenhouse gas emissions 2 orders of magnitude over the same trip by train.
    - mac01021 7y ago
      If you ammortize the environmental impact of building the rail network over all the rail trips, it might swing the other way. Especially if someone figures out carbon neutral air travel in the next decade.
      - jdnenej 7y ago
        If we are factoring in imaginary future tech then someone could invent carbon neutral trains
nikofeyn 7y ago
> A major problem with train systems in the United States (and this is both short and long haul) is that almost the entire country is sprawl - built around the automobile. this is an excuse i have repeated myself, but it is just that, an excuse. have you actually been to china? i have never seen such sprawl. shanghai is massive and sprawling. but yet, they (china) have extremely efficient and unbelievably cheap trains and subways. also, i have never seen a cleaner subway than what i saw in shanghai. and this excuse doesn't even account for regions like the northeast. the amtrak from boston to new york takes four hours at its absolute fastest and costs couple hundred dollars. this is unbelievably sad. in china, the same ride would take about 1.5 hours and cost around $20 for business class (in u.s. terms, as in china, it's called first class).
- lmm 7y ago
  Shanghai is massive but that's just the sheer size of its population. It's the most populous city in the world on some measures; they've planning for 30 billion by 2030. It's built much denser than most US cities, which means it's much more walkable, and the subway network also makes it much more practical to travel by train because it means you don't need a car at the other end. You have to start with getting rid of parking minimums and "green space" and building dense, walkable cities. Once you have those it makes a lot more sense to connect them with trains or similar.
  - HenryKissinger 7y ago
    > they've planning for 30 billion by 2030. I think you mean 30 million. A city of 30 billion would contiguously occupy a continent.
- usaar333 7y ago
  Been to China many times actually. I wouldn't call Shanghai sprawl in the American sense. Yes it is huge, but what matters is that driving isn't a quick way to get around the city (there are no quick ways to get around the city, just like NYC) so you don't end up needing a car to live or travel. Agreed though that the Acela cooridor is the most reasonable place for the US to invest in high speed rail
opportune 7y ago
If I wanted to take a trip to LA there is no way I would spend a day driving each way on the I5. So for me it’s either fly or take a train. Regardless of the sprawl within metro areas, there is absolutely a need for connections between big cities - the last mile transit for airports is still bad anyway
astrodust 7y ago
It's not sprawl, it's that the United States, and by extension Canada, have extensive freight rail systems but almost zero exclusively passenger rail networks. In Europe and Asia these networks are generally separated. The American model means that passenger trains need to be built to freight-train safety standards, that a passenger car must be engineered to "survive" a potential collision with a freight train, since that is a possibility. American passenger trains don't own their right-of-way, and freight companies really don't care about high-speed anything since their business model doesn't require it.
- gwright 7y ago
  Interesting enough the new version of the Acela trains in the Northeast will not have to be built to those freight train standards. On of the reasons is that the tracks are not generally shared with freight trains in the Northeast corridor. Some details in this article: https://www.wsj.com/articles/will-new-train-guidelines-improve-speeds-not-so-fast-11547209980 https://www.wsj.com/articles/will-new-train-guidelines-impro...
- Fricken 7y ago
  I recently took VIA rail, from Vancouver to Edmonton. Partway through the trip the attendant announces we'll be 6-10 hours late, which is normal. It hasn't been on time since April. Some daft Europeans with a connecting flight were relieved that we pulled in to Edmonton only 2 hours late! The best in weeks!
  - astrodust 7y ago
    It's highly probable that a trip in 1919 across Canada by train and a trip in 2019 take the same amount of time.
kurtisc 7y ago
China is dense? This is a study working towards connecting cities >900 km apart. edit: article says 2200, maps says 900ish
- usaar333 7y ago
  Cities are dense, unlike American ones
  - kurtisc 7y ago
    I'm not aware of any city-local maglev trains. American cities are still spread out from one-another.
    - usaar333 7y ago
      I think you are misunderstanding my point. The issue in America is that you tend to need a car to navigate within a city (metro area). Far less true in China.
    - nrp 7y ago
      Shanghai happens to have one of the few, but it’s not especially practical: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_maglev_train https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_maglev_train
      - WillPostForFood 7y ago
        It is pretty practical when you go to the airport.
    - rangibaby 7y ago
      There’s the Linimo in Nagoya, Japan
- puranjay 7y ago
  China's density metrics are skewed by its humongous size, a massive chunk of which is sparsely populated desert. Its coastal areas, where much of the population is concentrated, is extremely dense
WalterBright 7y ago
> killing the ROI on building the train in the first place In Seattle the light rail was pressured to serve the poor communities. Once built, they belatedly discovered that a transit station causes gentrification around it, pushing out the longtime residents. So they've tried zoning to prevent development around the transit station, which then reduces the ROI on the system.

toephu2 7y ago

Interesting, from https://www.amtrak.com/acela-train https://www.amtrak.com/acela-train: "Superior comfort, upscale amenities and polished professional service at speeds up to 150 mph, Acela offers hourly service downtown to downtown during peak morning and afternoon rush hours between New York, Washington, DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia and other intermediate cities, as well as many convenient round-trips between New York and Boston."

kaishiro 7y ago
“And at only five times the cost of a Jetblue shuttle from JFK to Logan!” Having lived between NY and Boston for most of my life, and being a massive fan of trains, I am always so disappointed this isn’t a more realistic option.

tyfon 7y ago

Flying easily adds 1-3 hours to the trip just for bullshit and boarding and stuff so there is a certain distance where the high speed trains are faster. It's also way more comfortable and relaxed. I prefer train over driving when I'm going somewhere too.. well until I discovered lane assist functions in modern cars that is :) But I can't yet work while driving so I guess the train wins in overall productivity. Flying is also a massive hit to the environment so I try to minimise it. So far I've avoided three roundtrips with planes and driven my car instead, but I've had to fly twice when going Oslo->Helsinki->Oslo.. I should probably have driven there too but for this instance time was of the essence.

noetic_techy 7y ago
Exactly. We would be better off disrupting the BS of air travel then building out train networks. I've often dreamed of a world that comes to its senses and realizes that adding all the extra bull to flying hasn't done any good and there was a consistent effort to eliminate it all. Imagine if flying was as easy as getting on a train or bus. Buy a pass. Sign up for a slot on a flight online. Show up DIRECTLY to the gate (your are pre-cleared by TSA and AI verified your face on exit of the vehicle). Someone else or some automated car mover parks your car, drop your bag off IMMEDIATELY on a conveyor belt and forget about it (let some AI system handle its tracking and tagging), then just board with a valid pass. No lines, no checkin process, no bag tagging, per-screened, no fuss. In your seat within 5 minutes of exiting your car. Similar experience on the backend. You exit, grab your bag quickly (not sure how this would work, mass bag pile or some tech to quickly exfiltrate your bag from the plane), then get on a shuttle to a rental car center or bus/taxi/uber center to wherever you are going. Or some automated car mover retrieves your car from a parking garage and has it ready for you outside. Maybe even has your bags carried by drone to it quickly.
- jdnenej 7y ago
  That does nothing about the fact that flying is destroying our environment and emits greenhouse gas emissions 2 orders of magnitude over the same trip by train.
  - mac01021 7y ago
    If you ammortize the environmental impact of building the rail network over all the rail trips, it might swing the other way. Especially if someone figures out carbon neutral air travel in the next decade.
    - jdnenej 7y ago
      If we are factoring in imaginary future tech then someone could invent carbon neutral trains

nikofeyn 7y ago

> A major problem with train systems in the United States (and this is both short and long haul) is that almost the entire country is sprawl - built around the automobile. this is an excuse i have repeated myself, but it is just that, an excuse. have you actually been to china? i have never seen such sprawl. shanghai is massive and sprawling. but yet, they (china) have extremely efficient and unbelievably cheap trains and subways. also, i have never seen a cleaner subway than what i saw in shanghai. and this excuse doesn't even account for regions like the northeast. the amtrak from boston to new york takes four hours at its absolute fastest and costs couple hundred dollars. this is unbelievably sad. in china, the same ride would take about 1.5 hours and cost around $20 for business class (in u.s. terms, as in china, it's called first class).

lmm 7y ago
Shanghai is massive but that's just the sheer size of its population. It's the most populous city in the world on some measures; they've planning for 30 billion by 2030. It's built much denser than most US cities, which means it's much more walkable, and the subway network also makes it much more practical to travel by train because it means you don't need a car at the other end. You have to start with getting rid of parking minimums and "green space" and building dense, walkable cities. Once you have those it makes a lot more sense to connect them with trains or similar.
- HenryKissinger 7y ago
  > they've planning for 30 billion by 2030. I think you mean 30 million. A city of 30 billion would contiguously occupy a continent.
usaar333 7y ago
Been to China many times actually. I wouldn't call Shanghai sprawl in the American sense. Yes it is huge, but what matters is that driving isn't a quick way to get around the city (there are no quick ways to get around the city, just like NYC) so you don't end up needing a car to live or travel. Agreed though that the Acela cooridor is the most reasonable place for the US to invest in high speed rail

opportune 7y ago

If I wanted to take a trip to LA there is no way I would spend a day driving each way on the I5. So for me it’s either fly or take a train. Regardless of the sprawl within metro areas, there is absolutely a need for connections between big cities - the last mile transit for airports is still bad anyway

astrodust 7y ago

It's not sprawl, it's that the United States, and by extension Canada, have extensive freight rail systems but almost zero exclusively passenger rail networks. In Europe and Asia these networks are generally separated. The American model means that passenger trains need to be built to freight-train safety standards, that a passenger car must be engineered to "survive" a potential collision with a freight train, since that is a possibility. American passenger trains don't own their right-of-way, and freight companies really don't care about high-speed anything since their business model doesn't require it.

gwright 7y ago
Interesting enough the new version of the Acela trains in the Northeast will not have to be built to those freight train standards. On of the reasons is that the tracks are not generally shared with freight trains in the Northeast corridor. Some details in this article: https://www.wsj.com/articles/will-new-train-guidelines-improve-speeds-not-so-fast-11547209980 https://www.wsj.com/articles/will-new-train-guidelines-impro...
Fricken 7y ago
I recently took VIA rail, from Vancouver to Edmonton. Partway through the trip the attendant announces we'll be 6-10 hours late, which is normal. It hasn't been on time since April. Some daft Europeans with a connecting flight were relieved that we pulled in to Edmonton only 2 hours late! The best in weeks!
- astrodust 7y ago
  It's highly probable that a trip in 1919 across Canada by train and a trip in 2019 take the same amount of time.

kurtisc 7y ago

China is dense? This is a study working towards connecting cities >900 km apart. edit: article says 2200, maps says 900ish

usaar333 7y ago
Cities are dense, unlike American ones
- kurtisc 7y ago
  I'm not aware of any city-local maglev trains. American cities are still spread out from one-another.
  - usaar333 7y ago
    I think you are misunderstanding my point. The issue in America is that you tend to need a car to navigate within a city (metro area). Far less true in China.
  - nrp 7y ago
    Shanghai happens to have one of the few, but it’s not especially practical: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_maglev_train https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_maglev_train
    - WillPostForFood 7y ago
      It is pretty practical when you go to the airport.
  - rangibaby 7y ago
    There’s the Linimo in Nagoya, Japan
puranjay 7y ago
China's density metrics are skewed by its humongous size, a massive chunk of which is sparsely populated desert. Its coastal areas, where much of the population is concentrated, is extremely dense

WalterBright 7y ago

> killing the ROI on building the train in the first place In Seattle the light rail was pressured to serve the poor communities. Once built, they belatedly discovered that a transit station causes gentrification around it, pushing out the longtime residents. So they've tried zoning to prevent development around the transit station, which then reduces the ROI on the system.