4 ms·

I'm still hoping for rail. It's much more carbon friendly, and has the opportunity to be way less stressful. I'd do 18 hours on a NY to LA if I could walk aro

by axaxs 6y ago

I'm still hoping for rail. It's much more carbon friendly, and has the opportunity to be way less stressful. I'd do 18 hours on a NY to LA if I could walk around, eat, talk, sleep, etc over a 5 hour misery ride in an airplane any day.

TylerE 6y ago
A single NY-LA route alone would cost over $500 billion. High speed rail is well $100m/mile, just for the track.
- axaxs 6y ago
  I'd like to see it thoroughly planned out, and a real cost estimate. Most of the trip is plainsland...simple. Getting through the Rockies, way more complicated. I've tried to read on the subject but estimates are an order of magnitude off between projects. All that said, of course, figuring out how to lower costs safely would be a great thing.
  - TylerE 6y ago
    The Rockies are the big obstacle of course, but the stretch east of the Mississippi is also problematic... hard to go around all the towns, and you've also got to cross the Appalachians and/or Alleghenies.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- gsnedders 6y ago
  > High speed rail is well $100m/mile, just for the track. That's frankly an insane figure, and depends vastly on what you're building and where. For something that's largely running through rural landscape, you really should expect no more than half that for the total construction cost. Maybe US construction is that expensive, but… wow.
  - sojournerc 6y ago
    If we're talking east-west in the US, there are two major mountain ranges, many smaller ones, vast deserts, let alone getting contiguous land in the East.
- imtringued 6y ago
  At those prices you can build the railway with maglev technology. I don't think these costs are realistic.
- ekingr 6y ago
  That seems too high. I'd rather say in the order of c.$100bn. In France the average cost is €15m/km, and that's for extremely high standards / constraints (350km/h or 220mph nominal speed, incl. barriers & bridges for wildlife)

by axaxs 6y ago

TylerE 6y ago

A single NY-LA route alone would cost over $500 billion. High speed rail is well $100m/mile, just for the track.

axaxs 6y ago
I'd like to see it thoroughly planned out, and a real cost estimate. Most of the trip is plainsland...simple. Getting through the Rockies, way more complicated. I've tried to read on the subject but estimates are an order of magnitude off between projects. All that said, of course, figuring out how to lower costs safely would be a great thing.
- TylerE 6y ago
  The Rockies are the big obstacle of course, but the stretch east of the Mississippi is also problematic... hard to go around all the towns, and you've also got to cross the Appalachians and/or Alleghenies.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
gsnedders 6y ago
> High speed rail is well $100m/mile, just for the track. That's frankly an insane figure, and depends vastly on what you're building and where. For something that's largely running through rural landscape, you really should expect no more than half that for the total construction cost. Maybe US construction is that expensive, but… wow.
- sojournerc 6y ago
  If we're talking east-west in the US, there are two major mountain ranges, many smaller ones, vast deserts, let alone getting contiguous land in the East.
imtringued 6y ago
At those prices you can build the railway with maglev technology. I don't think these costs are realistic.
ekingr 6y ago
That seems too high. I'd rather say in the order of c.$100bn. In France the average cost is €15m/km, and that's for extremely high standards / constraints (350km/h or 220mph nominal speed, incl. barriers & bridges for wildlife)