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High Speed Rail is EXTREMELY expensive to build and maintain. It's one of the most impractical ideas to come along. Please put this to rest. Don't believe me? R

• wk_end 3y ago
  Read up on how it worked for the Japanese, the Germans, the French, ... Actually, I'm curious - I don't know a lot about China (although I know that they're maybe not the ideal comparison for Canada for any number of reasons). What should I read? Wikipedia says... The improved mobility and interconnectivity created by these new high-speed rail lines has generated a whole new high-speed commuter market around some urban areas. Commutes via high-speed rail to and from surrounding Hebei and Tianjin into Beijing have become increasingly common, likewise are between the cities surrounding Shanghai, Shenzhen and Guangzhou.[144][145][146] Sounds pretty good TBH.
• maxglute 3y ago
  It worked extremely well for the Chinese. A bunch of motivated premature analysis kept insisting it was a failure pre mass adoption - HSR takes decades to reach full utilization - now few years later it's hitting positive net returns when considering society wide multiplier effects. Also bonus of developing secondary cities along routes, which is actually perfect for Quebec-Windsor corridor that contains half Canadian population along 1200km line. It's almost a no brainer if Canada wants to keep immigration flowing and decongest new comers settling in a few cities. Extra bonus it's electrified, Canada can build trains, and it's more comfy than aviation. Primary problem is Canada/US can't build large scale infra anymore, especially not proper HSR that needs to be elevated, more so to have it route/link to networks that connect urban centres.