3 ms·

> Trucks carry something like 60% of the freight in the US. You could say that rail should carry more of it... Interestingly, the US carries a higher proportio

• panick21_ 2y ago
  Some people in the US like to pat themself on the back about this. The reality isn't that impressive. Because the US has basically no passengers on the rails, its of course far easier to get things on the rails. Given that the US basically doesn't have passenger, the number are not that great. Plus, Europe has ocean on 3 sides and generally a much longer coastline so lots of stuff that in the US uses rail, in Europe simply uses water transport. In general a lot more things simply use local resources, for historical and political reasons. Switzerland for example matches the US in terms of cargo modal share. But if you look what we had to do to achieve this high % while still having very large passenger numbers its incredibly hard. Basically it requires a concerted effort by government to prevent road use and to have a concert policy of all government and private institutions working together to enable it. If you compare the US freight system to a actual peer competitor, the Soviet Union, the US doesn't look that great: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/54/RailUSAvsUSSR.svg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/54/RailUSAv... If the US actually had a concert policy of increasing modal share of rail compared to road freight transport, the US could do so, so much more. It would be a great thing for the environment and everybody in the US.