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> Today the US has 3-5X less population density than any country with high speed rail. This may be true when averaged across the entire country (or even just t

> Today the US has 3-5X less population density than any country with high speed rail. This may be true when averaged across the entire country (or even just the lower 48). But it is absolutely not true if you consider various zones of the country as candidates for good rail service. Several such zones exist, among them: 1. the north east corridor, perhaps one of the largest and densest conurbations in the world 2. the roughly rectangular shape formed with the NW corner in Minneapolis, the NW corner in Milwaukee, the SE corner in Detroit and SW corner in <wherever the hell that is> 3. The triangle in Texas formed by Dallas/Ft. Worth, Austin and San Antonio All 3 have higher population densities than those found in non-urban parts of Europe; the latter have good to excellent train service, but none of these 3 do.

pembrook 2y ago
The problem is the equivalent driving times aren't crazy on those routes either though. When you factor in that you need a car in both your departing city and destination city (except for NYC), AND the fact that nearly every household in those regions owns one or multiple cars (which is not true in higher density/higher urbanization countries)...it begins to not make sense especially given the massive upfront cost of construction.
- mnky9800n 2y ago
  You highlighted it. The real problem is when you get somewhere you still need a car.
  - mitthrowaway2 2y ago
    It's possible that would gradually start to change, starting around rail stations.
    - mnky9800n 2y ago
      That requires the area around rail stations to be built for pedestrians and bicycles, not cars. That doesn’t seem to be the case in many places in America.
      - mitthrowaway2 2y ago
        Places can change! American cities were built for pedestrians in the '20s, and Dutch cities were built fir cars until the '90s.
- ghaff 2y ago
  I do take Acela from Central Massachusetts to NYC but mostly because I hate driving into NYC so much. (And don't need a car when I get there.) It basically involves driving an hour in the wrong direction to south suburban Boston. I could drive to New Haven and for a longer drive I'd get a shorter/cheaper trip.
bongodongobob 2y ago
I will speak to the Chicago, Milwaukee, Madison, Minneapolis/St Paul region. Rail is not going to happen until you don't need a car in those cities. Chicago you could do, but the others are not pedestrian friendly. Anyone traveling within that region will have a 95% chance of already owning a car. Unless the train gets you from Chicago to Minneapolis in an hour, people are just going to drive. The risk with car rental and money spent on Uber's isn't worth it. I feel like these types of comments come from people that live in NYC or LA. The rest of the country is so fuckin sparse. Your "walkable cities" idea doesn't make any sense and is completely unfeasible outside of major metro areas which land wise in the US is like 99%.
- PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
  For the record, I live in a tiny village in New Mexico. Also for the record, the overwhelming majority of the US population lives in metropolitan areas, not rural ones.
- rtpg 2y ago
  I don't see why Madison doesn't work. I've taken buses to Madison, you can get downtown. You can usually find some transport. Or you can just call a ride share or something! I've done Chicago -> Madison by bus, and honestly prefer it to the plane at least (even from the airport). More comfortable seats and I get out just at a station. High frequency bus lines feel like good indicators of where some trains could work, and it's not like bus services are dead. (Similarly, I did Portland -> Eugene on Amtrak and it was nice and chill! I roadshared to my final destination but I had to get from A to B somehow)
rtpg 2y ago
I do agree with the idea of building out strong localised networks (and roll my eyes at the "US rail network" dream maps people post out). But my impression from France and Germany at least is that you have two sort of failure modes: - For France, rural areas don't really have that good of a rail network. Instead there are several trunk lines that are reliable. But it means that east-west stuff is nearly non-existent. Lots of "drive me to the station and drop me off please". Good enough to put France at number 2 in numbers of km ridden per passenger! - For Germany, the network is much more evenly spread out. But ever German I've met complaints constantly about the unreliability of the trains, combined with the low rate of service. So you end up with stations everywhere, but if a train gets cancelled you could be stranded for hours. Anyways I do think the French model makes a hell of a lot of sense (prioritizing train frequency over coverage), but it might not be what people are expecting if they just look at a map of trains.
- pjmlp 2y ago
  Also in rural Germany you will need a car anyway, even if all major cities are well connected.
- def_true_false 2y ago
  German trains are unrealiable because they spend like 5-10 times less per km of railway than Austria or Switzerland.
  - nec4b 2y ago
    This probably has a lot to do with topography of Germany compared to both Austria and Switzerland.

pembrook 2y ago

The problem is the equivalent driving times aren't crazy on those routes either though. When you factor in that you need a car in both your departing city and destination city (except for NYC), AND the fact that nearly every household in those regions owns one or multiple cars (which is not true in higher density/higher urbanization countries)...it begins to not make sense especially given the massive upfront cost of construction.

mnky9800n 2y ago
You highlighted it. The real problem is when you get somewhere you still need a car.
- mitthrowaway2 2y ago
  It's possible that would gradually start to change, starting around rail stations.
  - mnky9800n 2y ago
    That requires the area around rail stations to be built for pedestrians and bicycles, not cars. That doesn’t seem to be the case in many places in America.
    - mitthrowaway2 2y ago
      Places can change! American cities were built for pedestrians in the '20s, and Dutch cities were built fir cars until the '90s.
ghaff 2y ago
I do take Acela from Central Massachusetts to NYC but mostly because I hate driving into NYC so much. (And don't need a car when I get there.) It basically involves driving an hour in the wrong direction to south suburban Boston. I could drive to New Haven and for a longer drive I'd get a shorter/cheaper trip.

bongodongobob 2y ago

I will speak to the Chicago, Milwaukee, Madison, Minneapolis/St Paul region. Rail is not going to happen until you don't need a car in those cities. Chicago you could do, but the others are not pedestrian friendly. Anyone traveling within that region will have a 95% chance of already owning a car. Unless the train gets you from Chicago to Minneapolis in an hour, people are just going to drive. The risk with car rental and money spent on Uber's isn't worth it. I feel like these types of comments come from people that live in NYC or LA. The rest of the country is so fuckin sparse. Your "walkable cities" idea doesn't make any sense and is completely unfeasible outside of major metro areas which land wise in the US is like 99%.

PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
For the record, I live in a tiny village in New Mexico. Also for the record, the overwhelming majority of the US population lives in metropolitan areas, not rural ones.
rtpg 2y ago
I don't see why Madison doesn't work. I've taken buses to Madison, you can get downtown. You can usually find some transport. Or you can just call a ride share or something! I've done Chicago -> Madison by bus, and honestly prefer it to the plane at least (even from the airport). More comfortable seats and I get out just at a station. High frequency bus lines feel like good indicators of where some trains could work, and it's not like bus services are dead. (Similarly, I did Portland -> Eugene on Amtrak and it was nice and chill! I roadshared to my final destination but I had to get from A to B somehow)

rtpg 2y ago

I do agree with the idea of building out strong localised networks (and roll my eyes at the "US rail network" dream maps people post out). But my impression from France and Germany at least is that you have two sort of failure modes: - For France, rural areas don't really have that good of a rail network. Instead there are several trunk lines that are reliable. But it means that east-west stuff is nearly non-existent. Lots of "drive me to the station and drop me off please". Good enough to put France at number 2 in numbers of km ridden per passenger! - For Germany, the network is much more evenly spread out. But ever German I've met complaints constantly about the unreliability of the trains, combined with the low rate of service. So you end up with stations everywhere, but if a train gets cancelled you could be stranded for hours. Anyways I do think the French model makes a hell of a lot of sense (prioritizing train frequency over coverage), but it might not be what people are expecting if they just look at a map of trains.

pjmlp 2y ago
Also in rural Germany you will need a car anyway, even if all major cities are well connected.
def_true_false 2y ago
German trains are unrealiable because they spend like 5-10 times less per km of railway than Austria or Switzerland.
- nec4b 2y ago
  This probably has a lot to do with topography of Germany compared to both Austria and Switzerland.