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HN is full of clickbait messages like this. US and Canada can use a lot more trains, but air transport is more suitable for medium to long distance, such as thi

HN is full of clickbait messages like this. US and Canada can use a lot more trains, but air transport is more suitable for medium to long distance, such as this Minneapolis-Toronto route. They are complementary. The accident occurred on the ground, any aircraft is susceptible, “more trains” doesn’t make it less so.

lmm 2y ago
> air transport is more suitable for medium to long distance, such as this Minneapolis-Toronto route. Eh maybe. That's not much longer than Beijing-Shanghai. Rail can definitely be competitive. > The accident occurred on the ground Plane crashes generally do. Given that all plane journeys involve at least one takeoff and landing, it's fair to consider collisions and incidents during those as part of a safety comparison.
- dmix 2y ago
  > Eh maybe. That's not much longer than Beijing-Shanghai. Rail can definitely be competitive. Connecting two growing mega cities by rail in a country that can still build things vs two mid-tier cities in two different countries, neither of which build anything without a decade of delays and 3x the budget (before the projects get cancelled), is not a good analogy to use against flight IMO.
  - lmm 2y ago
    > countries, neither of which build anything without a decade of delays and 3x the budget (before the projects get cancelled) That ends up being circular though. The main reason the US and Canada can't build anything is that they don't build anything.
    - sfn42 2y ago
      It's also bullshit. Clearly both the US and Canada do build lots of things.
      - School-Cotton 2y ago
        Like what?
        rangestransform 2y ago
        Second avenue subway in NYC for over 1b/mi CAHSR for ~100b A completely useless underground palace at grand central for 11b Really can’t build shit in this country without getting shaken down by unions, nimbys, lawyers, and consultants
- seanmcdirmid 2y ago
  China eastern airlines has its own desk at the airport to deal with Beijing-Shanghai flights, even after HSR was built out there are still more planes flying between those two mega cities than Minneapolis and Toronto (makes sense if you consider connecting flights wouldn’t benefit from HSR very much). Maybe when they get a maglev going…
- School-Cotton 2y ago
  Can you really not imagine any reason why world-class rail between Beijing and Shanghai is more feasible than between Minneapolis and Toronto?
  - lmm 2y ago
    If you want to say something then say it. No, I don't think there's any particular physical reason for that; I think the poor state of north american passenger rail is almost entirely for political reasons and could be changed if the public had the will to improve it.
    - School-Cotton 2y ago
      Beijing and Shanghai are two of the most important cities in the world. Minneapolis and Toronto are not. Of course it’s physically possible to build a high-speed train from Minneapolis to Toronto, but it makes little sense to do so unless you’re building all the O(n^2) point-to-point links between all the medium-importance cities in North America.
    - kortilla 2y ago
      High speed rail requires density. Toronto and Minneapolis are villages comparatively. There are significant air routes in China between higher population cities than the MSP, YYZ pairing
- signatoremo 2y ago
  Beijing and Shanghai are the two largest cities in China. There is enough demand to justify trains. There are also at least 50 daily flights between the two cities. Now what is the demand between Minneapolis and Toronto?
  - lmm 2y ago
    The twin cities MSA has a population of about 3.7 million, the Toronto CMA 6.2 million, so Chinese cities at a similar metropolitan area population and distance would be Kunming and Changsha. Which see 20 trains a day per direction, not counting the slower sleeper trains (and also 10-12 flights per day).
    - signatoremo 2y ago
      The population comparison is misleading. Kumming and Chiangsa are part of Shanghai–Kunming railway. The trains between these two cities don't stop at either, but connect all the stations on the larger railway. Compare that to flights between Minneapolis and Toronto. The majority of passengers are point to point, as transit passengers from Minneapolis probably take hubs such as Chicago or NYC, not Toronto. There are up to 6 daily flights between MSP and YYZ, so up to 600 passengers daily. That'd fill up less than a train. That doesn't justify a high speed passenger train connection between the two cities. The original assertion is that train can probably replace airplane on this route. That doesn't make any sense. > and also 10-12 flights per day That are probably those who want to travel directly between the two cities. So even though train option exists people still choose to fly.
      - lmm 2y ago
        > Kumming and Chiangsa are part of Shanghai–Kunming railway. The trains between these two cities don't stop at either, but connect all the stations on the larger railway. Which would be the same for a North American rail network. Kunming was Minneapolis in this analogy, trains to Toronto could carry on to Boston or Montreal or New York just as trains to Changsa carry on to Shanghai. > The original assertion is that train can probably replace airplane on this route. I don't think anyone claimed that it would replace planes completely. It could be competitive, it could be an option for people who want it.
jltsiren 2y ago
The conventional wisdom is that high speed rail is competitive with flying when travel time is at most 4.5 hours. But China has been challenging that with some ridiculously long routes, such as 2760 km from Beijing to Kunming (10 hours 43 minutes). I think the idea is that if flight time is long enough that you can't travel and work reasonably on the same day, you have to dedicate the entire day for travel. Then the difference between a 3.5-hour flight and a 10-hour train trip is no longer that significant.
- dredmorbius 2y ago
  "Night trains" (where the train effectively doubles as lodging for 8--12 hours) make even longer-haul routes quite viable. Even without HSR that affords nearly 1,000 mi / > 1,500 km of range (80 mph constant / 130 kph). At typical HSR speeds of 185 mph / 300 kph, that extends to ~2,200 mi / 3,600 km. That's sufficient for travel from SF to Chicago, or NYC to Salt Lake (with range to spare). (Both calculations presume 12 hours and operating largely at top speeds, both of which may be atypical in practice, but do satisfy the maximum possible range question.) Travel within major population corridors, generally the east coast (Boston, Minneapolis, Miami, Houston) or west (San Diego, Phoenix, Seattle, Salt Lake, Denver) should be highly viable. And as is often noted, rail operates city-centre to city-centre, and typically has fewer security checks and delays.

lmm 2y ago

> air transport is more suitable for medium to long distance, such as this Minneapolis-Toronto route. Eh maybe. That's not much longer than Beijing-Shanghai. Rail can definitely be competitive. > The accident occurred on the ground Plane crashes generally do. Given that all plane journeys involve at least one takeoff and landing, it's fair to consider collisions and incidents during those as part of a safety comparison.

dmix 2y ago
> Eh maybe. That's not much longer than Beijing-Shanghai. Rail can definitely be competitive. Connecting two growing mega cities by rail in a country that can still build things vs two mid-tier cities in two different countries, neither of which build anything without a decade of delays and 3x the budget (before the projects get cancelled), is not a good analogy to use against flight IMO.
- lmm 2y ago
  > countries, neither of which build anything without a decade of delays and 3x the budget (before the projects get cancelled) That ends up being circular though. The main reason the US and Canada can't build anything is that they don't build anything.
  - sfn42 2y ago
    It's also bullshit. Clearly both the US and Canada do build lots of things.
    - School-Cotton 2y ago
      Like what?
      - rangestransform 2y ago
        Second avenue subway in NYC for over 1b/mi CAHSR for ~100b A completely useless underground palace at grand central for 11b Really can’t build shit in this country without getting shaken down by unions, nimbys, lawyers, and consultants
seanmcdirmid 2y ago
China eastern airlines has its own desk at the airport to deal with Beijing-Shanghai flights, even after HSR was built out there are still more planes flying between those two mega cities than Minneapolis and Toronto (makes sense if you consider connecting flights wouldn’t benefit from HSR very much). Maybe when they get a maglev going…
School-Cotton 2y ago
Can you really not imagine any reason why world-class rail between Beijing and Shanghai is more feasible than between Minneapolis and Toronto?
- lmm 2y ago
  If you want to say something then say it. No, I don't think there's any particular physical reason for that; I think the poor state of north american passenger rail is almost entirely for political reasons and could be changed if the public had the will to improve it.
  - School-Cotton 2y ago
    Beijing and Shanghai are two of the most important cities in the world. Minneapolis and Toronto are not. Of course it’s physically possible to build a high-speed train from Minneapolis to Toronto, but it makes little sense to do so unless you’re building all the O(n^2) point-to-point links between all the medium-importance cities in North America.
  - kortilla 2y ago
    High speed rail requires density. Toronto and Minneapolis are villages comparatively. There are significant air routes in China between higher population cities than the MSP, YYZ pairing
signatoremo 2y ago
Beijing and Shanghai are the two largest cities in China. There is enough demand to justify trains. There are also at least 50 daily flights between the two cities. Now what is the demand between Minneapolis and Toronto?
- lmm 2y ago
  The twin cities MSA has a population of about 3.7 million, the Toronto CMA 6.2 million, so Chinese cities at a similar metropolitan area population and distance would be Kunming and Changsha. Which see 20 trains a day per direction, not counting the slower sleeper trains (and also 10-12 flights per day).
  - signatoremo 2y ago
    The population comparison is misleading. Kumming and Chiangsa are part of Shanghai–Kunming railway. The trains between these two cities don't stop at either, but connect all the stations on the larger railway. Compare that to flights between Minneapolis and Toronto. The majority of passengers are point to point, as transit passengers from Minneapolis probably take hubs such as Chicago or NYC, not Toronto. There are up to 6 daily flights between MSP and YYZ, so up to 600 passengers daily. That'd fill up less than a train. That doesn't justify a high speed passenger train connection between the two cities. The original assertion is that train can probably replace airplane on this route. That doesn't make any sense. > and also 10-12 flights per day That are probably those who want to travel directly between the two cities. So even though train option exists people still choose to fly.
    - lmm 2y ago
      > Kumming and Chiangsa are part of Shanghai–Kunming railway. The trains between these two cities don't stop at either, but connect all the stations on the larger railway. Which would be the same for a North American rail network. Kunming was Minneapolis in this analogy, trains to Toronto could carry on to Boston or Montreal or New York just as trains to Changsa carry on to Shanghai. > The original assertion is that train can probably replace airplane on this route. I don't think anyone claimed that it would replace planes completely. It could be competitive, it could be an option for people who want it.

jltsiren 2y ago

The conventional wisdom is that high speed rail is competitive with flying when travel time is at most 4.5 hours. But China has been challenging that with some ridiculously long routes, such as 2760 km from Beijing to Kunming (10 hours 43 minutes). I think the idea is that if flight time is long enough that you can't travel and work reasonably on the same day, you have to dedicate the entire day for travel. Then the difference between a 3.5-hour flight and a 10-hour train trip is no longer that significant.

dredmorbius 2y ago
"Night trains" (where the train effectively doubles as lodging for 8--12 hours) make even longer-haul routes quite viable. Even without HSR that affords nearly 1,000 mi / > 1,500 km of range (80 mph constant / 130 kph). At typical HSR speeds of 185 mph / 300 kph, that extends to ~2,200 mi / 3,600 km. That's sufficient for travel from SF to Chicago, or NYC to Salt Lake (with range to spare). (Both calculations presume 12 hours and operating largely at top speeds, both of which may be atypical in practice, but do satisfy the maximum possible range question.) Travel within major population corridors, generally the east coast (Boston, Minneapolis, Miami, Houston) or west (San Diego, Phoenix, Seattle, Salt Lake, Denver) should be highly viable. And as is often noted, rail operates city-centre to city-centre, and typically has fewer security checks and delays.