14 ms·

You commonly hear that it's ridiculous for California to try to build a high-speed rail network, because people are "so far apart". But France -- a nation calle

by timr 11y ago

You commonly hear that it's ridiculous for California to try to build a high-speed rail network, because people are "so far apart". But France -- a nation called out in this article for being well-connected by high-speed trains, is about the same vertical height as California. It's a bit wider. If you place the northern tip of France on the northern border of California, the southern tip of France lands just north of San Diego. We have about 40 million people; France has about 60 million. Japan (another country with great trains), is about the same vertical distance north/south as the west coast of the US. And while Japan's population is crammed into the coastline of an island nation where it's expensive to build, we have gobs of open space where it's comparatively cheap to run rail. There's simply no excuse. Sure, it doesn't make sense to try to make a high-speed train across the country, but we should have great regional rail systems in the US. The east/west coasts, in particular, should be corridors for rail -- if you can get from Kagoshima to Tokyo in 6 hours by Shinkansen, there's no reason you couldn't get from New York to Miami in the same amount of time.

mahyarm 11y ago
And California only needs a rail system for about half of it's length, most of the population is in it's bottom half on top of it.
barney54 11y ago
The question is why? Why should the U.S. spend billions on a great passenger rail system? High speed rail is almost always a serious money loser. What are the benefits? Japan and Europe's high speed rail is nice, but it hasn't necessarily resulted in a greater share of passengers taking rail. "Since Japan introduced high-speed bullet trains, passenger rail has lost more than half its market share to the automobile. Since Italy, France, and other European countries opened their high-speed rail lines, rail’s market share in Europe has dwindled from 8.2 to 5.8 percent of travel. If high-speed rail doesn’t work in Japan and Europe, how can it work in the United States?" http://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/highspeed-rail-wrong-road-america http://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/highspeed-r... And some environmentalist don't like it either. http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2015/01/california-high-speed-rail-waste-time-and-money http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2015/01/california-hi... Most people don't know that the U.S. has a great freight rail network. U.S. passenger rail obviously isn't great, but U.S. freight rail is the best in the world. http://business.time.com/2012/07/09/us-freight-railroads/ http://business.time.com/2012/07/09/us-freight-railroads/ I just don't know why the U.S. should build high speed rail, other than the fact that it is fun to ride.
- cactusface 11y ago
  Less cars on the road?
  - deelowe 11y ago
    That has to actually happen to be true. The OP's point is that it doesn't actually result in more people taking rail.
    - cactusface 11y ago
      Correlation is not causation? How does the introduction of high speed rail reasonably result in people deciding not to take the train?
- willyt 11y ago
  It's not a money loser. TGV is highly profitable in France. All the major intercity routes in the UK run at a profit and these operate at 125-140mph, which is high speed by US standards.
  - ekianjo 11y ago
    > TGV is highly profitable in France. LOL. French here. I am not sure where you get that impression, but TGV lines cost dozens of billions of euros to be built, and the ROI is calculated in 30-40 years time, so saying the "TGV is highly profitable" is a pure lie, because we don't know in 40 years if people will still take it as much as now. On top of that, the SNCF (public company operating the TGV) is a sponge debt and if it were not for the ongoing government spending to keep it alive every single year with huge cash injections, it would have disappeared long ago. Yeah "highly profitable", hey.
    - zanny 11y ago
      The national highway system isn't making anyone any money, and we don't criticize it for costing upkeep and the billions it cost to build. I'm of the opinion that good infrastructure should not be turning a profit. If it were profitable out of the gate you would just let private enterprise build it. The reason you get the state involved is because good infrastructure like high speed rail is a force multiplier on the effectiveness of everyone around it, even when it isn't turning a profit in and of itself (and usually you get the best societal value out of these things when they are a loss leader, and tickets are not prohibitively expensive...). You want a high speed rail system in California so that hundreds of thousands or millions of workers could stop spending significantly more combined time and money on the much more inefficient road network when it comes to commuting. It would be a net positive in less need to maintain over-capacity highways, less car deaths, less anxiety and stress from the traffic conditions, and more workplace mobility along the rail lines.
randall 11y ago
Not saying it's truth, but a lot of people believe in this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspi...
codecamper 11y ago
how about this for no excuse: the train between SF and silicon valley is a diesel train. Loud. Shaking and vibrating. Romania & the Ukraine have electric trains all over the place. I'd bet that Albania has them too. Why not Silicon Valley? (for those of you asking why is electric better: lower Co2 emissions in sunny california. It's quiet, so you can get your work done in peace. probably missing another plus point. )
- ukandy 11y ago
  A local branch line (UK) has been testing battery powered trains this year, to save the expensive of electrifying the line. They charge the batteries on the electrified main line. Hopefully this will take off on other branch lines.
- mmckeen 11y ago
  Caltrain is in the process of adopting electric trains. http://www.caltrain.com/projectsplans/CaltrainModernization.html http://www.caltrain.com/projectsplans/CaltrainModernization.... You obviously haven't ridden it recently because signs are posted up at the major stations about it.
  - codecamper 11y ago
    That's great to hear! I haven't ridden it in years, you are right. Back then they made a survey on how much it would cost & the price tag was something ludicrous. Hundreds of millions or maybe a billion? I dunno. That was when I formulated the idea that this is lame. Much poorer countries manage electric trains. etc etc. Good to hear they are making the switch.
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  I wonder how much % of its electricity consumption a sunny-californian train could generate if one were to tile its roof with PV panels.
  - ggreer 11y ago
    My intuition tells me it wouldn't even be close, but let's do the math since it's pretty straightforward. Caltrain uses cars that are 26 meters long and 3 meters wide[1]. That's 78m^2 of area to catch sunlight. The largest trains have 6 passenger cars and one locomotive. Let's cover all 7 in solar cells, giving 532m^2 of sunlight. At noon on the equator, approximately 1kW/m^2 of energy hits the earth. The bay area is around 37ºN latitude. sin(37º) ≈ 0.6x the energy per unit area. While 600 watts per square meter sounds like a lot of power, we must also account for solar panel efficiency. The best commercially-feasible panels are around 19% efficient. That gives us 114 watts per square meter. Multiply by the total area and we have 60kW of power at noon on a cloudless day. To compare with your car: 60kW is 80 horsepower. The locomotives used by Caltrain put out 3600-4000 horsepower[2]. To sum up: 26m * 3m * 7 * 1kW/m^2 * sin(37º) * 0.19 ≈ 60kW.[3] On a cloudless day at noon, with no tunnels or shade on the tracks, solar cells could generate 2-3% of the train's needed power. As I thought, not even close. 1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardier_BiLevel_Coach http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardier_BiLevel_Coach 2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPI_MPXpress http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPI_MPXpress 3. http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=26m+*+3m+*+7+*+1kW%2Fm%5E2+*+sin%2837%C2%BA%29+*+0.19 http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=26m+*+3m+*+7+*+1kW%2Fm%...
ekianjo 11y ago
> Japan (another country with great trains) In Japan here. Trains in Japan (especially Shinkansen) are extremely expensive. Even for trips like Osaka to Tokyo the plane is much much cheaper (we are talking about 40%-50% cheaper). And lines take dozens of years to be paid in full before they generate money. It's just debt that is likely never going to be paid again (another very japanese concept).
- timr 11y ago
  Your claims didn't match my recollection, so I just looked up a one-way fare from Tokyo to Osaka (6/25/2015; date randomly chosen) on the train, and on Kayak. The first train I found (not necessarily the cheapest) was $117 USD, vs. a cheapest airfare that was $55-$140 via the deep-discount airlines and $200+ for the less crappy ones. So yes, if you're willing to fly the discount airlines, you can save about $60. That said, flying takes 1h30, plus an hour on each end, give or take, and then you have to get to the city. The train takes 170 minutes (~3 hours), doesn't require security, and drops you right in the center of town. That seems pretty competitive to me -- which is probably why most trains I've taken in Japan have been at least half full, and popular routes sell out on a regular basis. I won't dispute that Japan has spent a great deal on their train system. The US has easily spent hundreds of billions on the highway system. It's a matter of priorities.
  - cyorir 11y ago
    I agree that the Shinkansen can be regarded as a competitive option for medium-distance inter-city travel, but I think that daily use of trains in Japan can be expensive. A Tokyo Metropolitan pass costs 750 yen/day, and that's only sufficient if you don't travel outside the metropolitan area. In contrast, I only pay $5.50 round trip going between Evanston and Chicago on the L. Although I guess that comparison had more impact when the exchange rate was worse.
  - ekianjo 11y ago
    > So yes, if you're willing to fly the discount airlines, you can save about $60. The point is that Shinkansen never offers discounts. The price is always the same. So if you are poor or if your company asks you to travel for business on the cheap, they will save on the trips using airlines instead of trains, because there is virtually no difference between ANA and any other discount airline for such short distances. > That said, flying takes 1h30, plus an hour on each end, give or take, and then you have to get to the city The Shinkansen arrived either in Shinagawa or Tokyo, which may be far from where you want to go as well. Let's not assume that "in the city" is close to your actual destination. Most of the time I need to take subway/train for another 30-40 mins so I'd say it's about the same with the plane. And security checks in Japan for domestic travel is very, very fast.
chernevik 11y ago
The problem with trains in the US is the incompetence of institutions running them. Acela, for example, was supposed to be a high-speed service, enabled by a tilting mechanism to counter turning forces. But the mechanism is frequently unusable, because the train's tracks are too narrow. It cannot tilt without risk of hitting another train, or a telephone pole. [1] While advertised at 150 mph, it only briefly reaches that speed. Its shorter travel time is mostly a function of being an express. [2] This was knowable well before Amtrak spent billions on the project, but wasn't realized until after they had. The Acela cars are nice, but their expense was driven by a feature they largely don't use. The whole project is a waste of capital. What's really needed for high-speed rail between Washington and NY would be straight track. This could be found by going north of DC to Pennsylvania, and then in -- but this would take Baltimore and Philadelphia off the route. A similar route could be found for NY to Boston, but this would abandon Providence. Does anyone think Congress will allow that? It might also be found by clearing a new right of way by eminent domain. This would already be hugely expensive. And it too would be fraught by politics, as local communities vied to have the route curved to serve them. And can you imagine the corruption possibilities -- to move the route, to gain knowledge of where the route would go for land speculation? And the construction of the route, and the train equipment, would become opportunities for Congress to take care of their various union and corporate partners, all at tremendous cost, and at risk of the technical requirements of the service. The US lacks really good rail because it lacks really good civil institutions to build and maintain it. The problem isn't money -- look at the billions that went into Acela -- it is the lack of the competence and focus to actually serve the public interest. [1] http://articles.courant.com/2000-05-27/news/0005270037_1_tilt-technology-slow-acela-express-train-station http://articles.courant.com/2000-05-27/news/0005270037_1_til... [2] http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2001/0110.carr.html http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2001/0110.carr.htm... See also: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/24/us/acela-built-to-be-rails-savior-bedevils-amtrak-at-every-turn.html http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/24/us/acela-built-to-be-rails... EDIT: It turns out that Amtrak looked at all this in 2010: http://www.amtrak.com/ccurl/214/393/A-Vision-for-High-Speed-Rail-in-the-Northeast-Corridor.pdf http://www.amtrak.com/ccurl/214/393/A-Vision-for-High-Speed-... Look at the routes they analyze (p. 9 and 11). Rather than look to straighten track, they bend the NY-Boston route to catch such vital places as Westchester Airport, Danbury and Hartford. The DC - NY route turns to catch Baltimore, Wilmington, Philadelphia and Trenton. The economic case studies talk about the benefits of high-speed rail for Hartford and Baltimore. We can only guess at the cost increases and service impairments associated with routing to those cities. The point of this isn't to get people from DC - NY - Boston faster. It is to get the promise of that service -- which people do want -- to justify enormous spending serving the interests and vanities of incumbent players.
grantlmiller 11y ago
Sure, high-speed trains were great. So was the Edge Network at one point. The point is that we shouldn't spend time planning for the future with yesterday's technology. The CA high speed rail isn't scheduled for completion until 2029. I would prefer that we invest those 14 years and that 68 billion dollars in advancing driverless car infrastructure (luckily much of this can piggyback on existing highway system). It doesn't take much of an imagination to grasp the impact of driverless cars (on demand, shared, smaller 1 person vehicles, no parking, fewer deaths, etc)... even for longer distances (faster speeds, less traffic, caravanned vehicles).
sliverstorm 11y ago
I think the point of "far apart" is the great emptiness between California's cities. In France or Japan, one train line services many many cities, right? In California, you might hit SF, LA, SD, SJ, SAC... That's not necessarily terrible, because you can carry high speed through the empty stretches, but I think what it really says is any California train would be more like the shinkansen, which (while a great train line) is not as rosy as the other lines. Even in train-loving Japan, I believe it operates at a loss.
- lispm 11y ago
  Cities develop over time with train access. Here in Germany it is almost comical how smaller cities fight to be on the high-speed ICE train network. But not all trains are high-speed. There are lots of slower speed trains which reach around 200km/h. The ICE are supposed to connect the larger cities. The ICE from Hamburg to Berlin has a fast connection which allows people to commute over that distance - something which was unthinkable with slower trains. But there are also cheaper and slower trains, which are servicing more cities between Hamburg and Berlin.
prawn 11y ago
Over the years, I've begun to suspect that the resistance to trains and public transport in general comes from politicians in the pockets of either big business or a particular branch of big business. Is that wrong? If not, what's the crux of it? Maintenance contracts? The auto manufacturing industry? Strength of AAA (RAA in Australia) as lobbyists? Australian PM Tony Abbott said in a book years back that even the "humblest person is king in his own car." There are currently battle lines seemingly drawn over (largely left) state governments wanting funding for rail projects with the (right) federal government refusing and only wanting to fund large road projects.
bane 11y ago
One interesting difference with both France and Japan compared to the U.S. is that both countries have "chosen" a central city to focus all transit through. It's a kind of modern "all roads lead to Rome" phenomenon. In other words, in both countries, rail spiders out from Paris or Tokyo respectively. It can be faster to go from the North of the central city to the South of the city, than between two "arms" of the system that are basically right next to one another. For example, it takes about 18 hours to go from Lille to Montpellier by train, on opposite ends of the country. While it takes about the same to go from Metz to Dijon, a 2 hour drive. The Paris Metro Area has about 12.3 million people, or almost 1/5th of the country. Tokyo Metro has 32.5 million or about 1/4 of the country. The U.S. on the other hand doesn't have a central capital city. There are no cities that have nearly that kind of gravity. Despite that, New York to Miami by train takes about 19 hours. Lille to Montpellier is about half the distance of New York to Miami. That's not too bad considering the crap infrastructure the U.S. has in place.
- delroth 11y ago
  Metz to Dijon is 3h by train. Lille to Montpellier is 5h. I'm not sure how you ended up with 18h.
  - bane 11y ago
    You're right, my time for Lille to Montpellier was by bus, by train it's closer to 24 hrs, I double checked. By TGV it's 6-8 hours. SNCF lists Metz to Dijon as between 3 - 6 hours depending on route. But the quickest route (on TGV) still goes through Paris, which is nonsensical for two cities almost next to one another. An analogy with the U.S. would be like going from San Francisco to L.A. via Denver or Kansas City.
    - seszett 11y ago
      > You're right, my time for Lille to Montpellier was by bus, by train it's closer to 24 hrs, I double checked. By TGV it's 6-8 hours. Well no, it's really 5 hours. And I don't understand how you can say "by train it's closer to 24 hrs" as TGV is a train. If you mean intercity, well... I'm not even sure how you could take intercity-only tickets and as far as I know there are no intercity trains going from Lille to the south. It would probably be around 10 hours even as the slower speed of such a train, never 24.
raverbashing 11y ago
Or better illustrated (scroll down) http://mapfrappe.com/?show=30898 http://mapfrappe.com/?show=30898
sschueller 11y ago
I think the bigger issue in the US it that it appears no longer possible to start large public infrastructure projects that aren't bogged down by corruption and incompetence at every level. As an example the "Big Dig" in Boston was almost $12 Billion over budget and many years late. There are huge water leaks and there are many cases of bad work. In one case a woman was killed because the epoxy bolt of a ceiling panel broke and fell on the car she was a passenger in. [1] Compare this with the Swiss NEAT train tunnel [2] which cost $10.3 billion and will be open for rail on December 2016 under budget by $300 Million. It had Problems as well, such as a stuck drill and bad concreet delivered by a company cheating by selling lower quality for the higher quality price. However these kinds of problems can occur and can be dealt with if you hire the right people for the job which may not always be the lowest bidder. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Dig_ceiling_collapse http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Dig_ceiling_collapse [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gotthard_Base_Tunnel http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gotthard_Base_Tunnel

by timr 11y ago

mahyarm 11y ago

And California only needs a rail system for about half of it's length, most of the population is in it's bottom half on top of it.

barney54 11y ago

The question is why? Why should the U.S. spend billions on a great passenger rail system? High speed rail is almost always a serious money loser. What are the benefits? Japan and Europe's high speed rail is nice, but it hasn't necessarily resulted in a greater share of passengers taking rail. "Since Japan introduced high-speed bullet trains, passenger rail has lost more than half its market share to the automobile. Since Italy, France, and other European countries opened their high-speed rail lines, rail’s market share in Europe has dwindled from 8.2 to 5.8 percent of travel. If high-speed rail doesn’t work in Japan and Europe, how can it work in the United States?" http://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/highspeed-rail-wrong-road-america http://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/highspeed-r... And some environmentalist don't like it either. http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2015/01/california-high-speed-rail-waste-time-and-money http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2015/01/california-hi... Most people don't know that the U.S. has a great freight rail network. U.S. passenger rail obviously isn't great, but U.S. freight rail is the best in the world. http://business.time.com/2012/07/09/us-freight-railroads/ http://business.time.com/2012/07/09/us-freight-railroads/ I just don't know why the U.S. should build high speed rail, other than the fact that it is fun to ride.

cactusface 11y ago
Less cars on the road?
- deelowe 11y ago
  That has to actually happen to be true. The OP's point is that it doesn't actually result in more people taking rail.
  - cactusface 11y ago
    Correlation is not causation? How does the introduction of high speed rail reasonably result in people deciding not to take the train?
willyt 11y ago
It's not a money loser. TGV is highly profitable in France. All the major intercity routes in the UK run at a profit and these operate at 125-140mph, which is high speed by US standards.
- ekianjo 11y ago
  > TGV is highly profitable in France. LOL. French here. I am not sure where you get that impression, but TGV lines cost dozens of billions of euros to be built, and the ROI is calculated in 30-40 years time, so saying the "TGV is highly profitable" is a pure lie, because we don't know in 40 years if people will still take it as much as now. On top of that, the SNCF (public company operating the TGV) is a sponge debt and if it were not for the ongoing government spending to keep it alive every single year with huge cash injections, it would have disappeared long ago. Yeah "highly profitable", hey.
  - zanny 11y ago
    The national highway system isn't making anyone any money, and we don't criticize it for costing upkeep and the billions it cost to build. I'm of the opinion that good infrastructure should not be turning a profit. If it were profitable out of the gate you would just let private enterprise build it. The reason you get the state involved is because good infrastructure like high speed rail is a force multiplier on the effectiveness of everyone around it, even when it isn't turning a profit in and of itself (and usually you get the best societal value out of these things when they are a loss leader, and tickets are not prohibitively expensive...). You want a high speed rail system in California so that hundreds of thousands or millions of workers could stop spending significantly more combined time and money on the much more inefficient road network when it comes to commuting. It would be a net positive in less need to maintain over-capacity highways, less car deaths, less anxiety and stress from the traffic conditions, and more workplace mobility along the rail lines.

randall 11y ago

Not saying it's truth, but a lot of people believe in this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspi...

codecamper 11y ago

how about this for no excuse: the train between SF and silicon valley is a diesel train. Loud. Shaking and vibrating. Romania & the Ukraine have electric trains all over the place. I'd bet that Albania has them too. Why not Silicon Valley? (for those of you asking why is electric better: lower Co2 emissions in sunny california. It's quiet, so you can get your work done in peace. probably missing another plus point. )

ukandy 11y ago
A local branch line (UK) has been testing battery powered trains this year, to save the expensive of electrifying the line. They charge the batteries on the electrified main line. Hopefully this will take off on other branch lines.
mmckeen 11y ago
Caltrain is in the process of adopting electric trains. http://www.caltrain.com/projectsplans/CaltrainModernization.html http://www.caltrain.com/projectsplans/CaltrainModernization.... You obviously haven't ridden it recently because signs are posted up at the major stations about it.
- codecamper 11y ago
  That's great to hear! I haven't ridden it in years, you are right. Back then they made a survey on how much it would cost & the price tag was something ludicrous. Hundreds of millions or maybe a billion? I dunno. That was when I formulated the idea that this is lame. Much poorer countries manage electric trains. etc etc. Good to hear they are making the switch.
TeMPOraL 11y ago
I wonder how much % of its electricity consumption a sunny-californian train could generate if one were to tile its roof with PV panels.
- ggreer 11y ago
  My intuition tells me it wouldn't even be close, but let's do the math since it's pretty straightforward. Caltrain uses cars that are 26 meters long and 3 meters wide[1]. That's 78m^2 of area to catch sunlight. The largest trains have 6 passenger cars and one locomotive. Let's cover all 7 in solar cells, giving 532m^2 of sunlight. At noon on the equator, approximately 1kW/m^2 of energy hits the earth. The bay area is around 37ºN latitude. sin(37º) ≈ 0.6x the energy per unit area. While 600 watts per square meter sounds like a lot of power, we must also account for solar panel efficiency. The best commercially-feasible panels are around 19% efficient. That gives us 114 watts per square meter. Multiply by the total area and we have 60kW of power at noon on a cloudless day. To compare with your car: 60kW is 80 horsepower. The locomotives used by Caltrain put out 3600-4000 horsepower[2]. To sum up: 26m * 3m * 7 * 1kW/m^2 * sin(37º) * 0.19 ≈ 60kW.[3] On a cloudless day at noon, with no tunnels or shade on the tracks, solar cells could generate 2-3% of the train's needed power. As I thought, not even close. 1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardier_BiLevel_Coach http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardier_BiLevel_Coach 2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPI_MPXpress http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPI_MPXpress 3. http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=26m+*+3m+*+7+*+1kW%2Fm%5E2+*+sin%2837%C2%BA%29+*+0.19 http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=26m+*+3m+*+7+*+1kW%2Fm%...

ekianjo 11y ago

> Japan (another country with great trains) In Japan here. Trains in Japan (especially Shinkansen) are extremely expensive. Even for trips like Osaka to Tokyo the plane is much much cheaper (we are talking about 40%-50% cheaper). And lines take dozens of years to be paid in full before they generate money. It's just debt that is likely never going to be paid again (another very japanese concept).

timr 11y ago
Your claims didn't match my recollection, so I just looked up a one-way fare from Tokyo to Osaka (6/25/2015; date randomly chosen) on the train, and on Kayak. The first train I found (not necessarily the cheapest) was $117 USD, vs. a cheapest airfare that was $55-$140 via the deep-discount airlines and $200+ for the less crappy ones. So yes, if you're willing to fly the discount airlines, you can save about $60. That said, flying takes 1h30, plus an hour on each end, give or take, and then you have to get to the city. The train takes 170 minutes (~3 hours), doesn't require security, and drops you right in the center of town. That seems pretty competitive to me -- which is probably why most trains I've taken in Japan have been at least half full, and popular routes sell out on a regular basis. I won't dispute that Japan has spent a great deal on their train system. The US has easily spent hundreds of billions on the highway system. It's a matter of priorities.
- cyorir 11y ago
  I agree that the Shinkansen can be regarded as a competitive option for medium-distance inter-city travel, but I think that daily use of trains in Japan can be expensive. A Tokyo Metropolitan pass costs 750 yen/day, and that's only sufficient if you don't travel outside the metropolitan area. In contrast, I only pay $5.50 round trip going between Evanston and Chicago on the L. Although I guess that comparison had more impact when the exchange rate was worse.
- ekianjo 11y ago
  > So yes, if you're willing to fly the discount airlines, you can save about $60. The point is that Shinkansen never offers discounts. The price is always the same. So if you are poor or if your company asks you to travel for business on the cheap, they will save on the trips using airlines instead of trains, because there is virtually no difference between ANA and any other discount airline for such short distances. > That said, flying takes 1h30, plus an hour on each end, give or take, and then you have to get to the city The Shinkansen arrived either in Shinagawa or Tokyo, which may be far from where you want to go as well. Let's not assume that "in the city" is close to your actual destination. Most of the time I need to take subway/train for another 30-40 mins so I'd say it's about the same with the plane. And security checks in Japan for domestic travel is very, very fast.

chernevik 11y ago

The problem with trains in the US is the incompetence of institutions running them. Acela, for example, was supposed to be a high-speed service, enabled by a tilting mechanism to counter turning forces. But the mechanism is frequently unusable, because the train's tracks are too narrow. It cannot tilt without risk of hitting another train, or a telephone pole. [1] While advertised at 150 mph, it only briefly reaches that speed. Its shorter travel time is mostly a function of being an express. [2] This was knowable well before Amtrak spent billions on the project, but wasn't realized until after they had. The Acela cars are nice, but their expense was driven by a feature they largely don't use. The whole project is a waste of capital. What's really needed for high-speed rail between Washington and NY would be straight track. This could be found by going north of DC to Pennsylvania, and then in -- but this would take Baltimore and Philadelphia off the route. A similar route could be found for NY to Boston, but this would abandon Providence. Does anyone think Congress will allow that? It might also be found by clearing a new right of way by eminent domain. This would already be hugely expensive. And it too would be fraught by politics, as local communities vied to have the route curved to serve them. And can you imagine the corruption possibilities -- to move the route, to gain knowledge of where the route would go for land speculation? And the construction of the route, and the train equipment, would become opportunities for Congress to take care of their various union and corporate partners, all at tremendous cost, and at risk of the technical requirements of the service. The US lacks really good rail because it lacks really good civil institutions to build and maintain it. The problem isn't money -- look at the billions that went into Acela -- it is the lack of the competence and focus to actually serve the public interest. [1] http://articles.courant.com/2000-05-27/news/0005270037_1_tilt-technology-slow-acela-express-train-station http://articles.courant.com/2000-05-27/news/0005270037_1_til... [2] http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2001/0110.carr.html http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2001/0110.carr.htm... See also: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/24/us/acela-built-to-be-rails-savior-bedevils-amtrak-at-every-turn.html http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/24/us/acela-built-to-be-rails... EDIT: It turns out that Amtrak looked at all this in 2010: http://www.amtrak.com/ccurl/214/393/A-Vision-for-High-Speed-Rail-in-the-Northeast-Corridor.pdf http://www.amtrak.com/ccurl/214/393/A-Vision-for-High-Speed-... Look at the routes they analyze (p. 9 and 11). Rather than look to straighten track, they bend the NY-Boston route to catch such vital places as Westchester Airport, Danbury and Hartford. The DC - NY route turns to catch Baltimore, Wilmington, Philadelphia and Trenton. The economic case studies talk about the benefits of high-speed rail for Hartford and Baltimore. We can only guess at the cost increases and service impairments associated with routing to those cities. The point of this isn't to get people from DC - NY - Boston faster. It is to get the promise of that service -- which people do want -- to justify enormous spending serving the interests and vanities of incumbent players.

grantlmiller 11y ago

Sure, high-speed trains were great. So was the Edge Network at one point. The point is that we shouldn't spend time planning for the future with yesterday's technology. The CA high speed rail isn't scheduled for completion until 2029. I would prefer that we invest those 14 years and that 68 billion dollars in advancing driverless car infrastructure (luckily much of this can piggyback on existing highway system). It doesn't take much of an imagination to grasp the impact of driverless cars (on demand, shared, smaller 1 person vehicles, no parking, fewer deaths, etc)... even for longer distances (faster speeds, less traffic, caravanned vehicles).

sliverstorm 11y ago

I think the point of "far apart" is the great emptiness between California's cities. In France or Japan, one train line services many many cities, right? In California, you might hit SF, LA, SD, SJ, SAC... That's not necessarily terrible, because you can carry high speed through the empty stretches, but I think what it really says is any California train would be more like the shinkansen, which (while a great train line) is not as rosy as the other lines. Even in train-loving Japan, I believe it operates at a loss.

lispm 11y ago
Cities develop over time with train access. Here in Germany it is almost comical how smaller cities fight to be on the high-speed ICE train network. But not all trains are high-speed. There are lots of slower speed trains which reach around 200km/h. The ICE are supposed to connect the larger cities. The ICE from Hamburg to Berlin has a fast connection which allows people to commute over that distance - something which was unthinkable with slower trains. But there are also cheaper and slower trains, which are servicing more cities between Hamburg and Berlin.

prawn 11y ago

Over the years, I've begun to suspect that the resistance to trains and public transport in general comes from politicians in the pockets of either big business or a particular branch of big business. Is that wrong? If not, what's the crux of it? Maintenance contracts? The auto manufacturing industry? Strength of AAA (RAA in Australia) as lobbyists? Australian PM Tony Abbott said in a book years back that even the "humblest person is king in his own car." There are currently battle lines seemingly drawn over (largely left) state governments wanting funding for rail projects with the (right) federal government refusing and only wanting to fund large road projects.

bane 11y ago

One interesting difference with both France and Japan compared to the U.S. is that both countries have "chosen" a central city to focus all transit through. It's a kind of modern "all roads lead to Rome" phenomenon. In other words, in both countries, rail spiders out from Paris or Tokyo respectively. It can be faster to go from the North of the central city to the South of the city, than between two "arms" of the system that are basically right next to one another. For example, it takes about 18 hours to go from Lille to Montpellier by train, on opposite ends of the country. While it takes about the same to go from Metz to Dijon, a 2 hour drive. The Paris Metro Area has about 12.3 million people, or almost 1/5th of the country. Tokyo Metro has 32.5 million or about 1/4 of the country. The U.S. on the other hand doesn't have a central capital city. There are no cities that have nearly that kind of gravity. Despite that, New York to Miami by train takes about 19 hours. Lille to Montpellier is about half the distance of New York to Miami. That's not too bad considering the crap infrastructure the U.S. has in place.

delroth 11y ago
Metz to Dijon is 3h by train. Lille to Montpellier is 5h. I'm not sure how you ended up with 18h.
- bane 11y ago
  You're right, my time for Lille to Montpellier was by bus, by train it's closer to 24 hrs, I double checked. By TGV it's 6-8 hours. SNCF lists Metz to Dijon as between 3 - 6 hours depending on route. But the quickest route (on TGV) still goes through Paris, which is nonsensical for two cities almost next to one another. An analogy with the U.S. would be like going from San Francisco to L.A. via Denver or Kansas City.
  - seszett 11y ago
    > You're right, my time for Lille to Montpellier was by bus, by train it's closer to 24 hrs, I double checked. By TGV it's 6-8 hours. Well no, it's really 5 hours. And I don't understand how you can say "by train it's closer to 24 hrs" as TGV is a train. If you mean intercity, well... I'm not even sure how you could take intercity-only tickets and as far as I know there are no intercity trains going from Lille to the south. It would probably be around 10 hours even as the slower speed of such a train, never 24.

raverbashing 11y ago

Or better illustrated (scroll down) http://mapfrappe.com/?show=30898 http://mapfrappe.com/?show=30898

sschueller 11y ago

I think the bigger issue in the US it that it appears no longer possible to start large public infrastructure projects that aren't bogged down by corruption and incompetence at every level. As an example the "Big Dig" in Boston was almost $12 Billion over budget and many years late. There are huge water leaks and there are many cases of bad work. In one case a woman was killed because the epoxy bolt of a ceiling panel broke and fell on the car she was a passenger in. [1] Compare this with the Swiss NEAT train tunnel [2] which cost $10.3 billion and will be open for rail on December 2016 under budget by $300 Million. It had Problems as well, such as a stuck drill and bad concreet delivered by a company cheating by selling lower quality for the higher quality price. However these kinds of problems can occur and can be dealt with if you hire the right people for the job which may not always be the lowest bidder. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Dig_ceiling_collapse http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Dig_ceiling_collapse [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gotthard_Base_Tunnel http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gotthard_Base_Tunnel