[cpbell0033944]

Interesting stuff, and an enjoyable debate.

I agree that the scale of the US and the emptiness of tracts of it is impossible for a Brit to get their head around.  I recently researched the origin of US counties, and found one county in the upper Mid-West (cannot remember where) that had a similar land area to my home English county (Norfolk), yet had a population of under 1000, whereas the population of Norfolk in 2006 was around 830,000 (and Norfolk is a rural county).  That said, I don't see that prior decisions to focus on air and car travel prevent high-speed passenger rail travel from becoming a reality in certain locations.  We are similarly wedded to the car anmd aeroplane, (I can never understand people using budget airlines to fly from London to Edinburgh when they could travel along the East Coast Main Line at up to 125 mph on a comfy train) yet we now have the CTRL.  I repeat that I'm not suggesting high-speed lines extending more than, say 700 miles, so of course not all areas will be suitable candidates.  Another factor in favour of rail is comfort – no turbulence and room to stretch out.

As for the links – they're interesting, but I don't see their relevance.  High-speed rail isn't as fanciful as high-speed travelators, after all. ???

[Mimi]

[font=times new roman]~Mimi[/size”>[/font]

[cpbell0033944]

[font=times new roman][size=11pt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0rhtVIaQSE&feature=related ::)

[Michael Pouliot]

One thing is getting overlooked here.  Although there was a discussion of the size of the US, there hasn't been a discussion of where people travel to.  Look at this survey of long distance travel in the US.  You'll notice that most travel is for pleasure, and almost all of that is by car.  Why?  Well the size of the US greatly amplifies the number of travel destinations.  Travel in the US is not simply major city to major city.  US population in non-urban areas can be very sparse.  It is not adaptable to rigid lines of travel.  I live in the Northeast US, which by US standards is well covered with public transit options…which I hardly ever use.  I travel to different locations all the time, but rarely are they major population centers.  And when I wish to travel to a major population center, rarely is public transit setup to make it convenient.  There's a train not 10 minutes from my house that runs to Boston…only twice a day.  Not particularly useful.  And it costs at least 4x the equivalent expense in gas (assuming $4/gallon) for my family of three.  So it's inconvenient and four times the price (of course, that doesn't include overhead costs for my vehicle, but still…).  And it's only useful if I'm going somewhere in Boston.  What if I was going to Worcester?  Or Manchester?  Or Dover?  (All smaller cities within 45 minutes of my house.)  Or a relative's house?

We are a long long way from car travel in the US being more expensive and more inconvenient than any form of public transit.

[cpbell0033944]

One thing is getting overlooked here.  Although there was a discussion of the size of the US, there hasn't been a discussion of where people travel to.  Look at this survey of long distance travel in the US.  You'll notice that most travel is for pleasure, and almost all of that is by car.  Why?  Well the size of the US greatly amplifies the number of travel destinations.  Travel in the US is not simply major city to major city.  US population in non-urban areas can be very sparse.  It is not adaptable to rigid lines of travel.  I live in the Northeast US, which by US standards is well covered with public transit options…which I hardly ever use.  I travel to different locations all the time, but rarely are they major population centers.  And when I wish to travel to a major population center, rarely is public transit setup to make it convenient.  There's a train not 10 minutes from my house that runs to Boston…only twice a day.  Not particularly useful.  And it costs at least 4x the equivalent expense in gas (assuming $4/gallon) for my family of three.  So it's inconvenient and four times the price (of course, that doesn't include overhead costs for my vehicle, but still…).  And it's only useful if I'm going somewhere in Boston.  What if I was going to Worcester?  Or Manchester?  Or Dover?  (All smaller cities within 45 minutes of my house.)  Or a relative's house?

We are a long long way from car travel in the US being more expensive and more inconvenient than any form of public transit.

With respect, on reading your post, I would argue with your final sentence. I would suggest that the truth is

We are a long long way from car travel in the US being expensive enough to dissuade us from using current forms of public transit.

Just because train services in your area are sparse does not mean that it cannot be improved.  You cannot say that rail travel in the US is unimportant just because it is not being used to the optimum.  For example, I have seen many YouTube videos that show glitzy Amtrack services meandering along single-track branch lines at 30 mph, when the should be using multi-track routes that would allow for tighter scheduling and therefore many more trains per day.  It seems to me that the problem is that Amtrack is beholden to the freight companies.

[Michael Pouliot]

With respect, on reading your post, I would argue with your final sentence. I would suggest that the truth is

Your re-write suggests that you find car travel inherently inferior to rail travel.  I don't care to debate that point.  That's a preference, not a statement of fact.

It seems to me that the problem is that Amtrack is beholden to the freight companies.

The problem is that the costs of obtaining the right of ways and of building the necessary infrastructure far exceed any gains.  When oil is $400/barrel, we can talk…but we won't, because by then we'll be burning coal and using plug-in cars.

The automobile is here to stay in America.  Geography has dictated that fate.  The only thing that would change that is if vehicle travel was cost prohibitive, and that won't occur, even if all the oil in the world was used up.  Because there are alternative fuel sources that still make vehicular travel cheaper than a massive mass transit infrastructure.  So the only way things would change is by force.  And there exists no political will of significance to force things in a different direction.

[demented20]

The problem is that the costs of obtaining the right of ways and of building the necessary infrastructure far exceed any gains.  When oil is $400/barrel, we can talk…but we won't, because by then we'll be burning coal and using plug-in cars.

The automobile is here to stay in America.  Geography has dictated that fate.  The only thing that would change that is if vehicle travel was cost prohibitive, and that won't occur, even if all the oil in the world was used up.  Because there are alternative fuel sources that still make vehicular travel cheaper than a massive mass transit infrastructure.  So the only way things would change is by force.  And there exists no political will of significance to force things in a different direction.

Most of what you say is true. We Americans are pretty territorial and whoever tried to accumulate enough land to build new rail lines would be in court for decades. But I think you are a little fatalistic about the whole thing. There is probaly a middle course that the US will most likely take. 
To your point though, in order to build a high speed rail network from sea to shining sea you would have to tunnel through a few mountain ranges and cross some small rivers like the Ohio, Mississippi, and Missouri plus go over or under countless highways and existing rail lines. Then of course you would have to get people to ride it. If you wanted to go from one corner of the US to the other, we're talking about 3000 miles, or in British terms that like riding a train from London to umm… let me see… from London to Kuwait City, and I'm not joking.

A while ago I had a chance to travel on France's Really Fast Train and it would be great to have something like that in the US especially for business travelers and families for a weekend trip. We're talking about from major city to major city of course without too many stops in between. I don't think that it would ever replace air travel or cars for the reasons I just mentioned, but also because we do love the freedom and flexibility of automobiles.

That leads me to the last thing. I just mentioned how big the US is, but there is also some really nice scenery here. Last fall I had to drive to Washington DC area and my route took me through the Appalachian mountain ranges. They aren't as rugged as the Alps or Rockies, but the are just rugged enough and the forest is wonderful. I actually stopped on the way to take about 20 or 30 shots of the sun setting between 2 mountains with the leaves changing colors and all that. Now could I have done that on the TGV, no of course not. I would be too busy trying to see if I could read the road signs in french while going 180mph.

[Lingster]

Another thing no one has mentioned is the way we Americans generally finance infrastructure, which is via 20-year bond obligations.  So the idea of replacing something we're still paying for is a bit of a problem.  It makes much more fiscal sense to do something like this gradually, but the difficulty with that approach is that high speed rail is usually placed as a revolutionary rather than evolutionary change.

One thing that has worked pretty well are 'multimodal' commuter rail/highway corridors, where the rail is in the median of the highway.  Route 66 west of Washington, DC has this feature – aerial photo: http://www.infoi66.com/

[Lingster]

Peggy Noonan has a pertinent column in the Wall St. Journal today: http://online.wsj.com/article/declarations.html

I never fly anymore when I can avoid it.  I'll take the train or drive – I nearly took the bus to Columbus, OH this year for the Arnold but finally decided to fly.  The constant violations, the rituals I'm supposed to know but don't (because I rarely fly anymore) that inevitably wind up earning me a scowl from a 19-year-old rent-a-cop raised to a position of ultimate power.  The whole thing is infuriating and humiliating and I can barely tolerate it without exploding.

So I don't do it.  I abstain from flying whenever possible.  I've probably flown ten times (round trip) in the last six and a half years, when I previously did so ten times every year.

[Author]

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