[Lingster]

I'll say no more.

Ha!  We don't have the money.  I'll tell you what's going to happen – at some point we'll have machinery that can dig tunnels cheaply and at low risk.  Once that's done, we'll be able to do high speed rail in the U.S. 

Given the clusterf*ck of Boston's Big Dig, no one's seriously looking to do huge transportation engineering projects in the U.S. right now, especially not ones that touch big cities, with all their corruption.

[Lingster]

I'm going to have to disagree with your last statement Lingster, I think trains could be very practical in the US especially when you have to travel from Iowa.  Air-fare is outrageous in Iowa since are surrounded by some major cities (Minneapolis, Kansas City, St. Louis, and Chicago.  We have to travel 3-4 hours to get to some of those spots for decent air-fare.  I have started going to Atlanta for Christmas for the last couple of years and if I had the option to take a 180-200 mph train down there or to Chicago for the weekend, I would never drive again.  You would have to account for stops on the way at other locations, but at that speed, even 700-800 miles could still be covered in 6 hours (compared with 14 for driving.)
If train use were more common in the United States with more destination options and faster trains, I think we would have plenty of people that would be willing to use them.  Look at how reliable they are in China and Europe.  They aren't perfect, I realize, but then again neither are planes.

But then of course we get into the question of how much the train costs.  These superfast trains cpbell describes don't run on old-fashioned freight rail, so we'd need to spend untold billions to lay new rail lines.  The new rail would also need to be better protected – because a derailment at 250mph is a very, very bad thing – which means the whole length would require durable, frequently-inspected fencing and every crossing would need to be elevated.  How many roads cross any given rail line over 1000 miles in the U.S.?  Hundreds of elevated road crossings would need to be constructed, at a cost of several million dollars each. 

[Lingster]

Well, I'm glad you don't trundle around at 55 mph anymore. ;D

I fear, though, that you are falling for the old American trait of viewing rail travel as being slow.  In Europe, trains regularly travel safely at 180 mph.  In Japan, 200 mph is not unknown.  How much slower is that tha air travel, after you factor-in check-in, baggage check-in, security, etc?

Really?  Your commuter trains travel at 180 mph?  I've been on the Eurostar going over 200 mph, but that's meant to travel between three national capitals.

Automobiles are great up to 150 miles distance.  Trains are great from 50 to perhaps 500 miles distance.  Beyond 500 miles, air travel is the best way to go.  While Washington and Boston – the TERMINUS points on the only financially successful passenger rail corridor in the U.S. – are only 450 miles apart (with Baltimore, Wilmington, Philadelphia, Newark, New York and Hartford in between), most DESTINATION cities in the U.S. are further apart than that.  Atlanta and Chicago are more than 700 miles apart.  St. Louis and Denver are 850 miles apart.  Hell, you can go almost 300 miles in any direction from St. Louis before you hit another major city, and that's the center of the country and a major urban hub.

Additionally, anyone going west from South Florida probably ought to fly.  Anything going east from the upper midwest ought to fly, because the land route is blocked by Lake Michigan.  The Rockies are an impediment to trains, too. 

And let's not forget than any train trip lasting more than about 12 hours is either going to be very uncomfortable or very expensive, depending on whether you've booked a sleeping car.  When trains can average 400 mph then they'll be practical for the U.S.  Until then it doesn't make sense for us to invest in a long-distance transportation infrastructure that takes two or three days to get from one end of the country to the other, when a jet can do it in six hours at a fraction of the cost.

[Lingster]

In the U.S. we simply have too much space between our large cities, everywhere except the Boston-Washington corridor.  So people in the U.S. tend to combine travel modes instead of relying on one.  Trains aren't that flexible, and they're slow, so people prefer to use planes (inflexible but fast) and cars (flexible but slow).

Also, the infrastructure costs of rail construction and maintenance are pretty high.

And 55 is not the national speed limit anymore.  In most states its 65 or 75 on the open highway.

[Lingster]

Good luck, Mimi.  I'm sure you'll figure it out and thrive.

Today is also bittersweet for me, because this morning I discovered a new innovation that will very rapidly strip away the anonymity of many web site operators, including me.  So I am also wondering where to go from here with all of this.

I've always thought that old mantra – "change is good" – to be ridiculously simplistic.  Even when we get to choose the change, which is rare, it's still painful to go through it.

[Lingster]

As a Brit, you are probably not familiar with some of the legendary traits attributed to him (mostly due to Parson Weems' partly fictionalized biography that was published after Washington's death). However, some are more credible, such as the story that he threw a rock across the Rappahannock River in Fredericksburg, which would have been about three hundred feet.  So this video is a parody of those tales, tall and otherwise.

In reality he was physically a very large and powerfully built man, especially for the period, and could be incredibly intimidating when he wanted to be.  He also looked pissed-off most of the time: he'd lost his teeth at an early age and the primitive dentures available in that time gave him a sour expression.  So it's true that he was pretty bad-ass.

He was a very strong leader and administrator but a mediocre strategist and tactician.  His most remarkable feature, however, was that he had the strength of character to walk away from supreme power on two distinct occasions – following the war in 1783 and again following his second term as president in 1797.  Through his humility he demonstrated the practicality of elected government and contributed perhaps more than any other to the rise of democratic states.

The only president who defied Washington's tradition of limiting presidential service to two terms was Franklin Roosevelt, who held on to the office until he keeled over in his fourth term.  During FDR's third term, the two-term limit was formalized as a constitutional amendment, lest any future president have similar designs on permanently occupying the office.

[Lingster]

This.  Is.  Awesome.

[html][/html]

[Lingster]

The first She-Hulking ever is available on eBay.  The original artwork of the first appearance of She-Hulk! 

h/t: http://shulkie.com

[Lingster]

Did you write that in an editor with line breaks and then insert it, Philo?

[Lingster]

As part of my ongoing attempt to fix the forum weirdness, I tried something novel that will probably cause all sorts of unintended problems down the road.

I hesitate to ask, but if you see anything genuinely weird that has not previously been posted as a problem on the feedback forum, please post it here.

[Author]

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