If they can't make it profitable in places where train ridership looks like this, then they can never make it work in places like the US where train ridership is virtually non-existent
Posted on 04/23/2011 1:10:17 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
/sarcasm>
Dolt.
Hmmm. Is CapMetro running it?
If they can't make it profitable in places where train ridership looks like this, then they can never make it work in places like the US where train ridership is virtually non-existent
If Americans aren't big on high speed rails, so be it. But the Chinese are going to forge ahead to eventually have more high speed rails than the rest of the world combined. And if it fits them, so be it.
Cancel the space shuttle and returning to the moon because it has been done.
But let's build faster trains.
Still, the technology is being developed to automate automobiles ~ there are computer systems actually in place on real motor vehicles traveling around the United States.
They take on the chore of driving the route. They don't need rails or even special marker posts to assist them.
In the long run automated automobiles will be the standard ~ and that long run is coming up fast.
Wonder what a chinee 200+ MPH train wreck is gonna look like?
High speed rail might be feasible in the USA if our city populations become as dense as Tokyo, Beijing or Shanghai.
But who would want that to happen? Obama maybe?
First time an “automated” automobile runs over a 3 year old.
That will be the end of them.
For that matter, that is precisely why there won’t be any in America.
“As a result, Amtrak receives the highest per-passenger federal subsidy of any mode: $237.53 per 1,000 passenger-miles compared to $4.23 per 1,000 passenger-miles for commercial aviation.”
That’s the money quote.
Economics is at the crux of understanding why so many things with government should not be done, by government. If it’s less efficient in economic terms then it cannot be justified as a legitimate cost to be extracted by law from the pockets of taxpayers.
And, contrary to what’s often presented by passenger train advocates. the crux of the economics of the quote is in it’s use of a subsidy rate per a number of passenger miles. Rail advocates often want to quote simply the total whole dollar statistics on “transportation subsidies”, ignoring the much greater volume of passenger miles both airplanes and buses achieve. So, even when the whole dollar amount of subsidies for rail is less, in almost every case it is more on an annual passenger-miles basis.
“But the Chinese are going to forge ahead to eventually have more high speed rails than the rest of the world combined.”
Yes we know; and the British and the French kept their national pride with their Concorde for many years too. Are we to feel sad we did not join them?
“In the long run automated automobiles will be the standard ~ and that long run is coming up fast.”
Won’t ever happen for passenger cars. It might happen for buses running on fixed daily routes.
But the whole thing of getting in a car is you are in control and you can make your route as different as any spur of the moment desire or need comes to you.
There might be “automated” vehicles for very special and commercial purposes, but the un-automated personal passenger car will not go away, ever. People will find the idea to be a nightmare not a dream.
Automated cars that can be instantly overridden by a human in control are already on the roads being tested. http://alttransport.com/2010/10/the-google-car-that-drives-itself-successfully-tested/
http://alttransport.com/2010/10/the-google-car-that-drives-itself-successfully-tested/ In America. Working. Will only get better. Guy at work managed to run over his 3 year old with his car ~ as it was parked in his driveway. Fortunately it only ran over her hair.
Another one nailed by Sarah Barracuda: Bullet trains to bankruptcy.
You know it! Democrats would love that kind of population density.
Train experts have told me that if we do want to spend a bunch of money improving railroads, it should all go into separating existing freight trackage from streets and highways. This would enable faster freight, which is what would really improve our competitiveness with the rest of the world.
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