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I think the question should be, why should America have high speed bullet trains.

But the reasons why we can’t have them are tied into why we don’t have passenger trains now.

1. America is not laid out like Europe. Essential businesses and population areas are spread out all over.

2. America is much bigger than Europe or Japan.

3. Americans don’t ride passenger trains or buses if they have a choice. As my daughter said, returning to Texas after a year in New York City, I don’t want to ride to work in a subway with all those creepy people. I want to drive my own pickup.

4. American rail lines are currently in the wrong places for bullet trains or the best routes are already occupied by freight lines. And they are terribly maintained because it doesn’t pay to maintain them better.

5. As shown in California, the “environmental studies” and environmental litigation encouraged by American law cost as much or more than the physical cost of construction. That doesn’t even include the vast time delays this causes, and time delays in a construction project are gigantic costs. We would not be able to build the existing Interstate highway system if we started today, either.

Nobody here wants to ride a train if they don’t have to. Bullet trains do fit the soviet-style planned economy and living conditions the progressive are so eager to force upon us, though.

As my daughter said, returning to Texas after a year in New York City, I don’t want to ride to work in a subway with all those creepy people. I want to drive my own pickup.

My grandfather bought his Essex sedan not because the roads in Iowa were pleasant - or even useable at times - but because he didn't particularly like having to share a railroad car with his fellow Americans... and grandpa was far from a snob.

This is sometimes posed as a question in elementary topology. Trains and cars are linear operators constrained to one dimension. Travel within a city or country is constrained to two dimensions. Travel then becomes an areal operation. The only way to effect a transform with the linear operation is with a grid, which means inefficiency and bloated costs when applying an engineering solution. Those inefficiencies manifest as either a lot of nodes on the grid, or limiting nodes which means larger gaps between nodes which have to be covered means. Air travel avoids some of this by adding a third dimension, which makes point-to-point travel possible, at least on a limited basis. You still need nodes (airports), but the former linear gridlines are now stretched and warped to minimize node to node travel. The ideal solution is point-to-point air travel using a personal conveyance, and while we have been waiting a long time for the George Jetson-type flyer, I'm not convinced I will ever live to see it.

Which reminds me of the old jest about topologists:

Q: What is a topologist?

A: Someone who cannot distinguish between a doughnut and a coffee cup.

I've read all the the comments. It seems like the general consensus is that most FReepers (with one or two exceptions) have never rode in a HSR, do not care to ride in one, and associate it with progressive liberalism and communism. They would rather follow the dictated of whomever is flying the conservative banner rather than question why things are so, and what is wrong with our society.

I for one, have a background in aviation, and I love trains. So am I conflicted? Not in the least. Each method serves a purpose and a role. For cheap costs, easy comfort, and a leisurely experience, nothing beats HSR. This is hands-down the preferred way of travel.

Air travel in the USA is like going into a slaughterhouse with TSA groping, and NSA screening, not to mention DHS military watching your every move. Then you are jam packed in seats too small for you, with cramp inducing leg room.

As the videos clearly show, that HSR in China doesn't resemble the USA nightmare. And the point of the article is a good one...
Americans need... NEED to slap their collective faces and look around them. The rest of the world is moving on, and America is being left in the dust. Or to put it another way....

I met a IT specialist who did ten years at hard labor. He told me that all he could think of while he was in prison was all the different ways that "dial-up" modems could be improved. he must have worked out twenty really ingenious ways to improve them. Then when he exited prison he looked around and everyone was using wireless and dial-up modems were obsolete. He was totally out of his element, and went into a kind of mind numbing shock. It is difficult when all your plans and beliefs come crashing down.

Most of the comments here, and read them for yourself if you don't believe me, are rationalizations as to why there isn't any HSR in the USA. Rationalizations. Not one person is willing to look at the problems and the obstacles and say.."Here's the problem! and we, as Americans can easily over come that minor hurtle." Instead, we rationalize.

Like the overweight person that sits in front of the television and watches a show on how to exercise. Instead of turning off the TV and exercising themselves.