Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.
Posted on 06/07/2010 7:45:38 AM PDT by Willie Green
China's $1T USD high speed rail gambit leaps ahead
High speed rail is right up there with electric vehicles when it comes to promising green solutions to transportation in the new millennium. High speed rail uses electricity and mass-transit to drastically cut emissions when compared to automobile travel. And it's expected to be far faster and more cost effective transportation method, albeit with some big up front costs for infrastructure. Much as the original coal-burning locomotive and oil-burning automobile revolutionized transportation in the 19th and 20th centuries, the electric locomotive looks to transform society in the 21st century.
The U.S. under President Barack Obama has committed $13B USD in high speed rail investment. That seems somewhat impressive until one hears about China's high speed rail commitment. China has already spent $259B USD on high speed rail and plans on spending a total of $1T USD by 2020 to install 16,000 miles of high speed rail track -- or roughly 1/3 of the length of the U.S.'s total interstate highway system.
China put the exclamation point on its efforts last week with the unveiling of its flagship high speed rail model, the 380A train. With a 236 miles per hour top cruising speed, the train is the world's fastest.
A handful of maglev trains can beat the 380A in top speed, but they are unable to sustain a faster average speed. The "380" part of its name comes from its 236 mph cruising speed which translates into 380 kilometers per hour. The train will offer a 4 hour ride between Shanghai and Beijing. That cuts the trip time to less than a third of the driving time (12 to 13 hours).
A Chinese firm, Changchun Railway Vehicles Co., makes the impressive vehicles. The first production model, the "He Xie", was unveiled last week at a ceremony in Changchun, the capital of the northeastern province of Jilin in China. At the ceremony, the Chinese government pledged to purchase 100 of the speedy trains.
High speed rail will provide the Chinese economy with a unique advantage as it continues to grow and expand. Business travelers will be able to make trips much faster and regain literally weeks in productivity each year. And carbon emissions, long a sore spot for China, will be cut in a way that's actually beneficial for the economy.
Meanwhile, the U.S. sees its own plans for high speed rail stalled as it ponders potentially less effective solutions for carbon control like "carbon-credits". The 380A and China's high speed rail ambitions have led some to question if the U.S. will be left behind as the rest of the world embraces high speed rail.
The USA is not China.
We are individualists rather than collectivists and this especially applies to personal transportation.
Pretty nifty for a country that still murders hundreds of thousands of its own people a year and has the poverty numbers it does.....the US left will and does worship the government style of China, despite every once in awhile throwing out the human rights violations card....Anita Dunn and other Moaist are tickled to death....
I wouldn’t want to travel 200+ mph in anything made in China.
I would prefer a train system that actually takes me to where *I* want to go, in modest comfort, at a fair price, and doesn’t permit thuggish patrons and/or public urination/defecation on the facilities.
I don’t care if it’s the world’s fastest.
translation: I want the UK trains.
good let the chicoms ride in cattle cars...
....I will fly or drive thank you very much.
Great, back to Coal Powered Trains.
Over 80% of China’s electrical power comes from coal.
http://iea.org/stats/electricitydata.asp?COUNTRY_CODE=CN
Yes, that's why we drive on government owned roads, pay taxes to the government to pay for said roads, and beg every 1 to 4 years the precious privilege of a license to drive on said roads from said government and a registration to permit use by said government of our personally owned vehicle. Then we submit meekly to the directions of the officers of said government about how we may use these roads and suffer financial penalities when we get to indidivualistic about our own opinion of safe condut on the roads concerning speed, passing, and other driving manuevers.
That sounds very non-collectivist to me. (/sarcasm)
Good thing we don't use those evil collectivist trains that permit free passage without distraint by anyone with no conditions other than payment of the fare.
China Unveils World's Fastest High Speed Train WRECK!
In Texas we’ve sold some of the major roads to private companies to operate as toll roads...so you were saying?
“Good thing we don’t use those evil collectivist trains that permit free passage without distraint by anyone with no conditions other than payment of the fare.”
I think so, you are free to ride all the Amtrac you want to.
Yeah. Just wait until they have a high-speed trainwreck. It should all fit on one good sized lowboy once the juices quit oozing out.
Since Green energy is a fraud, so is this boondoggle. Nobody wants this antiquated method of transportation other than environazis and corrupt pols.
Pray for America
In Texas we’ve sold some of the major roads to private companies to operate as toll roads...so you were saying?That's pretty stupid, especially since we could've collected the tolls ourselves instead of letting Perry's cronies stuff the tolls into their own pockets.
Hey, America will get a high speed train. Unfortunately, it will only be allowed to go 45 miles per hour so as not to hurt any endangered snails that may attempt to cross the tracks. (Gotta give the conductor time to stop!)
“China’s $1T USD high speed rail gambit leaps ahead”
Great. Let’s give Obama yet another idea for how to waste more trillions. If high-speed trains were economically viable, the private sector would offer them up. Do the Europeans, Japanese, Chinese or anyone else have trains that are self-supporting?
Amtrak subsidies cost $32 per passenger.
http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2010/05/of-cows-subsidies-and-amtrak.html Why do we think high-speed Amtrak would be any different?
Pixie dust?
Obama and China and the MSM like trains because they are easy to unionize and easy to use to control personal transportation.
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