Posted on 05/09/2014 9:49:39 PM PDT by Cronos
AMERICA has by far the largest rail network in the world, with more than twice as much track as China. But it lags far behind other first-world countries in ridership. Instead of passengers, most of America's massive rail network is used to carry freight. Why don't Americans ride trains?
..the Japanese, the Swiss, the French, the Danes, the Russians, the Austrians, the Ukrainians, the Belarussians and the Belgians all accounted for more than 1,000 passenger-kilometres by rail in 2011; Americans accounted for 80. Amtrak carries 31m passengers per year. Mozambique's railways carried 108m passengers in 2011.
There are many reasons why Americans don't ride the rails as often as their European cousins. Most obviously, America is bigger than most European countries. Outside the northeast corridor, the central Texas megalopolis, California and the eastern Midwest, density is sometimes too low to support intercity train travel. Underinvestment, and a preference for shiny new visions over boring upgrades, has not helped. Most American passenger trains travel on tracks that are owned by freight companies. That means most trains have to defer to freight services, leading to lengthy delays that scare off passengers who want to arrive on time.
(Excerpt) Read more at economist.com ...
The Willie Green reference come from his constant posting passenger rail threads. See the link below and reply 65 by the owner at the lower link.
http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/by:williegreen/index?brevity=full;tab=comments
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2607597/posts?page=65#65
The loss of the train infrastructure, or the electric trolly’s, is the saddest part, because those are billions to replace in today’s rebuilding costs and it won’t happen.
Whereas, ten years ago in Ohio the people could go across town for fifty cents, probably costs a lot more now. The city that kept up their infrastructure preserved the cheapest, and cleanest form of public transportation. Today to rebuild is not cost effective nor could the people afford to ride, if those costs were passed on...’it was a missed opportunity about the trolley train removal’ and in exchange their diesel, pollution, buses that they bought cheap are now expensive to maintain, replace, and meet regulations.
I would say the San Francisco Peninsula was best seen by that system you described...too bad.
Yes!
And our trains no longer go to most towns, as they once did.
The trains themselves are far slower than they once were because, for one thing, the tracks are no longer banked around curves because they are maximized for freight. The infrastructure for passenger rail is gone ... the gov-subsidized hi-speed passenger rail of Europe doesn't run at 200 mph on wooden sleepers!
AMTRAK? As you point out it leaves you high and dry miles short of the destination ... and is damned expensive. Yes, we need our cars. However, the Socialists have determined that the auto is not good for us and see no reason to keep the price of fuel within reason, while they strive to limit production.
because trains are inefficient to a society of liberty and private property. (property of ones person, thoughts, mobility)
Trains are pork and crony projects. trains DON NOT reduce congestion or reduce traffic. This article seems a false flag effort to push the US to herd its citizens like cattle into corruption crime.
Trains are about worker drones. This keeps in track with new company starts DROPPING and more companies closing.
The governments that control the trains want only big company employees NOT individuals.
Trains control where you can travel. They limit mobility choice. (property of ones thought and travel)
Actually if you combine regional train travel with local bus service, you can get within a 20 minute walk to just about anywhere within any US city with a population of over 100,000.
all passenger train projects, light, faux high speed, passenger, is just crony pork projects for politicians to simulate government “making” jobs.
(see USSR jobs paying people to be fence posts)
It is also a way for insiders to magically buy just the right land to sell for rail right of ways.
100000?
That is a small town and has no need for rail.
olympia NP
The Ferry from Victoria BC crosses to Port Angeles WA. There is a company there that has a Budget rent a car agency, a hotel and a bus line.
You take the ferry and stay in their hotel right at the station, rent a car to visit the park for several days and then return to their hotel. The next morning their bus takes you to the Amtrack station in seattle
As experienced auto/rv travelers, it is a little disconcerting to rely on others and public transit......but that is the adventure
You have your rain gear packed....right?
well, to be fair, my picture I used is one I took myself :)
Exactly! There is a significant difference in culture that leads to different population densities over a given area.
Trains to Greyhound. Greyhound to trains. Whatever works. Then use the local bus routes. You will learn when you get too old too drive. Not there yet myself.
On a lot of routes, yes. The security required and the remoteness of the airport from the city center make flying much less convenient and often not much quicker.
That guy wasn’t the Basketball player, was he?
And don’t forget, too unreliable and too union.
As a kid growing up in the greater Detroit area, my friends and I would walk the tracks for “short cuts” to avoid areas that weren’t the safest to walk through.
I figured someone would notice that from the links I put in that post.
Competing train operators are also running on Deutsche Bahn’s rails; however, DB has leeway to interfere with their advertising, ticket sales and timetable availability at train stations. (Similar to how the Pennsylvania Railroad did the same thing to the Jersey Central Railroad in Atlantic City going back to the 30s and 40s.)
That’s only been true in the USA since the end of WWII. But it is also true of airlines and bus companies.
Why is it necessary for the federal government to control the highways, though?
What killed the railroads? The interstate highway system. Whose idea was that?
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