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Of course airplanes travel nearly twice that speed with about one percent of the friction. Are they going to pack rail passengers in like sardines the way airlines do? If not I don’t see how rail can ever bee more efficient.

Bullet train passenger cars are laid out similar to planes in seating configurations. 4-5 across the train depending on the model (ones I’ve seen) with say 15 rows per car (WAY MORE LEGROOM). Much wider isles than planes and lets say conservatively 8 passenger cars. That’s 15x5 per car x 8 cars = 75x8=600 on a very conservative estimate.

Of course the thing about trains are, you can add another car, and you can have other amenities that are just not possible on planes.

I have no doubt that a bullet (though I would prefer if you are going to spend that kind of money go maglev and not 40 year old tech, but that’s another story) between SF and LA would be commercially viable and successful if built, it should have been built by cali $$’s not fed $$. Cali has wasted 100’s of times the cost of this project on failed social programs over the last 40 years.

There's no doubt rail is by far the most energy efficient means of trasnportation. The problem has always been to attract enough riders to optimize the cost per unit, comparable to the cost of moving freight.

IDK the California market but if they can fill this train close to capacity it probably would make sense in a variety of ways.

Of course airplanes travel nearly twice that speed with about one percent of the friction. Are they going to pack rail passengers in like sardines the way airlines do? If not I don’t see how rail can ever bee more efficient.

Trains are more efficient because they don't have to defy the Law of Gravity.