So, as someone that lived in New York for 6 years and California for 6 years, stories like this are incredibly depressing. The US is the world's largest economy and should be the shining example of amazing infrastructure, high-tech, green cities, and forward thinking policies. California is an especially egregious example in terms of infrastructure investment: If California was a country it would be the world's fifth…
The alternative to being stuck in traffic for hours is flying. A major problem with train systems in the United States (and this is both short and long haul) is that almost the entire country is sprawl - built around the automobile. In dense environments (China and the north-east coast of the US (which has Acela), it's great to take a train into the core -- you beat traffic and are near your destination. In sprawling…
China laying tracks for 1,000km/h maglev trains
201–210 of 503 posts
Re: China laying tracks for 1,000km/h maglev trains
#202Sadly, China has already wasted too much money on the so called high speed rails running at 300-350km per hour. I was looking at my HSR options from Shanghai to Xi'an (1,500km distance) yesterday, the fastest train takes almost 6 hours and there is only one everyday. That 6 hours ride costs me almost $100 USD while $120 USD can covers my flight to Xi'an in 2.5 hours and I can choose the time of my flight. $20 extra t…
Re: China laying tracks for 1,000km/h maglev trains
#203Re: China laying tracks for 1,000km/h maglev trains
#204So, as someone that lived in New York for 6 years and California for 6 years, stories like this are incredibly depressing. The US is the world's largest economy and should be the shining example of amazing infrastructure, high-tech, green cities, and forward thinking policies. California is an especially egregious example in terms of infrastructure investment: If California was a country it would be the world's fifth…
Re: China laying tracks for 1,000km/h maglev trains
#205So, as someone that lived in New York for 6 years and California for 6 years, stories like this are incredibly depressing. The US is the world's largest economy and should be the shining example of amazing infrastructure, high-tech, green cities, and forward thinking policies. California is an especially egregious example in terms of infrastructure investment: If California was a country it would be the world's fifth…
I’m under the impression that the US public want cars not trains and even the current tech celebrity’s vision is to have self driving cars that work together as if they are train carriages and go in a tunnel as if they are metro train carriages. In the rest of the world, people are fine with ride sharing.
Re: China laying tracks for 1,000km/h maglev trains
#206Why? Why would anybody build trains like that instead of adopting the hyperloop technology which is faster, much more cheap and more safe?
Re: China laying tracks for 1,000km/h maglev trains
#207Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Every time California's high speed rails come up on HN it's obvious that everyone here hates the idea California's major cities are almost in a line along the coast. That's the route that makes sense. California's HSR instead took a tour through the Central Valley's farming communities, taking a slam dunk pitch for linking San Francisco and San Diego via L.A. and turning it into a carcass.
Unless you wanted to build an HSR line through a long coastal mountain range most of way from SF to LA further driving up the cost, having it go the majority of the distance through a relatively flat valley definitely has its benefits. I do think that the line should have paralleled i-5 instead of going through Bakersfield and Fresno, but that's not the choice that was made.
Re: China laying tracks for 1,000km/h maglev trains
#208Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think there are two factors at play here. 1) We have the curse of being first. Our cities are old so our infrastructure is old. 2) We can't just say, "Your land is ours, get the fuck out, construction begins in one week" They can also cut corners on safety and pollution. The ends always justify the means.
> We can't just say, "Your land is ours, get the fuck out, construction begins in one week" didn't they say that when they arrived 400 years ago
Didn't x say y 1,000 years ago?
You're talking about different people: literally, morally, culturally - in most every way in other words. What does the average American today have to do with someone that came over from the British Empire in September 1620? The Pilgrims were not a mixture of German, African, Mexican and Chinese. Today is not 400 years ago.
Re: China laying tracks for 1,000km/h maglev trains
#209So, as someone that lived in New York for 6 years and California for 6 years, stories like this are incredibly depressing. The US is the world's largest economy and should be the shining example of amazing infrastructure, high-tech, green cities, and forward thinking policies. California is an especially egregious example in terms of infrastructure investment: If California was a country it would be the world's fifth…
The Chinese government is much more autocratic yet it obviously does a much better job in building infrastructure
The problem with the US government is lobbyism. It does not work for itself, it does not work for the people, it works for big corporations and lawyers.
Re: China laying tracks for 1,000km/h maglev trains
#210Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can gauge the insincerity of the project by the mendacity of the title. There is an area of Texas known universally as "Central Texas". The "Texas Central" project goes nowhere near it. It's a rail line from Houston to Dallas. It's not going to happen, unless the legislature goes full bore socialize-the-losses and subsidizes it.
that seems very unlikely to happen in texas, right? socialized public transit doesnt seem like a distinctly texan thing to do.