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Taiwan managed to build high-speed rail. Why can't California?

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Re: Taiwan managed to build high-speed rail. Why can't California?

#121

Post by sct202 »

andy_ppp wrote: post #74
jedberg wrote: post #39

The California HSR has a lot of problems not matched in Taiwan. Firstly, once you get from San Jose to Bakersfield, then what? We don't have good public transit in LA, much less to Bakersfield. But even if the train went all the way to Union Station in Los Angeles, you'd still need to rent a car to get anywhere useful, or take Uber/Lyft. And same thing on the other end. What happens when you get to San Jose? You stil…

There really is no reason picking up a rental needs to be as time consuming as it is (could be dropped off like an Uber near to the station) and I’m amazed there isn’t a version of Uber that combines short hops from public transport somewhere timed for when the train arrives. These problems are actually opportunities in my opinion, I’m surprised Uber isn’t onto them...

If you have status with the rental car companies, a lot of them have express pickup where you just walk up to a designated spot number that's listed in the app and drive away. I have no idea why they go thru the whole charade of retyping everything on the computer at the rental car location if you don't have status, when they obviously know how to save data for other people.

Re: Taiwan managed to build high-speed rail. Why can't California?

#123

Post by erentz »

Fund rail like we do highways. Establish an agency to incrementally purchase ROW or track rights and incrementally upgrade services. And to tie all these services together into a cohesive network.

This would mean first all the lines in NoCal and separately SoCal would reach speeds of 120mph, electrified, with regular high quality service. That first supports the massive need for transit within these separate mega regions. You’d have a fast enough train from Sacramento to San Jose. Or from San Diego to LA. So on. This already provides good economic benefits.

Second, starting a rail renaissance this way around means you have laid out everything you need to get support for the 180+ mph HSR line that would later link these two networks into one statewide network.

At that point you would not only have support from the public because it’s obvious what the benefits will be, but you also have all the construction and project management experience built up over the years of buying/fixing/upgrading lines in these northern and southern networks.

And instead of this inside out (outside in?), stand-alone plan we had with CAHSR. You now all the way through are making peoples lives better AS YOU GO with your capital investments.

The Central Valley construction right now for example is ridiculous as everyone knows. (We know it was done because there was federal money for it, but still.)

Imagine instead that same capital expenditure had gone to making the Sacramento to San Jose Capitol Corridor route a high quality electrified 120mph line? It would’ve had immediate economic benefits and people would ride the trains and be like holy shit give me more of this now!!

Re: Taiwan managed to build high-speed rail. Why can't California?

#124

Post by LargoLasskhyfv »

jccooper wrote: post #43
throwawaytoday5 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just California, it's every state and every city in the US. People have an aversion to public works projects often crying about taxes or how the service is useless or not good enough. We have a political system where one major party (out of two) decries any public spending that might help people who aren't millionaires/billionaires/corporations. Is it any wonder when you have evil groups of people spending h…

Major highway and road projects in the US are often completed with minimal fuss. You don't really hear about these, because they go off smoothly. The difference may perhaps be that there's plenty of experience and precedent in doing these, both in government and industry, as road projects are constantly executed. Major rail construction has basically been absent in the US for a generation or more. Does the lack of ex…

Hmhmmumblemumble Houston Harvey Flooding Hagibis Flooding Nagano Shinkansen...

You mean like this?

[1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/10/13/national/ten-tr...

10 out of 30 down until further notice.

Re: Taiwan managed to build high-speed rail. Why can't California?

#125

Post by zenexer »

briandear wrote: post #119
chongli wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are these environmental lawsuits really about protecting the environment (fighting climate change) or are they NIMBY lawsuits taking advantage of environmental laws/ordinances? In general, I would expect environmentalists to be among the major proponents of high speed rail, with the goal of getting more cars off the freeways. This calls to mind the Faculty of Environment at my university, whose primary focus is on th…

> Are these environmental lawsuits really about protecting the environment (fighting climate change) “Protecting the environment” isn’t “fighting climate change.” Regardless of one’s position on the effects of CO2, that’s like suggesting that ensuring health should be entirely about how to prevent influenza. Protecting the environment includes protecting habit, stopping (actual, toxic) pollution. Climate change isn’t…

It can, but there’s a point of diminishing returns. There’s little point in protecting an ecosystem if it isn’t going to exist in a decade or two anyway. A big construction project might have a more tangible short-term impact, but if that excuse is used in every project that’s likely to have a strong positive impact on climate change, we might be shooting ourselves in the foot.

Of course, nothing is every black-and-white; destroying countless local ecosystems is a high cost, and it’s difficult to measure whether it’s worth that cost. How many ecosystems will be saved as a result? From any single project, probably none. From all the projects combined, maybe a lot.

It’s along the lines of, “nobody else is trying to prevent calamity X, so calamity X is inevitable, and I shouldn’t try to stop it if the cost is calamity Y, where calamity Y is a more localized version of calamity X.” Well, calamity X is going to bring about calamity Y anyway if everyone has that mindset.

It reminds me of the Trolley Problem [1], except the “do nothing” outcome is a long way off, and the “do something” outcome happens immediately, thereby skewing the choices.

[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolley_problem

Re: Taiwan managed to build high-speed rail. Why can't California?

#126

Post by slededit »

bobthepanda wrote: post #112
ghaff wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Evacuating cities in the event of an atomic attack was also cited as a reason though that obviously seems questionable as well. As I wrote in another comment, the defense justification was probably mostly just a way to get the help get the act passed.

Katrina and Harvey showed that at best, evacuating cities with highways is an extremely long, drawn out process that will most likely leave the most poor and destitute (who don't have cars) totally stranded.

They don't completely solve the problem, but it would be much harder to evacuate the cities without the highway system in place.

Re: Taiwan managed to build high-speed rail. Why can't California?

#127

Post by chongli »

briandear wrote: post #119
chongli wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are these environmental lawsuits really about protecting the environment (fighting climate change) or are they NIMBY lawsuits taking advantage of environmental laws/ordinances? In general, I would expect environmentalists to be among the major proponents of high speed rail, with the goal of getting more cars off the freeways. This calls to mind the Faculty of Environment at my university, whose primary focus is on th…

> Are these environmental lawsuits really about protecting the environment (fighting climate change) “Protecting the environment” isn’t “fighting climate change.” Regardless of one’s position on the effects of CO2, that’s like suggesting that ensuring health should be entirely about how to prevent influenza. Protecting the environment includes protecting habit, stopping (actual, toxic) pollution. Climate change isn’t…

Cars and trucks emit more than just CO2. They also emit particulates, nitrogen oxides, and sulphur oxides in the case of diesel. Getting thousands to millions of vehicles off the road is going to dramatically reduce local pollution in addition to cutting down on CO2.

Los Angeles is infamous for being a city with a lot of air pollution (particularly smog) and so cutting down on cars commuting to/from LA should be a major priority for environmentalists.

Re: Taiwan managed to build high-speed rail. Why can't California?

#128

Post by zeroonetwothree »

rb808 wrote: post #62
yongjik wrote: post #42

I think any talk about HSRs in the US should be able to explain US highways. American highway system is arguably one of the best in the world - it's also a gigantic government project, and it's constantly being extended. So how come America, with its proven track record of great highways, is totally impotent with high speed rails? The answer can't be just "American government doesn't work" or "the country is too big.…

> American highway system is arguably one of the best in the world No, I'd say the German Autobahn system is the best in the world, followed by France (expensive) then UK, before USA. USA is good because they tend to go to central cities, where European motorways deliver to a ring road. You can commute to work on a US motorway, but between cities they aren't special.

So you agree that it's "one of the best in the world"?

The US highway system is extremely impressive given the low population density.

Re: Taiwan managed to build high-speed rail. Why can't California?

#129

Post by zeroonetwothree »

Retric wrote: post #34
_delirium wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The total area of the state isn't too relevant, since California isn't exactly proposing to build HSR to Eureka or Redding. It's true that California's project is larger-scale, but by 2x: Taiwan has a single 200-mile HSR line, and California is trying to build a single 400-mile line.

Taiwan has 1/5th the GDP of California. So, it’s more like California had even lower goals than Taiwan.

Maybe part of the reason for the higher GDP is the lack of wasteful infrastructure spending with low returns?

Re: Taiwan managed to build high-speed rail. Why can't California?

#130

Post by zeroonetwothree »

jcranmer wrote: post #53
jccooper wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Major highway and road projects in the US are often completed with minimal fuss. You don't really hear about these, because they go off smoothly. The difference may perhaps be that there's plenty of experience and precedent in doing these, both in government and industry, as road projects are constantly executed. Major rail construction has basically been absent in the US for a generation or more. Does the lack of ex…

> Major highway and road projects in the US are often completed with minimal fuss. You don't really hear about these, because they go off smoothly. The difference may perhaps be that there's plenty of experience and precedent in doing these, both in government and industry, as road projects are constantly executed. ... yeah, I don't think that's true. Major road projects in the US often have exactly the same kinds of…

That's only a small number of the hundreds of major road projects. Most of them you don't hear about because nothing interesting happens.

FWIW, my experience with smaller-scale local projects in my area is that they are completed generally on time, competently, and achieve the desired aims.

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