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French lawmakers approve a ban on short domestic flights

reuters.com

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Re: French lawmakers approve a ban on short domestic flights

#291

Post by bildung »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #283
js2 wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference in relative risk is high, but the absolute risk of dying in a car is still pretty low if you're sober, wearing a seatbelt, and not speeding. Oh, and apparently if you're not driving in the U.S. Geez, didn't realize we're such crappy drivers here. https://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/motor-vehicle-safety/index.ht...

It's mostly not that people in the US drive worse, it's that people in the US drive more. Similar risk multiplied by more miles leads to more fatalities.

Sadly that isn't the case: The actual fatalities and accidents per billion km driven is higher in the US than many other industrialized countries, so it's not about more km/miles being driven in the US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...

Re: French lawmakers approve a ban on short domestic flights

#292

Post by kergonath »

gsnedders wrote: post #198
toinebeg wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lines exists. There is a project of a cooperative rail company who want to exploit this route with the existing infrastructure. https://www.railcoop.fr/ (in french)

Though note from Wikipedia ( https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ligne_de_Lyon_à_Bordeaux ) the projected journey time is 6h47, whereas going via Paris (and crossing by Metro) takes around 5h52, and there are a few connections via Massy TGV taking around 5h31. That said, I think this exactly shows one of the benefits of liberialisation of the rail market: it allows other companies to serve routes that the nationalised oper…

> That said, I think this exactly shows one of the benefits of liberialisation of the rail market: it allows other companies to serve routes that the nationalised operator does not want to.

It really does not. Private companies won’t invest in the un-profitable routes that are the most important for half the country. Instead, they’ll eat into the margins of the established companies on high profit main lines, which are used to subsidise secondary lines at the moment. So either we’ll need more public subsidies and incentives, or these routes just won’t be served. It’s good if Railcoop can keep the route open (supported by local councils, so public money), but this won’t redeem the privatisation project overall. Doing this for all important secondary routes will be more expensive than a well-run public operator Train service is a public service.

Re: French lawmakers approve a ban on short domestic flights

#293

Post by rlanday »

realusername wrote: post #85
EdwinLarkin wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any source on this or it's just your assumption that trains are faster and more reliable? I doubt that would be the case in France especially when it comes to trains.

If you're thinking about strikes, airplanes also have their fair share of strikes in France.

If you’re lucky, the train conductors and the air traffic controllers won’t be on strike at the same time though!

Re: French lawmakers approve a ban on short domestic flights

#294

Post by vl »

ornornor wrote: post #277
fy20 wrote: post #272

I grew up in the UK and from a late teen until my mid twenties I travelled by train across the country every week or so. I took the train as it was convenient for my route (no changes) and it didn't make sense to have a car for the rare times I used it (I'd commute to work by train or bike). There were long distance busses, but the times weren't convenient and they had even less leg room than aircraft. The one thing…

I think this has to do with privatization. If trains were run by the government (sure, less efficient but also no need to feed greedy shareholders), it would be much cheaper.

Ironically it’s other way around. The reason why flights are so cheap is because they are privatized and there is heavy competition. US used to have heavily-regulated air travel. Once it was de-regulated prices went down.

Since railroads require very expansive infrastructure, have natural competition limitations (two companies can’t send two trains on the same path at the same time), they are heavily regulated, and as such there is less competition, and thus no invisible hand of the market helping to lower the prices.

Re: French lawmakers approve a ban on short domestic flights

#295

Post by ekimekim »

thitcanh wrote: post #289

Semi-related: Do you think we’ll ever see a substantial reduction of pre-flight times? Why can’t we go through check-in and board directly, after an immediate security check? (Needless to say, this requires a brand new type of airport) Some airports are in a good position to implement this already: Singapore airport has security checks right at the gate so you go through them and wait a short time in the seating area…

I think the problem here is security checking, and not just because it adds time, but because it adds a highly variable AMOUNT of time.

Queueing theory says that unless you massively overprovision on available security screening stations, there's always going to be a long tail of latency for getting through security. For example, if a burst of people arrive all at once then you could take an hour to get through, whereas if you arrive at just the right moment you might only need 5 minutes.

The second part of the puzzle is that the plane costs a lot to be sitting around while people board. So it's important the plane spend as little time boarding as possible, which means passengers need to all be available to board at the same time.

I don't really see any other solution to these requirements except for passengers to arrive early enough that the worst-case security latency still gets them to their boarding on time, which means a long seemingly-useless wait for the vast majority of passengers who don't get unlucky.

Of course, the real solution to all of this is to discard or streamline the security theater that happens at airports, but that's a political problem, not a technical one.

Re: French lawmakers approve a ban on short domestic flights

#296

Post by winter_blue »

> French lawmakers voted ... as the government seeks to lower carbon emissions even as the air travel industry reels from the global pandemic.

I'm trying to reconcile with the stuff I've read and heard recently about how France (a country where 80%+ of the electricity comes from nuclear) is trying to move away from nuclear. It makes zero sense; it makes absolutely no sense at all.

Germany has also been shutting down its nuclear plants, and switching to (freaking) coal power in the interim instead. It's horrid beyond words.

Re: French lawmakers approve a ban on short domestic flights

#297

Post by fakedang »

belorn wrote: post #246
tgsovlerkhgsel wrote: post #4

There is no reason to fly short distance if you want to go from city center to city center. However, if you're already arriving or leaving on a long distance flight, the whole overhead of getting to/from/through the airport disappears and those 1.5 hours start making a difference. I think forcing companies to advertise more honest flight durations and prices could make a huge difference. If the airline tells you that…

When we compare train and air travel here in Sweden, the issues are far away from being about time, UX or advertisements. The rail system has been stagnated in the last 40-50 years and maintenance neglected. The rail is not straight and gives a lot of lateral movement, vibration and noise. The train departments are not sound isolated or have air condition. The speed limit (as a result of the neglect) makes the trip s…

German trains haven't inherited German punctuality though.

Re: French lawmakers approve a ban on short domestic flights

#298

Post by kergonath »

jcranmer wrote: post #81
Scoundreller wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I largely agree. One issue with France is that their train system is very Paris-centric. Want to go from the Rennes northwest to the Toulouse in the southwest? Yeah, you’re going to go through Paris in the centre of the country. Same with Bordeaux to Lyon. Takes about the same time driving as high-speed rail takes a horseshoe route.

This is caused in large part by the French economy and transportation needs largely being Paris-centric--the Paris metro is larger than the next 10 largest cities combined . (Admittedly, a Bordeaux-Toulouse-Montpelier-Marseille-Nice connection in the south is probably a viable TGV route. But at a quick glance, that's probably the only viable non-via-Paris route I see.)

Lyon-Strasbourg (and Germany beyond) would be useful too. Most of the high speed line is built already anyway.

I don’t know if you count them as “Paris-centric” or not, but Lyon-Lille via Marne-la-Vallée, or Lyon-Nantes via Massy are important as well.

Re: French lawmakers approve a ban on short domestic flights

#299

Post by kergonath »

dmurray wrote: post #48
tgsovlerkhgsel wrote: post #4

There is no reason to fly short distance if you want to go from city center to city center. However, if you're already arriving or leaving on a long distance flight, the whole overhead of getting to/from/through the airport disappears and those 1.5 hours start making a difference. I think forcing companies to advertise more honest flight durations and prices could make a huge difference. If the airline tells you that…

"Planes take longer to travel city centre to city centre" always gets trotted out in these discussions, but it's the wrong comparison. People don't all live in the city centre. Airports are usually outside the city, but well served by motorways and public transport. I wouldn't be surprised if more people can reach Charles de Gaulle or Orly within 45 minutes at rush hour than can get to Gare de Lyon.

> I wouldn't be surprised if more people can reach Charles de Gaulle or Orly within 45 minutes at rush hour than can get to Gare de Lyon.

Gare de Lyon sits on the RER A and 1 stop away from the RER B. Plus local suburban trains that terminate there. I’m not saying you’re wrong, but that is dead easy to access, and connects an awful lot of people. Gare du Nord is similarly very easy to get to (and the busiest station in Europe). Granted, Montparnasse or St Lazare are annoying.

Re: French lawmakers approve a ban on short domestic flights

#300

Post by Guthur »

bildung wrote: post #291
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's mostly not that people in the US drive worse, it's that people in the US drive more. Similar risk multiplied by more miles leads to more fatalities.

Sadly that isn't the case: The actual fatalities and accidents per billion km driven is higher in the US than many other industrialized countries, so it's not about more km/miles being driven in the US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...

Are they also reluctant to wear seat belts?
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