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How far can you go by train in 5h?

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Re: How far can you go by train in 5h?

#91

Post by DrBazza »

qalmakka wrote: post #22

As a European it boggles my mind seeing how trains are basically non-existent in the USA (just look at Houston station), given how dominant the whole "Wild West" railroad rush is in everybody's immagination. Railroads are super ubiquitous here, and we've to work with a pretty hostile terrain - Italy has lots of mountains, hills, rivers, and yet has one of the best networks in the world. Most of the USA are basically…

I'm not convinced high speed rail would ever work in the US due to how entrenched the car culture is, regardless of the terrain.

In Europe with we have spoke-and-hub railways - want to get into London? There's almost certainly a local station near you in the suburbs. Then jump on the Eurostar to Paris. Get to Paris, and then get a local line back out to wherever you want to go.

Right now, it would have to be airport like terminals, and a multi-decade (if not century long) plan to connect the city centres.

In the US, drive to the new high speed mainline station outside the city, where there would have to be as much parking as an airport, and then get the high speed line to the destination, and then... hire a car?

Building a mainline station in many US city centres for high speed lines isn't going to work right now. There are too few local lines going in, and nowhere to build super-sized car parks.

Re: How far can you go by train in 5h?

#92

Post by klohto »

ramboldio wrote: post #30

It's sad to see how disconnected the national railway systems are in eastern europe. Basically, 5h always fills the national borders but no further in Hungary, Romania, Poland etc E.g., train connections from Czech Republic to southern Germany are missing all together.

We all have neglected the networks while claiming to have “the biggest rail network”. Well, now it’s the slowest, and probably the most underfunded. The missing connection to South Germany don’t make sense though. Just take a train to Berlin and take DB anywhere.

Re: How far can you go by train in 5h?

#94

Post by gield »

From Brussels, Belgium, you can reach in 5h:

- Wales and deep into northern England (Newcastle

- the whole western border of Germany

- the south coast of France

- Switzerland

I was never into the whole "center of Europe" thing, but this puts things in a different perspective.

Re: How far can you go by train in 5h?

#95

Post by nisa »

klohto wrote: post #92
ramboldio wrote: post #30

It's sad to see how disconnected the national railway systems are in eastern europe. Basically, 5h always fills the national borders but no further in Hungary, Romania, Poland etc E.g., train connections from Czech Republic to southern Germany are missing all together.

We all have neglected the networks while claiming to have “the biggest rail network”. Well, now it’s the slowest, and probably the most underfunded. The missing connection to South Germany don’t make sense though. Just take a train to Berlin and take DB anywhere.

> The missing connection to South Germany don’t make sense though. Just take a train to Berlin and take OBB anywhere.

It's the difference between 6-8h and 2-3h to reach a city in Czech Republic. However the tracks connecting Germany/Czech Republic in the south are not in good shape if I remember that correctly.

Re: How far can you go by train in 5h?

#96

Post by onlyrealcuzzo »

melling wrote: post #35
Robotbeat wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact the US is basically empty means the cost to build a HSR route to go between population centers is super high because of the sheer distances involved. You’re talking like 1000 miles, not 200. The places which are closer together, like the East Coast, do have some passenger rail but they’re also much denser, like Europe, and so they have the same kind of constraints (or worse). The US has a lot of freight rail…

Yes, we agree we should only build where it makes sense. 1000 miles is quite far. That would be 5-6 hours! - NYC - Miami 1300 miles - NYC - Chicago 800 miles Then we have these: - NYC - Philly 92 miles - NYC - DC 225 miles - NYC - Boston 215 miles - NYC - Portland, ME 325 miles - NYC - Pittsburgh 380 miles - NYC - Cleveland 470 miles - Cleveland - Chicago 350 miles - St. Louis - Chicago 320 miles - Houston - Dallas 2…

The entire Great Lakes region is decently densely populated.

- Columbus - Cleveland 142 miles

- Columbus - Cincinnati 106 miles

- Cleveland - Pittsburgh 134 miles

- Cleveland - Toledo 114 miles

- Columbus - Toledo 142 miles

- Toledo - Detroit 58 miles (Cleveland, Columbus, & Cincinnati can share this)

- Toledo - Chicago 244 miles (Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, & Detroit can share this)

Theoretically, you can connect Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, & Pittsburgh into That's going to beat flying. And that connects about:

- Chicago 9.5M

- Detroit 4.5M

- Pittsburgh 2.3M

- Cincinatti 2.3M

- Columbus 2.2M

- Cleveland 2.1M

- TOTAL = 23M+ people (~7% of the US)

For 940 miles of rail...

Even considering that HSR costs ~$100M per mile - that's about $4k per person.

That sounds like a lot. But since we have frequent opportunities to finance 30-year treasuries at ~1.5% interest and the Fed mandates inflation to be ~2% or higher:

=PMT(-0.005/12, 30*12, -4000)

That's about ~$10.30 per month per person. Considering the average tax payer is paying ~$1,300 per month in federal taxes - 0.7% of that going to HSR where it makes sense - does not seem like a terrible idea...

For context, highways cost about ~$200B per year - which comes down to ~$49.75 per tax payer per month - however, only about 1/4th of that is Federal taxes (~$12.43).

I'll also add that the Great Lakes is probably at the bottom of the list of regions where HSR would make sense. Other places like the Northeast make much more sense.

Re: How far can you go by train in 5h?

#97

Post by fatnoah »

woodruffw wrote: post #43

For the Europeans on HN: on the East coast of the US, the furthest you can get by train in ~5h is roughly Boston to NYC, or NYC to Washington, DC. Both are roughly equidistant (~220 miles, ~354 kilometers). One of the perverse things with our passenger rail network is that you can actually take take trains that "only" take 2.5 hours, but: they run nonstop point-to-point, and any subsequent connection you make (e.g. t…

Boston to Philadelphia a closer approximation. The Acela is scheduled for 5h 1m for that trip. I travel between Boston and New York by train frequently, and even the slower regional service takes < 4 hours. Either way, still not a great comparison to Europe.

Re: How far can you go by train in 5h?

#98

Post by melling »

DrBazza wrote: post #91
qalmakka wrote: post #22

As a European it boggles my mind seeing how trains are basically non-existent in the USA (just look at Houston station), given how dominant the whole "Wild West" railroad rush is in everybody's immagination. Railroads are super ubiquitous here, and we've to work with a pretty hostile terrain - Italy has lots of mountains, hills, rivers, and yet has one of the best networks in the world. Most of the USA are basically…

I'm not convinced high speed rail would ever work in the US due to how entrenched the car culture is, regardless of the terrain. In Europe with we have spoke-and-hub railways - want to get into London? There's almost certainly a local station near you in the suburbs. Then jump on the Eurostar to Paris. Get to Paris, and then get a local line back out to wherever you want to go. Right now, it would have to be airport…

Would never work because of our car culture? I’m going to use my imagination on this one since “never” is a long time.

The year 2040. Two technologies combine make never a reality.

1. Maglev trains that travel at 350 miles per hour (600kph)

2. Self-driving taxis

Exhibit 1:

https://www.cnn.com/travel/amp/china-fastest-maglev-train-in...

NY to LA in 10 hours by maglev sometime in this century.

The 4 hour maglev between Miami and NYC will be popular.

Re: How far can you go by train in 5h?

#99

Post by geraldwhen »

dr_dshiv wrote: post #41
rr888 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to think this too, now I live here the American system actually works pretty well. Railways are actually very busy with freight, which keeps it off the roads and freight doesn't mind pauses and running overnight. Lots of rural connections are much easier to drive. Even between cities its easier because for train connections you'd have to get to the station (usually central) where if you drive you can go direct…

But that means the modern USA misses out on the inherent benefits of density. This is a weird counter rational behavior— it is in everyone’s perceived best interest to live in big separate homes, but the collective social economic benefit of living together is evident. Also evident is how sprawl sucks vitality from culture.

No thank you. I live near enough howling dogs. I will never forget the peace and quiet when I stepped into my first house.

Why anyone lives in apartments by choice is beyond me. The noise is absurd.

Re: How far can you go by train in 5h?

#100

Post by vidanay »

PaulHoule wrote: post #80
qalmakka wrote: post #22

As a European it boggles my mind seeing how trains are basically non-existent in the USA (just look at Houston station), given how dominant the whole "Wild West" railroad rush is in everybody's immagination. Railroads are super ubiquitous here, and we've to work with a pretty hostile terrain - Italy has lots of mountains, hills, rivers, and yet has one of the best networks in the world. Most of the USA are basically…

It’s almost forgotten how much resentment Americans had to the private railroads. They would buy land along the tracks, refuse to make a stop in your town, and start a new town. There was a phrase, ‘railroaded’ to describe being a victim of this power imbalance. As such, people saw the roads as belonging to everyone but railroads being to the benefit of a few.

A significant portion of the land wasn't bought, it was acquired through eminent domain.

And an even more significant portion of the land was simply stolen from natives (both by settlers and by the railroads.)

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