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Why high speed rail hasn’t caught on

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Re: Why high speed rail hasn’t caught on

#121

Post by inglor_cz »

matkoniecz wrote: post #115
inglor_cz wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He is not entirely wrong about the capacity limits of the railway stations, though. European cities struggle with inadequate railway capacity all the time. The main problem is that the original railway stations were laid out in about 1840-1870, for much smaller passenger streams, and today find it hard to cope with modern requirements (a lot of commuters from the suburbia). But given that there is dense city infrastr…

If you have no space for larger train station, then you will have problem to fit airport there. Or even commuting infrastructure to reach airport.

That is why airports are built in the middle of nowhere (also because of the noise).

People can tolerate a longer commute to the airport and back, because few Europeans commute by air daily. Most of us fly at most several times a year.

Re: Why high speed rail hasn’t caught on

#122

Post by deepthunder »

arinlen wrote: post #36
leoedin wrote: post #3

What I find odd about this is that... Trains are the go-to means of intercity transport across much of Europe. The term "High speed rail" isn't strictly defined, but seems to kick in somewhere between 110 and 155 mph. Pretty much every intercity train in the UK is running at 125mph for at least some of their journey. Europe is full of functioning high speed rail networks - TGV, ICE, Eurostar, networks in Spain and It…

> The author tries to make the argument that there's physical limits to high speed rail that mean it'll never catch on. But the limits are far more political than physical. The author is showing considerable ignorance on the topic. For decades it's well understood that railway top speed is lower than airwaily travel. That's irrelevant. For travelling, the key factors are door-to-door speed and rider comfort. It makes…

The higher the speed the higher the cost of track maintenance.

Re: Why high speed rail hasn’t caught on

#123

Post by nopenopenopeno »

viraptor wrote: post #12
nopenopenopeno wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>HSR fails cost/benefit analysis It only fails the cost/profit analysis. The benefits are priceless when we consider the environmental impact.

Even ignoring the environmental impact, good train network is a benefit to a country. Too many people get stuck with the "train lines most be private and profitable" line of thinking.

That too!

Re: Why high speed rail hasn’t caught on

#124

Post by 1123581321 »

arinlen wrote: post #84
1123581321 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Read the article—the author prefaces with their experience riding trains all over the world and has worked in rail. There is a ton of detail, much more interesting than the conclusion.

> Read the article—the author prefaces with their experience riding trains all over the world and has worked in rail. That's like claiming they rode taxis a lot and has owned a car, and somehow that makes them an authority on public transportation.

That doesn’t track, since I was responding to a comment implying the author was ignorant of rail infrastructure outside of the US.

As to the expertise, he seems unseasoned but in command of a lot of facts. Which is why I think the conclusion is wrong despite the post being interesting and informative. Unfortunately, my fellow rail enthusiasts think I’m against them because I read the article and ignored the headline and first and last few sentences. :)

Re: Why high speed rail hasn’t caught on

#125

Post by gaadd33 »

jsinai wrote: post #48
bmitc wrote: post #5

Riding the high-speed rail in China made me so envious of that setup. If we had that in certain locations in the U.S., it would be absolutely amazing. You just show up a half hour before your train (gotta get there earlier in certain huge stations) and basically walk on. The train ride is buttery smooth with a lot of space, and you can order food from the next station to be delivered to you if you don't want any of t…

> If we had that in certain locations in the U.S., it would be absolutely amazing. You just show up a half hour before your train (gotta get there earlier in certain huge stations) and basically walk on. Security theatre in the US means you don’t just walk on the train. You sit in a waiting room with no ambition for capacity and get escorted to the platform by friendly security guards. Quite an experience if you’re n…

Where did you experience that? At least last month Amtrak from NYC didn't require anything like that, nor does the new station have any sort of waiting area to even facilitate that. I've seen something similar in Madrid, where you have to have your bags xrayed and enter into a sterile area but never in the US.

Re: Why high speed rail hasn’t caught on

#126

Post by DiogenesKynikos »

danhor wrote: post #119
DiogenesKynikos wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You would never fly Frankfurt-Paris, because the train is a much faster, more comfortable option. The Deutsche Bahn has significantly degraded over time, due to insufficient investment, but it's still an incredibly useful system. If you want to see what's possible with current technology, look at Chinese HSR. Beijing to Shanghai is a 20% longer distance than Berlin to Paris, yet it takes only half as long by train (j…

CHSR is technologically impressive, but planning and operations of boarding and stations are superior with DB that treats HSR like normal trains and not ground-level planes (an issue with many HSR systems).

In Germany, the fact that you can just walk onto the platform at any time and that your ticket is checked after boarding is very convenient.

However, on-time performance in Germany is horrendous compared to China, so I'm not willing to call Germany's operations as a whole superior. If I had to choose between my train arriving within half an hour of the scheduled time and having to board airplane style, I would board airplane style.

Re: Why high speed rail hasn’t caught on

#127

Post by midoridensha »

thrown_22 wrote: post #111
b800h wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the article: "Over longer routes, the relative hassle of getting to and from an airport instead of an HSR rail terminal is eroded by the higher speed of aircraft, even in places where the rail terminal is in a densely populated city center and the airport is way outside." I think in the case of the US, the distance makes the difference. The trouble of checking in at an airport is factored out by the length of th…

The US is the size of Europe. You'd have to take a train from Lisbon to Kiev to have a similar to say NYC to SF. A intra state high speed rail network would make a lot of sense in the US. Especially in New England. Boston - NYC should be a nice one hour and a half trip from down town to down town.

They already have a "high speed rail network" between Boston and DC (through NYC); it's called the Amtrak Acela Express.

I put "high speed" in quotes above for a reason, however...

Re: Why high speed rail hasn’t caught on

#128

Post by midoridensha »

matthewmacleod wrote: post #63
leoedin wrote: post #3

What I find odd about this is that... Trains are the go-to means of intercity transport across much of Europe. The term "High speed rail" isn't strictly defined, but seems to kick in somewhere between 110 and 155 mph. Pretty much every intercity train in the UK is running at 125mph for at least some of their journey. Europe is full of functioning high speed rail networks - TGV, ICE, Eurostar, networks in Spain and It…

Indeed. I had to fly between LA and SF while on holiday earlier this year, because the equivalent rail service takes over 11 hours . I’ve done those London-Scotland routes hundreds of times over the years and they are 4.5 hours end-to-end, and as you say this isn’t even on modern high-speed infrastructure. I get that it may be impractical to introduce a continent-spanning national rail service in the US, but there ar…

It's true, there are many corridors and routes, and not just on the coasts, where HSR would be quite feasible in America. The problem is that Americans refuse to see this and refuse to accept train travel as acceptable. You can talk until you're blue in the face about how many people transit regularly between LA and SF, or between DC and NYC and Boston, or between Houston and Dallas, and Americans will simply counter that a train between NYC and LA takes too long, and therefore trains are a completely unworkable solution anywhere in the whole country.

There's just no political will to implement true HSR in America and I don't think there ever will be.

Re: Why high speed rail hasn’t caught on

#129

Post by midoridensha »

fanf2 wrote: post #112
mickdeek86 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This topic comes up periodically on HN and it typically ends in the same points: 1. Your entire country (UK) is smaller than 11 of our 50 states. The several hundred miles between London and Edinburgh pass through many smaller cities and towns, between which people travel. Between SF and LA is a pea soup restaurant and a handful of midsized, mainly agricultural settlements that can't be gotten around without a car (o…

The USA used to have a reputation for a can-do attitude to large engineering projects.

Used to. Those days are long gone, and they're not coming back.

If we're lucky, the decline of America will resemble the decline of the UK. If we're not, it'll resemble the decline of Russia.

Re: Why high speed rail hasn’t caught on

#130

Post by midoridensha »

rendall wrote: post #76
bmitc wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

20 years is a long time and basically means it will never happen by that fact alone. The Green Line extension for Boston's MBTA has taken 16 years and still isn't done and has cost several billion dollars. It was discussed even longer than that. New York's subway systems experience the same delays and costs. It's embarrassing. Free speech, land/property rights, etc. are important, but they are just excuses, as they d…

> Free speech, land/property rights, etc. are important, but they are just excuses, as they don't seem to be the things actually slowing down these projects. Why do you say that? What is slowing them down?

Utterly broken politics at all levels, plus a ton of corruption.
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