Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The night train revolution has been hailed as an alternative to airplanes

cnn.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 95 posts

Re: The night train revolution has been hailed as an alternative to airplanes

#31

Post by mschuster91 »

traceroute66 wrote: post #9
jmclnx wrote: post #5

>At least that’s the theory – and why the new wave of night trains are being touted as one way to replace short or even medium-haul flights across Europe and the US. I am sure in the US it is and will always be talk. Train service in the US is terrible compared to what is in the EU. It will never happen. Maybe this will work in Boston where the subways run a 3 MPH (~5kph) due to ignored repairs over the past 30/40 ye…

> Train service in the US is terrible compared to what is in the EU. And train service in the EU is terrible compared to Japan. If EU/US trains ran like Japanese Shinkanzen then there would be exactly zero need for night trains. You would board a clean train, that departed on-time, and whisked you along the countryside, reaching your destination hundreds of miles/kilometers away in 3–4 hours. Before the pedants arriv…

> If EU/US trains ran like Japanese Shinkanzen then there would be exactly zero need for night trains.

Nah, if I need to be somewhere in the morning I prefer a sleeper train over a regular train. Can't sleep while seating, gives me utterly horrible back pain.

Re: The night train revolution has been hailed as an alternative to airplanes

#32

Post by baz00 »

jddj wrote: post #28
baz00 wrote: post #6

It's not. It's expensive, noisy, takes a long time (6h door to door) and is uncomfortable as fuck. I recently had to go to Edinburgh. It was £235 standard class to get a train that takes several hours. Or £80 to get a plane that takes 2h door to door (1h in the air). If I want to go anywhere in Europe it's quicker, easier and almost always cheaper to fly. Even on a bad Lufthansa flight where everything goes wrong :)…

2hr anywhere door to door with LHR is an amazing feat. Surely doesn't include wait time? Or did you mean airport door to airport door

LHR is fine if you don't have checked baggage.

Timing was 2h14m to be precise so a little over. 11 minutes to get to the airport from here. I was running somewhat late I will add!

Re: The night train revolution has been hailed as an alternative to airplanes

#33

Post by Firmwarrior »

traceroute66 wrote: post #19
baz00 wrote: post #6

It's not. It's expensive, noisy, takes a long time (6h door to door) and is uncomfortable as fuck. I recently had to go to Edinburgh. It was £235 standard class to get a train that takes several hours. Or £80 to get a plane that takes 2h door to door (1h in the air). If I want to go anywhere in Europe it's quicker, easier and almost always cheaper to fly. Even on a bad Lufthansa flight where everything goes wrong :)…

> I recently had to go to Edinburgh. It was £235 standard class to get a train that takes several hours. UK rail is truly depressing. In Japan you can take a Shinkanzen from Tokyo to Hokkaido, 4.5 hours, 800km (appx 500 miiles) for 20,000 Yen (£108) first class or 11,000 Yen (£60) standard class. And that is walk-up fare for "right now", you can use an app to get advanced fares. And I can assure you those 4.5 hours w…

PSA: I took a long "first class" Shinkansen trip last year, and it was hideously uncomfortable. Swaying movement made me feel sick when I did anything, and the seat was curved in a way that made it impossible to relax as a 6' tall person.

My toddler went on a rampage the whole way, too, since it was an open cabin and not a private cabin

I've never taken the train in the UK, but had a much more comfortable ride in Italy a few years back

Re: The night train revolution has been hailed as an alternative to airplanes

#34

Post by bombcar »

gorgoiler wrote: post #18

You can also hear OBB’s Kurt Bauer on this episode of The Bottom Line from a few weeks ago: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001ryt1 Capacity is ultimately much harder to expand on 1D trains compared to 3D airspace. Economic pressure also means the removal of what is, for many people, the most romantic part of the whole experience: the dining car. The economics seem to be this is basically always going to be about f…

People want to move fast. Planes are great for this.

Freight has no opinion about speed. Trains are great for this.

Reducing the total amount of freight that has to be moved, and moving as much of it to rail as possible, is the easiest improvement we can make.

I think the US falls short sometimes because of the unwillingness to admit of excessive first class things that can help subsidize cheaper options.

Re: The night train revolution has been hailed as an alternative to airplanes

#35

Post by KingOfCoders »

I went on one with a bed (6 people) some years ago from Berlin to Vienna and it was a nightmare (OEBB Nightjet). It stopped several times and there were constantly people getting in and out of bed, storing suitcases, getting dressed etc.

Re: The night train revolution has been hailed as an alternative to airplanes

#36

Post by DrBazza »

traceroute66 wrote: post #19
baz00 wrote: post #6

It's not. It's expensive, noisy, takes a long time (6h door to door) and is uncomfortable as fuck. I recently had to go to Edinburgh. It was £235 standard class to get a train that takes several hours. Or £80 to get a plane that takes 2h door to door (1h in the air). If I want to go anywhere in Europe it's quicker, easier and almost always cheaper to fly. Even on a bad Lufthansa flight where everything goes wrong :)…

> I recently had to go to Edinburgh. It was £235 standard class to get a train that takes several hours. UK rail is truly depressing. In Japan you can take a Shinkanzen from Tokyo to Hokkaido, 4.5 hours, 800km (appx 500 miiles) for 20,000 Yen (£108) first class or 11,000 Yen (£60) standard class. And that is walk-up fare for "right now", you can use an app to get advanced fares. And I can assure you those 4.5 hours w…

Unfortunately we have the oldest railway in the world in continuous use, running mostly at capacity, with draconian planning laws, ridiculous land costs, population density, and a stupid general public.

You'd be hard pressed to find any capital project that's been built in the UK that anyone regrets, and that includes the Millenium Dome. I'm old enough to remember opposition to HS1 ("No to route 2!"), and opposition to CrossRail.

No one would argue that any of those were a waste.

Yet we've cancelled parts of HS2.

With the absurd bidding process of:

Govt: we have a budget of £10bn for this section in the Cotswolds, how cheap can you do it?

Bidder, erm, £9.99bn ??

Govt: ok!

Bidder: kerching!

Trying to find the link, but Rob Holden, HS1 boss, stated that HS2 budgets were publicly disclosed and the above is pretty much the outcome of contract firms knowing how much the Govt is prepared to pay.

Had we pressed ahead with HS2 we might have gotten an HS3 and 4, but that's vanishingly unlikely now.

> Assuming the London train even leaves the station and is not delayed or cancelled, as usual.

Apparently German trains are far worse than London right now.

Re: The night train revolution has been hailed as an alternative to airplanes

#38

Post by okokwhatever »

Doctor_Fegg wrote: post #23
baz00 wrote: post #6

It's not. It's expensive, noisy, takes a long time (6h door to door) and is uncomfortable as fuck. I recently had to go to Edinburgh. It was £235 standard class to get a train that takes several hours. Or £80 to get a plane that takes 2h door to door (1h in the air). If I want to go anywhere in Europe it's quicker, easier and almost always cheaper to fly. Even on a bad Lufthansa flight where everything goes wrong :)…

A sleeper train takes 0 useful hours, because you’re asleep. Plus you potentially save on a night’s accommodation. Last time I took the Caledonian Sleeper was for a morning meeting in Glasgow. My colleagues flew from Luton on the first morning flight and turned up irritable and tired. I got the Cally Sleeper and was fresh as a daisy with no time wasted - in fact I could do a couple of hours’ work while they were trog…

If you want to find excuses, we will find them. Wherever, even if it's under the stones

Re: The night train revolution has been hailed as an alternative to airplanes

#39

Post by iagooar »

What I really miss sometimes is a different approach: offer trains that can take me really far (e.g Warsaw - Paris, Berlin - Madrid), but allow me to take my car with me on the train. This way, I can enjoy the comfort of the sleeping wagon, give the kids space to move around, and I do not need to rent a car at the destination, which is very expensive and is not-my-car.

Re: The night train revolution has been hailed as an alternative to airplanes

#40

Post by VyseofArcadia »

I regularly take the Amtrak Crescent overnight to visit family down south. With two people (my wife and I), a roomette has been about on par with air travel pricewise the last couple of times we've traveled. Total privacy, comfy accomodations, internet access, meals and snacks included.

Yeah, it does take longer, but frankly I find air travel to be stressful and uncomfortable. The longer travel time is worth it to me, especially if it's roughly the same price. Not to mention that air travel at our airport has had declining on time reliability, probably because of problems with and shitty business practices of its biggest airline. Our trip might take double or triple what we expect anyway due to canceled or delayed flights.

As a bonus, a sleeper car ticket counts as "first class", so we get to enjoy the lounge at Moynihan Train Hall during our stopover in NYC.

Clarification edit: the Amtrak Crescent roomette has been on par pricewise with two regular old sardine-class airplane tickets. I'm not comparing first class to first class.

I've never actually flown first class. I doubt it is as nice as an Amtrak roomette.

Post reply on HN