Here's a cool one for Tokyo in 3D: https://minitokyo3d.com/
Show HN: Trains.fyi – a live map of passenger trains in the US and Canada
161–170 of 316 posts
Re: Show HN: Trains.fyi – a live map of passenger trains in the US and Canada
#162It's sad that even great potential routes like SF->LA aren't accessible by train, and we don't seem to have the state capacity to build HSR there. I was just in Japan, and took the Shinkansen from Tokyo to Kyoto, which is a similar distance as SF to LA. That train: - runs every 10 minutes -- if you miss one, just take the next one! - takes 2.5 hours travel time - starts and ends in city centers on both ends. - has be…
High speed rail between San Francisco and Los Angeles isn't economically viable. California HSR will cost at least $30 billion to construct and California's own estimates claim it will cost $700-$874 million per year to operate.[1] Around four million passengers fly between SF and LA every year. Assuming every single one of them takes the train instead of flying, you're looking at $175-$218 per ticket just to pay for…
Assuming this is all true, what then makes the Japanese Shinkansen economically viable?
Re: Show HN: Trains.fyi – a live map of passenger trains in the US and Canada
#163Earlier quoted context omitted.
Outside the northeast corridor and a few others, there are many Amtrak trains are only once a day, or less, and often with long routes. It's unfortunate. The network is pretty good in terms of coverage / states covered on the map (since it's optimized for that), but lots of places it's pretty much impractical to use because the one time/day doesn't work. I really wish they could at least get to a minimum of two train…
Isn't that mostly based on the fact that they share rail time? Its not like these tracks are unused in the other periods of time, they're just not Amtrak trains.
There used to be way way more lines forming more of a mesh than the skeleton we have today. Through a series of mega-mergers we are down to effectively a west-coast-duopoly and an east-coast-duopoly of companies that can run long-distance trains.
When railroad companies merge they tend to abandon one or the other's trackage in areas where the formerly-separate networks ran between the same market areas, keeping the minimum segments of track to cover the maximum number of customers (not even maximum geographical area).
Check out the 2023 North American Abandoned Railroad Lines map: https://www.frrandp.com/p/the-map.html
Re: Show HN: Trains.fyi – a live map of passenger trains in the US and Canada
#164Earlier quoted context omitted.
High speed rail between San Francisco and Los Angeles isn't economically viable. California HSR will cost at least $30 billion to construct and California's own estimates claim it will cost $700-$874 million per year to operate.[1] Around four million passengers fly between SF and LA every year. Assuming every single one of them takes the train instead of flying, you're looking at $175-$218 per ticket just to pay for…
Assuming this is all true, what then makes the Japanese Shinkansen economically viable?
They already have the land rights, favorable social environment for construction, more compliant population, less local/more federal legal zoning and land use power, more federal level direction to get things done, higher rate of engineers in population.
That CA is bad at all of those makes it expensive and hard
In addition to very low competence levels in gov't compared to Japan due to many factors. Sure Japan has financial corruption in construction but it's a known system and they build things treating it as a tax. In CA there are many more parties who all attempt to hold construction projects hostage.
Re: Show HN: Trains.fyi – a live map of passenger trains in the US and Canada
#165Earlier quoted context omitted.
High speed rail between San Francisco and Los Angeles isn't economically viable. California HSR will cost at least $30 billion to construct and California's own estimates claim it will cost $700-$874 million per year to operate.[1] Around four million passengers fly between SF and LA every year. Assuming every single one of them takes the train instead of flying, you're looking at $175-$218 per ticket just to pay for…
Assuming this is all true, what then makes the Japanese Shinkansen economically viable?
I expect one of the biggest factors is population density.
California has a land area of 165,000mi^2. Japan has a land area of 145,000mi^2.
California population is 39M. Japan population is 125M.
Re: Show HN: Trains.fyi – a live map of passenger trains in the US and Canada
#166How very convenient! I'm on this map. My train is in the right position, but I don't think the name is quite right: I'm on the Silver Star but it's labelled as the Northeast Regional. Excellent project, though, thanks for posting.
Re: Show HN: Trains.fyi – a live map of passenger trains in the US and Canada
#167It's sad that even great potential routes like SF->LA aren't accessible by train, and we don't seem to have the state capacity to build HSR there. I was just in Japan, and took the Shinkansen from Tokyo to Kyoto, which is a similar distance as SF to LA. That train: - runs every 10 minutes -- if you miss one, just take the next one! - takes 2.5 hours travel time - starts and ends in city centers on both ends. - has be…
High speed rail between San Francisco and Los Angeles isn't economically viable. California HSR will cost at least $30 billion to construct and California's own estimates claim it will cost $700-$874 million per year to operate.[1] Around four million passengers fly between SF and LA every year. Assuming every single one of them takes the train instead of flying, you're looking at $175-$218 per ticket just to pay for…
well if you're assuming the same number of passengers - given the logistics and hassles of air travel, one is likely more inclined to travel with hassle-free HSR, not to mention the secondary economic benefits
Re: Show HN: Trains.fyi – a live map of passenger trains in the US and Canada
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Acela does the same trip in 3.5 hours. I just rode it last week, and it actually took 3 hours, not 3.5. Most of the NEC corridor from DC to NYC has a speed limit of 125mph; from NYC to New Haven, it's generally 70mph (!), from New Haven thence to about Kingston generally 90mph, and from there to Boston it's mostly 150mph. Given the density of the corridor, Amtrak should be trying for 150-220mph speed limits, but ev…
https://pedestrianobservations.com/2023/11/24/curves-in-fast... is a good analysis for anyone who doesn't want to believe jcranmer or wants more detail. (what I linked is a second best approach, but it links to other low hanging fruit like switches)
I read that post, and I have been working slowly on a set of jupyter notebooks, with ipyleaflet (mapping) integration to make building train maps (with max speeds) easier. Looking for colaborators
Re: Show HN: Trains.fyi – a live map of passenger trains in the US and Canada
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
High speed rail between San Francisco and Los Angeles isn't economically viable. California HSR will cost at least $30 billion to construct and California's own estimates claim it will cost $700-$874 million per year to operate.[1] Around four million passengers fly between SF and LA every year. Assuming every single one of them takes the train instead of flying, you're looking at $175-$218 per ticket just to pay for…
Assuming this is all true, what then makes the Japanese Shinkansen economically viable?
The distance between SF and LA (350 miles) is 50% greater than the distance between Tokyo and Kyoto (227 miles), making the time tradeoff favor trains to planes. The two cities are much bigger than SF and LA, so many more people travel between the two cities (85 million per year). Also Japan can build and maintain rail much cheaper than the US.
Re: Show HN: Trains.fyi – a live map of passenger trains in the US and Canada
#170Earlier quoted context omitted.
Same experience on my first Japan trip earlier this year. Why can't we have nice things over here?
But if there were nice things then other people would profit from that too. Especially those people [gestures vaguely]. /s In the country of individualism, options that are better but would also help other people who haven't directly contributed to it aren't very popular.
it's funny that there instances of collectivism in the US when there's either a monetary incentive or the desire to keep the "others" out
for example, the restrictive residential permitting systems in many urban areas, which just happens to be another thing Japan gets right