Trains are more efficient and less polluting than other transportation modes • Hacker News Board

Re: Trains are more efficient and less polluting than other transportation modes

#111

Post by kaybe » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:12 AM UTC

philwelch wrote: post #36

shereadsthenews wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you think of an American state with a growing population you can take the existing infrastructure as a given and plan for rail for your new capacity. Unless you are willing to say we're just not going to add transportation capacity for our new citizens, you face a choice of road, rail, or air. Rail is often a good choice. As for "far apart" this seems irrelevant. Ohio has a greater population density than does S…

I'm curious how long Europe's famous rail infrastructure will continue to be cost-effective in the era of Ryanair.

I don't think this era is going to last much longer. Something has to give if we want to make any headway on climate goals, and increasing air travel prices is one of the more obvious steps.

Right now train travel is cheap if you plan ahead and have the right discount cards and some flexibility regarding time. Otherwise, not so much. But then again, this is true for flying as well.

Re: Trains are more efficient and less polluting than other transportation modes

#112

Post by mabbo » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:14 AM UTC

My wife and I took a trip to the middle of nowhere in Wales last fall. Train to Cardiff from London, then from Cardiff to our little cottage in the Pembrokeshire coast, I drove for 2+ hours in a rental car, learning to drive on the left.

The day after we arrived, we learned we could have caught a train to Fishguard, a tiny village nearby, and then the local bus would have gotten us within a ten minute walk from our rental house. It probably would have even been faster and cheaper than the car we rented. It sure would have been less stressful for me.

It's not just that the cities are more walkable. It's a whole culture that says cars should not be required to live a full life.

Re: Trains are more efficient and less polluting than other transportation modes

#113

Post by int_19h » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:14 AM UTC

anarchop wrote: post #24

Deisel freight trains are huge poluters with regard to particulate matter (PM). This actually causes cancer as opposed to CO2. Reducing PM without impacting fuel efficiency significantly is possible but requires investment. https://www.epa.nsw.gov.au/-/media/epa/corporate-site/resour... Same goes for diesel trucks / busses. This type of change throughout the world would really improve people’s lives immediately.

Trains are easier to electrify than any other mode of transport, though.

Re: Trains are more efficient and less polluting than other transportation modes

#114

Post by rtpg » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:14 AM UTC

jackcosgrove wrote: post #90

The main reason US cities rely on automobiles is because the "job watershed" of a private automobile exceeds the job watershed of train systems everywhere in the US, even New York City. The job watershed is the number of jobs within commuting distance, whatever your tolerance for a commute is, given a transportation modality. In some cities the automobile job watershed is 100x larger than the transit job watershed. T…

>both employers and residents want to minimize rents which drives sprawl and transportation webs, as opposed to hub and spoke models.

I don't think this holds up empirically? The US is home to some of the highest rents in the world. Mid-sized US cities have way higher rents than major cities like Tokyo or Paris.

Or maybe this is the idea, but if so it has failed miserably at letting people on the lower end of the spectrum be able to rent stably

Re: Trains are more efficient and less polluting than other transportation modes

#115

Post by nerfhammer » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:14 AM UTC

gruez wrote: post #56

paxy wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone is constrained by economic considerations. It's not like China has unlimited money. They are just choosing sectors and making bets on what to prioritize and what to ignore, same as everyone else.

You're right, but it's still relevant to note whether something is successful on its own accord, or whether it's being propped up by the government. If something can't be profitably done in a country as dense as China, there's no hope of it ever working in the US. At that point you might as well go with planes and spend the savings on carbon sequestration methods instead.

I mean, roads are propped up by the government and clearly not profitable

Re: Trains are more efficient and less polluting than other transportation modes

#116

Post by kposehn » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:14 AM UTC

narag wrote: post #89

kposehn wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well put. Until they have a good reason, the major freight railroads (BNSF/UP/CSX/NS/CN/CP/KCS) will continue to be all-diesel. Also, as emissions requirements have gotten more stringent they've moved to rebuilding older power (which gets around the current Tier-4 requirements instead of buying as much newer motive power. In fact, a number of the most recent-gen units have been stored as they're often 15% less effici…

Excuse if this is an absurd idea, I really don't know. But... Wouldn't it be possible to use (giant) batteries? It sounds terribly dangerous, but possible?

Power density is the main issue. There are some experiments with batteries, for sure, but you can't really create the same density of stored energy as diesel that would actually fit on a frame and can be recharged in some semblance of a normal time.

IIRC it was bandied back and forth but you'd only get a few hours of peak load, vs a diesel which can run at peak power for days before running out of fuel.

Re: Trains are more efficient and less polluting than other transportation modes

#117

Post by kaybe » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:14 AM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #91

seattle_spring wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sure don't see it that way. Let me know when we invent something that can affordably and reliably take me to the base of mountains for hikes (real hikes, not shitty crowded garbage like Lake 22 or Mount Tam).

> Let me know when we invent something that can affordably and reliably take me to the base of mountains for hikes (real hikes, not shitty crowded garbage like Lake 22 or Mount Tam). If you visit Switzerland, you'll find this is an extremely solved problem.

The connections actually go to the top of mountains as well, you can buy a ticket from Munich to the top of Zugspitze for example.

Re: Trains are more efficient and less polluting than other transportation modes

#118

Post by WalterBright » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:16 AM UTC

jcranmer wrote: post #103

temp-dude-87844 wrote: post #8

Most of the US freight rail system isn't electrified because the capital expenditures of doing so would be very large, and its return on investment in terms of direct monetary savings wouldn't materialize for many, many years. Since externalities aren't priced in, diesel-electric locomotives haul most trains in the US. More passenger rail isn't really being built in the US, because the capital expenditures of doing s…

> Most of the US freight rail system isn't electrified because the capital expenditures of doing so would be very large, and its return on investment in terms of direct monetary savings wouldn't materialize for many, many years. There's a decent amount of mainline freight rail that was electrified 100 years ago but has since been ripped out. It turns out that electrification has a lot of operational constraints that…

One possibility is a diesel-electric locomotive that also has a pickup on the top. That way part of the lines can be electrified, and the diesel fills in the gaps.

Re: Trains are more efficient and less polluting than other transportation modes

#119

Post by kaybe » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:16 AM UTC

wongarsu wrote: post #18

ams6110 wrote: post #3

Cycling is cleaner than any of them. So what?

Cycling to/from the train station and transporting your bike in the train is great (with train cars designed for it, which is not uncommon in Europe).

Folding bikes are becoming more and more popular lately. You can take them without a ticket or restriction, which is nice.

Re: Trains are more efficient and less polluting than other transportation modes

#120

Post by seattle_spring » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:16 AM UTC

undersuit wrote: post #98

seattle_spring wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sure don't see it that way. Let me know when we invent something that can affordably and reliably take me to the base of mountains for hikes (real hikes, not shitty crowded garbage like Lake 22 or Mount Tam).

Your feet?

Can you elaborate on how my feet would help get me to remote trailheads? Even if buses took me directly to the dirt roads, it's often another 20 miles to the trailhead itself. Are you suggesting I take unreliable 3 to 5 hours one way buses and then walk for 6 hours on a dirt road just to get to a good mountain climb?