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High-speed rail taking shape even as opponents seek to kill it

sfchronicle.com

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Re: High-speed rail taking shape even as opponents seek to kill it

#211

Post by dragonwriter »

datahack wrote: post #106

If I had known that they were going to run this through the Central Valley instead of down the coast where it belongs I never would have voted for it. It should have gone straight from la to Oakland or emeryville, turned and gone straight to Sacramento. Instead we have a convoluted mess of rail connections that take people places they don't even want to go (no offense to Bakersfield buts it's hardly a holiday destina…

> If I had known that they were going to run this through the Central Valley instead of down the coast where it belongs I never would have voted for it.

The coast would be a stupid place to run high speed rail; it would be both more expensive to the lay the track there and less useful.

Re: High-speed rail taking shape even as opponents seek to kill it

#212

Post by mikekchar »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #190
pm24601 wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously - trains should go where the people are. The people are in the central valley. Between Santa Barbara and Santa Cruz the population is very light and the terrain is very difficult. It wasn't until the 20th century that access to the Big Sur area was possible. And even today for over a hundred miles highway 1 is the only access. Fresno - 509,000 people Bakersfield - 363,000 people The first segment connects 1…

trains should go where the people are That's why the money would be better spent on local transit improvements inside the Los Angeles area and the Bay Area, not connecting them.

Making trains go where people aren't relieves the pressure on ever increasing prices in populous areas. People will have a realistic option of living in cheaper areas.

AND it allows real estate speculators to get a much higher rate of return when they build up cookie cutter neighbourhoods in cheap land that is soon to be linked up by rail.

Both a good and a cynical reason for this behaviour, which is why I don't think you'll ever see it change (no matter where you are).

Re: High-speed rail taking shape even as opponents seek to kill it

#213

Post by Sanddancer »

1024core wrote: post #154
ajmurmann wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it rains at SFO or there is fog they have to close 2 of the 4 runways and now you got massive delays. I've had a flight delayed from 8pm to 1:30am last year. Having lots of flights going the same way doesn't help, if the flights cannot take off.

And what do you do if there's a suicide (unfortunately) on the HSR? The Caltrain that runs down the Peninsula from SF to SJ has a pretty high suicide rate; high enough, that there are people posted to look for potential suiciders.

Part of the cost is improving the peninsula rail corridor for full grade separation, along with the suicide prevention improvements Caltrain is already performing on the corridor. When it's built, there should be a lot fewer places for suicide and a lot tighter control.

Re: High-speed rail taking shape even as opponents seek to kill it

#214

Post by dragonwriter »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #190
pm24601 wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously - trains should go where the people are. The people are in the central valley. Between Santa Barbara and Santa Cruz the population is very light and the terrain is very difficult. It wasn't until the 20th century that access to the Big Sur area was possible. And even today for over a hundred miles highway 1 is the only access. Fresno - 509,000 people Bakersfield - 363,000 people The first segment connects 1…

trains should go where the people are That's why the money would be better spent on local transit improvements inside the Los Angeles area and the Bay Area, not connecting them.

Money is being spent on local transit improvements in the LA and Bay Area as part of the High Speed Rail project.

Re: High-speed rail taking shape even as opponents seek to kill it

#215

Post by arrosenberg »

Justin_K wrote: post #171
capkutay wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is really disappointing that it doesn't at least go near the coast. I doubt they'd be able to eminent domain coastal lands now that california homeowners are so politically powerful now, but they at least could have tried to build it along the 101 so it was driving/bus distance to the coast. If you want to take a beautiful coastal train ride, nothing beats the Amtrak from LA to San Diego.

Which takes longer than a drive in traffic.

Usually only by 30-60 minutes if there is any amount of traffic, and it's substantially less stressful.

Re: High-speed rail taking shape even as opponents seek to kill it

#216

Post by the_mitsuhiko »

gsnedders wrote: post #85
the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Eurostar does Eurostar is the exception to every train. It's a monster of complexity because it has to work on three systems. It also does not have 550mm platform height. I think it has 750? > some TGV trainsets But not because of the platform height but because of stability in case of a crash. The TGVs with bogies between the cars has the same general height setup as the traditional ones. > (If the floor is below…

Eurostar is 760mm. The EU TSI requires 550mm or 760mm; the UK rail network has a blanket exemption excluding it from that (platforms are more-or-less universally 915mm in the UK).

Except when you are in rutal Scotland. Then you will find a little stool on the platform to help you climb up a meter :)

Re: High-speed rail taking shape even as opponents seek to kill it

#217

Post by ant6n »

gydfi wrote: post #191
sethhochberg wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd be surprised if a "car train" running on rubber tires, even if as aerodynamically efficient somehow as a high-speed train, could ever match the same efficiency per occupant-mile. Ignoring everything else, steel wheels on steel rails have a massive efficiency advantage from lower rolling resistance alone - and a train carrying 400 people is going to have far fewer wheels per passenger than a "car train" carrying 4…

Yep, rolling resistance is the big factor in favour of the train. The big factors for the car-train are much smaller cross sectional area and the fact that it's always exactly as long as it needs to be, unlike the train which needs to run even when it's mostly empty.

Once you have steel wheels, air resistance is the main problem. For trains it largely only depends on the nose of the train, then the length doesn't really matter. Since your "car train" isn't smooth, it'll have much more overall air resistance.

Re: High-speed rail taking shape even as opponents seek to kill it

#218

Post by briandear »

avn2109 wrote: post #123
dclowd9901 wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You really think the TSA isn't going to want a piece of this?

The TSA's primary mandate is just to socialize legal liability for terrorist attacks away from the airlines. Their secondary mandate is crony capitalism. Their tertiary mandate is to acclimatize the population to the trappings of the unconstitutional American police state. Only the latter would be substantially aided by encroachment onto rail, so I'm not too worried about it for now.

The airlines never asked for TSA. In fact the airlines would prefer doing their own screening like the old days. And 'crony capitalism?' That makes no sense.

Re: High-speed rail taking shape even as opponents seek to kill it

#219

Post by dragonwriter »

briandear wrote: post #218
avn2109 wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The TSA's primary mandate is just to socialize legal liability for terrorist attacks away from the airlines. Their secondary mandate is crony capitalism. Their tertiary mandate is to acclimatize the population to the trappings of the unconstitutional American police state. Only the latter would be substantially aided by encroachment onto rail, so I'm not too worried about it for now.

The airlines never asked for TSA. In fact the airlines would prefer doing their own screening like the old days. And 'crony capitalism?' That makes no sense.

The airlines asked for both retrospective and prospective relief from liability for the actual past (retrospective) and potential future (prospective) security failures in the wake of 9/11.

Nationalization of the security function was the mechanism for the prospective portion of that relief; since they no longer controlled the function, they would no longer be liable for any failures.

Now, they would have preferred immunity from liability while controlling the function, but even their allies in Washington couldn't sell that open-ended a handout publicly. But TSA security theater made adequate political cover for the real purpose.

Re: High-speed rail taking shape even as opponents seek to kill it

#220

Post by digitalzombie »

milesrout wrote: post #140
shiny wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another potential concern is that it runs through some good farmland, which CA has some of the best of in the world. I would love to have an HSR along the coast however. When I was in Taiwan it was amazing being able to get to the bottom of the island in a couple hours.

>some good farmland, which CA has some of the best of in the world. Is that a joke? California is a terrible place to be farming. Farming in California is only viable because farmers are allowed unfettered access to water, depriving it from residents (who are told they should turn off the water in the shower while farmers are pouring untold millions of gallons on crops that could be grown somewhere actually suited to…

To be fair we make some of the best wine in the world. So there is some merit...
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