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

Europe is investing heavily in trains

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

311–320 of 654 posts

Re: Europe is investing heavily in trains

#311

Post by xixixao »

m2fkxy wrote: post #298
lobochrome wrote: post #288

Observations from a frequent train traveller in Germany and Japan: - Train Travel works when the frequency of trains is so high that you do not need to think about "a" connection, but instead just choose the "next" connection. - Any significant number of delayed trains are a problem when one has important appointments. Morning meetings require an overnight trip, even if an early morning connection would usually work.…

> Electrification of lines is just not happening anymore in Germany. It's politically more sexy to do something with Hydrogen. Very odd. "Odd" is a fine euphemism to describe Germany's energy strategy. > By trying to remodel stations cheaply for commerce, most stations in Germany have become unpleasant to navigate. Signage is particularly bad (compared to Japan) Yes... Parisian train stations are also becoming gigant…

Every train station and every airport is a geographical monopoly. There needs to be government regulation that prevents them from forcing people through a huge shopping mall maze.

Re: Europe is investing heavily in trains

#312

Post by Manuel_D »

mcv wrote: post #284
Manuel_D wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Overhead wires would involve a significant infrastructure investment. Not too much of an issue with more densely populated areas like Europe - and countries like France and Japan already do use overhead wires - but it is not cost competitive in sparse locations like much of North America. It's true that it's contingent on a carbon-free source of hydrogen. But if something like thermochemical hydrogen production throu…

> "Countries like France and Japan already do use overhead wires" Don't most countries already use these? World wide, a third of all rails is electrified in some way, and for long-distance rail, that's bound to be overhead. Most European rail is electrified. So hydrogen or any other diesel replacement is only relevant for very rural, very sparsely used lines.

If a third of all rail is electrified then two thirds are not. Most of North America's railways are not electrified. Be cautious when looking at statistics on electrification: many results specifically only show electrification of passenger railways.

Re: Europe is investing heavily in trains

#313

Post by cheschire »

einpoklum wrote: post #203
cheschire wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having commuted with both american and german rail systems before, my educated guess it's likely due to who owns the rails. American rail freight companies have far more control over prioritization than european freight companies. DB Netz owns the vast majority of german rail and therefore prioritizes what makes them the most money. Historically that's been carrying people due to all the government and company subsid…

But why couldn't DB Netz do both people and freight, if both are profitable (after subsidies for passenger traffic)? i.e. why does it have to be a choice?

They could but german rail is already ridiculously crowded when factoring in all the safety regulations. Automation on the speed control already lets them pack the lines pretty tightly, which may be one reason why they've removed so much rail already.

Germans, in my experience, tend to be pretty rational folks. As much as the public likes to ream the decision makers for poor choices while armed with the perfect clarity of hindsight, my guess is they've gotten to this point because all the other choices seemed worse at the time they considered them.

Re: Europe is investing heavily in trains

#314

Post by diordiderot »

burlesona wrote: post #192
julienb_sea wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Construction of road infrastructure can be compared to construction of tracks and stations, and it's fair to say taxpayers foot the bill in full for both. The difference is that trains operate at a loss even with high ticket prices and operational subsidies are necessary for market viability. That is not the case with car and truck usage.

At least in the US, local road networks in the suburbs and rural areas bleed money terribly, and as fuel taxes have not kept pace with inflation even the inner city streets and crowded highways can barely break even.

Like a growth Ponzi scheme

Re: Europe is investing heavily in trains

#315

Post by balaji1 »

encryptluks2 wrote: post #30
lqet wrote: post #26

Here in Germany, for as long as I can remember, the government praises itself every year for investing as much in rail as never before. I have not noticed the service quality to change for the better over the last 15 years. The ever-rising investments seem to be only enough to keep the status quo of the crumbling infrastructure.

Trains are incredibly expensive to maintain. The US still relies a lot on manual operations when running trains. I wonder if they will ever be able to fully automate their travel.

Rail networks have a lot more potential for automation and electrification. It is way too underestimated.

It would be cool to see when Amazon gets into Rail.

Re: Europe is investing heavily in trains

#316

Post by Manuel_D »

adgjlsfhk1 wrote: post #286
Manuel_D wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Overhead wires would involve a significant infrastructure investment. Not too much of an issue with more densely populated areas like Europe - and countries like France and Japan already do use overhead wires - but it is not cost competitive in sparse locations like much of North America. It's true that it's contingent on a carbon-free source of hydrogen. But if something like thermochemical hydrogen production throu…

Given that trains need tracks, why is it significant added infrastructure to have wires?

You have to put up wires and a bunch of posts. Googling around, cost estimates are $4.8 million per track-mile [1]. At 140,000 track miles in the US that's $672 billion to electrify the railway network.

Especially if hydrogen becomes very cheap through something like generation through waste-heat from nuclear power plants, hydrogen propulsion may make more sense.

1. https://www.freightwaves.com/news/is-electrifying-the-freigh...

Re: Europe is investing heavily in trains

#317

Post by pintxo »

ls15 wrote: post #230
lioeters wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My most memorable train experience in Germany was when Deutsche Bahn left me in Munich in the middle of the night. I had a connection there but my first train was ~10 minutes late, and my second train had already left. So I spent the whole night at the train station until ~5am when I could catch another train in the direction I needed. I've taken many train trips in the Czech Republic, and that has never happened.

I never take the last possible connection of a day, because of this risk.

DB will pay a Taxi or Hotel in such cases. Just had them pay my Taxi home last week.

Re: Europe is investing heavily in trains

#318

Post by [deleted] »

lobochrome wrote: post #288

Observations from a frequent train traveller in Germany and Japan: - Train Travel works when the frequency of trains is so high that you do not need to think about "a" connection, but instead just choose the "next" connection. - Any significant number of delayed trains are a problem when one has important appointments. Morning meetings require an overnight trip, even if an early morning connection would usually work.…

[deleted]

Re: Europe is investing heavily in trains

#319

Post by nicoburns »

avianlyric wrote: post #62
fredoliveira wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The UK is a European country. Not in the EU anymore, but you folks didn't move continents ;-)

Culturally we generally consider Europe to mean continental Europe i.e. Europe without the islands. Thus the U.K. being an island nation isn’t part of Europe. But the definition of Europe will change depending on who you’re talking to and what your talking about.

In my experience, the UK is culturally very similar to the rest of Europe (much more similar then we are to the US, although there is some influence there). This fact is just obscured by the language barrier.

Re: Europe is investing heavily in trains

#320

Post by seattle_spring »

singhrac wrote: post #301

Mildly unrelated to the article at hand, but I wish Amtrak had better quality (faster and more consistent) wifi onboard for NE regional and other non-Acela trains. I think even the Acela doesn't have high speed wifi. If I could work during a 6+ hour journey it would really change the equation on traveling for me. The desks that are available on these trains is a huge change from the tiny lapdesks on flights. The thin…

The service in the NW is similarly garbage. Was completely useless between Seattle and Portland.
Post reply on HN