Why The US Has No High-Speed Rail

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

that depends on how you define "a lot", but yes, there are some, however, they're usually not of the everyday variety.

most of the cross metro commuters i have come across mainly have a work from home gig in one city, but have to head into the main office in the other city once or twice a week.

no doubt many of them take advantage of amtrak's hiawatha route so they can at least be productive during that time.

They sell monthly passes so there must be some demand. 90 minutes is how long it takes from some metra terminuses anyway.

[llamaorama]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

HSR is just not a good economic investment except in very few places where gigantic, centralized cities with congestion problems and huge volumes of intercity traffic are located somewhat close to one another. Even in Europe, HSR construction has slowed considerably compared to 10 years ago. China is still building lines, but not at the fever pitch of a decade ago.

It’s just a lot of money to spend for quite incremental gains. The technical demands of the infrastructure is like building a metro system - except over hundreds of miles.

Unless you have an existing passenger rail corridor that is maxed out for capacity, the money will be better spent increasing the frequencies and reliability than spending tens of billions of dollars to save twenty minutes of travel time.

The US has so little intercity rail infrastructure that everything would need to be built new. It would be pointless to throw money at privately owned freight railroads to speed up the twice weekly train they allow on a freight line whose route isn’t relevant to passenger travel.

In Europe and Asia, investment has slowed because those networks are now mature. Upgraded networks make more sense.

There is no reason to build a brand new slow conventional railway in the US when it costs about the same due to land acquisition and construction.

Regarding Chicago to Milwaukee, an upgrade to the line was recently cancelled. NIMBYs and private freight line owners did it in. It will never be more than an inconvenient slow line with only a few daily trains. The only option to create useful rail between the two is with a whole new line. Which might as well be HSR.

[mhays]

There's no "might as well." True high speed rail is difficult on a very different level -- mandatory grade separations (many times the cost, and a far greater physical barrier), different route geometries which can result in very expensive solutions vs. hugging a hillside for example, etc.

[Sun Belt]

Originally Posted by 202_Cyclist

Reposting.

No need to repost your OP. Everybody [grown adults] knows what their car costs to operate it and understands that when they sell it a few years down the road, it has depreciated in value.

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by Sun Belt

No need to repost your OP. Everybody [grown adults] knows what their car costs to operate it and understands that when they sell it a few years down the road, it has depreciated in value.

Based on the number of Uber drivers with inefficient cars, I'm not so sure.

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by mhays

There's no "might as well." True high speed rail is difficult on a very different level -- mandatory grade separations (many times the cost, and a far greater physical barrier), different route geometries which can result in very expensive solutions vs. hugging a hillside for example, etc.

I was going to say this. Contrast the Point Defiance bypass near Tacoma with Package 1 of the CAHSR project near Fresno, for a comparison of the scope of work required to upgrade a conventional rail line for passenger rail vs building a true HSR line of similar route length.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

chicago and milwaukee have 7 train a day each way, but at 90 minutes, there's no time savings over driving, so a lot of people just drive.

chicago and st. louis have 5 trains a day each way, but at 5.5 hours, there's no time savings over driving (it's actually a ~1 hour penalty), so a lot of people just drive.

chicago and detroit have 3 trains a day each way, but at 5 hours, there's no time savings over driving (it's actually a ~30 minute penalty), so a lot of people just drive.


without the high speed part, there's not a very compelling reason to take the train if you already own a car.

yes, a lot people drive but a lot of people take the train from stl. sometimes inbound traffic is so atrocious on a friday night that even the train is as fast or faster. when the speeds get to be over 100 it will be a huge improvement, though.

[llamaorama]

The entire line doesn’t need 220 mph track geometry, that is a poor argument. But without grade separation you can’t run lightweight trains.

The biggest real cost is land acquisition and politics, again why save 10% of the cost and gimp the whole thing with grade crossings and FRA heavy rail crash requirements?

The cascades line is a failure. It is much slower than competing bus services like bolt that stop at the same stations, while Amtrak achieving 60% on time performance, will cost billions to shave off an hour, the talgo sets are weird maintenance headaches that rarely get to tilt, etc.

This thread proves Americans can’t run passenger rail. Just get foreign companies to build and operate whatever gets proposed, they will do it the right way.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by Doady

I imagine high-speed rail is only useful for connecting cities that have good local transit. Building high speed rail from Chicago to Milwaukee seems pointless when Milwaukee is currently destroying its transit system, for example. Places like Detroit and St. Louis are obviously out of the question for high-speed rail connection, and they are probably more representative of the state of public transit in the US than Chicago is.

i took a fairly fast (dedicated ROW) train downtown for years to the train station for chicago bound trains.

[202_Cyclist]

Originally Posted by Sun Belt

No need to repost your OP. Everybody [grown adults] knows what their car costs to operate it and understands that when they sell it a few years down the road, it has depreciated in value.

Not true, many people seem to think gas is the only cost of operating a car when comparing costs across modes of transportation.

[mhays]

If the Cascades line is a "failure," why does it fill up?

I'll give you a few hints...it's more reliable than a bus on a freeway with traffic, you can walk around and grab a beer or food...

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by mhays

I'll give you a few hints...it's more reliable than a bus on a freeway with traffic, you can walk around and grab a beer or food...

for sure!

if bus and train are even remotely time/cost competitive, the train experience utterly annihilates the bus experience.

[The Chemist]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

for sure!

if bus and train are even remotely time/cost competitive, the train experience utterly annihilates the bus experience.

Oh, definitely. Even a slow (<100mph) train is vastly preferable to a bus. The only time I've ever taken buses in China is when going to places that basically have no rail access, and I've hated it pretty much every time.

[mhays]

Gotta admit that buses can be good too. The train to Sienna, Italy, was out of service, so a bus replaced it, and we wound through little towns on tiny streets...

But in the US context, a train is much better by every measure.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by llamaorama

Regarding Chicago to Milwaukee, an upgrade to the line was recently cancelled. NIMBYs and private freight line owners did it in. It will never be more than an inconvenient slow line with only a few daily trains. The only option to create useful rail between the two is with a whole new line. Which might as well be HSR.

the hiawatha upgrade hasn't been cancelled, just delayed by the selfish myopia of glenview and lake forest.

the forces behind expanding frequency on the route are certainly not throwing in the towel.

Joint Finance Approves Funding To Expand Rail Service Between Milwaukee, Chicago
Money Would Be Leveraged For Federal Transportation Grants

By Corrinne Hess
Published: Monday, June 10, 2019

The Legislature's budget committee included $35 million in their transportation budget to expand rail service between Milwaukee and Chicago on the busy Amtrak Hiawatha line.

The money would provide matching funds for federal transportation grants to complete road improvements needed before service could increase from the current seven round trips daily to 10 round trips daily.

The total cost of the project is approximately $195 million, according to the Wisconsin Department of Transportation.

source: https://www.wpr.org/joint-finance-ap...waukee-chicago

[10023]

Originally Posted by The Chemist

Oh, definitely. Even a slow (<100mph) train is vastly preferable to a bus. The only time I've ever taken buses in China is when going to places that basically have no rail access, and I've hated it pretty much every time.

I would rent a car and brave Chinese roads before taking a bus anywhere.

[sopas ej]

Originally Posted by The Chemist

The only time I've ever taken buses in China is when going to places that basically have no rail access, and I've hated it pretty much every time.

Are the buses that bad in China?

I took long-distance buses to get around Turkey, and it was actually quite nice. The seats are very plush and recline, they have curtains to block out the sun, and they even have a steward who serves snacks and gives you a hot washcloth. Now I'm having a flashback of taking an overnight bus from Istanbul to Cappadocia/Ürgüp; the experience wasn't so bad; I slept most of the way. Of course a train would have been faster, but the buses weren't bad. This was back in 2001; I don't know if many people still get around cross-country by bus in Turkey, I haven't been keeping up with news about their transportation infrastructure.

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by sopas ej

Are the buses that bad in China?

I took long-distance buses to get around Turkey, and it was actually quite nice. The seats are very plush and recline, they have curtains to block out the sun, and they even have a steward who serves snacks and gives you a hot washcloth. Now I'm having a flashback of taking an overnight bus from Istanbul to Cappadocia/Ürgüp; the experience wasn't so bad; I slept most of the way. Of course a train would have been faster, but the buses weren't bad. This was back in 2001; I don't know if many people still get around cross-country by bus in Turkey, I haven't been keeping up with news about their transportation infrastructure.

Yeah I had a great experience on a bus in the UK and France. Saved tons of money and got to see the buildings clearly