There's nothing like a bonafide electrified.....

[smackaholic]

high speed monorail national rail system.

Barry H, apparently thinking he has a few extra trillion kicking around wants to spend it on high speed rail.

He could hire this dude to pimp it....if he wasn't dead.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3xGtjhZ_Yg

I'm a big fan of the idea....but....they already did it a few years back. Anybody ever hear about the Accela. It is an overpriced pos that amtrack did awhile back between boston and new york.

Why didn't barry point out this as an example of how great an idea it is? Because he'd be laughed right out of the fukking room.

High speed rail is a good idea in some parts of the eastern US. Not so much the west as it is too damn stretched out.

Question is, do we want the same folks that brought us Accela to do it?

If we are gonna do this, just hire the damn frogs to run it. They actually have some sort of track record with running high speed rail

[Left Seater]

High Speed Rail is a good idea and will help to lighten the load on ATC facilities and the idiots currently screening airline pax.

However, I agree that Amtrak isn't the way to implement high speed rail. Now Amtrak in and of itself isn't all bad. Congress on both sides of the room has consistently fucked Amtrak. Budgets were bare bones and included almost zero for capital projects. Further rail infrastructure is the only trasportation medium not heavily subsidised by the government. Truckers benefit from gas taxes, they don't first have to build the roads they use. Airlines didn't have to build their own airports and ATC systems first. Ships use ports they didn't have to build. Rail on the other hand has for the last 60+ years been forced to put up all the cash for their right of way, tracks, signaling, etc.

Now, Amtrak in partnership with States has plenty of successful operation on a regional scale. Cali, North Carolina, Indiana, Illinois, Texas, and Oklahoma are all running successful trains with Amtrak as the operator. Something like these agreements would seem like a good place to start these High Speed Networks.

[Left Seater]

Broaden your horizons, mvscal.

By rail I meant all rail transportation. Union Pacific, BNSF, KCS, etc own the rails that Amtrak trains travel on. The exception to this is the North East Corridor between DC and Boston. These companies don't have rails to run over that the government laid down for them to use like other means of transportation.

And yes, Amtrak does rely on Goverment payments, notice my thoughts on their Congressional Appropriations. Had Congress treated Amtrak like it did Conrail, Amtrak today would likely also be in private hands. They didn't and it isn't.

[Wolfman]

Bad idea--- expen$ive to build and operate---screws up regular freight traffic. VERY vulnerable to terrorist attack.
All around waste of our money---errr--- our Granchildren's money !

[BSmack]

High speed rail is a good idea for the Boston/NY/DC corridor because all those cities have sophisticated local mass transit systems in place. I'd rather see money spent here in Rochester on more buses and perhaps a light overhead monorail system that utilizes the center medians of our local expressways. High speed service to Rochester, Buffalo, Syracuse or just about any mid sized city in America would be an absolute waste without the local mass transit infrastructure to actually support the needs of the traveling public once they disembark.

[Terry in Crapchester]

High speed rail is a good idea for the Boston/NY/DC corridor because all those cities have sophisticated local mass transit systems in place. I'd rather see money spent here in Rochester on more buses and perhaps a light overhead monorail system that utilizes the center medians of our local expressways. High speed service to Rochester, Buffalo, Syracuse or just about any mid sized city in America would be an absolute waste without the local mass transit infrastructure to actually support the needs of the traveling public once they disembark.

Agree with the first sentence. I see the point to the rest, but I'm not entirely sure I agree.

There's already a Great Lakes route for Amtrak which runs from NYC to Chicago and does a pretty decent business. I went back and forth between home and college on it a few times back in the day.

There are a few drawbacks to it, though. The train runs only once a day in each direction, and in Rochester, the westbound train arrives at 3:00 a.m. Not to mention that the Amtrak station ain't exactly in the nicest part of town, to put it charitably.

Another drawback is that the train is pretty slow. It won't get you there any faster than you could get by driving yourself.

About 15 years ago, my dad had to make a business trip to NYC, and he took the train to and from NYC. I went to the station to pick him up, since I didn't want my mom out in that area alone at that time of night.

I'd agree that the public transportation systems in the cities you mentioned leave a lot to be desired. But if it would be possible to replace the current Great Lakes route with a high-speed service at minimal cost, it might work.

I'd also think that high-speed service in California, say between the Bay Area and San Diego, might work. Again, the public transportation service in Caliofrnia leaves much to be desired, but I think there's enough of a population base to support it nonetheless.

I think the key difference between the U.S. and Europe in this regard is population density. There's much greater population density throughout Europe than there is in a significant portion of the U.S. To connect the entire country by high-speed light rail service doesn't make much sense for that reason.

[Cuda]

Now Amtrak in and of itself isn't all bad. .

You ever actually ridden on an Amtrak train?

I traveled by train from Denver to Chicago several years ago. If the ride was in an airplane, it would be classified as continuous moderate turbulence. The only time the train wasn't violently rocking from side to side was when it stopped to pick up or let off passengers- which was pretty frequent. There are no non-stop trains, in case you didn't know. Despite reaching speeds of 75 mph between stops, the train was only 7 hours late getting into Chicago, making the trip 19 hours of unvarnished hell. And I was only 90 minutes late for the meeting I was supposed to not-under-any-circumstances be late for.

I didn't use the return portion of my train-ticket. Instead, I gratefully paid full-fare coach on United.

[smackaholic]

The northeast corridor makes sense. Chicago-detoilet-cleveland might make sense. San Fran-LA? Doubt it. Pretty long stretch and some terrain issues. Trains don't much care to climb over mountains.

Remember that no matter how fast they make the damn thing, a plane will be 3X quicker or better, so you pay a big time penalty on anything over 300 miles or so.

Some areas of florida might make sense.

Koods, I did the philly to Old saybrook run a few times. Got stuck with technical difficulties a few times between stations. Was supposed to be home at around 6 PM. Got in after midnight. When I lived in Nashville, I drove the wife and my daughter who was about 4 at the time to Atlanta for a train ride home to see gramma and grandpa in CT. She said it was way beyond the suck and barely any cheaper than flying.

[Terry in Crapchester]

Remember that no matter how fast they make the damn thing, a plane will be 3X quicker or better, so you pay a big time penalty on anything over 300 miles or so.

A plane will be faster while actually traveling. Where I think the trains have the potential to make up the time is in loading/unloading passengers. I don't think you'll have to get to the train station 2 hours ahead of your departure. Factor in that time, and with high speed rail the train might not be any slower, except for cross-country travel. Most folks traveling cross-country don't even think about the train unless the goal is to see the U.S. along the way.

[smackaholic]

Remember that no matter how fast they make the damn thing, a plane will be 3X quicker or better, so you pay a big time penalty on anything over 300 miles or so.

A plane will be faster while actually traveling. Where I think the trains have the potential to make up the time is in loading/unloading passengers. I don't think you'll have to get to the train station 2 hours ahead of your departure. Factor in that time, and with high speed rail the train might not be any slower, except for cross-country travel. Most folks traveling cross-country don't even think about the train unless the goal is to see the U.S. along the way.

I agree. What I don't agree with is the distance at which air travel starts making a lot more sense. Perhaps it is more than 300 miles, maybe 500, but, it sure as hell ain't 3000 miles.

Assuming an average speed of 150mph, which is probably a high guess, 500 miles is probably the break even point. So, maybe a 700 mile train ride would make sense assuming a decent price advantage. The only way we'll see that price advantage is if we have reasonably full trains.

[Wolfman]

Florida shot down the idea a while back and for good reason---way too much cost for what you might get. Better idea would be to spend more $$$ making air travel (mainly the TSA bullshit) more efficient and cut down on that time wasted getting to your plane. Also--- maybe they could cut out some of those TSA people. Last week when I had to fly north for a funeral there seemed to be like 50 of them--checking your driver's license twice and making some people go to the side and rifle through their carry ons after they had already been x-rayed. What ever happened to the idea of retinal or iris ID ??

[smackaholic]

Florida shot down the idea a while back and for good reason---way too much cost for what you might get. Better idea would be to spend more $$$ making air travel (mainly the TSA bullshit) more efficient and cut down on that time wasted getting to your plane. Also--- maybe they could cut out some of those TSA people. Last week when I had to fly north for a funeral there seemed to be like 50 of them--checking your driver's license twice and making some people go to the side and rifle through their carry ons after they had already been x-rayed. What ever happened to the idea of retinal or iris ID ??

I wonder if some sort of disney inspired train deal might get more families down to florida? Paint the thing ridiculous colors, conductors dressed like disney characters. Make the ride there part of the fun. Just better have a beer car for the parents. Run one from NY, one from chicago. Being on the damn train for 24 hours isn't such a big deal if you give them something to do enroute.

Doubt that electrification makes sense though, unless there is an awful lot of traffic. Big ass diesel trains are stupid efficient compared to cars, trucks or airplanes. It costs a hell of a lot of jack to electrify rail lines.

[PSUFAN]

Boston/Providence/NYC/Philly/Balmer/DC - makes some sense in that corridor.

[smackaholic]

why, it makes so much sense, they did it a few years back. It's called Acela and last I heard, it was an utter POS. Trouble is, rather than laying down a proper high speed track, they used the existing 100+ year old rails. The Acela is designed to lean into turns so that it can handle the sharp turns of the old track.

Maybe it's better now, but, I doubt it.

perhaps barry will print up a few bazillion to rip it up and grade it proper.

[Wolfman]

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/? ... YwNGNlZTE=

[Left Seater]

Now Amtrak in and of itself isn't all bad. .

You ever actually ridden on an Amtrak train?

I traveled by train from Denver to Chicago several years ago. If the ride was in an airplane, it would be classified as continuous moderate turbulence. The only time the train wasn't violently rocking from side to side was when it stopped to pick up or let off passengers- which was pretty frequent. There are no non-stop trains, in case you didn't know. Despite reaching speeds of 75 mph between stops, the train was only 7 hours late getting into Chicago, making the trip 19 hours of unvarnished hell. And I was only 90 minutes late for the meeting I was supposed to not-under-any-circumstances be late for.

I didn't use the return portion of my train-ticket. Instead, I gratefully paid full-fare coach on United.

The reasons for that poor trip were mostly not Amtrak's fault.

Over that route Amtrak runs on BNSF line. The rail is maintained for freight traffic not pax train. So Amtrak is limited to 79 mph due to rail standards and maint. The train is capable of higher speeds the track isn't. Also, the delays are due to Amtrak trains running up the ass of the slower freight trains and single track passing sidings. BNSF will sit Amtrak trains for a hour to save their train from a 10 minute stop. Makes sense for BNSF and totally screws the Amtrak schedule.

High speed trains can work in certain areas, provided they are done correctly. Cross country High Speed train travel is not feasable. Terry is also correct in that train travel has its advantages in time on the loading and unloading. You need only arrive early enough to step on the train before it leaves. Your suitcase can go in the closet at either end of each car. No need to walk to baggage claim upon arrival either.

One thing Terry didn't mention though is station arrival and departure locations. For business travel and leisure travel too, most people are going closer to city center than where airports are located. Rather than an hour ride to and from airports, train stations are often walking distance or short cab rides to offices and hotels. Another factor that makes train travel over short to medium distance a faster option.