Real Estate Market / Inflation / Recession / Depression (mortgage broker, broker, debt)

[multitrak]

Originally Posted by Bob from down south

and casual use of air travel that has filled, to the point of hazard, the US skies with half-empty aircraft.

vlj's or very light jets are being pushed big time by the FAA as a solution to overcrowded airports and "half-empty" aircraft. most companies (including Adams Aircraft in Denver, Cessna, Diamond, among others) are awaiting FAA approval on their respective models for this class of aircraft. what's cool about them is that the FAA only requires an owner-pilot to possess a private pilot license and instrument and multi-engine ratings plus some time in a jet flight simulator. they're fun to fly (so i'm told), fuel efficient, and only require a 3,000 foot runway. asking price: the cheapest one runs around $1.4 million.

[Bob from down south]

Originally Posted by Pettrix

Don't forget Countrywide, which was hurting BAD, just got bought out by Bank of America...

There's still a lot of speculation that BOA will never complete the acquisition of CountryFried Mortgage. I read a few weeks back that BoA may have had some diabolical scheme to separate the mortgage side of the business from the Countrywide Bank with its deposits and the servicing business, with the intent to keep the well-funded bank and the profitable servicing business while letting the $billions in subslime mortgage securities sink. I doubt that can legally happen, but nothing would surprise me anymore.

Another theory is that BoA only stepped up under pressure with an agreement to buy CFC just to buy time and cool things off in the market before they bug out in the 13th hour and watch CFC slip below the waves.

Anyway, BoA has lots of ways to backpedal their way right out of that deal, and even more reasons not to go through with the acquisition. Time will tell.

[Bob from down south]

Originally Posted by multitrak

vlj's or very light jets are being pushed big time by the FAA as a solution to overcrowded airports and "half-empty" aircraft. most companies (including Adams Aircraft in Denver, Cessna, Diamond, among others) are awaiting FAA approval on their respective models for this class of aircraft. what's cool about them is that the FAA only requires an owner-pilot to possess a private pilot license and instrument and multi-engine ratings plus some time in a jet flight simulator. they're fun to fly (so i'm told), fuel efficient, and only require a 3,000 foot runway. asking price: the cheapest one runs around $1.4 million.

The VLJs are more focused on the small business aircraft market. I was referring more to half-empty 737s and Scarebuses flying the friendly skies.

The watered-down pilot qualification requirements for the VLJs look like real trouble to me. The speed at which things happen in a turbine-powered aircraft makes flying one much different than a single or light twin. I used to refer to complex GA aircraft as "doctor and lawyer killers" because rich professionals like to go buy themselves an airplane, take lessons, get drawn away for a while, and they come back and end up driving pointy-end first into a cumulogranite cloud because they didn't stay proficient.

Add jet aircraft speeds to that, and I think we're going to see even more airplane-shaped holes in the dirt.

[jazzlover]

I personally don't think air travel has much of a long-term future. Exploding fuel prices will make it unaffordable to all but the wealthiest customers in the not-too-distant future. We had better be working on bringing back long-distance train travel in this country or most average Americans aren't going to be getting more than a few miles away from home in the years ahead. Of course, people still don't want to hear things like that--they haven't gotten their arms around the lifestyle-changing events we are about to confront.

[Bob from down south]

Originally Posted by jazzlover

I personally don't think air travel has much of a long-term future. Exploding fuel prices will make it unaffordable to all but the wealthiest customers in the not-too-distant future. We had better be working on bringing back long-distance train travel in this country or most average Americans aren't going to be getting more than a few miles away from home in the years ahead. Of course, people still don't want to hear things like that--they haven't gotten their arms around the lifestyle-changing events we are about to confront.

We're already seeing this in general aviation, although there is some debate as to whether it's caused by fuel prices or the fact that the trial lawyers drove most of the GA aircraft manufacturers out of light aircraft production for much of the last two decades.

Was talking to a friend that's a pilot for United this morning...he was pretty glum about prospects for the future. He was talking about the merger rumors...sees them as likely and as a last line of defense survival measure for the industry. I don't think any of the air carriers are positioned to survive any sort of severe economic downturn. Good thing that can't happen anytime soon...

[Charles]

Originally Posted by jazzlover

I personally don't think air travel has much of a long-term future. Exploding fuel prices will make it unaffordable to all but the wealthiest customers in the not-too-distant future. We had better be working on bringing back long-distance train travel in this country...

Wouldn't the increase in fuel costs affect ticket prices on trains too? Will trains be able to get people to the destinations they are getting now as fuel efficiently (pick a metric, like passenger-mile/gallon or something) for similar costs? Also, when factoring in how much money a person's time is worth will train fares be low enough to make the extra time traveling an considerable alternative?

I guess the question would be, How big a price ticket differential (between planes and trains) would there have to be for someone to say, "I think I'll spend two or three days on a train rather than six hours on a plane."?

[Shuffler]

Locomotive technology these days is nothing short of amazing...typically they are diesel electric hybrids, I believe. "Convenience" is a term that is going to take on new meaning, so 'extra time' in comparison to air travel is relative. I agree that the days of convenient, affordable air travel for the masses will be a thing of the past, and these companies will either merge or die as a side effect of limited energy supplies that are best utilized for more important things like growing food.

[jazzlover]

The least fuel-efficient passenger transportation mode is air. When fuel was cheap, the time-savings overwhelmed the additional fuel cost. Despite that advantage, and a plethora of direct and indirect government subsidies to air travel, the airline industry has never really been profitable. (I paraphrase this conclusion from a business acquaintance of mine who has spent his career analyzing the profitability and value of transportation companies.)

The second-least efficient mode of passenger transportation is the automobile, especially when the auto is occupied (as most are for the majority of passenger miles in the US) by only one or maybe two people. Again, when fuel was cheap, this inefficiency was overshadowed by the flexibility of auto transportation.

The most fuel-efficient mode of passenger transportation (excepting ships on water) is rail, even in the US, where most trains are diesel-powered. The efficiencies become even more dramatic if the route is electrified. Rail is also (through electrification) able to be powered by non-petroleum means (hydro, nuclear, etc.) which for air transport is impossible.

Several studies have shown that "conventional rail" (not even the fancy "high-speed" rail advocated by some) run at average passenger train speeds typical over 50 years ago is actually as time-efficient as current air service (figuring security checks, typical take-off and landing times, etc.) on routes of less than approximately 250 miles.

The big problem with rail today is that the average American's concept of rail is the pitifully underfunded, route-sparse ("you-can't-get-there-from-here"), equipment-starved, and seldom-punctual Amtrak system. No other "advanced" country on this planet has such a pitiful passenger rail system as does the US. That's sad, because for about 10% of what taxpayer monies we lavish on highway systems and air travel, we could have the best rail passenger system in the world--and save millions of barrels of oil in the bargain.

Sadly, most of today's Americans have never ridden a train. I've been on trains typical of what ran in the US 50 years ago. When people--those same people who might have never ridden a train before--ride those, the most common comment I've heard is, "If trains were like this today, I much rather ride a train than fly." I then explain that trains DID used to be like that all across the US, until the massive subsidization of highways killed them off.

I will say this: I like to drive, I like to fly. But, my favorite mode of transportation is rail. It is the most satisfying and relaxing way to travel there is--and it is the best way to see the country.

[Charles]

Originally Posted by jazzlover

The least fuel-efficient passenger transportation mode is air. ...


The most fuel-efficient mode of passenger transportation (excepting ships on water) is rail,

From

Fuel efficiency in transportation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Passenger airplanes averaged 4.8 L/100 km per passenger (1.4 MJ/passenger-km) (49 passenger-miles per gallon) in 1998....

Amtrak reports 2005 energy use of 2,935 BTU per passenger-mile, or 39 passenger-miles per gallon...

However this page:

Train vs Plane vs Car

paints it different, (53 pm/g, 30 pm/g) or almost 2:1 in favor of rail. Still, how much is time worth?

[Mike from back east]

Transport was my career. My life. Much of the current airline mess can be laid to Jimmy Carter's de-regulation of the airline industry, setting up a fare-war free-for-all with fare levels going into a total free fall (say that 3 times quickly after a couple of gins). On the altar of stupid policy we sacrificed Pan Am Airways, the gold standard of airlines, our national flagship airline, the airline that taught the WORLD how to fly, sacrificed them to fare wars with idiots like Freddy Laker of the UK and his "Laker Sky Train" crap. Not satisfied, we drove Eastern Airlines into backruptcy too, the airline that created the very convenient shuttle between DC and NYC. Stupid. Gone too are many more...National Airlines (remember the Sun Birds?), Republic, Ozark... lots of tombstones in that de-reg cemetery.

To save what's left of our airline industry, someone with nuggets of steel has to get in the white house and restore the "floor" under airline prices, a floor being a basic level of fares below which no airline can go. We used to have one, BC (before Carter). A rate floor largely assures that decently run airlines will be able to fly safely, pay its bills, pay its people and provide service that IS of service to the traveling public. Hub and Spoke is NOT of much service - to the flying public. Putting a rate floor back into place (after 30+ years) will mean that fares go up, maybe 10%, maybe more. But it will keep airlines solvent and able to fly, something we will always NEED to have, as no amount of trains will solve long-distance commuting over a continent and world this big. The vision of 300MPH MagLev trains is a hundred years or more off and will never go over in this nation due to the high cost and what seems the inability of any level of government to get anything done in the face of NIMBYs, environmentalists, special interests and competing issues.

Meanwhile train travel has major cost / energy benefits for regional and corridor travel. Especially true if we get our national heads out of our national sand pile and look at nuclear power for reliable electric to power high speed trains of 125-175MPH. Best airline between DC & NYC is Amtrak: downtown to downtown in 3 hours - which we can shorten with modest investment in track improvements in that corridor.

We need a railroad building program in the USA to rival that of the interstate system. It will take 25+ years, if we push real hard, but it's all money spent on things that last and provide benefit for 100+ years. By not taking the long view of our nation's future, our leaders seem to be condemning us to a short future as a nation, sort of like Wall Street's obsession with the next 90-day quarterly numbers reports.

This is a long way of getting to the point, which to me is that the lack of a long term national vision to solve our collective energy, food, health, water, education, and transport issues is more damning to our national survival than any housing bubble, credit crunch, recession or depression - all of which we survived before. But if we don't plan for a future, we won't have one.

s/mike