"Pointless" high-speed rail needed (Atlanta, Savannah: 2014, buy, taxi)

[netdragon]

I really want the vacation high-speed rail

I can see them coming up with an excuse for a connection to Savannah like you said under economic pretenses. and because that's already part of Obama's HSR map, so that's a good start.

[bu2]

Obama's map is meaningless. Its just a copy of Amtrak's 130 year old Chicago centric network.

Look at what is not on there:
Houston-Dallas-probably the first line that will get built
Atlanta-Chattanooga-Nashville-a line that seems to be the priority in Georgia
Albuquerque-Denver-a line that has had a lot of discussion in that area.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by MattCW

It's not the vacation market that drives transportation, it's economic movement. A connection to Savannah will carry tourists sure, and plenty of them, but the real benefit is the movement of employees, not as commuters necessarily, but as people that need to be on-site at various times for various reasons. The primary targets for HSR out of Atlanta should be Charlotte (gateway to the Northeast) and Jacksonville (gateway to Florida via All Aboard Florida). Conventional-speed regional rail work work well out to Chattanooga, Augusta, LaGrange and maybe Birmingham (more challenging due to terrain).

HSR will displace short plane trips which don't really make a lot of money for the airlines anyway and will be driven by business travel.

[tikigod311]

I'm of the mindset that autonomous cars and services will render this idea obsolete before it has a chance to come to fruition.


Uber wants to buy all of Tesla's self-driving cars, rumours suggest | Daily Mail Online

Carnegie Mellon Reels After Uber Lures Away Researchers - WSJ

Uber poached a load of staff from Carnegie Mellon to help it make self-driving cars - Business Insider

This Is Big: A Robo-Car Just Drove Across the Country | WIRED

Even Don Draper is selling the technology now -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tna7rU_Tfhg



At this rate, I think I'm almost ready to put money on the table that autonomous cars will disrupt transportation in such a huge way we won't be having the same conversations about public transportation in 10 years. Rail to Chattanooga and Savannah, places you need a car once you get there, won't make sense to get on rail when you can Uber it from your door in suburban Atlanta to Broughton St. in SAV.

Retrofitting roads to handle this will be a fraction of laying rail. At the same time, this brand new technology is easily accessible as no one owns the cars and you just use it when you need it. Uber LD (Long Distance) 1.0 will be less than flying or taking a train to Savannah. As it continues, it will get even cheaper.

I'm very leery of huge investments like this right now. I think, when built to destinations where the final node isn't immediately pedestrian, rail will become obsolete for long distance regional travel in the very near future.

[netdragon]

Originally Posted by tikigod311

I'm of the mindset that autonomous cars and services will render this idea obsolete before it has a chance to come to fruition.

I think that's a ways out, testing aside (and there have been problems). People couldn't even get PRT off the ground except in a couple cities, and that's much more controlled.

What I'd like to see come very quickly is cars taking over at major stop lights to decrease latency. I think that'd be very easy to do and control.

[2nd trick op]

Originally Posted by netdragon

I will keep this short, but it's been a long time that I've brought this up: To compete with some other large metro areas like L.A., we need to have faster access to beaches and the mountains and other recreation. We need a high-speed connection to Savannah/Hilton Head and/or the Gulf Coast. Another to Cherokee, NC , Asheville and Gatlinburg Tennessee would be nice.

"High Speed Rail" is a term that has been ridiculously distorted -- mostly by the young and those who don't have enough exposure to the built-in constraints -- both technical and economic; same thing applies to "self-driving" or autonomous vehicles; the OP appears to be a perfect example.

[netdragon]

Originally Posted by 2nd trick op

"High Speed Rail" is a term that has been ridiculously distorted -- mostly by the young and those who don't have enough exposure to the built-in constraints; the OP appears to be a perfect example.

No, I specifically meant high-speed rail.

[tikigod311]

O i hate multiquote, but it's appropriate.

Originally Posted by netdragon

I think that's a ways out, testing aside (and there have been problems).

Barely any problems. Especially when compared against human drivers and the fact that in some scenarios, there is going to be a collision, regardless of what you do. Autonomous cars will be exponentially safer than human piloted vehicles, day one.

Humans at fault in self-driving car crashes - LA Times

The Arrival of Autonomous Cars, Examined

How Driverless Cars Will Sneak Up On Us All

Autonomous Cars Are Closer Than You Think | TechCrunch

And a dissenting opinion, but I don't he is considering services like Uber -
Autonomous-drive car reality further out than most expect

People couldn't even get PRT off the ground except in a couple cities, and that's much more controlled.

You're talking about something that requires HUGE initial and continual public investment. The infrastructure investment will essentially be relatively minor retrofits to existing infrastructure. The actual service provided will be paid for privately and can be done very cheaply.

What I'd like to see come very quickly is cars taking over at major stop lights to decrease latency. I think that'd be very easy to do and control.

The easiest task for an autonomous car will be long distances on a limited access highway. Why? Minimal variables and potential very high speeds. Making long distance travel one of the best first uses of the technology.



I think people in the planning world are drastically underselling how much this will change the way people travel in the very near future.

[2nd trick op]

To succeed, real high-speed rail has to have strong anchor cities at both ends to generate sufficient traffic -- routes like Boston-New York-Washington or Sacramento-Bay Area-Los Angeles-San Diego. Atlanta-Savannah might work -- if you added another state (which might or might not cooperate) and extended the service to Jacksonville. But HSR to seasonally-patronized vacation spots is purely a fantasy; the initial cost is just too great.

The only "true" built-from-scratch HSR operations are Japan's shinkansen (conceived not long after the close of a war that left everything in ruins, and a lot of dead bodies) and France's TGV system (possible because eminent domain laws made seizure of private property easier in Europe, and because the city of Paris dominates the French economy to a degree not found in any other developed nation),

America currently has one "qualified" HSR system in operation (Boston-Washington), built upon an existing network inherited from the former New Haven and Pennsylvania railroads; it has been under development, and slowly, but demonstrably improving. That is all we can expect; the cost of building a new system from scratch is both too high, and subject to never-ending opposition from the "Not in MY Back Yard" crowd.

California broke ground last year for its own system; that one will operate mostly in the flat country of the Central Valley, where land is relatively easy to obtain. So speeds will be substantially better than in the Northeast. But getting the service into the downtown areas of the large, politicized cities will take a while; ditto for the "Tehachapi bottleneck" -- finding a way through one of the mountain passes that will have to be breached to enter the L. A. Basin.

What our faux President promised to his sycophants and groupies during his one train ride back in 2009 was little more than a pipe dream.

[netdragon]

Savannah was on the Jacksonville - Charlotte line so that's a federal thing.

Atlanta had an Atlanta - Charlotte line.

Then there was an Atlanta to Jacksonville via Savannah, and bisecting the two lines.

So it's already on the map. I'd just like it to be done so I can take it for vacation.

On the other hand Asheville would be a complete splurge and "pointless" but hey.