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Having had the pleasure of riding a bullet train before I agree in part.
That said the people who prefer it may not like the idea of paying for it. I know I won't even take a trip on Amtrak. To expensive and it isn't worth the extra time. I can't imagine what it would cost to put in a coast to coast bullet train.
Having had the pleasure of riding a bullet train before I agree in part.
That said the people who prefer it may not like the idea of paying for it. I know I won't even take a trip on Amtrak. To expensive and it isn't worth the extra time. I can't imagine what it would cost to put in a coast to coast bullet train.
Never will be a coast to coast HSR line; distances are just too vast.
Also as have stated for true HSR you need trains under the wires (electricity), and there is *NO* way any RR is going to build out such a network. Costs would be astronomical and ROI wouldn't justify the outlay.
What you could get is faster speeds (125mph) across large sections of track, but again you'd have to put in hundreds of millions to upgrade tracks and signals. Oh and maybe take out a number of grade crossings as well.
I can fly from JFK in New York in just over 6 hours for $400. Adding in TSA check in and checkout with baggage claim, that is ~9 hours travel time door to door. A bullet train going 200 mph nonstop on a less efficient route would take ~20-22 hours.
So trains take longer.
The route for an airplane to go from JFK to LAX requires exactly 0 infrastructure and 0 maintenance. The air at 35,000 feet altitude does not require building or maintaining. The route for high speed rail is ~3,100 miles of track @$12 million per mile (averaging various HSR projects and their estimates across various distances), plus the right of way costs, annual maintenance costs, clearing/grading/prep costs etc. For just that one route, you're looking at $50+ billion in initial costs and then maybe another $5 billion annually? Let us say there are 10 trains per day in each direction of that route, for 20 trains per day, and let us say that each train carries 2,000 passengers, is always 100% full, runs every single day and never experiences any failures/delays. Over 10 years of cost under my wildly optimistic scenario, the tickets would have to average $700 per person each way JUST TO PAY FOR THE TRACK. Now add in the cost of fuel, labor, etc and even under wildly optimistic conditions the ticket price will be closer to $1500-2k.
So trains cost more. A lot more.
Airlines run at a profit. Amtrak has never turned a profit, not even one year.
So trains are less profitable and require government subsidy.
Conclusion - there's a reason the private market has not embraced high speed rail. It's a solution that nobody wants, and costs more and is less efficient in every possible way than a solution that already exists.
And per the "study" there...yeah, asked the way the questions are, with the rail being presented the way they present it, of course a majority preferred it. If I polled 100k people and asked if they prefer 1st Class over coach and said absolutely nothing about the cost difference, I bet 1st class would do well.
I can fly from JFK in New York in just over 6 hours for $400. Adding in TSA check in and checkout with baggage claim, that is ~9 hours travel time door to door. A bullet train going 200 mph nonstop on a less efficient route would take ~20-22 hours.
So trains take longer.
The route for an airplane to go from JFK to LAX requires exactly 0 infrastructure and 0 maintenance. The air at 35,000 feet altitude does not require building or maintaining. The route for high speed rail is ~3,100 miles of track @$12 million per mile (averaging various HSR projects and their estimates across various distances), plus the right of way costs, annual maintenance costs, clearing/grading/prep costs etc. For just that one route, you're looking at $50+ billion in initial costs and then maybe another $5 billion annually? Let us say there are 10 trains per day in each direction of that route, for 20 trains per day, and let us say that each train carries 2,000 passengers, is always 100% full, runs every single day and never experiences any failures/delays. Over 10 years of cost under my wildly optimistic scenario, the tickets would have to average $700 per person each way JUST TO PAY FOR THE TRACK. Now add in the cost of fuel, labor, etc and even under wildly optimistic conditions the ticket price will be closer to $1500-2k.
So trains cost more. A lot more.
Airlines run at a profit. Amtrak has never turned a profit, not even one year.
So trains are less profitable and require government subsidy.
Conclusion - there's a reason the private market has not embraced high speed rail. It's a solution that nobody wants, and costs more and is less efficient in every possible way than a solution that already exists.
And per the "study" there...yeah, asked the way the questions are, with the rail being presented the way they present it, of course a majority preferred it. If I polled 100k people and asked if they prefer 1st Class over coach and said absolutely nothing about the cost difference, I bet 1st class would do well.
Just so you know historically since deregulation the airline industry as a whole has only had brief intervals of profitability. Otherwise things were quite different. You see this in that there are only a handful of domestic carriers left in the USA and very few of the "legacy" carriers.
Low fuel prices, lack of competition on many routes, and the fact airlines have found ways to squeeze more revenue out of passengers has helped many carriers bottom lines recently. This can change and is by no means permanent.
Just so you also know nearly everywhere in Europe or Asia where HSR was rolled out air travel along same routes declined.
Passenger rail transport will never replace long haul flights. However on short haul it is a different ball game all together.
As to the balance of your post, am sorry but much of it just is not true.
On the NEC Amtrak is bursting at the seams with passengers. Indeed it is one of if not the only part of that RR which is largely profitable and could be self sufficient.
Private companies/individuals aren't jumping in to start new airlines either. If airlines are so profitable and so forth you'd think another "People's Express" or other start-up would appear.
If there's one lesson to be learned from the recent entries of this thread, it's this. Transportation, in any market, but especially of passengers, is a thankless, and risky business. Even the trucking industry, with a near-perfectly-competitive environment, underwent a huge shake-up, with about two thirds of its membership merged or out-of-business in the wake of deregulation, The freight railroads have morphed unto a steady-but-unspectacular profitability similar to the electric utilities, but only after a 40-year decline and a close brush with nationalization. And through most of the industry's history, a compilation of the profits and losses of all commercial airlines would produce a negative figure.
This is a characteristic of an economic activity which could not separate itself from public sector participation, even if it desired to do so, And many of the factors behind it are difficult to explain to a public subject to manipulation by those with a politically-rooted agenda, and with limited economic education and understanding.
So you'd voluntarily pay if it were an option. Welcome to the private sector where your neighbor isnt forced to fund your mode of travel.
Yep. Theyre blowing lots of money in places like Milwaukee on streetcars when they should be widening their interstates and using busses for public transit. Roads and air travel are how the US does it. If you want high speed rail or streetcars that are barely faster than walking they should be paid for by private business.
Yep. Theyre blowing lots of money in places like Milwaukee on streetcars when they should be widening the interstates and using busses for public transit. Roads and air travel are how the US does it. If you want high speed rail or streetcars that are barely faster than walking they should be paid for by private business.
The case for urban streetcars is way overstated, but there are a number of areas (Long Island, the San Francisco Peninsula, South Florida. and most of the Los Angeles Basin) which have become "saturated" with regard to new freeway construction / expansion. When I have reason to go into New York or Philadelphia, for example, I park at one of the suburban stations, and take a commuter train in from there. And until SEPTA cut back on its "exurban" services in the early Eighties, I could find a way to do this from as close a location as Bethlehem or, if going to Philly, even from Pottsville.
I think a lot of the reluctance here is a holdover from the polarization of the late Sixties and Seventies, and it's actually much stringer among the truly "rural" component of our population than among those who've visited the cities regularly, or in recent years; also those who've gotten a clearer picture of the real America via military service, etc. It's the people still looking for "Mayberry towns" who are fooling (and short-changing) themselves.
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