I read an article in the paper the other day. Vietnam, that little country we nearly bombed into extinction is now a popular tourist destination and is building a high speed train from Hanoi to Ho Chi Men city at a cost of 50 billion dollars.
The United States, supposedly the most powerful nation on the face of the earth wants to rebuild its rail system, highways, and airport runways. Price tag? 50 billion dollars. But the present thought is it's too expensive.
Vietnam prepares for the future. The United States isn't so sure about the future.
Drive on to the train / car carrier. Plexiglass cover comes over everything, then, 200MPH all the way from New england to Florida. 6 hours later we get off and no need for a rent a car. If it's less than .25 a mile I'm on!
Remember - we're Americans - gotta have a car in there somewhere.
It is a lengthy and well illustrated account on how China suddenly came from nowhere to become he world leader in HSR. Most of the planning and technology issues raised in this thread have been addressed and it will be worthwhile to read about China's solutions.
This outcome should encourage US industries to jump in .
WIKI: The expansion into HSR is also developing China into a leading source of high-speed rail building technology.[15] Chinese train-makers have aborbed imported technologies quickly and localized production processes. Six years after receiving Kawasaki's license to produce Shinkansen E2, CSC Sifang can produce the CRH2A without any Japanese input, and Kawasaki has ended cooperation with Sifang on high speed rail.[20]
Chinese train-makers and rail builders have signed agreements to build HSRs in Turkey, Venezuela and Argentina, and are bidding on HSR projects in the United States, Russia, Saudi Arabia and other countries.[16] They are competing directly with the established European and Japanese manufacturers, and sometimes partnering with them. In Saudi Arabia's Haramain High Speed Rail Project, Alstom partnered with China Railway Construction Corp. to win the contract to build phase I of the Mecca to Medina HSR line, and Siemens has joined CSR to bid on phase II.[21]
I have some overseas clients, it isn't always the cheaper labor that keeps them overseas...its our failing infrastructure.
Thanks to the lobby in washington favoring the airlines, We still don't have a decent bullet-train.
there're flights from coast to coast taking up to 16 hrs between being aflot and waiting time in connections.
No to mention the abusing charges, and ticket-prices.
I had to rent a car to drive into Barcelona one time. I was driving the tollway and there was one section that paralleled the tracks. I was driving at 160 KPH (100 mph) and one of those trains went by me like I was standing still.
Riding them is wonderful, smooth and relaxing. I'd love to be able to hop on a train here in San Antonio and be in Houston or Dallas within a couple of hours. I really wish the US would wake up to this. We should be leaders, not followers. Or worse, whiners.
Your nation has not yet hit bottom, but it surely is in the third world category.
O.K. Berry, let's spend $50 billion on a high speed train so you can get your liberal jollies. Are you going to ride it? Not just once as a tourist, but every day so it can pay operating costs? Are you redo your life to fit where the train goes? Of course not. You're going to take the plane or car or whatever, if not a personal private plane because you are filthy rich, to go where you want to go.
I know Barry! Since you want a bullet train so much, invest in one! Take your personal money, not my tax dollars, and invest. Come'on Barry. If Vietnam will do it. Why won't you???
If the gas tax was the ONLY source for the roads, and drivers had to pay their own way....boy you wouldn't be driving that SUV now.
Trains compete with planes, just look at Spain. And before you mouth off about small country, homogeneous geography etc etc...just look at Spain's geography once.
Liberal jollies,....BS...you're after protecting your own jollies.
There's no real reason for air travel between major hubs on the same continent. High-speed rail makes sense wherever there's enough travel to have the trains run frequently. If done right, it would be faster and cheaper than air, when waiting time is taken into account.
Every where high speed rail is successful is because the country is small...France, japan, Vietnam, Germany, .....
Not suited for USA. it is NOT very inefficient (energy wise) to operate a high speed rail above 126KmPH for a distance more than 450Kilometers. air transport beats high speed rail because of the high altitude low resistance transport.
it is just a feel good myth that politicians dish out..
Begin by connecting the larger cities within individual states. Those larger cities become the hubs for connecting the smaller communities in the state. Finish the system by connecting the larger cities from state to state.
What we really need is small, frequent transit into the hub cities and frequent connectors between the hub cities.
High speed rail CAN compete over longer distances if you find a way to eliminate the cost (money AND time) of driving to an airport, finding a place to park ... all the other time wasters involved in air transportation.
Plus the system should be inter-modal, combining transit bus, light rail, high-speed rail and air transportation. But the key is right-sized transportation units moving frequently within the system.
We need to nationalize that rail network again. Allow the private corporations to use the rail network, but regulate them and tax them on a per mile basis the same way we tax interstate trucking to use the highway system.