High Speed Rail - Yes or No?

I'm sure a few of you have heard the news. The presidential administration has unveiled plans for investing in a network of high speed trains that are common place in Europe, Asia and significantly in Japan.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/16/obama.rail/

I personally am ALL FOR RAIL! Not only do I know it is supremely more economical to travel by rail, but we're talking 200mph rail in the most congested parts of the country.

It will ease our dependence on oil, and also majorly cut our emissions.

I can't wait for the day I have a straight line of high speed rail to take me from Chicago to California as quick as an air plane.

It's worked successfully in Europe and Japan for decades. Question is, do you think it's a good investment, why or why not?

I'd be very interested in hearing someone's reasons about why it's not a good idea. Because personally, I can't think of any. :P My biggest concern would be how well would it actually work if the government is in charge of it. The government subsizes and regulates our current passenger train system and the whole thing is abysmal.

I think the "investment" would be extremely risky if the government is in charge...but the overall concept is excellent and I hope private enterprise gets a chance to pull it off right.

Well, as far as I know, it is portioning money to the states...?? No clue about that, but I also read they are giving some money to Amtrack for repair and improvement. I don't personally want to see Amtrack continuing as the ONLY long haul passenger rail across the US. That is just asking for trouble.

I guess we'll see what happens, however I am stoked to see this underway. Not even trying is a piss poor excuse to me. :P

I think the BBC has given a good summary of the routes.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8003077.stm

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Obama plans high-speed rail in US
US President Barack Obama outlines his high-speed rail plan
President Barack Obama wants less congestion on roads and in the air

US President Barack Obama has announced his "vision for high-speed rail" in the country, which would create jobs, ease congestion and save energy.

He said the US could not afford not to make the investment in 10 routes.

Six of the routes already approved, including California and Florida, could get some of the $8 billion (£5.4bn) earmarked for rail improvements.

Mr Obama said his plan would provide faster journeys, increased mobility and better productivity.

His strategy envisions a network of short-haul and long-haul corridors of up to 600 miles, with trains capable of speeds of up to 150mph (240km/h).

Although super-fast trains in Japan, Germany and China run at more than 220km/h (137mph), the fastest service at the moment in the US averages only 120km/h.

He said: "Our highways are clogged with traffic, costing us $80 billion a year in lost productivity and wasted fuel.

"Our airports are choked with increased loads. We're at the mercy of fluctuating gas prices all too often," he said.

"We pump too many greenhouse gases into the air. What we need, then, is a smart transportation system equal to the needs of the 21st Century."

List of potential routes

* California corridor : Bay Area, Sacramento, Los Angeles, San Diego
* Pacific Northwest corridor : Eugene, Portland, Tacoma, Seattle, Vancouver British Columbia
* South Central corridor : Tulsa, Oklahoma City, Dallas/Fort Worth, Austin, San Antonio, Little Rock
* Gulf Coast corridor : Houston, New Orleans, Mobile, Birmingham, Atlanta
* Chicago hub network : Chicago, Milwaukee, Twin Cities, St. Louis, Kansas City, Detroit, Toledo, Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Louisville
* Florida corridor : Orlando, Tampa, Miami
* Southeast corridor : Washington, Richmond, Raleigh, Charlotte, Atlanta, Macon, Columbia, Savannah, Jacksonville
* Keystone corridor : Philadelphia, Harrisburg, Pittsburgh
* Empire corridor : New York City, Albany, Buffalo
* Northern New England corridor : Boston, Montreal, Portland, Springfield, New Haven, Albany

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I'm for them but against them as a stimulus package. They should have been introduced under a bill solely for a rail system. We are looking at 3 to 5 years for environmental studies and research to determine the best places for them. We will also not see 200 mph trains in the US for a long time. All the estimates that I've seen have said we will get 120 mph trains and that the upgrades need to get to 200 mph would cost over $70 billion. Like JLC said as well, who's going to run them? The Government, AMWAY???

Well, no better time to start then the present right? :)

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Originally Posted by littleindiangirl

Well, no better time to start then the present right? :)

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Not really. I only say that because we don't have the money to do it. My argument against it is that while its a very worthwhile project so is a banana clown for my business HOWEVER I don't have the money for it so I'm going to have to put it off for awhile. The Government technically can never go bankrupt as it can always just print more money when China stops lending it to us but back to HOWEVER our kids and their kids will one day have to pay it all back or face an economy 100 times worse that we are seeing now.

I think that a good,affordable, safe clean inner state mass transit system like a high speed monorail would be nice. When I went to Europe in high school I loved the rails over there. You paid could ride where ever..

However I think the down side it it would end up being like the subways in NYC great when they first come out but 20 years down the road they are crap..We can't even find the funds to keep paved roads in drivable condition I think the rail system would be the same way.

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Originally Posted by neilgolli

Not really. I only say that because we don't have the money to do it. My argument against it is that while its a very worthwhile project so is a banana clown for my business HOWEVER I don't have the money for it so I'm going to have to put it off for awhile. The Government technically can never go bankrupt as it can always just print more money when China stops lending it to us but back to HOWEVER our kids and their kids will one day have to pay it all back or face an economy 100 times worse that we are seeing now.

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I think putting things off will hurt us in the long run. I think the benefits of decreasing our oil use, creating jobs for the rail system of this size, and cutting emmisions is something to invest in.

We are already decades behind europe and asia in regards to transit, why should we put it off any longer?

Remember, to make money, you have to spend money. Have you seen an increase in taxes lately? I havent. Or is it moving money and spending it on other projects?

I'm all for it. I'm sure things will have changed for me by the time they actually have trains up and running, but it would be great for me know.

I go to school in Boston but my parents live in Jersey and my fiances parents live near Portland Maine. Anytime I go home or up to her parents house, I take the train. I sold my car before I came to college, I hate the bus, and planes are to expensive.

To get from Boston to my home in Jersey it takes up to 9 hours (driving is about 5) from start to finish on trains. It really depends on the amount of time I spend waiting in New York for the commuter rail to Jersey, but if the ride from Boston to NYC was 1.5 hours as apposed to 4, it would be so much quicker.

The high speed train is great no doubt about that, but here are the things to remember

In france for example it is not in people's culture to drive more than 2 hours when people have to drive long way they will take the train or fly.

The size of the countries where it has been implemented are very small which mean less of an expense compare to what it would be here.

So the question is this will people in the US start travelling by train more, and what will be the cost of doing this in a country as large as the US and will that cost be worth it?

minneapolis has "the light rail" running from downtown to more residential areas or other business sections of the city. I've only used it once, but it is FAN-TAS-TIC.

If only I didn't work outside of the city.. lol. I really should move to the suburbs closer to work.

Rail systems are perfect for city commuters, but you have to build them right. It would also be a great addition to the already prevalent "park and ride" bus systems we have running in just about every major city already. Houston, for example, really needs a high capacity park-and-ride rail coming in from the west headed downtown, right along I-10. Perhaps even only with one stop on each end.

If you implemented mass-transit park-and-ride to shuffle people into houston, and then had another "light rail" system similar to the one in minneapolis running around downtown, you could get rid of 30% of houston's rush hour traffic, and that's a VERY conservative estimate.

The problem is the cost in money and time to put the system together, plus restructuring downtown to accomadate a new traffic system.

Unfortunatly train travel does not make sense travelling between the destinations all around the country. As mentioned earlier, countries that are small in landmass can have rails running between all major cities and constantly run commuter trains between them, but here in the US, our rail systems are better used as they currently are, to shuffle mass amounts of goods around. We already have plenty of train tracks built for traveling around the country, but the cost in time and money to get from one destination to another is great enough that air travel or driving makes much more sense.

I'm all for implementing the use of this cheap and clean technology as long as they don't build one from Mexico, through the U.S. and into Canada, like the plans for that super highway that would have the government confiscating all the land along the route, and that would bring us that much closer to losing our sovereignty as a nation, and turning us into the North American Union.

I guess I am not so worried about high speed (over 200mph) trains, but rather a stable system of passenger rail routes in the midwest and east coast.

Japan is just about the same size as the eastern seaboard, from the top of Florida to mid New York. They have an exstensive rail system, with several high speed trains connecting major cities. Japan is a very mountainous country surrounded by volcanos, experiences regular earthquakes and typhoons, yet rail is exceedingly popular and safe way to travel by.

I don't see why it couldn't be translated here in eastern America. Obviously, we are no experts with rail, but doing the planning and bringing in experienced people will greatly help us achieve success.

I'm pretty stoked about all of this, if you can't tell! :sunny:

when i lived in tampa, they talked about putting one that went from tampa across the state. i would rather ride that thing than drive on I4 anyday!! the plans fizzled out for some reason....probably budget cuts. it was supposed to go from tampa to the east coast and then down to miami.

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Originally Posted by littleindiangirl

I think putting things off will hurt us in the long run. I think the benefits of decreasing our oil use, creating jobs for the rail system of this size, and cutting emmisions is something to invest in.

We are already decades behind europe and asia in regards to transit, why should we put it off any longer?

Remember, to make money, you have to spend money. Have you seen an increase in taxes lately? I havent. Or is it moving money and spending it on other projects?

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I completely agree that we are decades behind many parts of the world in regards to mass transit and need to solve our energy issues. My main point is that I'm for a train system (one should have been built in 60's - 70's however the teamsters union massively fought against it fearing they would loose their jobs) however how this money was appropriated I believe was wrong. I don't think that we should we should just say hay were spending 10's of billions of dollars a day, what a few more. As a nation Obama is trying to tackle WAY to much at once, I say WAY more that what this country can afford and potentially more that what it can survive.

In regards to Tax's, call someone who smokes, someone in california paying 9% sales tax or anyone self employed who actually plays by the rules to the T, paying threw the nose. Both sides have fully acknowledge that taxes are going up, way up to cover all the entitlements being handed out right and left. Most won't go into effect until 2011, but they are coming and the TEA parties that took place this week will look like a joke when hundreds of thousands of people start protesting working until june or july to just pay their tax's. Cities and States are already massively raising taxes, even after federal bailout money as they are nearly all still facing huge deficits and the federal government is lining up to HAVE to do the same just a few years behind them.

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Originally Posted by neilgolli

In regards to Tax's, call someone who smokes, someone in california paying 9% sales tax or anyone self employed who actually plays by the rules to the T, paying threw the nose.

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9.25% by the way...

It burns a bit, but I know it had to happen.



YAY Rail, by the way :)

The government is only studying the possibility of high speed rail. Most large length "new" travel systems require insane amounts of right of way. To aquire the right of way from citizens could take 10 plus years for the legal work and hundreds of billions in tax money.

Or since this is a socialist county they could just take the land from people.

My opinion is that it will never happen and the government is just wasting money. They should be putting more into roads and developing fuel efficient inexpensive vehicles.

Yes! Create Jobs and it's an alternative to the airline industry.

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Originally Posted by LadyOhh

9.25% by the way...

It burns a bit, but I know it had to happen.



YAY Rail, by the way :)

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Heather it burns now, but how will 10, 11, 12 % feel like? You know the increase had to happen because of poor choices and overspending in the past. How will burning threw 8,000,000,000,000 (thats 12 zero's) (plus interest) to study the possibility of a railway system impact your taxes in the future? Is it worth the burden on your children?

Personally, I'm all for investing in Schwinn. :P Might take a bit longer to get where you're going, but it'll be cheaper! ;)

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Originally Posted by neilgolli

Heather it burns now, but how will 10, 11, 12 % feel like? You know the increase had to happen because of poor choices and overspending in the past. How will burning threw 8,000,000,000,000 (thats 12 zero's) (plus interest) to study the possibility of a railway system impact your taxes in the future? Is it worth the burden on your children?

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Would you say that investing in the existing rail ways for use as passenger routes would be a good idea? Because that money is also (Or most of it, per some reports) investing in the existing tracks.

I work in rail, and I can tell you, we already have a very large amount of railways around the east and midwest. CSXT is on the eastern side, with UP and BNSF from the midwest to pacific and south.

The problem though is these routes aren't made for high speed (90+mph) trains, and really run mostly heavy freight. Upgrading the tracks takes time, and money that rail companies do when absolutely necessary.