Reply #25: Please do explain to me why a train traveling at 100 mph is slower than a truck?

[originalpckelly]

I understand what you're saying, just in time delivery, yada yada. I agree, but you can slap together JIT shipments for multiple customers in a single train, then run that train at high speed, and beat the truck drivers. All while having lower and more predictable fuel costs.

The only part of the route that has to be driven by truckers, is the part from the freight terminal to the customers place of business. We can use an inter-modal containerized system to just take the loads off a train and put them on trucks, without have to unpack a train and reload the stuff on a big rig's trailer.

Freight in France travels at higher speeds than it does in the US, and the french mail service uses old TGVs to ship mail, we might be able to get away with putting freight on something like a TGV for cargo that has an outer streamlined shell to reduce drag. Time segregate the shit so that there is less danger to passenger rail.