Requiem for a Train - High-speed rail is dead in America

[liberal N proud]

Well, you can stop imagining it now. High-speed rail isn’t happening in America. Not anytime soon. Probably not ever. The questions now are (1) what killed it, and (2) should we mourn its passing?

There was a brief burst of enthusiasm around the future of high-speed rail in January 2010, when President Obama announced $8 billion in federal stimulus spending to start building “America’s first nationwide program of high-speed intercity passenger rail service.” Since then, however, the project’s chances of success have been heading in one direction: downhill. First, Tea Party conservatives in Florida and wealthy liberal suburbanites in the Bay Area began questioning their states’ plans. Then, just as Joe Biden was calling for $53 billion in high-speed-rail spending over the next six years, a crop of freshly elected Republican governors turned down billions in federal money for lines in Wisconsin, Ohio, and Florida. Finally, Republicans in Congress zeroed out the federal high-speed rail budget last month. (To understand why conservatives hate trains, see my colleague Dave Weigel’s story from earlier this year.)

Though Republicans’ outright rejection of high-speed rail is short-sighted, so were many of the plans themselves. Rather than focus on the few corridors that need high-speed rail lines the most, the Obama administration doled out half a billion here and half a billion there, a strategy better-suited to currying political support than to addressing real infrastructure problems. Spread across 10 corridors, each between 100 and 600 miles long, Obama’s rail system would have been, at best, a disjointed patchwork. The nation’s most gridlocked corridor, along the East Coast between Washington, D.C. and Boston, was left out of the plans entirely. Worse, much of the money was allocated to projects that weren’t high-speed rail at all.

The Europeans define high-speed trains as those that travel at speeds of 155 miles per hour or more (or 125 mph for tracks that are upgraded, rather than newly built). Wisconsin’s proposed $823 million Milwaukee-to-Madison line was to reach 110 mph, at most, in between stops in cities such as Brookfield and Oconomowoc. Ohio’s version was even slower, with trains on an upgraded freight-rail track topping out at 79 mph. With stops, the trip from Cincinnati to Cleveland would have been significantly slower by rail than by car. Who would ride such a thing? Former Ohio governor Ted Strickland, a Democrat, bemoaned the jobs that would be lost when his Republican successor killed the project. But at a cost of $400 million, this was job creation of the sort that John Maynard Keynes himself would have eyed skeptically. Florida’s $2.4 billion Tampa-to-Orlando line made more sense, but it was no surprise that Republican Gov. Rick Scott nixed it in February. By that time, high-speed rail had already become a punch line among fiscal conservatives.

and the reasons go on and on at the link: http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technocracy/2011/12/high_speed_rail_is_dead_in_america_should_we_mourn_it_.html



Also linked: Why do conservatives hate trains so much? - http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2011/03/off_the_rails.html


"Conservatives used to be in favor of a civilized way of doing things," William Lind, the director of the American Conservative Center for Public Transportation

[haikugal]

1. I'm mourning....

I was looking forward to it.

[mmonk]

2. Too 1st world for a budding 3rd world country.

[marmar]

3. I mourn it.....but the plan was too timid and half-assed.

The kind of compromised plan you get in a country where oil companies have so much influence.

[No Elephants]

23. Not only oil companies. Auto industry, too.

Same two industries that got the U.S. to build a national highway system--under the defense budget, no less. (For evacuation after a nuclear attack I believe, but I have not checked).

Ike loved him some General Motors and some Esso.

There was a simpler time, when people worked and shopped and went to school in their own neighborhoods, and many went home for lunch with their families.

[Warpy]

4. Rich oil men killed it. They've been hostile to mass transit

since the 1940s. They're especially hostile to rail, unable to kill it because it's still the cheapest way to move most goods but eager to prevent any expansion of it.

The last thing those fuckers want is anything that gets people out of cars and off asphalt.

[liberal N proud]

12. GM - Firestone and Standard Oil company killed the streetcar

So the theory goes.

[No Elephants]

24. I am again outed as posting before reading the entire thread. Please see Reply 23.

I forgot about tire companies, though.

[Kolesar]

5. That article is shallow and badly researched. Intercity passenger rail expenditures are *way* up ..

...in the last decade or so.

Further, you don't have to build maglev or even electrified catenary fed trains to have effective high speed rail.

[liberal N proud]

13. But it points to the cases in Florida, Wisconsin and Ohio

where high speed rail plans were killed by republican governors who are controlled by the Koch Brothers.

The only places we see spending on rail is the east and west coasts. Not much in between.

[Brother Buzz]

6. I'm a neophyte on all things rail but.....

I would far prefer to see conventional passenger service restored to its previous splendor in all of the United States before we invest in high speed rail.

YMMV

[liberal N proud]

8. If you have ever traveled the High Speed Rail service in Europe...

You would long for it here in the US. It is great, 2 hours from Paris to Geneva in a nice wide seat with a picture window looking out on the French country side and into the foothills of Alps.

Can you imagine such a rail across the great plains and through the Rocky Mountains. Oh I mourn the fact that we have greedy men keeping us from such amenities.

[Turbineguy]

11. My Cousin in the Netherlands

takes the Eurostar to London to visit his Daughter. It takes the same amount of time as flying and is a lot less of a hassle.

[liberal N proud]

14. So much less hassle

[hifiguy]

15. No kidding.

I was in France in '03 on a junket related to my avocational writing gig. Flew into deGaulle, walked to the TGV station (located in the deGaulle terminal!) and hopped on the train. Incredibly comfortable, with seats bigger than first class air, great coffee and snacks, and what fun it was to sit and watch the cows and vineyards fly by at around 300 kmh (186 mph). Within three hours we were in Lyon. Grabbing a bag and getting out to the street took, oh, four or five minutes. Simply the most comfortable and civilized way to travel ever invented.

[Brother Buzz]

16. Back in the day, I was very impressed with conventional European rail service

It got me where I needed to go in a fine fashion.

I suggest we rebuild to those standards, then expand to the high speed stuff.

[No Elephants]

27. Why re-build to a standard that is long outdated before rebuilding to the

standard available today?

Not getting it.

Do you think re-creating a standard of fifty years ago or more would be significantly less expensive? If so, why do you think that?

[karynnj]

17. We took it in Spain from Malaga to Madrid - just as you described

In addition, there was a movie where the audio was available in several languages. For us, it was incredibly easy - letting us spend a week seeing Andalusia, followed by 3 days seeing Madrid. It was wonderful seeing areas of Spain we would have missed in a plane.

[No Elephants]

26. I did take a train trip across the U.S., from Manhattan to New Mexico I saw a lot of cars rusting

until I got motion sick and had to lie down until we hit New Mexico, where I went to the Emergency Room.

The most interesting thing I saw was a tombstone right beside the tracks saying "He stole the payroll," which was supposedly very old. I suspect it may have placed there by Amtrak for us tourists, as it was the only thing train personnel point out to us.

Not at all as breathtaking as the castles on the Rhine at which I gawked from the train from Germany to Amsterdam, which I also took.

I am guessing, in the U.S., I either slept overnight through or was motion sick through most of the great scenery? Either that, or our train tracks were not placed to take advantage of it.

However, my U.S. did bring home to me what a vast country this is in a way that nothing else really could.

[KoKo]

31. The vast country of America could really seem infinitely boring compared to the Compactness

of Europe.

That might be why "High Speed" here...might not be the same. Not saying we shouldn't have it...but, that our country is so vast with so many "dead areas" that might be interesting and beautiful in many ways....but, cannot compare to Europe.

:shrug: We are different folks and it might take "different strokes" to achieve better energy efficiency? What works for other areas of the world ...might need to be "modified" for here in the USA? :shrug:

[No Elephants]

25. A company atttempted to do that by attaching a few luxury cars to Amtrak. I think they went broke.

I traveled from New York to Chicago on it, courtesy of a multi millionaire friend who did not wish to travel alone and hates flying.

I imagine the fare was quite expensive. Splendor takes a lot of people rendering service and a lot dollars to reproduce.

[Turbineguy]

7. Just getting regular

train service improved would have been an accomplishment. Republicans only see benefits if their buddies make profits. Otherwise it's only a cost.

In 2008 when gasoline hit $4.50 per gallon, my mother (living in Southern California) told me how sorry she felt for people who had to pay so much to get to work. "Would those be the same people that have consistently voted against rapid transit?"

[liberal N proud]

9. Yes Greed rules the nation yet again.

[NickB79]

10. We either vastly expand rail lines, or transport in this country grinds to a halt

When the fossil fuels start to run low and climate change caused by burning those fuels starts to destroy our croplands.

It looks like America has opted for the second choice, unfortunately.

[liberal N proud]

18. Sad, isn't it.

[Kablooie]

19. Hmm. I wonder what Dagny Taggart would say?

Old John Galt ain't a mould'ren in the grave no more.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

20. Meanwhile, European countries and Japan are expanding their high-speed systems, and

countries such as China, Taiwan, South Korea, Thailand, and, get this, Vietnam are building systems.

Yes, folks, we're falling behind Vietnam in high-speed rail. :banghead:

[liberal N proud]

21. Our corporations are striving to turn America into a third world country

then maybe we to can get mass transit.

[NYC_SKP]

22. We will get more rail, and some of it will be high speed. Sooner or later.

It just won't happen as soon or at as large a scale as we'd all like.

K/R

[No Elephants]

28. So, here I was, posting merrily along, before noticing that this thread pre-dates DU 3.

[KoKo]

29. Well...there are some "not so Oldies but Goodies" that are still worth a read..

There was a time when folks used to subscribe to News Magazines who did "in depth reporting after the news broke in the MSM" and we used to have time to "reflect and think further" about what is today's "Breaking News" but goes down Memory Hole after a day.

So...it's nice to be here in the "forgotten, unsupported zone" and see folks kicking some articles that might have been missed and giving time to "catch up?" :shrug:

I don't think that's a waste of time...but I know there are those who would disagree.

:-)'s and peace. Thanks for your posting some more current articles to take up the slack here, though.

[No Elephants]

30. You're welcome.

DBT felt he or she was doing it for Phed, a DUer died and whom I never knew, but who I understand kept LBN going almost single-handedly at one point.


I feel that I owe it to dbt and to the DU2ers who are still here. :grouphug: