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| ▲ | meowkit 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Yesh go to literally any other industrialized part of the world and see how ** backwards the US is on trains I’ve become quite radicalized on trains after visiting Japan and Switzerland myself. | | |
| ▲ | dmix 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Not like the US didn't try. California spent 15yrs trying to build a high speed train and failed. Canada has been talking about building trains forever too and it usually goes nowhere because the budgets explode like every major infrastructure project these days. UK spent $100M just to deal with bats in a single train tunnel, which is representative of the issue https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c9wryxyljglo | | |
| ▲ | skyyler 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I wonder what's different between these English speaking countries you mention failing to build out rail transit, and places like Japan and China that have built fabulous rail networks. | | |
| ▲ | rootusrootus 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | Japan is a fairly unique case, and probably does not share much with China aside from being in the same region. Japan is geographically well suited to serving a large portion of the population with one long line with a few branches. That's a convenient advantage. China just doesn't have to worry about environmentalists or anyone else locally trying to stand in the way, they just bulldoze them and build. China also has much lower labor costs, and even Japan is a good bit cheaper (than the US, at the least) | | |
| ▲ | dgacmu 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | Yes, but also: The metro area density of Tokyo is 3,000 / km^2 The metro area density of Beijing is 1,747 / km^2 Greater Los Angeles: 208 / km^2 | | |
| ▲ | rtpg an hour ago | parent [-] | | LA proper seems to have a density of 3000/km^2 according to Wikipedia A perhaps more interesting use case is the utsunomiya light rail. Utsunomiya has a density of around 1200/km^2. What they ended up doing was building a new tram with exactly one line. The main thing they did was make sure the tram comes frequently, including off peak. End result is people rely on the tram line and the tram is making good money, being operationally profitable (still gotta pay back construction costs of course). Utsunomiya is obviously not exactly greater LA, but Utsunomiya has on average 2.25 cars per household[0]. It has traffic issues and people feel the need to own a car. And yet the tram line is finding success because transportation is a local issue, not a global one! You can solve for transportation issues in crowded areas. Few reasonable people are lamenting that you don't have a train between madison, WI and Chicago every 15 minutes. Many are simply lamenting that even at a local level PT in many places is leaving a lot on the table despite there being chances of success! Smaller focused PT has proven itself to work time and time again, and compounds on other PT projects in the area. [0]: https://www.pref.tochigi.lg.jp/english/intro/overview.html |
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| ▲ | rtpg an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | > California spent 15yrs trying to build a high speed train and failed. It has to be said: even in Japan train projects are multi decade projects. Is Cali HSR stopped? I can imagine it being slow but I wonder if it's 10x slower or "merely" 3x slower. | | |
| ▲ | Jblx2 an hour ago | parent [-] | | I wonder if California high speed rail will ever surpass quadcopter personal vehicles in passenger miles per year. I know which way I'd bet for the year 2040. |
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| ▲ | tormeh 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Those are two unusually competent countries when it comes to trains. Try Germany or the UK for a more average outcome. | | |
| ▲ | rootusrootus 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | Ha, even using the UK as a counterpoint, they do pretty well. I enjoy taking the LNER, and appreciate that it is a 'slow' train that happens to run 50% faster than the top speed of Amtrak in all but a very limited set of tracks in the NEC. And maybe I've just had unusually good luck, but LNER has almost always been punctual. |
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| ▲ | rootusrootus 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | OTOH, on my visits to Europe I am simultaneously impressed with the prevalence of passenger train options, but disheartened by the price. If Europe struggles to provide really affordable trains, there isn't much hope for the US. Aside from regional train options in the densest areas, we just have too much distance to cover. Infrastructure costs would kill the plan. At this point maybe we should just be trying harder to produce renewable fuels for planes. |
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| ▲ | nunez 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Bus Rapid Transit is another option that could be amazing (while being much cheaper to implement), but it falls short for the same reason as trains: they require dedicated infrastructure that complicates driving, and complicating driving is political suicide. | | |
| ▲ | Schiendelman 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | One of the things I found when advocating for transit was that BRT cost savings in the US almost always come from reducing quality at stations, which loses public support faster than you save money. I found that voters are usually willing to spend far more on trains than on BRT, in excess of any savings. | | |
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| ▲ | soiltype 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | None. Why would you think that? My guess is you're an American living nowhere near an urban rail system but I thought most people here would at least be passing familiar with modern trains. Even some American cities have them. | | |
| ▲ | floxy an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | >modern trains. Even some American cities have them. Which American cities have notable modern train systems? Not Portland, or NYC, or Washington DC. | | |
| ▲ | soiltype 16 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | What do you mean by notable? | | |
| ▲ | floxy a minute ago | parent [-] | | Only that they are worthy of noting. If there is a modern system, but it happens to suck for some reason, you don't have to mention that one. So feel free to strike that "notable". Which American cities have modern train systems? |
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| ▲ | Schiendelman an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | It's hard to say "system", but Seattle's just opened our second line, and we've got a couple in design as well. |
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| ▲ | dzhiurgis 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Why the ad hominem? I've lived and travelled in a ton of places. Trains in low density cities are simply not working well enough. I now prefer to live in exurb and drive everywhere. It's so good. | | |
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| ▲ | array_key_first 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Also just like... looking at a train and noticing it can carry a ton more people than a car, has no concept of traffic, and can theoretically go as fast as possible. | | |
| ▲ | xnx 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | But in practice runs empty most of the time, is commonly delayed by any problem on the line or station, and operates on a very limited schedule. |
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| ▲ | Schiendelman 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | What makes you say that? I'd only propose them in very high density corridors (or in corridors where building a train would be paired with allowing high density). | | |
| ▲ | Jblx2 an hour ago | parent [-] | | A lot of it probably has to do with train advocates seeming like audiophiles extoling the virtues of phonograph records and the like. It seems like they are nostalgic for an 1880s utopia. That's just the vibe I get. I wonder what people in this thread think about The Line. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Line,_Saudi_Arabia | | |
| ▲ | Schiendelman an hour ago | parent [-] | | That's understandable, but I think the mass transit crowd is pretty different. I think you may need to meet more transit advocates! | | |
| ▲ | Jblx2 18 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | I think there is also a couple of other factors at play with the online train / mass transit advocates on places like HN. It could just be my imagination, but I think there is trains-are-a-good-solution-for-other-people (but not necessarily for me) contingent. And there is a trains-are-good-for-you transportation method, that you have to put up with for the "greater good". A bitter pill to swallow, not something you actually want. Kind of the opposite for say, electric vehicles, where they currently are a much superior alternative to and internal combustion engine vehicle for almost ever use case (acceleration, $/mile, maintenance, general hassle). That's why I think EVs will inevitably win, even in the U.S.. Maybe someone could come up with a luxury light rail that people would actually want to use? I mentioned it up-thread in the context of California high speed rail, but now I'm going to broaden it. When will personal (flying) quadcopter vehicles have more annual passenger miles than every passenger rail combined (subways/light rail/Amtrak) in the U.S.? I'm could see it happening within my lifetime. Maybe this has some bearing on why I see trains as antiquated? | |
| ▲ | Jblx2 6 minutes ago | parent | prev [-] | | And am I the only one who thinks the concept of a "transit advocate" is a bit odd? I mean, yes, there are people whose career is to make transportation work/better. And they should continue to do so. Were there non-Bell-Telephone-employees that were telephone advocates back in the 1940s? Airline advocates convincing people to fly? Car phone/cell phone brick/flip phone/smart phone advocates? |
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