Obama wants to raise gas pricesFollow

How is connecting to another dying city going to help?

My experience with Civ II is that railways are an absolute must.

Edited, Mar 3rd 2011 3:24pm by Uglysasquatch

So, a rail ticket to travel 400 miles is $400? No? Sounds cheaper than flying to me then. Is it cheaper than driving? Maybe or maybe not, but it'd be quicker. Much, much quicker.

Just did a random search for Amtrak prices. Boston to Orlando on Amtrak takes a day of travel, and costs $224 one way. Expedia has a round-trip Delta flight for $221 taking 5 hours - note, round-trip. It's not a 400 mile trip obviously, but over long distances air travel > trains.

Tried another for Newark, DE to New York (Penn Station). I used to make this trip all the time in college, as my gf was in NYC. $44 one-way and 2 hours (a bit over, actually). But I used to take the Chinatown coach bus (AAbus.com); $35 roundtrip, and 2 and a half hours. It actually would take 2 hours, but they said 2 1/2 to account for traffic. Again, a much better deal, but a short distance (130 miles or so).

Last one, Newark DE to Boston MA (350 miles).
Flight: $167 round trip (Philly to BOS, so add another $40 for tipping a friend to drive you or taking a shuttle). 1 hr 15 minute flight.
Amtrak: $66 one way, 7 1/2 hours total, one stop. Save some money, lose some time.

Seems like over medium distances it's ok (takes longer, costs less), but short or long distances there are better options than rail.

Also, Sim City 2000. Man, Sim City 2000.

No matter how high speed it is, I can't see it outrunning a plane (depending on distance - you need to arrive much earlier for a flight than a train). Which makes it a question of availability and price. If Amtrak is so pricey already, I find it tough to believe the high speed train will be even as cheap.

First off, lol @ lengthy but unattributed cite from Cato.

Secondly, given that the road system and our flight industry are both heavily subsidized by taxpayers, I'm not seeing this as much of a kicker. I have no clue if light rail is cheaper (all things being equal) and will be the first to admit that Amtrak sucks. But the bolded, underlined portion there is kind of meaningless.

I suppose there's also the hope that a new and viable means of transportation will increase competition among all the means of transport, thereby driving prices down.

Edited, Mar 3rd 2011 5:11pm by Eske

It wont be. That's why it's a complete waste of money. And the whole thing about shorter waits and not having to take off your shoes that Biden touts? If more people ride passenger trains, they'll start to become the preferred target for terrorist attacks, and you'll see the same kind of delays. Arguably, trains are much more vulnerable to attack than planes. Planes take off and land at secured locations (airports), with not a whole lot you can do to them externally in between. If I wanted to kill a whole ton of people, I'd target a lonely stretch of high speed rail with a pretty simple device designed to detonate as a train roars over at 100mph. How do you defend every inch of rail? Answer: You don't.


And even ignoring that, the problem with high speed rail, as you've observed, is that it really doesn't compete with air travel at all, but it can't compete with road travel either. Unless everyone lives within walking distance of the rail lines, you have to have roads to get people from those end points to their final destination. Thus the "cost" for road systems is needed whether we build the rails or not. And once you accept that, you rapidly realize that it makes much more monetary sense to expand freeway and road systems to enhance short and medium range travel than to build rails.


Rails only look good if you completely cherry pick the benefits and ignore all the downsides. It's a waste of money.

Doubtful. Planes have the advantage of being giant missiles whereas it's hard to crash a train into a skyscraper. Certainly there's been terrorist attacks on trains in Europe but, for the same results, you could attack the New York subway system or Chicago L or some other packed commuter train. Is there a three hour security delay before getting on the Washington DC Metro?

Edited, Mar 3rd 2011 6:24pm by Jophiel

Ummm... I used the existing train system as an example of how terrorists aren't climbing all over themselves to blow up trains.

I'm not sure what point you thought you were just proving.