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Guest Post: Getting On The Train - The Rail Resurrection Gets Underway
Submitted by Gregor McDonald, a PeakProsperity.com contributing editor
Getting On The Train
Given emerging data in 2012, it's becoming increasingly clear that the post-war automobile era in the United States is now in well-articulated decline. Accordingly, it makes sense to note the beginning of a long-term supertrend that is just getting started: the resurrection of America’s rail system.
At Seattle’s historic King Street Station (a classic example of early 20th Century railroad architecture), a nasty looking dropped-tile ceiling – which hung above travellers for decades – was removed late last year to reveal ornate plasterwork as the building undergoes extensive renovation. These cosmetic (and structural) alterations are part of a wide-ranging upgrade to the entire Cascades passenger rail service that runs from Vancouver, British Columbia, to Eugene, Oregon.
In Tacoma, for example, a new station will either be built or renovated, and part of the Cascades line will be re-routed from its current shoreline path more directly through that city. Elsewhere, bridges are being rebuilt, track is being upgraded, and other infrastructure improvements are underway as part of the $500 million program to resurrect more efficient, faster inter-city rail in the 466-mile Amtrak route through this part of the Pacific Northwest.
These changes will not bring European-style high-speed rail to the United States. Indeed, in many similar projects across the country, top speeds of 125 mph will characterize new system capability, rather than the average speed actually maintained from city to city. However, the incremental improvements now underway will become the platform for the next phase of investment, as Americans are increasingly persuaded to limit their car ownership and make rail transport part of their lives once again.
What America Lost
Up until World War II, rail transport of all kinds – intercity, light rail, and commuter rail – dominated transportation in America. Los Angeles had the largest light-rail system in the entire world, connecting the San Fernando Valley to Long Beach, and San Bernardino County to central L.A. and the northern reaches of Orange County. As the old saying goes, however, the car killed America. And the following 40 years from 1945-1985 saw a relentless decline of all forms of rail in the United States.
To get a sense of what the country lost as it eagerly built out a vast highway infrastructure and foolishly stopped investing in rail, let's look at two historical maps showing a veritable collapse of passenger route miles over just a ten year period. The first map shows that in 1962 intercity passenger rail network still covered 88,710 route miles.
Just ten years later, however, with intrusive highways bisecting American cities and ruining the integrity of their downtowns, the number of passenger route miles had collapsed by over 75%(!), to just 19,366 miles.
Laughing at Amtrak
Most people born after World War II have regarded Amtrak as a kind of joke, with its routine dysfunction and massive annual operating losses. The economics of national rail transport, however, deem that your railway system will only be as efficient as the proper mix of investment and operational fitness allows. If you starve your railways of upgrades, make them share tracks with freight rail, and divert national infrastructure spending to other modes of transport, the results will be quite predictable.
One of the great misunderstandings of public rail transport is the mistaken belief that it should run at an operating profit. Not so. The purpose of commuter rail, light-rail, or intercity rail is to harvest economy-wide efficiencies and to ensure that wasteful expenditures spent collectively on transportation can be directed elsewhere. These "savings" were not an issue and were harder to determine during the cheap oil era, when much of the national highway system was built during the era of $14/bbl oil. Now, however, the impact on household budgets and monthly cash flow from much higher oil prices is pushing U.S. transportation demand rather dramatically away from roads and highways – and instead to rail.
In Los Angeles, for example, where the aggressive Measure R has been restoring L.A.'s lost light-rail system, annual ridership has made extraordinary gains. A recent piece from LA Observed reports that "[a]verage weekday ridership on Metro's rail lines in September soared to 357,096, up nearly 12 percent over the same time last year and 16 percent over 2010." Similar restorations of commuter rail in cities like Boston and improvements in either infrastructure or rolling stock in the NY Metro region have emerged in the past decade. Indeed, some U.S. regions took the signal of oil's price revolution early and began work on local rail systems long before federal spending began to shift, ever so slightly, to rail transport.
Meanwhile, on the national level, Amtrak just announced that ridership hit an all-time high and has climbed nearly 50% in the past decade. From its October 2012 press release:
Amtrak carried more than 31.2 million passengers in Fiscal Year 2012 ending September 30, marking the highest annual ridership total since America's Railroad started operations in 1971 and the ninth ridership record during the last ten years. A year-over-year comparison of FY 2012 to FY 2011 shows ridership grew 3.5 percent to a new record of 31,240,565 passengers and ticket revenue jumped 6.8 percent to a best ever $2.02 billion. In addition, Amtrak system-wide on-time performance increased to 83 percent, up from 78.1 percent and its highest level in 12 years. During FY 2012, ridership on the Northeast Corridor is up 4.8 percent to a record 11.4 million, state-supported and other short distance routes is up 2.1 percent to a record 15.1 million and long-distance services is up 4.7 percent to their best showing in 19 years at 4.7 million. Also, FY 2012 produced other ridership achievements including new records for 25 of 44 Amtrak services, and 12 consecutive monthly records with July being the single best month in the history of Amtrak. Since FY 2000, Amtrak ridership is up 49 percent.
Rationalizing the Rail System
Many will decry the fact that Amtrak and the United States as a whole are still not in a position to offer European- or Asian-style high-speed-rail, where sustained traveling speeds routinely average above 150 mph. However, five to six decades of neglect necessitate that the U.S. undertake its resurrection of rail in phases. Two of the many projects around the country (The Vermonter & The Cascade Line) demonstrate exactly the type of initial heavy-lifting that must be done, in which fundamental changes are made in route selection and in the separation of tracks between freight and passenger rail.
The Vermonter: New York City to Burlington
Three states, Vermont, Massachusetts, and Connecticut, are currently in partnership with Amtrak to upgrade tracks, bridges, and stations along the route between Burlington and New York City. The state of Vermont has just completed its part by upgrading track with new, very long, continuously-welded rail, which will increase speeds. Work in Connecticut and Massachusetts is now underway, but one of the more significant transformations occurs in the switching of 60 miles of track from Palmer and Amherst back to the other side of the Connecticut River. This is actually a restoration of the original route between Vermont and New York, and means that trains from Springfield, MA will now travel north to Holyoke, Northampton, and then Greenfield before joining up again with the current route through Brattleboro in southern Vermont. Below is one of the new train stations, located in Greenfield, Massachusetts.
In bringing The Vermonter back to the west side of the Connecticut River, Amtrak is rationalizing the route in several ways, but most importantly it is reducing the passenger train's exposure to freight traffic. Shared tracks, in which passenger service and freight traffic run on the same routes, is actually an enormous problem in the United States and accounts for a tremendous amount of the dysfunction that many users of Amtrak services experience. The biggest change in the Vermont-New York City trip, therefore, will come via on-time reliability as the transfer away from Palmer, MA will greatly reduce overlap with freight rail. Completion of this project is currently set for 2014.
The Cascades Line
The twin ports of Vancouver, Washington and Portland, Oregon – straddling each side of the Columbia River – have seen very strong growth the past few years as increasing volumes of lumber, potash, and wheat are shipped to Asia. Accordingly, on the north side of the river at the Port of Vancouver (Washington), a large freight rail project has been underway to help increase loadings.
But one of the little-noticed initiatives is the construction of new track to alleviate congestion for passenger trains as they head out of Portland toward Seattle. Finally, these trains will be able to steer clear of freight traffic at the Vancouver, Washington side of the river.
As usual, these are not the types of splashy, high-profile infrastructure improvements that garner headlines. But the Portland to Seattle route typically has had very poor on-time reliability, which invariably reduces ridership. As mentioned in the start of this essay, Cascades Line improvements are quite wide-ranging, with the Federal Government having awarded over $800 million to multiple projects. The upgrades will continue for several years, with noticeable differences in on-time reliability already in force.
Aiming for the Virtuous Circle: Reliability and Ridership
Amtrak's 50% increase in ridership the past decade certainly began as a result of rising oil prices, and not because of any notable service improvements. However in the latter part of the decade and especially in the past 3-4 years, Amtrak (and other rail networks) have started to deliver substantial improvements to riders as the upgrade cycle gains momentum.
Deep skepticism has greeted just about every major rail project in the country over the past twenty years. But a virtuous circle, in which riders are persuaded to reduce car-miles driven, has started to unfold as heavier demand comes online for rail services. This has been especially true in cities such as Los Angeles which started its light-rail project twenty years ago, greeted initially greeted by a fearful public. Now however, L.A. is laying track down along many of the same routes from its pre-war light-rail system. It is finally becoming possible to live in Los Angeles without a car.
Continuing the Virtuous Circle
Various trends are already coming together that will support the resurrection of rail and possibly strengthen it as we move out towards 2025. In Part II, Reducing Your Exposure to Oil, we explore ways to take part in the U.S. rail renaissance. I also offer a case study how much savings a household can capture by moving to a city that is served by extensive rail transport. Finally, I give a brief update on energy transition, as the developed world continues to move away from high-priced oil and pursues economic development along the contours of the powergrid.
Click here to read Part II of this report (free executive summary; paid enrollment required for full access).
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Yeah a rail decline from 1970.....
UK freight tonne KM (million freight tonne -kilometers)
1970 : 25,000
1995 : 13,000
2006 :22,000
2010 : 19,000
In more detail (recent)
Key results:The amount of freight moved peaked during 2006-07 with 21.88 billion net tonne kilometres moved. By 2009-10 the amount of freight moved had fallen to 19.06 billion net tonne kilometres. In 2011-12 the total amount of freight moved increased to 21.06 billion net tonne kilometres. Commodities such as coal and oil and petroleum have reduced within this time frame whereas commodities such as construction and domestic intermodal have increased the amount of freight moved.
Annual: 1) The total amount of freight moved in 2011-12 increased by 9.5% compared to 2010-11. This is the highest amount of total freight moved since 2007-08.
2) All commodities moved experienced an increase between 2010-11 and 2011-12, except Oil and Petroleum which decreased by 8.9%.
Quarterly:
1) In 2012-13 Q1 the total amount of freight moved was 5.49 billion net tonne kilometres, a 6.8% increase compared to the same quarter in the previous year. This is the highest amount of freight moved within a quarter since 2006-07 Q3.
2) The total amount of coal moved on the railway network during 2012-13 Q1 was 1.87 billion net tonne kilometres; this is 23.8% increase on the same quarter last year. This is the largest amount of coal moved within a quarter since 2008-09 Q4.
3). A number of commodities increased the amount of freight moved in 2012-13 Q1 when compared to Q1 last year, this includes: oil and petroleum by 5.1%, domestic intermodal by 4.1% and the other category by 22.8%. Metals, construction and international freight moved declined in 2012-13 Q1 when compared to the same quarter last year by 18.1%, 1.7% and 7.2% respectively.
Methodology:
Freight moved is measured in net tonne kilometres (NTKm). This takes into account the net weight (excluding the weight of the locomotive and wagons) of the goods carried (the freight lifted, measured in tonnes) and the distance carried. Infrastructure is not included in the total NTKm, we have included a separate series on infrastructure traffic (goods used for railway engineering work).
International comprises trains travelling through the Channel Tunnel; Domestic intermodal includes goods that have arrived by sea at ports.
Excellent work ; THE DORK OF CORK
It seems the cost of (energy) is becoming critical. Costs from the 70's are 40% higher, yet tonnage has been reduced buy 30%.
Warren Buffet is about to get (criss/crossed).
@Yen cross
I am afraid you don't understand the UK economy.
It became a non industrial country during the 70s and 80s........nothing much happens there so rail freight which is best at moving heavy materials is going to get crushed.
Indeed its amazing it has held up to such a extent.
However Rail passenger numbers have nearly doubled from the mid 1990s as people spend their global wage arbitrage gains on holidays in Cornwall.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwidjGWFMUs
From 750~ million passenger rail to 1500~ million today.
This puts the Amtrak numbers of +30 million in some context.
London , is the single largest financial center on planet Earth. I have wierd sleeping hours, because I prefer the liquidity of London over New York.
I understand the U.K. economy perfectly. I was spawned from it.
You are " meandering about"...
@Yen - there was I thinking I answered your question............................
In the great scheme of things UK energy consumption has not gone anywhere but the focus has been in transport energy consumption as the remaining rump Industrial economy was outsourced to cheaper labour markets.
Oil use reached a peak of 101.5 MTOE in 1973.
A nadir of 67.2 MTOE in 1983 (thatcher cuts)
Increased at a very rapid pace in 1984 as the city went for the BIG BANG loads of money era reaching a incredible 84.7 MTOE that year.
It went back to 1983 like levels in 2011 at 68 MTOE
Again total inland energy consumption peaked in 1973 at 220.5 MTOE
A low of 196.1 MTOE was reached in 1982 but dramatic rises in oil and gas consumption in 1984 was masked by a dramatic decline in coal consumption so therefore 1984 only had a total of 196.4 MTOE
Another mini peak of 220.7 MTOE was reached in 1993 (first EMU crisis)
A true peak was reached in 2001 at 236.9 MTOE .
In 2011 it was back down to 203 MTOE with lower quality coal doing more of the heavy lifting as gas stations get switched off again. (hence the more recent rise in rail freight during the 2011/12 period.)
But there is far more people living in the UK then in 1973
When the UK went into current account deficit in 1984 it can be understood very simply.
Destroy local British Industry.
Redirect the now surplus North Sea oil to the PIigs and others so that the city can gain a higher labour arbitrage from the Grot production.
When the oil is gone drive those PIigs into current account surplus so that you can remain in real goods deficit.
If we could just make everyone stay home watching a high efficiency flat screen TV all day, we wouldn't need trains or cars. Decreased physical activity would minimize the need for food intake, further decreasing the need for transportation. If current world wide government policies just stay in place we may possibly reduce all fuel needs!
You may well have rationalized living like livestock but that doesn't mean we should all follow in your foot steps. Live free range taking your chances or join the herd, licking the hand of your shepherd thinking he is your protector when all he wants is your meat.
We have a horse race folks!
On one track is the credit collapse caused by high oil prices. Nothing like fuel rationing to destroy businesses! Best way to ration fuel is to ration credit and to do so by price. The real price for credit is higher than it has been since the early 1980s, no wonder there are so many excess reserves! (No wonder there are so many bankruptcies!)
On the other track is how fast can the Yankees cobble together some sort of rail transit into service ... so that people can get from where they are to where they want to go ... (that might have a train station).
Are Americans hard-wired to buy shit? Are Americans complete idiots? Same question: the answer is YES, YES, and YES! It doesn't matter! The more people spend on non-remunerative shit like cars the more expensive credit becomes in real terms. The credit process has started to work in reverse: the more people want shit the more expensive credit becomes! Irony is great that way! You have to love it!
Even more ironic are the little, bitty petroleum shortages that are starting to appear here and there (for various reasons) ... and that are appearing big-time in Europe. There is only so much petroleum to go around and the Yanks are just another group of stupid poor people ... who are unable to buy gas because they can't afford it.
The next step is the getting rid of the cars part. In Europe, the cars are going because entire countries are going broke ... because they have to borrow to import fuel ... which was burned up recklessly for nothing but 'consumer preference'. Now ... Europeans cannot afford fuel, they cannot afford the cost of borrowing and the European car industry is in the process of unraveling.
Soon enough, the car industry in the US will die. Maybe next year. Sooner the better.
We should power our trains electrically, like in Europe. Electric trains allow many more tunnels to boost speeds and elimate surface affects. The trains run fast, accelerate faster, and recoup energy in the system on braking and hill descent.
It costs a lot to electrify a line. Diesel-electric trains carry their own generators so you get the benefit of electric but less infrastructure costs.
Having said that the Trans-siberian express is electrified.
I live near a big city and commute in and out almost daily. I am a proponet of improving these systems as the one's I use are inefficient and suffer from delays or other inconveniences. If they could improve service, I think people would gladly choose it as an option in order to cut back on driving and save money. The price of parking at the station and a round trip ticket is significantly less than driving into the city and parking a car.
As for Amtrak, the big story currently is "high speed" rail. To them, high speed is 100mph. Why not shoot for something truly innovative like 250mph? Yes, it would mean dedicated lines, above grade so no crossings, and many other considerations, but it would be worth it if they could change the game. As is; however, billions to be spent upgrading the status quo seems like a waste. I'd rather see it go to improving local commuter rail to get more people to use it.
@Rentenmark
The capital cost of high speed is huge ....its much like building a highway but then you must lay down high quality track......
The French are currently building 3 high speed lines but they can only do this by stripping the PIigs of oil / capital consumption.
100MPH - 150 MPH lines are fine .....the steel also lasts much longer.
The Tours High speed line is costing 7.8 b illion Euros
The would be best spent on more labour rather then capital intensive local rail lines closed since the war but the French are onl y doing this stuff while they can withen the euro framework.
www.eib.org/attachments/press/lgv-sud-europe-atlantique-en.pdf
If they can burn Greek diesel to do this then why not ?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJNproZQ4Zs&feature=plcp
Dork - we have an alternative high speed network that requires next to zero digging up the countryside ..aeroplanes,
Wanna compare their passanger numbers to the inflated railway network which correct me if i'm wrong please, includes short tube stops
Trains have not paid their way in 100 years and no private sector Co would try to sustain this bankrupt antiquated system were it not for lavsih Govt subsidies
Govt taxes cars and aeroplanes because they are PRODUCTIVE and EFFICIENT not to mention massively more popular than the untaxeable (ie. bankrupt) train, tram and bus netwroks
You can't tax a turkey ....you can only tax the truly productive. Enough already. Game Over
Airplanes have had the greatest of all subsidy in their development - it was called the Great , second and cold war............
Despite this they consume vast amounts of kerosene - see above British energy balance data.
Different transport mediums require different energy intensities - however the current car and plane transport systems leave no capital for capital growth at these oil prices.
sorry Dork but nobody gives a crap about kerosene ...aircraft would (does) stand up on its own two feet without subsidy... like cars
airlines and cars are taxed, you can only tax productive industries
trains, trams and tubes are turkeys, they generate no revenue for Govt, indeed they all suck (from motorists pockets). It's a tragedy of malinvestment and as with all govt, dragging society back from picking winners and fast progress to subsidising losers and grinding everything down (socialism)
let's have a level playing field, including getting Govt out of road and rail track building
trains will get slaughtered without Govt subsidy, everyone knows it, dead and buried (at last)
Not true. Pretty much every airport is built with subsidies. And to say the automobile industry isn't subsidized is just silly. Wasn't called Government Motors for nothin'.
Angry White - you shouldn't let yourself out on the blogsphere on market topics or economics if you cannot do maths. There's a number of you on this thread, i'm repeating myself over and over but here goes coz i'm such a patient lovely guy
airports are not "subsidised" if the money invested in them comes entirely from the industry itself. Many airports are State built/owned, many now are private run. All of them are funded by the airline industry from customer revenues, even the Govty airports cost less than the revenue from airlines and their passangers generate. Namely they are self financing, no cross subsidy required... like cars
in stark contrast trains, trams, tubes and buses do not generate enough revenue from their own industry (from passangers) to support re-investment in new rolling stock or tracks etc. They require cross-subsidy from other sources, in the case of public transport almost all from the highly productive motorists pocket.
public transport is like nuclear power, unable to stand on its own 2 feet from its own revenues without huge handouts from (taxing motorists) the Nanny State
So cars and airlines are so productive they not only generate plenty of revenue for reinvestment for their own future sustainability but are so strong they can support the forever sucking (subsidised) bankrupt parasites of public transport
It's been that way for 100 years, an absolute waste of money, epically stupid malinvestment, and as always with Govt backing losers that nobble the progress of the most productive system for society that provides the most beneficial changes
@Zero
You tax the money supply.........when goverments raise the money supply planes will fall out of the sky.
Planes : low labour input per passenger / high energy input per passenger.
Trains : high labour input per passeneger / low energy input per passenger.
Planes only seem to work from the mid 80s because companies such a Jet Blue have crushed labour inputs so that more inputs can be directed toward kerosene burn.
The UK is turning its railways into little Ryanairs so you see a decline of the London - Edinburgh air route for example.
But its much better to increase fiscal subsidy as it helps to reduce the banking leverage withen the system........i.e. when you reduce wages the banks must increase credit ratios so that demand can remain up but this is a very fragile system of course - see Ireland.
Dork - you're being totally clueless
the cost of taking bankrupt propped-up high-speed rail London to Paris or Brussels is what, £200/€250
Ryanair is highly profitable (unlike rail) and will get you there in 1/4th the time for anywhere between €1.99 and €59.00
which transport system would "fall out of the sky" is already in your face and crystal clear
Oh Zero ...oh boy you have been fucked up big time by the neo liberals.
Why is the Ryanair model profitable ?
It reduced wages and conditions so that it could afford to burn all that kerosene.
You need to get your head around how the banking system works - especially when wages are reduced.
This creates a physical surplus which must be burned................the banks give you credit to buy cars and shit .....but this is a malinvestment of resourses.............
Ryanair cut its teeth on the Dublin to London route...........
It became the busiest air route in Europe.............now its not.
Why
Eventually almost the entire population of Ireland worked for Ryanair companies ..........so they ran out of customers.
Ryanair has moved on to destroy the European transport system by giving false price signals but the Irish air routes from which this demon spawn was formed has not recovered and indeed is unlikely to recover
The resourses spent on Kerosense since 1986 ~ was best spent on a Irish sea tunnel.
Irish aviation is in collapse...............I could give you the numbers if you wish.
Uh huh.
Publicly owned and operated.
Goodness me, must work just fine....
Like the high speed California rail from Madera to Bakersfield in the Central Valley projected initially to cost bazillion umpteen unlimited dollars that nobody has the capacity to pay for either by taxes or debt service whatsoever, to connect Buttfucknowhere to Wherethefuckarewe for which there will be Zero ridership because it goes between two places nobody wants to go from or to.
This, not a well brainstormed, thought out considered pipe dream of an essay is what comes when the gubamint gets its maw about anything got money connected.
You ask a hard question knukles, which is more corrupt? France or California? It's like Hitler vs. Stalin, who IS THE WINNER?
Oh come on, Hitler, of course.
You merely piss people off when you compare their ideas to Stalin's. But you bring the conversation to a screeching halt when you invoke Hitler.
Stalin just didn't have enough style to be #1 With A Bullet.
Corrupt or not corrupt, it's extremely cool for passengers to be able to travel 500 miles in 2 hours and in relative quiet and comfort, without the hassle of going to an airport.
Muir of Ord railway station passenger numbers.........
otherwise known as the Middle of Nowhere railway station
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muir_of_Ord_railway_station
Pop. :1,812
62,428 passenger usage.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uk3YzGUzKiA
Rail you say? That's a Jim Dandy of an idea. I'll add the new rail companies which will inevitably spring up to my portfolio, along with my shares in Confederated Slaveholdings, Transatlantic Zeppelin, Amalgamated Spats, Congreve's Inflammable Powder, U.S. Hay, and the up-and-coming Baltimore Opera Hat Company.
Is this the beginning of a new way to get RAILROADED?
This is a rerun. I'm expat.
I think it might have something to do with rites-of-passage for freshman girls in highschool.
This article is complete and utter cr@p. That the automobile is in decline is entirely untrue. Further growth in automobiles and miles driven is mainly limited by slow/no growth of infrastructure, aka roads. In the US (exempting Alaska) it's physically impossible to be more than 17 miles away from a road.
In any case, it was inexpensive commercial air travel beginning in the 1960's that really killed passenger trains.
Amtrack is the zombie corpse of the last few private passenger rail companies, kept alive for political purposes. It's a money eating dinosaur. The LA to Florida run is so expensive to operate that it would lose less money by not running the train and just booking everyone that buys train tickets on an airline flight.
The necessary right of ways for a rail system to emulate the interstate highway system are long gone. That's why it will be cheaper to send men to Mars than it will to build a high speed railroad from Los Angeles to San Francisco.
Even in Europe, where it's possible to travel effectively by rail, it only works with heavy operating subsidies and $9 gas. Even then, you may have noticed a few European countries have some minor budget issues.
Absolutely... and why pray does anyone need a "high speed railroad from Los Angeles to San Francisco"
consumers already have 50 airlines running that route at speeds up to 500mph ...that not fast enough for the politicians?
when politicians say "high speed" what they mean is lets develope a computer system that's half the speed of what's on the market (ie. air transport). They want to invest vast amounts cutting a track cross country when airlines use no infrastructure, the air is free, zero investment required.
airlines must be pissing their pants at these ultra-sharp politicians competing with their much more expensive system that runs at half the speed ...will the 'high speed' rail executives be wearing and issuing staff Ronald McDonald outfits as company uniforms?
@Zero Goverment
When you build a high speed line from city to city (say less then 1000 Km) it does not just service those 2 cities........its the towns in between................
For example the Madrid Barcelona high speed route picks up much of its passenegers from Zaragoza
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaragoza
You would burn far more kerosene fighting gravity if your plane must service these towns.
you're missing the point (economics) Dork
airlines are twice as fast and if you care to look at train ticket prices (all Unicorn pricing because they're heavily subisidsed) and compare them to air fares, try some budget airlines, you'll see which is both the faster service and the most efficent
politicians are trying to re-invent the wheel, it'll run half as fast and cost 4 times the price
Goddit?
As part of the 'american' middle class is vacillating, and will soon be dropped one level or several levels lower, as they can no longer afford the middle class token known as a car, the question of providing them with a transportation means appears, especially as the 'american' middle class is about mobility. Old habits die hard.
Trouble is that 'american' economics thrive on conflicts. 'American' economics, at the core has smithian economics, which begets a transfer from an exterior to an interior through a border.
What's happening in the exterior is left to the discretion of the extraction mechanism: as long as wealth is extracted and transfered, it is as good as it goes.
This gives gated communauties which might harbour physicians who make a deal of selling oxycodone, turning their patients into addicted and later leading them to death in a matter of months.
Much conflictual.
Trouble is that with those mass transportation means as a train, the border between the exterior and the interior is blurred, as an 'american' who runs the typical 'american' business of farming the poor, extorting the weak, you might find yourself on the wrong side of the border, surrounded with the people you are used to extorting and farming.
That's a very powerful drive to explain why trains and the rest are going to have a hard time taking off.
Extortion of the weak, farming of the poor basic lesson: extorters and extorted, farmers and farmed do not mix well, the business of extortion and farming being somewhat of conflictual substance.
Something that the slipping 'american' middle class gets better to remember.
Why do durians and Chinese roadsides smell so bad?
Must be the fault of 'americanism', a.k.a. "US Citizenism", right?
Fuck trains. Trains are GroundPlanes and planes/airlines/airports suck now too. Train transport is a statist fantasy. Trains are for cargo. When people become cargo, accept being treated like cargo, bad things happen.
I will stick with my pick-up. It is my private train. Faster. Cheaper. More comfortable. More convenient. More flexible. Guests ride free. But thanks anyway.
Yesteryear's technology... today.
Even before the car there was a more efficient transport mode than the train: the horse.
Investing in a horse is better than investing in a train.
You can't eat a train.
Believe it or not but Horses are not efficient vehicles.
They don't have wheels for legs.........so their input to output ratio is very poor.
If you want to max out the input /output ratio buy & use a push bike.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmkHj-Psk7c
I LIKE trains. But you can't set one to grazing on the back lot to keep it fueled up.
This public transport story needs to be told.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westside_Express_Service
What other mode of transport system refurbishes 1950s vehicles to supplement modern unreliable buy America vehicles ?
They perhaps may need to reconsider restarting the Budd railcar production line with possibly a lighter upper body replaceable section.
The Bicycle storage area is the largest I have seen on a commuter train , its pure decadence when seen from a European perspective.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCScJdmMUgc
And only 1,750 users a day !!
In Europe pre crash it would be standing room only for a route that passes through towns of 50,000 – 80,000 population.
But still ,it strikes me as a great project if inflation is coming down the tracks
Question though....
Why have they not continued Salem ?
Lack of money ?
Resistance by private rail road companies ?
If so the lack of money causes a increase in waste.
So called ponzi - austerity to bail out the oligarchs.
Most of the locals have already BEEN to Salem. One peek at the state capital and the state capitol is more than enough for most Oregonians.
One big problem I keep seeing with otherwise sensible transit projects is failure to figure out a desirable way for the passengers to get themselves from house to train. Parking is often too sparse if the project actually attracts the desired ridership. Also, even though lots of buses often go to the transit terminals, they don't always go close to where the desired riders live; or worse, where they work.
A little less boondoggle and a little more actual transit is usually required for the projects I've seen with my 3 eyes here in the West. Politics always screws up an otherwise decent concept.
Maybe if everybody got out of their way, private industry could get back into passenger rail. But it would take a level of free market capitalism that hasn't been seen in these parts since Jesse James retired.
I personally don't care whether government moves us around or private enterprise moves us around. I just want it to get me where I need to go without spending much of my life waiting in stations, recovering from assaults, or identifying my fellow 'passengers' in a police lineup.
The widespread use of locos for many rail routes in the states must be questioned.
Locos are only good for non stop long distance or sleeper travel............any route which requires constant acceleration, and deceleration is better suited to DMUs rather then locos given their much lighter weight.
Perhaps mass licence production of the fantastic Swiss Stadler DMU is needed ?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbJ3fJWFro4
This quarterly transit ridership report gives you passeneger data for most non Amtrak lines
http://www.apta.com/resources/statistics/Documents/Ridership/2012-q2-ridership-APTA.pdf
America is not so far from the steam locomotive era.Collectively, they spent nearly 500,000 years stuck in traffic per year.
Pardon? Profits result from efficiency. Reinvestment to maintain and expand capacity and capability is derived from profits. Furthermore, outside of the most massive freight, railroads are an antiquated and inefficient technology for an individual's purposes. Where it not for government, these commuters would have been travelling via air taxi twenty years ago.