Europe and Japan take great pride in their high speed passenger rail. I've been to both places, ridden the trains, and they are slick. You board the trains in the center of town, no $100 cab ride to the airport, and you get a fine view of the passing countryside, and they drop you off in the center of town, where you can walk or take the subway to your hotel.
Why don't we have trains as nice in America? Simple, the US is too big, train takes too long to get anywhere. When I had business on the west coast, I could board a jet liner at Logan and be in California before lunch. That's 3000 miles at 600 mph. Even a science fiction 300 mph train would take all day. A practical 21st century high speed train (150 mph) would take a day and a night.
The only place in America with cities close enough for train travel to compete with air is the Boston-Washington corridor up the east coast. And, we have Acela, a medium high speed train. Not as fast as the French TGV or the Japanese Hikari superexpress, but fast enough. Acela can do the Boston New York run fast enough beat airline time, you can skip the taxi to the airport and the hour to get thru security. Funny thing, Acela fares are higher than airline fares.
Governor Jerry "Moonbeam" Brown out in California is trying for high speed rail the length of California. It's gonna cost billions. Real passengers will fly anyhow. Good luck California taxpayers.
No comments:
Post a Comment