China Debuts the World's Fastest Train

An anonymous reader writes "China unveiled their new high speed train that clocks in at an average of 217 mph. China's new rail service travels through 20 cities along its route, connecting central China and less developed regions to the larger and more industrial Pearl River Delhi. Seimens, Bombardier and Alstom worked together to design and build this feat of modern transportation, which topped out at a whopping 245mph (394km/h) during trial runs earlier in December."

Comments

Re:How hard is it to have something like this in U

[BearRanger]

It's not hard, just expensive. Unlike the Chinese we actually have to pay market rates to compensate people for the right of way for the rails. Seizing private property and forcing the owners to accept a pittance in return just won't work in the U.S.

Re:China debuts human rights abuses

[wickerprints]

Well, if you want someone to blame, blame US corporations for sending jobs to China and the US government for allowing trillions of dollars of trade deficit with China, that enables their government to be the economic powerhouse it is. The biggest abusers of human rights in the world is not China--it is the multinational corporations, many of them headquartered in the US, that exploits people in developing countries for cheap labor and props up dictatorial regimes so long as they make it easy and profitable for them to do business. And if you want to find out how these corporations got so powerful, all you need to do is go look to the Americans whose insatiable desire for cheap mass-produced goods has fed their gluttony with their hard-earned dollars.

You want this high-speed rail technology in the US? Stop running up all that credit card debt. Stop turning over your livelihood and savings to buy your own little slice of the American McDream(tm).

Re:China debuts human rights abuses

[uradu]

Not just the US, mind you, but the entire western world that is more than eager to offload manufacturing to China. We're all guilty of turning two blind eyes to save a buck, but I guess as long as we occasionally get to protest China's abuses in a public forum or some magazine opinion piece, all's well.

Re:How hard is it to have something like this in U

[amRadioHed]

Kelo v. New London was about the government being able to use eminent domain to free up propety for commercial development. As far as I've seen it had nothing to do with the amount of compensation given to people for their property, and in Kelo v. New London the plaintiffs were given market value for their property.

Re:How hard is it to have something like this in U

[amRadioHed]

as for long distance rail, Amtrak is already unreliable. there is no reason to think that a new high speed train will be reliable and there is no benefit over flying.

I think there is some reason to think high-speed rail would be more reliable. One of Amtrak's major problems right now is that they don't own the rails they use, they share them with freight companies. A new high-speed rail line, however, would be built specifically for passenger service and would not have this problem.

Re:China debuts human rights abuses

[spun]

I see how this works: it's too hard to do what's right, so let's not bother to try. And: they were doing it anyway, so why should we have to give up cheap goods?

Re:How hard is it to have something like this in U

[Red Flayer]

as for long distance rail, Amtrak is already unreliable. there is no reason to think that a new high speed train will be reliable and there is no benefit over flying. airports already have the infrastructure like rent a cars and public transportation that will have to be duplicated at a new high speed rail station.

Let's subsidize rail transport at the same rate we subsidize road and air transport, and then we can compare reliability figures.

NJ is probably a poor example, since we have the highest road density in the country, but we spend BILLIONS annually on road transport, and less than 1% of that on rail transport (though the building of the new tunnel across the Hudson will bridge some of the funding gap, pardon the pun).

And as for rental cars, public transportation at airports... that is easily solvable. You can run light rail from the high-speed rail stations to the airports (which would make a lot of sense anyway, to connect all your transport systems). You can even place your high-speed rail station adjacent to your airports.

i also know someone that used to take the Acela from NYC to Boston for work years ago and it took like 3 hours each way. The Delta Shuttle was 1 hour. 90 minutes if you count getting to the airport early. back when we bought a competitor we used to fly to Boston in the morning and come back for dinner. if we took the train it would mean extra expenses in staying at a hotel

Poor example. The Acela is not a high-speed train (maybe in comparison to regular commuter rail service -- but nothing like what is possible if we were willing to build the infrastructure -- a real high-speed train from NY to Boston would be about 60 minutes tops). And NY-to-Boston is not a 90-min trip time via plane (how long to get to the airport instead of getting to Penn Station via mass transit? Do you still plan on arriving only 30 mins before departure time? Good luck in today's airports... 30 mins is almost never enough time when flying out of any of NYC's three major airports.

I don't know why you use old examples for flight times, and examples of existing rail (instead of the high-speed rail being discussed) to make your anecdotal analysis. But I think your blanket negativity on rail transport needs a good looking-over... you might be surprised.

Re:Fuel efficiency of this train vs airplane?

[TheEvilOverlord]

The trouble is a project of that size usually requires some level of state/federal organisation or funding to secure the necessary investment from private funding and the power to buy the land. Which in the USA seems to cause foaming at the mouth and long rants about the evils of communism.

(I'm assuming here a new high speed railway would require a new less bendy track than already exists)

Re:China's Achievements

[haruchai]

Americans used to value hard work for an honest day's pay. And you have millions who don't work at all.
I agree that China's authoritarian government and a large population has its advantages but it also has
downsides, which the US doesn't have.

It's time for Americans to stop bitching and whining - stand up, think for yourselves and tape your assholes
shut so the moneyed interests can stop blowing smoke up them.

It's not too late to reverse the slide of the American Dream - but the clock is ticking and time is fast running out.

Re:China A Developing Country?

[prefec2]

No you cannot. For example in Western-Europe especially in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland or Austria the countries are very well "developed". In Germany you can get to a highway (Autobahn) in a 50 km radius. Also most towns are accessible by train. And every big city is connected to others on an hourly schedule (with fast trains) and additional local trains.