Is a US High-Speed Railway Economically Feasible?

An anonymous reader writes "The federal government has committed at least $8-billion (and counting) for the development of a nationwide high-speed intercity passenger railway system in almost three-dozen states. Rail advocates have long dreamed of an extensive railway grid that will provide clean, speedy, energy-efficient travel. The high-speed rail program is also expected to create thousands of desperately needed jobs, while reducing the nation's dependence on foreign oil and easing gridlocked highways and congested air-space. However, this noble, ambitious, multi-year plan faces a multitude of obstacles — including costs that will no doubt escalate as the years pass by; and an American public that may be reluctant to relinquish the independence and convenience of their beloved automobiles for a train."

Comments

Alternate solution

[Atmchicago]

Cut subsidies for all forms of transportation. Then, tax in proportion to carbon emissions. Trains win in every densely populated region, hands down.

Re:Alternate solution

[arose]

The energy that went into the van is a sunken cost. You might as well advocate that it should have never been produced, because the steam engines were already there.

Re:Alternate solution

[SQLGuru]

This is why countries in Europe and Asia can offer public transportation that is actually used. Ever try to get anywhere in Texas? It's not dense enough for much public transportation to be feasible. New York and a few other cities can do it because of density, but not the rest of the US.

Japan - 145k mi^2
UK - 95k mi^2

We have 11 states larger than the UK. 4 larger than Japan. How can you hope to have a train system that is actually used regularly that covers that much area.

Re:Alternate solution

[stdarg]

That's funny, because if you look at where federal tax revenue comes from vs where it goes, you'll see that it's primarily the more densely populated areas paying federal taxes, and the rural, less densely populated areas receiving taxes.

That's an artifact of the top 1% of income earners paying over 40% of all federal income tax. It's spun as the average noble city dweller subsidizing the lazy ungrateful Republican farmer, but in reality it's a tiny proportion of each city subsidizing the rest of the city and the countryside. I would love to see a tax payment/benefit breakdown by neighborhood rather than the grossly ridiculous urban/rural divide. I suspect you would see most cities turn from seas of green to tiny pinpricks of green with a deep red surrounding them, and rather less red in the rural areas. But I'm just guessing.

Re:Another stupid idea that will increase the defi

[Second_Derivative]

A private consortium tried just that back in 1991 in Texas. Then Southwest Airlines called in a few favours and had the project destroyed (some details on Wikipedia here.). Free market capitalism may or may not have worked here (if it did then one could certainly expect other consortia to follow suit) but the Texas state government never gave us a chance to find out.

Where there's a will, there's a way.

[Anonymous Coward]

People love their automobiles because the great majority of them aren't given a choice in the matter.

Wouldn't it be great to be able to hop on a train to head to a concert, sporting event, famous restaurant, etc. a couple hundred miles away and back on the same day? That sort of casual impulse travel would be of new benefit to the economy (particularly of hub cities) even if the railway itself didn't pull in the cash.

Not on National Basis - Some Local Solutions, Yes

[wclough]

Europe has certain zones where high speed rail makes sense. Those also exist here, such as the Acela route, also perhaps Miami to Orlando to Tampa Bay, LA to San Diego, and Dallas - Fort Worth. However, extending high speed rail across the US makes no economic sense now, and would place the government into direct competition with private commercial transport. It is unlikely that high speed rail will become economically viable on a nationwide basis given the huge costs of creating dedicated, isolated rails on such a broad spread basis. While I strongly support high speed rail in high density, closely located urban zones, especially where urban mass transit exists to get people to and from the train stations, it doesn't seem either economically viable or practicable in other locations.

Re:Solution: Tax gas more.

[Pharmboy]

I'm pretty sure that simply raising taxes isn't the cure to all that ails us. Keep in mind that everything you eat, wear and touch is delivered in one way or another on transportation of some kind, so literally everything would become more expensive. From experience, I can say that often a very large part of the price of goods is from transportation. When you double that cost, everything now costs 10% to 50% more overnight. That is called inflation, and it cuts demand dramatically, which is likely not the best solution considering we have the highest unemployment since the early 80s, and the most persistent unemployment since the Depression.

The problem is that the US is one giant suburb sprawl, and because our population densities are so much lower between cities, trains will never be viable all over. On the east coast, yes, and maybe even a few in fly over country. But to have trains in most of the rest of the country would take more carbon than driving cars. From building the trains cars that would only be partially full because of the lower density, to the fuel used for those smaller passenger loads, it doesn't make sense in the US for most areas, at least not for daily travel.

Also, you have to condemn land, lay tracks, uproot people and remove farm land and utilities, and in the end, most people here would still rather drive less than use the train. You can't turn America into Europe by simply taxing fuel at the same rate.

Fly-over country need not apply

[wowbagger]

I fear the high speed rails will be deployed on the east and west, and those of us in "fly over" country will be left out in the cold.

Which is a shame, because in many ways the middle of the country is where high speed rail could really shine: the trains could get up to speed and stay there for a significant length of time.

However, a few random points:

1) France has a total of 1000 miles of high speed track. The Southwest Chief runs from Chicago to LA - about 2000 miles. That's just ONE of Amtrak's routes.
2) In Europe, they have auto-trains: put your car on, go, take your car off, drive. The only place this happens in the US is on the east coast, on one run. Again: were it possible to put your car on in New York, pull your car off in Flagstaff, and drive up to the Grand Canyon, I think it would be much more attractive to many people.
3) Were autotrain runs more common in the US, then driving an electric car with limited range wouldn't be the deal-breaker for long trips it is now: again, put the car in in NY, off in Flagstaff, with a fully charged battery courtesy of the train's power.
4) There is a great push on just to restore old-style rail service in the middle of the country: see the Heartland Flyer extension effort.

I routinely travel long distances: Wichita to Los Angeles for example. I'd love to be able to put my car on the train, roll overnight, and be able to make the trip in a day rather than two. I'd love to be able to hop on the train for my business trips to Kansas City and Austin. The idea that Americans won't take the train doesn't square with how many ride it now, when Amtrak seems to go out of their way to make it unattractive. Over 4000 people used the Amtrak station in Hutchison KS last year, and that is a little station in a town of about 40,000 people - the station isn't even manned, and the train gets there at 4 in the morning.

No, rail COULD work in the US - it's just that no big company will make $$$$ from it, so no CongressCritters are motivated to do anything about it.

All I know is...

[SuperCharlie]

If I didnt put down the railways first in Sim City, I was basically screwed.

Re:Faster Solution

[Cwix]

Ive railoaded military vehicles before. It can happen alot faster then you think, all you have to do is have a trained crew do the actual loading while the travelers waits nearby.
I see the biggest issue with being are the people going to ride IN their own vehicle? These train trips can be long rides without restrooms and food. If you have these people ride inside regular rail cars on the same train, your going to be wasting alot of fuel toting around a shitload of vehicles all the time, and your not going to get the fuel savings trains normally have.

Re:Not on National Basis - Some Local Solutions, Y

[dkleinsc]

How true, how true. Of course, you bring up an interesting side point: Which organization stands to lose the most from a functional rail system with good routes and coverage? Greyhound Bus Lines, hands down.

And that's not an idle issue. For instance, at one point there was consideration of setting up passenger rail service between Boston and Concord NH, with stops at significant cities such as Manchester, NH and Nashua, NH, both of which have a lot of people who are commuting to Boston daily and clogging up the interstates during rush hour. The costs involved in creating such a route would have been relatively low, because there's already track laid for freight rail, and the cities which were likely stops conveniently had their public transit centers about 100 feet from the tracks.

It was shot down, primarily because of opposition by the bus line that is making good money running buses along that exact route. It doesn't matter that rail would have made things faster and more convenient for everybody.

Re:Don't target cars

[Anonymous Coward]

The Acela is more expensive than flying and takes 4 hours instead of 30 minutes (plus another 30-60 minutes airport time), barely faster than the normal train. The only way I would consider the Acela a viable option is if you needed it last minute. Personally, in that case I would take a bus at about 15% of the cost.

If this is the future of high speed rail, I think the whole concept is dead. High speed trains need to be able to run at full speed (which takes a combination of dedicated tracks and convincing states to not cripple the speed with noise restrictions) and they need to be cheaper than air travel. I don't know any other way it could work.

Ways to make this project a success....

[xmundt]

Greetings and Salutations....
          I have always enjoyed traveling by train, and, would be on it like a duck on a June Bug if it were available. However, there are three things that will have to happen before it will become successful.
          1) Whoever takes on this project (and I suspect it will have to be the Federal Government), will have to lay out a growth plan that will continue to add lines to areas in the USA where access does not exist. One of the massive fails of Amtrak was that the company built a few lines...then stopped, apparently expecting that this would be enough. For a model, look at the light rail systems in larger cities, such as Washington D.C., New York, or Atlanta. In all three cases the lines are laid out to minimize the distance that a passenger has to travel to get to a station.
          2) Arrange for auto transport cars to be part of the long-distance lines. This would allow the passenger to drive up to the station, get their vehicle loaded, and, enjoy a pleasant and comfortable ride across country. Upon arriving, they would have their own transport immediately available, which would go a long way towards making the trip more enjoyable.
          3) Ensure that the cost of a train ticket is no more than that of an airplane ticket. A few years ago, I was going to travel to Washington D.C. for an event. The cost of a round-trip train ticket was close to $400.00, and, in order to GET to Amtrak I would have had to drive to Atlanta. The airplane ticket (also round trip) was $175, and, I could fly out of Knoxville. Prices may be more at a parity now, but, there is still that long drive to get to a station.
              I would love to see train travel come back, as it is a great way to see the countryside, especially if one is not in a huge hurry.
              Regards
              Dave Mundt

Re:Don't target cars

[Anonymous Coward]

What is needed is for Amtrak to stop pissing away hundreds of millions of fucking dollars on bloated, late, grossly over budget, and laughably mismanaged IT projects with marginal returns on investment. The Accenture-led SAM project is one of them. The other is the black hole in Engineering known an EAM: Enterprise Asset Management. Years ago, a vendor managed to cajole Amtrak into a parasitic relationship with IBM/Tivoli (used to be MRO before IBM bought them) to customize Maximo (a steaming pile of shit software if ever there were one) for use in managing fixed infrastructure maintenance activities. The burn rate on those projects is stupefying, as is the shocking dishonesty the advocates of those projects advance in defending their empires: "We're doing this in the name of efficiency...and...and...saving money...and...um...FRA compliance...and...wait for it...FOR THE PASSENGERS!"

For the passengers. Really? A lot of the older passenger coaches (Amfleets) still in service routinely encounter air conditioner failures (which makes riding in them insufferable during summer months) and leak water on passengers' heads during rain and snow melts. These coaches are nearing the end of their useful lives and Amtrak desparately needs to buy new ones. But instead the German Sausage running EAM would rather divert all the money from the capital project pot to dumb shit like buying all the maintenance of way personnel fucking iPhones to do work reporting with. Amtrak also needs to install constant tension catenary south of NYC and install larger crossovers to allow trains to run faster south of the Big Apple down to DC -- but all that money is, again, being diverted to these IT projects. A good portion of Amtrak's Northeast Corridor assets are over a century old. What's amazing is how well the trains run in spite of that fact.

I had hope for Amtrak under Obama, but after the Inspector General was forced out for actually (gasp) discovering a significant amount of sketchiness and fuckery, that hope has since evaporated.

Comparing Trains in the US and Europe

[rssrss]

The US has a great rail system and we need to make sure that we do not ruin it by doing what Europeans have done.

"Europe's dependence on trucks stems from the failure of its vaunted passenger-rail network to provide a cheap, efficient alternative for cargo. Between 1995 and 2005, the percentage of European goods shipped by truck rose to 73% from 68%, while rail's share fell to 17% from 20%. The rest goes by canal or, in the case of oil and gas, pipelines. In the U.S. in 2005, 42% of freight was moved by train and 33% by truck."

"EU Looks to Cargo Trains To Ease Load on Trucking" by John W. Miller, in The Wall Street Journal on June 5, 2007 at p. A6

The US has optimized its rail system for freight, not passengers, and that is a good thing. Distances between population centers in the US are larger than in Europe, Americans will tend to prefer air travel for long distance intercity travel.