Kind of sad isn't it?
Now do a comparative of vehicle ownership. Then it’ll make sense. Americans like their cars. I know I do.
We can thank Amtrak for that. Government run businesses in the US are not known for their efficiency. Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, USPS, and Amtrak to name a few.There is a huge cultural difference for passenger trains between the USA and Europe.
I don't disagree. Though many made money by carrying mail and REA stuff on their passenger trains.None of the rails ever made a dime running passenger services
Overlay a population map. The US west is way to sparse to support major rail transit.Passenger lines
Hmmm, I don't know about that. Watch old movies and everyone talked about taking the train. Totally socially acceptable and even prestigious over "the bus". I think it is more like 2 days to get from Denver to New York vs 4 hours. We would need 300mph trains to compete with air travel.There is a huge cultural difference for passenger trains between the USA and Europe.
Kind of related, one of my favorite arguments to see in the modern day is "High speed passenger rail won't work."However, those two maps don't reflect the way it was during passenger train heyday. Between 1900 and 1945, the N. American map would have looked largely the same, albeit with larger spaces and runs.
Lol UK cancelled trains, late trains, train stuck because passenger door won’t shut properly, train halted because there is an autumn leaf on the racks, faints. I have been onWe can thank Amtrak for that. Government run businesses in the US are not known for their efficiency. Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, USPS, and Amtrak to name a few.
Trains are essential where I live in the UK, I am 14 miles from the biggest city in Scotland (Glasgow), I live in a large town (44k people) that has direct links by train to Glasgow and Edinburgh, 1 mile from my house is the main freeway in Scotland, the M8 motorway, which links Glasgow and Edinburgh yet I am unable to get a direct bus to Glasgow! In fact I am unable to get a direct bus to the next town, of 36k inhabitants, which is only 3 miles away to the east. I'd have to go south 4 miles to a smaller town, then get another bus. Total journey time would be almost 75 mins. Train does it in 5 mins.Lol UK cancelled trains, late trains, train stuck because passenger door won’t shut properly, train halted because there is an autumn leaf on the racks, faints. I have been on
1. A train that failed to stop ayt a London last stop station it mounted the platform I was third carriage and unhurt.
2. On a train that did an emergency stop going into London, stopped because some idiot sent a train from the other direction down the same track, coming round the bend luckily both drivers saw the other trains and managed to stop before collision
3. On the last carriage when train pulled up to my station but my carriage did not reach the short platform and by the time I had run down to a carriage that I could have got off the train had set off again so I had to go past to a station where I could catch a train back to mine, 2 hours later…
4. Yep been at the station where the train driver would not / could not leave because the catch on the old passenger carriage was not shutting, we took one look got back in the car and drove further along, got to a different station where we caught a train and where people were saying about going through the station on the wrong side because of the stationary train.
there are plenty of others not running on time, full etc, but trains are essential here because the areas are so dense traffic jams larking paying for parking is so much worse, lesser of w evils,
Always good to have insight one the one to one scale,Don't blame Amtrak for US passenger service, the railroads that were operating it prior to Amtrak would have completely killed intercity rail transportation if they could have, it doesn't make money and costs way more than it could ever earn. Amtrak saved the last vestiges of long distance passenger rail service in the US, without Amtrak it would have died out.
The big difference between rail and air transport (other than the speed) is that air tranport has done a much better job of supporting the first and last mile of trips. Lots of limos, cabs, car rentals, parking, etc. Rail stations rarely have the same depth of infrastructure so are much less attractive.
90 mph isn't "high speed rail", that's speeds over 125 mph or so. Even the NEC can't really achieve that because the curves are too sharp. You won't get "high speed rail" on the freight railroads is because the alignment doesn't support it. For true high speed rail teh alignment has to be engineered to support the speeds.
The big problem with electrified railroads is that they aren't "coast to coast", the electric operation only covers part of teh route, so you still need diesels on either end, making them much more expensive. With diesels I can put a set of power on a train at LA and run it all the way to New York (and back again) without having to change engines.
One of my former Superintendents was the last superintendent on the Milwaukee electrified operation. According to him, what really killed it was the Milwaukee used wooden poles for the overhead and basically the pole line went bad, rotting poles and termites killed the Milwaukee electrified. It would have been prohibitively expensive to replace the pole line. On the other hand, the PRR used steel catenary supports and it's still in service today.
One of my former Superintendents was the last superintendent on the Milwaukee electrified operation. According to him, what really killed it was the Milwaukee used wooden poles for the overhead and basically the pole line went bad, rotting poles and termites killed the Milwaukee electrified. It would have been prohibitively expensive to replace the pole line. On the other hand, the PRR used steel catenary supports and it's still in service today.
Maybe. The electric company that services our area claims that wooden poles last between 45 and 50 years before they need replacing. That's why they are replacing the ones along our road. They were installed when the first houses were built here in the boonies back in the mid-70's. Termites though, have nothing to do with it, at least here.everyone else's wooden poles were somehow termite proof?
I understood it was the price of copper and the executives couldn't wait to get the millions of dollars of copper "just hanging" over the track down and off to the metal recycle people.What I do buy into is the explanation I read, which the locos were worn out or wearing out and there were no good replacements on the market. EMD had a couple things in the works, but they couldn't match or beat the old GE's. All the MILW guys who knew the system had retired or were about to, and the same could be said of their counterparts at GE.