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by rad_gruchalski 1048 days ago
> Well, China has built a shit ton of high speed rail across their country. There is nothing preventing the US from doing just the same.

It’s been discussed many times. China simply does not have to deal with with unions, labour laws, land ownership and such. I don’t think we want to live in such system.

> A 300 km/h "classic" high speed rail like the German ICE will take 13h, but hey even that is manageable.

No, it won’t. There will be scheduled stops, weather, slow sections, accidents.

I used to take Cologne to Utrecht for 3 months once a week return travel. Only once I arrived in both directions on time.

2 comments

> China simply does not have to deal with with unions, labour laws, land ownership and such. I don’t think we want to live in such system.

Japan is a democracy that has all three, and yet they managed to build a HSR system. France has a very good HSR system as well.

> No, it won’t. There will be scheduled stops, weather, slow sections, accidents.

The entire point of the US being suited for HSR is that it is so sparsely settled in the center of the country that you don't need frequent stops, or you can get away with just having every 2nd/3rd train stop at a specific city - with 30min of spacing between the trains, that's still 1h/1.5h interval for "flyover states". And a single train carries up to 1.000 passengers, replacing 4-5 planes.

> I used to take Cologne to Utrecht for 3 months once a week return travel. Only once I arrived in both directions on time.

Please don't assume that the shit our politicians did with the DB network is valid for HSR in general.

> Japan is a democracy that has all three, and yet they managed to build a HSR system. France has a very good HSR system as well.

Yeah, both started in 1960s.

> The entire point of the US being suited for HSR is that it is so sparsely settled in the center of the country that you don't need frequent stops, or you can get away with just having every 2nd/3rd train stop at a specific city - with 30min of spacing between the trains, that's still 1h/1.5h interval for "flyover states". And a single train carries up to 1.000 passengers, replacing 4-5 planes.

And now you have 4000km of high speed rail tracks to keep in top notch condition. With a mountain range between the two coasts. And trains passing rather frequently.

> Please don't assume that the shit our politicians did with the DB network is valid for HSR in general.

Oh. Nothing to do with that. Weather, accidents, no staff were the most common causes.

> Oh. Nothing to do with that. Weather, accidents, no staff were the most common causes.

Actually, all three can be blamed on Deutsche Bahn. The Swiss for example have a ridiculously strong tree management program [1], which means they can keep operating even in storms because there is no danger of trees falling onto tracks which is a fairly common occurrence in Germany.

Accidents as well... a lot of tracks, everything up to 160km/h, has level crossings with roads. Only above 160 km/h you need dedicated, crossing free infrastructure. We could get rid of a lot of these level crossings if we wanted to.

And no staff? DB pays shit, that's the reason why no one wants to work for them, and the "private competitors" pay even less. And if the railroad workers go to strike, the entire fucking country shits on them for daring to fight for their rights.

[1] https://www.waldwissen.net/de/technik-und-planung/naturgefah...

> The Swiss for example have a ridiculously strong tree management program

Without even pausing I assumed this was some business speak MBA crap. I cackled when I realised.

As any British person knows, leaves on the line are no joke.
The Danish bespoke train IC4 has entered the chat.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IC4

Then why did I laugh out loud the first time I heard that sorry if true excuse?
> And now you have 4000km of high speed rail tracks to keep in top notch condition.

Maintaining hundreds of planes is also hard and planes are terrible for the environment and terrible to travel in. Surely we can aim higher?

The TGV averages ~280 km/h on several long-distance routes in France. For example, Paris-Strasbourg (490 km) takes 1:45.
Trains travelling from Paris to Strasbourg cover a distance of around 246 miles (396 km) during the journey.
But it is 490km by car
Sure, but the train doesn't travel by car. 396 km.
I don't get where you're going. Your initial take is that your ICE route in Germany was slow. Indeed because Germany has not a lot of dedicated high speed train track and it has a lot of stops. That is why the TGV example is brought up, as it runs on dedicated track. 1h45min for 400km (500km by road) from city centre to city center is unbeatable, and you just need to show up 5 min before train departure. That is why there is no flights from Strasbourg to Paris anymore.
This is the old track, with normal train (around 130kmh). The TGV track is 406km and has just a few stops: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGV_Est