[aposm]

There is no secret lost knowledge that enabled a steam-powered train to go from New York to Chicago in 16 hours in the 1930s. We simply do not care to run fast passenger trains anymore since they have largely been replaced by domestic air travel. The current NYC to Chicago train takes 20 hours and is routinely several hours delayed... all we have to do is invest in infrastructure and rebuild our rail system, but that won't happen unless it's "sexy" and can compete with air travel, and the best way to do that is with HSR. So while our passenger rail system _could_ be a lot faster (without true HSR) if it was run well, I don't think that's going to happen until we get the marketability/"sexiness" of HSR.

[JoshTriplett]

> We simply do not care to run fast passenger trains anymore since they have largely been replaced by domestic air travel.

That's a self-fulfilling prophecy. First-class passenger trains are much more comfortable, roomier, and less expensive, but as long as they're so wildly slower, they have a hard time competing with air travel.

[alwa]

I'm not sure they're much less expensive. To pick an arbitrary weeklong Tuesday-to-Tuesday trip in May, between New York and Chicago, the cheapest direct Amtrak fare—in coach, not in first class as you mentioned—is $336 (and 19 hours each way), whereas the same trip on Spirit Air is $96 (and 2 hours 30 minutes each way).

The cheapest first class train fare is $1,621 for the round trip, vs $385 for first class airfare.

[Mistletoe]

Train fares are just smoking crack and it’s so frustrating, because I want to take trains. I love everything about it but the price.

[TrainedMonkey]

Per hour they will be much cheaper. Part of self-fulfilling prophecy is that per hour price is mostly inelastic, so as trains get slower and take more time the price rises. And higher price means less people take trains...

[zeroonetwothree]

Per hour walking is even cheaper.

[rimunroe]

> Per hour they will be much cheaper.

How many people do you think care about the per-hour cost of travel. I feel confident saying that the vast majority of the traveling public wants to spend as little time and money as possible to get to their destinations.

[Jgrubb]

If I’m not mistaken, that’s the joke.

[rimunroe]

D’oh! It completely flew over my head. Thanks. I’ve heard people who are really into trains bill rail travel as being worth it purely for the experience, so it sounded plausible that they were arguing it seriously

[jpalawaga]

plus an hour on the train, or a hundred bucks in a taxi on the new york side, and likewise on the chicago side, plus security screening. and luggage is free too, I think?

so mostly just faster.

[jakelazaroff]

China’s new high speed train from Beijing to Shanghai — about the same distance as between New York and Chicago — takes a little less than four and a half hours. That’s about two hours longer than a flight between the two cities. If you include the time spent arriving early, going through security, etc, it probably comes out about even.

[missedthecue]

It's worth noting that at least in China, you must go through security checks before boarding bullet trains which include ID verification, X-rays of passenger and their luggage, and some liquid checks (staff may ask you to take a sip of your drink to confirm it's safe). Depending on the time of day, it is a bit quicker.

The main time saver is that the train stations are much more central. Say you you need to leave your office in Beijing's financial district and meet a client at their office in Shanghai's financial district. The station in Bejing will be 6km from your office vs the airport (30km), and you'll get off the train 9km from your client (instead of 45km at the airport).

[alephnerd]

And the region between Beijing to Shanghai is fairly flat and densely populated (Tianjin, Shandong, Jiangsu, Hebei), which makes it easier to justify and build out the associated infra, as plenty of other slower lines can also be run concurrently - specifically by connecting Tianjin (one of the most important cities in China)

Meanwhile, the only major population centers between NY and Chicago are Pittsburg and Columbus - both of whom combined have a fraction of the population that Jiagnsu or Shandong have.

Furthermore, land acquisition is different in a country like the US versus China. Mass expropriation or eminent domain of land is politically untenable in the US, but something that is easier to implement in China as a significant amount of land remains under local municipal ownership instead of private ownership.

[jakelazaroff]

If you pass Columbus, you’d also go through Indianapolis. Or you could go north and pass through Cleveland and Detroit.

Anyway, if you only support building infrastructure in regions of the U.S. that are as densely populated as eastern China, you’d basically never build anything.

[alephnerd]

> If you pass Columbus, you’d also go through Indianapolis. Or you could go north and pass through Cleveland and Detroit.

Which

1. Already exists

2. Leads to the same problem as before - the population size just does not justify those investments, nor is there any business demand when a flight will always remain faster.

> Anyway, if you only support building infrastructure in regions of the U.S. that are as densely populated as eastern China, you’d basically never build anything

I support building infrastructure that solves an actual problem - and public transit connectivity between NY and Chicago isn't one of those.

It will remain slower than flight transit (so most business and plenty of personal travel will remain flight based) and car ownership remains high in the US, so for personal travel, the independence of driving would still outcompete rail.

Those billions of dollars on such a hypothetical are better spent on plenty of other alternative programs - for example the local transit expansion grants which the Biden admin bundled as part of the IIJA, which helped expand bus and local rail transit instead.

Even China has stopped financing these kinds of mega-projects becuase of tightening financial due dilligence, and tries to tie investments with an actual business case [0]. Heck, now prices are roughly the same between a domestic flight and HSR on the major lines in China.

[0] - https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/13/business/china-bullet-tra...

----------

The only network that could even justify a high speed rail is the DC-Philadelphia-NYC-Boston corridor (so an extended Acela Line), but are you also fine with the federal government expropriating land to speed up development OR spending decades democratically building consensus.

And even then DCA to JFK or Logan will remain time competitive for business travel

[jakelazaroff]

> car ownership remains high in the US, so for personal travel, the independence of driving would still outcompete rail.

I mean, this is the catch-22 that prevents a lot of public transit projects from being built. Car ownership is high largely because in most places there is no viable public transit. Then people oppose building public transit because car ownership is high!

[rayiner]

> Anyway, if you only support building infrastructure in regions of the U.S. that are as densely populated as eastern China, you’d basically never build anything

Correct.

[iamtheworstdev]

You really just hurt the feelings of Cleveland there

[addaon]

> If you include the time spent arriving early, going through security, etc, it probably comes out about even.

Yeah, but that only lasts until someone figures out a clever way to use a train as a weapon, in which case you get to add the same security time to the front of the trip -- or even longer, since we've actually managed to get the airport security time down a bit over the past two decades. It would seem optimistic to try to scale usage of rail without accounting for the (time, safety, etc) costs that come with increased usage of rail...

[alephnerd]

> First-class passenger trains are much more comfortable, roomier, and less expensive, but as long as they're so wildly slower, they have a hard time competing with air travel.

Maybe, but around a third of all tourism spend in the US is business travel related [0]. You cannot justify spending an overnight train ride from NYC to Chicago when you can reach there within 2 hours by flight.

The US is MASSIVE - much larger than most countries, and population centers are extremely spread out once you leave the Northeast. Outside the NE, the math (time wise or financially) doesn't play out well for rail based public transit.

You see the same dynamics in China as well - the overwhelming majority of medium-long distance public transit is along the extremely dense coast.

Expecting a French style TGV is unrealistic as long as San Francisco to Los Angeles is the same distance as Paris to Berlin - except with almost no major population centers in between, and plenty of massive mountain ranges. Same for the rest of the US outside of the NE. Similar extent with NY to Chicago as well (roughly the same distance as Berlin to St Petersburg)

[0] - https://www.statista.com/topics/1832/business-travel/#topicO...

[seabass-labrax]

I don't see why it's a problem for a potential rail service for San Francisco and Los Angeles that there are no heavily populated areas between the two cities. There's no reason why you couldn't fill up a train with passengers at the start and travel non-stop to the destination, just as the vast majority of airlines operate.

Trains still have all their usual benefits including better passenger comfort and higher energy efficiency, and there is the option to build intermediate stations if the demand increases in the future.

I would also question the claim that overnight trains cannot be justified for business travel. If the cost is comparable to a hotel room - which is a big 'if', granted - this allows employees to be better rested and therefore work more effectively during the day.

[jeffbee]

The proposed CAHSR business plan calls for 2 peak hourly trains plus 2 additional trains per day stopping nowhere between the Bay Area and Los Angeles. 2 of these are suggested to be actual non-stop SF to LA Union Station, even though bypassing San Jose is pretty crazy. But anyway you are right: it's no problem at all.

There are also plenty of population centers between SF and LA which is why trains are going to stop in Fresno and Bakersfield (combined pop: 2.2 million). Also Palmdale. If Palmdale is nowhere then Brightline West is also a train to nowhere.

Alephnerd is making the same mistake that many nerds have made. They are arguing about the existing passenger, while the point of the project is to serve the next ten million Californians.

[0_____0]

Infrastructure can also drive development in places that it reaches. If you work in SF but fancy living in Hollister, and the train only takes 30 minutes to get there, why not?

[alephnerd]

Yep, but that does not need to be justified by a HSR expansion.

You could justify a San Benito County expansion as part of a Caltrain electrification and expansion project for a fraction of the cost and headaches.

And do the same for San Joaquin County to the Bay+Sacramento, San Bernardino County to LA, and Imperial Valley to San Diego.

In fact, this is what the CA government has been doing after treating the HSR as de facto moribund.

[alephnerd]

> between the two cities. There's no reason why you couldn't fill up a train with passengers at the start and travel non-stop to the destination, just as the vast majority of airlines operate.

This isn't flat land. There are expansive mountain ranges that make it difficult to build and any flat land that is buildable is ALSO prime agricultural land that is worth millions.

Just to recoup the cost you end up with ticket prices comparable to a flight.

> I would also question the claim that overnight trains cannot be justified for business travel. If the cost is comparable to a hotel room - which is a big 'if', granted - this allows employees to be better rested and therefore work more effectively during the day.

Yeah no. I don't want employees to come in unshowered, and they still need a place to keep their luggage. Furthermore, plenty of people like maintaining their daily routine or spending time with their SOs. Flying a couple hours, staying at a hotel overnight, getting work done, and immediately bugging out back home is the norm.

[yongjik]

> This isn't flat land. There are expansive mountain ranges that make it difficult to build and any flat land that is buildable is ALSO prime agricultural land that is worth millions.

Japan's Shinkansen started service in 1964, and the country is known for its mountains and earthquakes. Hell, forget Japan, California's mountain ranges somehow didn't stop America from building I-5, I-10, I-80, and what not, back in the 80s.

"Prime agricultural land" is non sequitur - those lands are sold by acres.

[seabass-labrax]

> This isn't flat land. There are expansive mountain ranges that make it difficult to build and any flat land that is buildable is ALSO prime agricultural land that is worth millions.

Flat land is convenient of course, but I don't think mountains are a make-or-break factor. It looks like the Interstate 5 already takes a viable route through the Tejon Pass, and as the land will already be publicly-owned it is a candidate for cut-and-cover or an elevated railway. A 5-mile tunnel to bypass Gorman would eliminate the tightest curve along the route.

Alternatively, for a detour of an hour or so the railway can be routed eastward through Los Angeles and through the Cajon Pass instead, thence following the path of Route 58.

But all of this doesn't negate my original point - that regardless of the feasibility of a railway, a lack of intermediate stops is not necessarily a disadvantage.

> Yeah no. I don't want employees to come in unshowered, and they still need a place to keep their luggage. Furthermore, plenty of people like maintaining their daily routine or spending time with their SOs. Flying a couple hours, staying at a hotel overnight, getting work done, and immediately bugging out back home is the norm.

The on-board facilities are among the easiest challenges to address. There are plenty of examples of showers on long-distance trains, and it's not much cost to build a few at the terminus station. Luggage can be sent ahead and lockers can be provided at stations.

Spending time with family? Those 'couple of hours flying' can add up: that's time that could have been spent with family, too!

[6510]

https://darienite.com/great-10-hour-new-york-chicago-railroa...

They do Beijing to Shanghai in 5 hours so you have to make New York to Chicago in 4 or it doesn't count.

The numbers are funny. Flying from New York to Chicago takes less than 2 hours but all things considered you lose 8 hours https://www.trippy.com/fly/New-York-City-to-Chicago

You might as well drive it in 12.

[roenxi]

Without disagreeing, it is a weird one to see described as a marketing problem. The political process is extremely low bandwidth; it is tough to express an opinion on more than one issue with one vote and usually the priority is not transport. Presumably the major reason that HSR isn't being deployed is that it is uneconomic or there is no legal way to do it.

[panny]

>We simply do not care to run fast passenger trains anymore since they have largely been replaced by domestic air travel.

Trains replace road trips, not air travel. You can travel from New York to Miami for $175 on Amtrak. That's a lot cheaper and much more comfortable than driving 1300 miles.

Saying you can do this faster or possibly cheaper on a budget airline is missing the point, because traveling on a budget airline is not enjoyable. There's no scenery. You're packed in like sardines. Best case scenario, every hour you spend in the plane is miserable. Every hour you spend waiting in airport security lines is miserable. Every hour spent waiting on the runway for delays is miserable. Waiting for your baggage only to find it is lost again is miserable. You can't get up to stretch your legs, sit down, the seat belt light is on.

On the Amtrak there are dining cars, cafe cars, observation cars. There's five toilets on each car, you never have to wait. There's free wifi. There are no middle seats to be miserable in. You can bring your own beer and drink it on the train. You can't do any of that in car or on an airline. Riding the train is more fun than flying, and a lot less hazardous than driving. If it takes a little longer than flying, that just means more time for fun.

[pseudo0]

Except that NY to Miami route you cited takes 28 to 33 hours... You could do that trip in a single long day driving, plus save money if you're a group of 3+ people. And then you'd have a car at your destination, which is pretty mandatory in most parts of the US.

It might be decent for a solo traveler, but for the stereotypical family road trip to Florida, the car still wins out.

[panny]

You're not going to drive 18 hours straight. It would be wildly dangerous for you to try as you will fall asleep at the wheel. Even if you tried it, you're going to have to make stops for gas, bathroom, and to eat, which will push the trip beyond one day. Which means you're going to have to get at least one hotel room along the way (more expense and time). And, you're assuming perfect traffic conditions, which doesn't exist, we all know.

You can go to the bathroom on the train. You can sleep on the train. You can eat on the train. Which means the 28 hours is the total time and the $175 is total price. Avg gas price is 3.37/gal. (https://ycharts.com/indicators/us_gas_price) Avg new car milage is 25 mpg, 52*3.37 is ... $175. Same as the train fare, but that's just the gas.

Taking the car is just dangerous and miserable IMO. Train wins.

[pseudo0]

My family used to do a very similar distance for summer road trips every year, and we always did it in a single day. Just pack the car the night before, leave early, and swap drivers every few hours when you stop for food or gas. The benefit is that it's way cheaper than five plane tickets or train tickets, and you have an entire car to fill up with stuff.

Like I said the train would probably work better for a solo traveller, but then why not fly? It's crazy to spend 28+ hours on a train when a plane ticket is around the same cost and 2 hours.

[SoftTalker]

Yep done it many times. Even did 24 hours once, with a 3-hour nap in the car at a rest area.

[panny]

>It's crazy to spend 28+ hours on a train when a plane ticket is around the same cost and 2 hours.

That's like saying it's crazy not to fill your salad bowl entirely with cheese :)

https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/salad

Besides, we both know it's 2 hours in line just for the TSA check sometimes. I'm very familiar with flying. I've probably logged enough air milage to circle the globe 10 times or more. I despise it. It's nothing like traveling by train. I can board a train in under 5 minutes. I don't even have to have a ticket, I can just decide to go and pay the conductor once I'm on board. Try that on a plane.

[rs186]

> There's five toilets on each car, you never have to wait.

Can't agree based on personal experience.

> There's free wifi.

That wifi is barely usable. I often ended up using my phone as the hotspot.

> Riding the train is more fun than flying

Depending on whether you are a big train nerd or plane nerd. I am a little bit of both, and I never consider train to be any more fun or boring than flights. On shorter trips where plane flies at a low altitude (e.g. Boston-NYC-Washington DC), if the weather is good, I would be staring at the ground and take (crappy) aerial photos the whole flight.

And your post doesn't mention the routine delays on Amtrak trains. Trains in China and Japan are much more punctuate.

Don't get me wrong, I take trains in the US for leisure purposes more than almost anyone I know, but it is not nearly as romantic as you try to paint, which is why most people choose driving or something else.

[panny]

>which is why most people choose driving or something else

Most people in the US have never ridden the Amtrak. Not even once in their lives. Source?

https://www.newsweek.com/more-americans-taking-train-ever-pa...

Amtrak set a record in December, the most passengers ever in a year. 32.8 million. If every single one of those rides was a different person instead of repeat riders, that would still be less than 10% of the total US population.

Yet 83% of the population supports more investment in Amtrak.

https://www.masstransitmag.com/rail/press-release/53068546/a...

It doesn't sound like the US population uses cars by choice to me. It sounds like they're forced to use cars, because their area has little or no Amtrak service.

I rode the Amtrak an average of twice a month last year, and the train was delayed/late only once. That's much less frequent than traffic jams I'd say. You waited for a bathroom? Okay, was there a big line or something, because otherwise that's gonna be like 5 minutes at most. It takes far longer than 5 minutes to find an off ramp with a service station and then get back to traveling. When compared to air travel, there is always a line when you need to use it because there's typically only 2 toilets for each cabin section of the plane. And everyone is loaded up on the complimentary beverage at the same time.

Are Japanese passenger trains better? Yes, of course they are. The cars are cleaner, the ride is smoother, train fare is paid with an IC card, platforms are level with the train so you don't need to drag luggage up stairs. I would love to see Amtrak improve to the level of Japan. But I'll still take Amtrak over driving/flying in the US any day.

[rs186]

What's your point? You can list all those things but doesn't change any fact, or how most people travel.

> I rode the Amtrak an average of twice a month last year, and the train was delayed/late only once.

Consider yourself lucky.