
High-speed rail in California was a disaster, but there’s a better way - ryan_j_naughton
https://slate.com/business/2019/02/high-speed-rail-in-california-and-the-green-new-deal-it-could-work-in-america-but-were-screwing-it-up.html
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joe_the_user
Good, damning, summary of the amazing decisions made during the construction
of this project (bullet points are quotes):

• A meandering route through the Central Valley devised to win support at the
ballot box, locking planners into a scheme that took the route away from its
goal of connecting the state’s biggest cities.

• A mad rush to begin construction without knowing the route, acquiring the
right of way, studying the geology, or securing the funding.

• An irresponsible partner in the federal government that rushed California to
get going and encouraged the state to proceed with half-baked plans.

• A balkanized planning process teeming with eager private-sector beavers who
were afraid to report how flawed the enterprise was, a system that Naik called
“no consultant left behind.”

• The determination not to engage French and Chinese engineers who offered to
just build the damn thing for us. “The equivalent of Bangladesh saying they’d
go to the moon with indigenous technology” is how Perl describes the general
attitude. “We excluded all the learning and tech that happened elsewhere.”

But after all that, the thing that wasn't said was "by how this was done, one
would deduce that no one really cared whether the project succeeded or not."

Which is to say that if another project of this sort is attempted, creating an
institutional imperative to succeed from the start is crucial.

And as far as popular support goes, it seems reasonable to make it clear to
the voters that the project didn't die by accident but that it was killed. Of
course, with all parties conveniently culpable, it's hard to say what a
concerned citizen is to do.

Sadly, corruption tends to be a part of any large scale infrastructure
project. The trick is creating a situation where the forces involved have
incentive not to eat the golden goose. And this incentive basically has to
come from the top. Obviously, it didn't this time.

~~~
Bucephalus355
Excellent summary.

Part of the reason he interstate got built / was such a success was that there
was enough goodwill and cohesion in society to see the whole thing through.
JFK served in his unit alongside guys who hadn’t finished the 9th grade.
People trusted each other more than they do today.

Even the moon landing and the work of NASA was part of this cohesive society.
That being said cohesion requires conformity which has a ton of drawbacks as
well, and this eventually fell apart after a Vietnam. Maybe it had to happen
but societies move in cycles and some other highly cohesive event will occur,
making stuff like this possible again.

~~~
joe_the_user
That is _a way_ things get built. But even third world countries occasionally
achieve success in infrastructure when the powers-that-be realize success will
make them far more money than failure.

The problem with public transit in the US generally is the process of
destroying infrastructure and soaking up money has become standard because
freeways and automobile were always an adequate alternative when public
transit failed (and it's failed and failed).

Now, we have a situation where a lot things dying in the waste of the
automobile but the habit of soaking up every bit of transit dollars is very
well established. And America's ruling class now resemble a slumlord class -
running the entire operation into the ground for maximum profits. Yet confused
where to go when things fall to pieces.

------
bmiranda
Even in Japan it's cheaper to fly between Osaka and Tokyo than take the train.
The train is a lot more convenient, though.

There are only a few corridors where high speed rail makes sense. Northeast
US. Texas Central Railway is even trying to build a line between Houston and
Dallas.

Building out everywhere though is a surefire way to rack up debt. Look at
Japan, which is touted as a high-speed rail success story. Although the Osaka-
Tokyo route is profitable (and very beneficial to their economy), the rest of
their high-speed rail network essentially bankrupted JR Rail. JR Rail ended up
being privatized, with most of the debt being funneled into a holding company
owned by the government. JR East/Central are operating off of a high-speed
network they essentially got for free.

~~~
zhte415
Sitting on a train from Jilin to Beijing, I noted the below from Wikipedia:

> In another study conducted about Japan's High-speed rail service, they found
> a "4-hour wall" in high-speed rail's market share, which if the high speed
> rail journey time exceeded 4 hours, then people would likely choose planes
> over high-speed rail. For instance, from Tokyo to Osaka, a 2h22m-journey by
> Shinkansen, high-speed rail has an 85% market share whereas planes have 15%.
> From Tokyo to Hiroshima, a 3h44m-journey by Shinkansen, high-speed rail has
> a 67% market share whereas planes have 33%. The situation is the reverse on
> the Tokyo to Fukuoka route where high-speed rail takes 4h47m and rail only
> has 10% market share and planes 90%. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-
> speed_rail](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-speed_rail)

The journey is a bit more than 4 hours. The above "4-hour wall" seemed to make
a lot of sense. Passenger ridership end-to-end was not very high, but
intermediate station pickup and putdown, consisting of quite large cities by
European or North American standards, was high. Taking a plane would be
slightly faster and sometimes a little cheaper, I prefer the train because of
time in laptop/connectivity, good seat size/leg room/decline, ability to have
a snooze.

Without the intermediate cities, the train would have be mainly empty. What
the train brought/brings was a relief of bus/coach traffic, and a substantial
increase in facilitating movement between 'smaller' (though not small) cities
that mainly don't have airports.

Does the US have this layout or need?

~~~
mikekchar
Just to give you the price, a return fare Shinkansen ticket from Tokyo to
Hakata (Fukuoka) costs almost exactly $400 (44660 JPY). I did a random search
for air fares for next week and the lowest ones were $250 return (was looking
at an English site, so it only gave me USD). The Shinkansen takes nearly 5
hours, while the flight takes 2. Even when you account for the crazy amount of
time ahead you need to arrive for a flight, it will end up being both nearly
half the price and half the amount of time. Especially for business travel,
there is no way for the Shinkansen to compete. I've actually done that ride
once and really enjoyed it, but you have to be a train fan :-)

~~~
ip26
_half the amount of time_

Hmm, many US airports recommend showing up a minimum of 2 hours early, and it
takes me 1 hour to _get_ to the airport...

~~~
mikekchar
Japanese airports are ridiculously efficient. I've gone through both Narita
and Haneda a numerous times and it's never taken me more than 15 minutes to
get through, even with an international flight. I can't quite remember how
long they recommend for domestic flights, but I think it's 1 hour (i.e. 30
minutes before boarding).

Narita is right out for time to get there (like your scenario, it will take
more than an hour to take a train there and make it to the check in desk).
However, Haneda is only 19 minutes from Tokyo station by monorail. If you live
in the more populated areas of Tokyo, it's probably not any more or less
convenient than taking the Shinkansen.

Coincidentally, Fukuoka airport is only 3 km away from Hakata station (though
you have to take a shuttle bus Edit: It's actually 2 stations away on the
metro -- I didn't know this!). So in _this_ example, it's really 6 of one half
a dozen of the other. You end up in practically the same spot. I think this is
one of the reasons why people fly to Fukuoka. In the other direction, I would
probably fly to Sapporo if I needed to get there quickly, but would take the
train if I was going anywhere in the Tohoku region (NE region of the main
island). The main reason is that the Shinkansen stops at Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto
and then you have to take a different train to Sapporo. When they finally have
a line going all the way to Sapporo, I think it will be competitive because it
takes an hour to get from Chitose airport to Sapporo station.

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gumby
America actually does have a world-leading rail system...for freight. In fact
passenger trains usually travel on freight tracks (yes, even Caltrain from SF
to SJ) and have to give way to freight which is prioritized.

As far as HSR goes, the article is actually unfair when it talks about the
Line running through the Central Valley. It's a lot cheaper to run the line
there than any straight line between SF and LA. More importantly, tying
Bakersfield, Merced and Fresno into the Bay Area and LA regional economies
would be great for all three.

~~~
chrisseaton
> In fact passenger trains usually travel on freight tracks

But the idea of ‘freight tracks’ vs ‘passenger tracks’ isn’t a thing in most
other places.

In most of the world they’re the same thing and they prioritise using a
schedule. This is another artificial problem that Americans see as an inherent
one.

~~~
Aloha
It's not a thing here either honestly - and we have freight trains, and amtrak
is now mostly ontime - but still slow - and it would remain slow - even with
high speed rail.

~~~
gumby
Is “here” Hawaii? (Looking at your user name). Because it is definitely the
case in the USA. Amtrak owns rolling stock but no rail infrastructure.

~~~
Aloha
(here is indeed the USA)

Amtrak does actually own its own infrastructure.

From wikipedia: "Amtrak owns approximately 623 miles of this track and
operates an additional 132 miles of track."

From the top of my head, this is the NEC (North East Corridor), some track in
Michigan, and some track in New Mexico.

~~~
gumby
I sit corrected! Though it’s a tiny amount.

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int_19h
The general antipathy towards rail seems to be an American cultural thing,
mostly. And a relatively recent (2nd half of 20th century?) at that.

What I find especially amusing is when US size is brought up as a counter-
point. It had the same size back in the day when it had the most vibrant
railway industry in the world.

~~~
sien
The US has a great freight rail network that is highly used.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_rail_usag...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_rail_usage#Freight_rail)

The US still has one of the most vibrant freight rail networks in the world.

~~~
apexalpha
Bit off-topic: is this why Tesla is building a Giga-factory in the middle of a
desert? I've always wondered how that is possible. No one in Europe would ever
build a factory so far from a sea or navigable river.

I guess Americans are simply used to the idea of transporting everything over
rail?

~~~
jdhn
They're building it there because they got a great deal from the Nevada
government, and because Nevada is basically empty desert so there's no real
impediments to building a giant factory.

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hexane360
As a progressive from far away from California, I can't help but be frustrated
that a) California seems to be all people talk about when it comes to
progressive reforms and that b) California consistently sets such a toxic
example when it comes to progressive reforms.

~~~
chipotle_coyote
So other than the high speed rail debacle, what progressive reforms has
California pushed through that are so "toxic?"

~~~
hexane360
I think you misunderstand me (I may have worded my point badly). It's not that
the reforms are toxic, or even anything to do with the reforms themselves.
It's that the political landscape in California is often toxic when it bleeds
over to the country as a whole. I don't mean this in the "California is just
too liberal for middle America" sense (as many Californians seem to). I mean
"California seems to have a level of corruption that makes successful reform
nigh-impossible".

You can see this "toxicity" in, for example, the singular influence California
(and Texas on the other side) have on K12 textbooks, and the synergistic
relationship between huge California ag businesses and the Bureau of
Reclamation.

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synaesthesisx
As long as I can fly from LAX to SFO for ~$100 RT it's going to be difficult
justifying high speed rail, unless it can be offered at competitive prices.
When I was living in the Northeast an Amtrak train from Boston-NYC could
easily soar above $100 one-way...

~~~
guiomie
It's also a 9 to 12 hours train ride from SF to LA. Which is mind boggling
long! I tried to do a business trip via train, but it's just not worth the
time.

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Grue3
Yeah, it's called private development. Just look at Brightline. Or privatized
railroads in Japan. Most of the profit comes from owning real estate (usually
the railway stations) redeveloped into business and shopping centers, which
thrive because of easy access to transportation. This real estate pays for
itself, subsidizing the train operations which might be unprofitable by
themselves.

~~~
jdhn
I agree that private development like Japan is the way to go, but outside of
the Brightline, it seems like nobody in the US is doing this. The only real
estate that the HSR line in Texas seems to buy is land for the tracks, but not
any real estate around the station.

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vondur
The property prices are crazy expensive when you start getting into the
populated areas of Southern California. I don't know it could ever be done
without spending huge amounts of money. I do think it would be great to link
the Bakersfield and Fresno areas with both SF and the Los Angeles area.

~~~
anonymous5133
It would have never been built simply because the uber rich property owners
would never let it be built. They would just stall it out long enough to
prevent it from ever being built.

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ilovecaching
I wonder what the rail-laying tech looks like, and if it's made any big
advancements in the past 50 years. I would imagine some big advancements in
rail construction would tip the scales of cost/benefit.

Let's invest in self-replicating rail construction!

~~~
Symbiote
Railway track laying machines.

I don't know if there's something to prepare the foundation, most videos show
replacing a line rather than laying a new one.

[https://youtube.com/watch?v=_MKcTbYDP7w](https://youtube.com/watch?v=_MKcTbYDP7w)

[https://youtube.com/watch?v=_-wThCECvxM](https://youtube.com/watch?v=_-wThCECvxM)

~~~
azurezyq
This is the one used in Chinese HSR construction, for elevated viaducts.

[https://youtu.be/T7hdo9tL6u0](https://youtu.be/T7hdo9tL6u0)

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ryanmetz
Always important to remember that a lot of the people slamming this stuff have
no counter-plan because they either don't believe in climate change or just
don't care about it. May an ill fate befall them.

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angel_j
I always thought the obvious route is to replace a couple lanes of interstate
with rail.

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hprotagonist
high speed rail is a beautiful thing.

who’s gonna be the guy who eminent domains all the existing developed property
to unkink the existing lines so they can support fast trains?

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robertAngst
>Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

Bait topic, cant we just talk about new tech and how that makes rail better?

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ilovecaching
Why can't the government just declare that the rail should be built for the
greater good and take control of all the land they need via eminent domain for
a nominal fee?

~~~
zaroth
Ah yes, the good old “men with guns show up to steal your land” approach. This
Green New Deal is really shaping up!

