
Why Can't the United States Build a High-Speed Rail System? - nkurz
http://www.citylab.com/politics/2014/08/why-cant-the-united-states-build-a-high-speed-rail-system/375980/
======
holograham
A couple of points the author misses IMO:

1\. High speed rail is an order of magnitude more expensive than interstate
highways. The cost effectiveness of the mass moving people via train vs. via
highways (buses, carpool lanes included) is still an active debate.

2\. The author cites that many folks use interstate highways daily. That may
be true but that vast majority of those commutes are 50 miles or less. High
speed rail only becomes cost and time effective over much longer distances.
Which fraction of the population need to frequently travel to cities greater
than 50 miles away? It's a small subset of the population (and skewed towards
wealthier citizens). Roads are much more democratic -- they are available to
anyone with a car.

3\. While his argument about traffic is correct... where is most of the
traffic on interstate highways? Answer: around major cities. The traffic is
mostly local commuter traffic that high speed rail would not solve.

~~~
lutusp
> High speed rail is an order of magnitude more expensive than interstate
> highways.

Only when being installed. When operating, the true cost per passenger mile is
much lower than for interstate highways and cars. It's best to avoid
misleading economic comparisons.

A bus is more expensive than a car, but the cost per passenger mile is much
lower.

A commercial airliner is hugely more expensive than a car, but an airplane
ride from A to B is cheaper than an equivalent car journey for most trips.

> The traffic is mostly local commuter traffic that high speed rail would not
> solve.

False choice. Cities have sophisticated, multi-level rail and surface mass
transit systems for a reason -- they make economic sense.

> Roads are much more democratic -- they are available to anyone with a car.

I have to ask -- who are you working for? Your arguments are all paper-thin,
easily torn to pieces. Roads and cars are democratic? More democratic than a
seat in mass transit?

~~~
rpiguy99
> I have to ask -- who are you working for? Your arguments are all paper-thin,
> easily torn to pieces. Roads and cars are democratic? More democratic than a
> seat in mass transit?

This is not at all constructive. And I believe the author probably meant
"individualistic" rather than "democratic."

There are no sound reasons for investing in passenger rail in the US now. The
current system is already meeting demand, and on a national level all lines
except the North East Corridor requires heavy subsidy.

If there were a pent up demand for it, it would have happened. We could
artificially create demand by jacking up the price of petrol, but then we are
taking choice away from the consumer.

Building better, faster trains is hardly a guarantee that they will be used.
My experience (which I admit is purely subjective) is that people who want
nicer trains already use them. I live in a major transit corridor to NYC, and
the folks who already ride the train would love it to be faster and nicer, but
would they pay the higher prices? Why are they all taking slow NJ Transit
instead of high speed Amtrak?

~~~
dragonwriter
> We could artificially create demand by jacking up the price of petrol, but
> then we are taking choice away from the consumer.

Jacking up the price of petrol doesn't take away choice. It may be
internalizing the massive externalities associated with the use of petroleum
based fuels and making the choice better reflect net utilities (including
disutilities experienced by people outside of individual purchase decisions as
a result of those decisions), or it may be artificially creating a new
externality so that the decisions less-accurately reflect real net utilities,
but in either case its not removing choice.

------
ArkyBeagle
The U.S. is largely built out already.

So look at Japan. Japan is 152,000 ish square miles.

The United States is 3,717,000 sq miles that are already crisscrossed with
Interstates, plus a great deal of air travel infrastructure, plus low-speed
rail.

It may not be obvious, but rail _crashed_ in the U.S. More than once. There
were worthless railroad stock certificates in many attics. These now have
actual numismatic value. Then it crashed again after Eisenhower built the
Interstate.

China is 3,704,000 sq. miles but doesn't have Interstates to the same extent
that the U.S. does.

The U.S. does pretty well with _low_ speed rail for freight and to a lesser
extent, passenger service. But the infrastructure in the U.S. is based on 50
year old technology. China should be able to do much better and by doing so,
the U.S. should develop a twinge of envy and possibly emulate them, if it
makes sense.

The U.S. should ( IMO ) do a lot more "moon shot" things but it didn't work
out. I watched this in real time after the moon landing. The shuttle was cool
and all, but it was nothing compared to what could have been. We said "BTDT"
and went to the disco.

When it comes down to it, the U.S. is a lot about granite countertops and not
much else. I will not say why I think that is.

But the geometry of the way the U.S. is laid out means that you can spend a
great deal on air transport before you get to break even with high-speed rail.

~~~
icehawk219
I completely agree with you but also feel like the big problem is people tend
to state it as a case of "why the country, as a whole, needs high speed rail"
and as you point out the vast majority of country really doesn't. Or at least
doesn't think they do. We'd benefit greatly if we instead looked at it as a
case of "why [state/city] should have high speed rail".

High speed rail from NYC to LA, while it may be cool and might be a nice big
engineering challenge, really just doesn't appeal to most people. But if I, in
central NJ, could take a train into Manhattan in under 2 hours, that would
actually be incredibly useful and I'd love to be able to. Right now the time
and cost of me taking a train from here to DC is prohibitively high compared
to driving or taking a flight. These regional cases are where high speed (or
at least higher speed) rail would really shine in my opinion.

~~~
adestefan
The problem is that it makes sense in the densest areas of the country, but
because it's so dense it then ends up being the most expensive areas of the
country to implement.

~~~
icehawk219
Agreed, and combined with NIMBY it'll be damn near impossible to build in
densely populated areas. NJ Transit has been dealing with this for decades as
people keep claiming they want more rail lines but don't want them in their
own towns, they want them in the next town over so they don't have to hear the
train. There's no reason to believe that trying to build a high speed line
wouldn't face the exact same complaints.

------
cdoxsey
> we have a political system in which the federal government, having devolved
> virtually all decision-making power to states

That's definitely not true. Just look at the ACA.

> California's high-speed rail progress—its proposed San Francisco-to-Los
> Angeles line remains the only truly fast train project in the country—is the
> exception that proves the rule; that state's size makes it no example for
> the rest of the nation.

Yeah let's just pretend that California's train to nowhere is an example other
states should emulate.

We can't build high speed trains because: (1) the government is corrupt,
incompetent and beholden to interest groups and (2) the public doesn't really
want them.

The best example of public transportation the US has is probably NYC and it
really isn't all that great. It's dirty, slow, unreliable, crowded and
surprisingly expensive. (at 100$/mo owning a car in almost any other city in
the US is cheaper)

~~~
genwin
> the government is corrupt, incompetent and beholden to interest groups

Which in turn is because of the 2-party oligopoly. Instant run-off voting, to
give 3rd parties a viable chance of winning, is part of the solution.

~~~
HarryHirsch
Another reason for corruption is pay-to-play. A full war chest doesn't
guarantee winning the elections, but not having one guarantees that you won't
get into parliament. And if you do get in your donors expect some kind of
return. Campaign finance return is sorely needed, at the moment the system is
plainly corrupt, and that doesn't help the legitimacy of whatever government
is in power at the moment.

~~~
genwin
Yep. In the US, if we could get a viable 3rd party we could maybe get campaign
finance reform. Until then there is no chance of it.

------
miahi
The problem European countries have with the high-speed trains is that they
are not as cheap as normal (slow) trains, and by introducing the high-speed
ones they retired many cheap ones - that were slower but still got you there.
This reduced the number of travelers, forcing even higher prices to cover the
expenses - so they are now not very far from plane tickets.

~~~
ojbyrne
My (now out of date) experience is that high speed trains are significantly
more expensive than direct flights in Europe.

I did a quick search and it looks like FRA to AMS return is about $400 by
train, $164 by plane.

~~~
skriticos2
I just checked, you can get a ticket from FRA to AMS _and_ back for about 108
EUR (~ 150 USD) if you buy them a few days early and choose a favorable time-
slot (full price, second class). I even did that trip some time in the last
three years and the price is about right.

Train rides in western Europe are not that expensive and certainly not worth
the hassle with airplanes over such short distances. Also, you can buy 25% and
50% discount cards for all tickets for a year for only a few EUR's. (25% for a
year = 62 EUR, 50% for 515 EUR for inland travel in Germany).

~~~
smackfu
Yes, the old experience of, "just show up at the train station and buy a
ticket for today at the window" has just become a good way to overpay.

------
Shivetya
The US got into air transportation with much more enthusiasm than Europe and
this combined with our love affair with the automobile pretty much negated a
need or desire for trains. For the longest time traveling between countries in
Europe could be met with restriction or such, the distances most traveled were
not that great. In the US, it wasn't uncommon to travel hundreds if not a
thousand miles on the big family vacation and you had three ways to get there.

High Speed rail might have some applications in some congested corridors, most
likely only in the North East, but for the rest - air travel isn't that
expensive.

~~~
hackuser
> air travel isn't that expensive

I would argue that air travel has become very expensive. I hardly can get a
ticket, even for hour-long flights, for less than $400.

Most Americans cannot afford that (take your two kids, and its $1600). Combine
it with the increased price of gas, and many Americans cannot afford to travel
outside their hometowns. We need better public transit.

~~~
ghaff
There's always Greyhound. I honestly don't mean that facetiously. If air is
too expensive and driving is too expensive, there are always buses-- though I
doubt they'd be cheaper for a a family of 4 than driving,

------
brandonmenc
The electric, self-driving cars we will certainly have in less time than this
rail system could be built will be using existing infrastructure - the highway
system - to transport us, congestion-free and at higher speeds, to absolutely
any city on the map - whether they have a train station or not.

Why waste money on a rail system when the whole country is going to look like
the car scenes in Minority Report in a couple decades?

~~~
rayiner
I don't really think that's the future. The most comfortable commute I ever
had was the Metro North into Manhattan from Westchester. Can't beat having a
bathroom on your commute. Can't beat the physics of rail having lower friction
than car tires (especially at higher speeds). In a place like Manhattan, I see
self driving cars as a replacement for taxis, not trains. Outside of
Manhattan, well who cares about those places?

~~~
brandonmenc
There's a bathroom every half-hour on a highway commute.

~~~
rayiner
There's a bathroom on the train in a train commute. And other people. And
space to get up and stretch your legs.

~~~
brandonmenc
Rest stops have all of these features. So do busses. And planes.

Trains don't have a monopoly on this.

------
Aloha
There are really only 3 or 4 viable high speed rail corridors in the US:

Northeast Corridor (Boston - Washington DC)

LA - SF

Chicago - NYC

and possibly Seattle - Portland

Beyond that, the traffic densities present are not enough to justify high
speed rail - not to mention, even nonstop at 200 mph from LA/SF/Seattle to
Chicago (or any eastern point) is a minimum of 10 hours in transit, versus
3ish to fly.

~~~
com2kid
> Beyond that, the traffic densities present are not enough to justify high
> speed rail

Remember that building transit infrastructure will also create new traffic!

As an example, park and rides an hour out from Seattle are packed full of cars
every day. Busses are then packed full of people every day heading into the
city from as much as 40 miles out.

IMHO what would be more interesting would be Vancouver BC --> Bellingham -->
Midway to Seattle --> Seattle --> Tacoma --> Portland

Of course going across the boarder makes this impractical. :(

~~~
brightsize
What would be interesting to me would be a Seattle<->Spokane HS line. Maybe it
could run along the Empire Builder route? The cities are separated by around
280 miles using I-90 and flights take around an hour tarmac-to-tarmac. If you
flew tomorrow the flight would cost around $200 RT. But you have to fly via
Seatac which isn't exactly convenient if you're going to the city. The Amtrak
station is right downtown in both cities. Such a connection could bring some
much-needed economic development to Spokane, and might even turn it into a
bedroom community of Seattle for some people - the economics might work out
considering that a $1M house in Seattle might run you $200K here.

~~~
Aloha
again, I'd add that post PDX-SEA - You could call the whole thing the Cascadia
Corridor, and eventually take it as far south as medford.

------
hackuser
Per an engineer in the train industry [1], an essential requirement is
effective mass transit in the cities where the high-speed rail stops. Without
that, passengers can't reach the inter-city trains easily enough.

[1] The kind of engineer who designs trains (and related systems), not the
kind who drives them.

------
jaxytee
Speaking of the northeast corridor specifically, there is a crap ton of
bureaucracy inhibiting the construction of a high speed line.

Think of all of the state/municipal level governments and unions that have to
be satisfied before any deal is struck. This would essentially mix NYC,
Jersey, Philly, Baltimore, and D.C. politics into one huge pile of WTF.

We couldn't even get a riverfront project going in Philadelphia because not
enough (of the powers that be) palms were greased.

Only way this could be possible is if some benevolent Palpatine-esqe dictator
comes along and makes shit happen.

~~~
smackfu
Eh, I think the biggest problem is just right-of-way issues. It's easiest to
build high-speed rail if you are starting from scratch, instead of trying to
work around an active commuter rail line and an existing Amtrak service. But
obtaining the necessary right-of-way to do a new build in the Northeast would
be extremely expensive.

------
fowkswe
The US has been bought and manipulated by the automobile and oil industries.
From early on when GM and others bought the street car networks and shut them
down, to lobbying the Eisenhower interstate network in place, this country has
been and continues to be built around the idea that everyone should be
required to use a car to participate in all aspects of their lives.

In order for an intercity rail network to work, it needs to link dense urban
cores that also have useful transit systems. A train between Omaha and Kansas
City does no good if you get off the train then face a 14 mile journey through
the suburbs to your destination.

2 things need to happen before a rail network makes sense:

1\. Urban infill. I know Denver has a policy for this in place, I'm sure
others do too. But sooo many city cores have huge tracts of land that are
derelict, or unused. New development should be incentivized to make use of
this land.

2\. Growth boundary regulation. Portland is the best example of this. With out
this you get the exurbs and sprawl (sorry to point out Kansas City again, but
it is one of the worst offenders here) which demand a car to traverse.

------
tormeh
Well, the business model is hard to get right. It's faster than plane and car
on medium distances, but capital costs are enormous compared to either. As far
as I know HSR can only be directly profitable with insane population density
(Japan). I believe it can be a net economic win for society in general, but a
certain kind of government and populace is required to consider that kind of
argument.

~~~
hackuser
> Well, the business model is hard to get right. It's faster than plane and
> car on medium distances, but capital costs are enormous compared to either.

Consider the climate impact costs. Part of the problem is that airlines and
car owners externalize a significant cost, making those modes of
transportation seem relatively less expensive. In reality, everyone else
covers those costs.

------
buckbova
> California's high-speed rail progress—its proposed San Francisco-to-Los
> Angeles line remains the only truly fast train project in the country—is the
> exception that proves the rule; that state's size makes it no example for
> the rest of the nation.

California's rail plan is a lie and a joke. It won't end up being "high speed"
rail. It's a waste of taxpayer money. It's another way for politicians to line
the pockets of their contributors.

Rail line won't meet target travel time.

[http://articles.latimes.com/2014/mar/27/local/la-me-
bullet-t...](http://articles.latimes.com/2014/mar/27/local/la-me-bullet-train-
hearing-20140328)

It will cost more than proposed to the voters.

[http://californiawatch.org/dailyreport/cost-high-speed-
rail-...](http://californiawatch.org/dailyreport/cost-high-speed-rail-project-
balloons-12325)

[http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_22929875/california-high-
speed...](http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_22929875/california-high-speed-rail-
costs-soar-again-this)

------
cpursley
holograham is correct.

The USA does not need a high-speed rail system. The interstate system and
airport network is sufficient. Between high trafficked short-distance
corridors? Fine.

What the USA needs is modern commuter rail supported by a network of private
short-trip mini-buses. This would have the most significant impact for lowest
cost.

~~~
gerbal
Commuter rail is also a much smaller, cheaper target to reach for. And it
would have a much greater impact on the quality of life in urban and suburban
areas.

However, the barriers to commuter rail in much of the country are stupid and
entrenched. In Raliegh, NC, the main barrier to commuter rail is a county
commissioner who believes in some absurd conspiracy theories [1].

[1]
[http://www.carolinajournal.com/exclusives/display_exclusive....](http://www.carolinajournal.com/exclusives/display_exclusive.html?id=9165)

------
JackFr
Article seems kind of ludicrous. It weirdly blames Federalism, ignores the
airlines, the auto industry and the rail freight business, all which would
stand to lose if public transportation dollars and regulation moved to
significant passenger rail investment.

------
AnimalMuppet
tl;dr: Basically, it's because the population density is too low.

High speed rail is great for population centers that are 300 miles apart, but
not so great for ones that are 1500 miles apart. The competition there is
primarily the airplane, and the time difference grows with distance. So does
the cost difference. (You only need an airport in each city, no matter how far
apart they are, but you need a mile of railroad for each mile of distance.)

The problem, then, is that the US doesn't have enough population centers that
are big enough and close enough to each other. The northeast corridor (from
Boston to Washington DC) is really the only one that fits.

------
tim333
Off topic but the graph of trust in the government in Washington descending
from 73% to 19% is striking. Now there's a system that looks like it could do
with disrupting or fixing or something like that.

------
smackfu
Not a fan of the essay style where you dismiss a bunch of possible reasons
with single sentences, then spend paragraphs talking about the one part you
want to talk about. It overly simplifies issues.

------
ojbyrne
I think the problem is not national will, but cost. In my experience (in
Korea, and Europe) is that high speed rail is heavily subsidized, but still
not competitive with air travel.

------
coldtea
Because the citizens have been indoctrinated to not believe in public works
and public goods.

Hence everything has to be privatized, and if something gives little or no
incentive for profit, it should not exist (like municipal fiber or proper
universal health care).

With the big exception of the army and the police of course, where it's handy
that the multitide of common citizens fund the resource-grabbing and property
protection of the few.

~~~
jerf
"Because the citizens have been indoctrinated to not believe in public works
and public goods."

Really? By whom? Where?

Trust in government hasn't collapsed due to a sudden lack of people advocating
government solutions for everything in the past 50 years. In a nutshell, it's
collapsed due to government not being able to deliver on a great deal of what
it promises. It's simply irrational for the public to pretend that the
government has some sort of spotless track record over the past 50 years.

Given how many of those failed promises have been infrastructure projects
themselves, it would bode poorly for trying to fix this distrust with yet
another one.

And remember, if you're inclined to start making excuses for why the public
may not trust the government, you simply end up explaining why the public
doesn't trust the government, it doesn't make the mistrust go away. Consider
that a list of problems to be attacked before the government has the moral
capital to spend again on such infrastructure projects. (One rather potent way
of looking at the government's trust problems is its repeated willingness by
government officials to spend that trust without putting a lot of effort into
depositing into that account.)

~~~
coldtea
> _Really? By whom? Where?_

By the prevalent public discourse ever since the 50's at least.

>* In a nutshell, it's collapsed due to government not being able to deliver
on a great deal of what it promises.*

Seems to be able to deliver just fine in Germany or Denmark for example. It
might no be infallible, but then is there any private entity that is?

> _And remember, if you 're inclined to start making excuses for why the
> public may not trust the government, you simply end up explaining why the
> public doesn't trust the government, it doesn't make the mistrust go away._

If you change "making excuses" to "finding the causes", then it's actually the
very first step to "making the mistrust go away".

------
malchow
It could be that the US's high-risk/high-reward/failure-positive ethic means
that elastic transportation routings are more economically valuable than
fixed-segment trains.

A train is 10% better than a jet from SF to LA. A train is much worse than a
jet for SF to NY. All other pairings -- or so one might argue -- are so much
lesser in density that the elasticity of roads is vastly preferable.

~~~
hackuser
> A train is 10% better than a jet from SF to LA. A train is much worse than a
> jet for SF to NY. All other pairings -- or so one might argue -- are so much
> lesser in density that the elasticity of roads is vastly preferable.

I think there are many other possibilities, and also many people live in
cities of hundreds of thousands, all over America, and they'd like to travel
too.

* The NE corridor, from DC to Boston, of course. Maybe south to NC

* Chicago - Indianapolis - Cincinnati - Columbus - Pittsburgh - Cleveland - Detroit (- Toronto) (That would include a spur or two, of course.) And what about people in Green Bay and Grand Rapids?

* The Florida cities, maybe up to Atlanta or West to New Orleans

* Texas cities

