I took Amtrak between Seattle and Vancouver recently. Great trip, stellar views, and overall just a super easy way to cross the border. No crazy invasive checks or waiting in lines, it was just like getting off a plane, but in the middle of downtown.
Ha, literally saw this while waiting for my Amtrak.
For medium-short trips, beats air travel hands down, cheaper, loads of space, reliable and limited security theater.
great, now all we need is more fucking trains
the money is always going to get in the way. its just not profitableโฆ because thats the end-all be-all of the untie states. profits above anything else whatsoever.
donโt forget you also have to beg the freight companies to let you run those trains
While I would also love that, itโs really not the best choice for most travelers. Currently we err in only driving or flying, but even in a well balanced system with a complete rail network that let everyone pick the best means of travel, flying will have the advantage for longer distances.
Even with how slow Acela is, it beats both flying and driving Boston โ> NYC. If we had high speed trains, they could be most effective over longer distances, but flying will always be much faster Miami โ> LA
If we optimize for time, the world is fucked. Thereโs things more important, especially if the trains have WiFi on board and you can work and read.
Loads of folks would take the train from NY to FL and didnโt complain that it took a few days. The journey becomes part of the trip. Enjoy it.
Iโd have a train except Scott walker gave our train we already paid for away for free, because trains are a liberal plot to make America weak and communist!
The 2022 Amtrak Connects Us plans have several new lines through Wisconsin specifically (extending Hiawatha services to Green Bay, a second Empire Builder route with more towns connected and a station in Madison) and the expanded Borealis service has exceeded ridership expectations in less than a year which bodes well politically for other Midwestern Amtrak projects
Took a high speed between Philadelphia and Newark, NJ. Got a deal for less than $30. It was a great ride at 120mph. Wish we had more of that.
120mph is not high speed though. It is 10mph below where the Shinkansen (130 mph) was (1964โ1986) 37 years ago. Since 2014, Shinkansen trains run up to 200 mph on the Tลhoku Shinkansen.
if you think the bumpy Acela Express is a great ride you should try the Shinkansen.
Itโs high speed for the US. It was a comfotrable ride. It wasnโt intended to be a comparison to other countries.
This is a race to the bottom. The rest of the world exists and lagging in infrastructure has practical impacts including apparently having no frame of reference to how harsh and noisy โhigh speedโ trains are in the US.
May as well define 80mph as high speed rail and have a massive network with the stroke of a pen.
Shinkansen was doing a top speed of 130 mph. At that time, the Hikari express service was making an average speed of 80 mph. Acela has a top speed of 150 mph and an average speed of 67 mph, comparable to the initial average speed of the Shinkansen Kodama (64 mph). Itโs definitely not great by todayโs standards, but Acela is essentially equivalent to the initial operating standards of Shinkansen (by average speed. Ride quality, reliability, etc. probably donโt compare as favorably thanks to the aging infrastructure of the NEC). People making unfair comparisons against American train service are well intentioned in pointing out that we need to do better and to modernize, but can make train travel appear less viable than it actually is in todayโs conditions by doing so
The Kodama and Hikari have more frequent stops. The Nozomi is more comparable to the Acela Express in number of stops.
At most intermediate stations, Kodama trains wait for faster trains, including the Nozomi, Hikari, Sakura, and Mizuho, to pass through before resuming their journeys.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kodama_(train)
The numbers alone donโt tell you the full story. The difference in punctuality, ride quality, and reliability has to be experienced. This video of a high speed in China shows what I mean, and if anything the Japanese are better at it.
