Someone should teach The Hill‘s headline writers a little history. A recent article about why we should give more subsidies to Amtrak and high-speed rail was headed, “The US is a first-world nation with a third-world rail system.”
Actually, the United States is a first-world nation with a first-world rail system which is probably the best rail system in the world. The only other contender for the title would be Canada.
Few people seem to remember that “first-world” terminology grew out of the Cold War. At that time, the First World consisted of capitalist countries such as the United States and Canada while the Second World was socialist countries such as the Soviet Union and China. The Third World included developing countries that hadn’t really decided whether they were going to follow the capitalist or socialist model (with those that failed to choose capitalism remaining poor today).
As far as railroads go, the First World consists of the United States and Canada, the only two major countries that haven’t nationalized their rail systems. Just about every other developed country is in the Second World. The Third World consists mainly of countries that don’t have railroads at all or have very few.
Where private owners attempt to earn profits, political leaders want to get re-elected. As a result, government ownership, especially in democracies, leads politicians to direct resources to the most visible activities. Passenger trains are more visible than freight, so Second-World countries dedicate their rail systems to passengers. Private rail systems in the United States and Canada are used mainly for freight because freight rail, unlike passenger trains, is profitable. Not coincidentally, these are also the most productive rail systems in the world.
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In fact, high-speed rail worldwide has just about reached a dead end. China, the nation with more than half of all high-speed rail miles in the world, is about ready to stop building new lines because it can’t afford the debt it has incurred on existing lines. Spain, the nation with the most high-speed rail miles in Europe, is an economic basket-case partly because it has run up its debt in order to use high-speed trains as a political tool to tie the country’s rebellious provinces together rather than emphasizing efficient transportation.
The European nation with the fastest growth in rail travel, Switzerland, has virtually no high-speed rail. Those with lots of high-speed rail, such as France, Germany, Italy, and Spain, haven’t seen rail’s market share make a significant dent in auto or air travel.
Britain’s trains had the second-fastest-growing passenger ridership in Europe after it privatized its rail operations. Yet it has now decided to build a new high-speed rail line even though the projected cost has tripled and the social benefits are likely to be outweighed by the environmental costs. That’s hardly a good advertisement for bringing the technology to the United States.
The United States has airliners that are much faster than trains and automobiles that are much more convenient. Moreover, both air and auto travel costs less than high-speed rail travel. Thus, contrary to the article in The Hill, the United States doesn’t need high-speed rail.
The author of the article, Jerry Haar, torpedoes his own argument …
The private activity bond support part has me concerned. Why do those bonds gets nearly as low of a interest rate as reg govt bonds? Smells like they’re still backed by the government.
If that’s the case, if private Brightline goes belly up it may be that private investors that bet wrong are still made whole on those bonds.
That smells like crony capitalism –> profits for the politically connected paid for by the public.
Note the details on Brightline are wrong. Brightline is currently building their Orlando Airport ( MCO ) extension. Running to to Tampa at this point is talk.
The same with Brightline West. That proposal isn’t approved nor funded at this point. It’s just talk.
Brighline’s had a lot of struggles to raise money in what is the richest capital market in the history of man kind. It shouldn’t be so hard w/ all this capital sloshing around the markets.
So far the foamers have loved their business plan but the markets are pretty skittish.
The whole point of “high speed rail” is that very long and straight corridors must be forced upon the urban and natural landscape, totally fenced off from any intrusion and blocking all connections of people and nature except those specifically constructed, just so a few minutes a day a bunch of rich people can go by very fast and in comfort.
“… very long and straight corridors must be forced upon the urban and natural landscape….”
Right. And remember, going through poor neighborhoods has been ruled out by the current powers that be.
I can’t wait to see these corridors pushed through white upscale suburban neighborhoods on their way from and to city centers! We could be looking at the mother of all backlashes.
“It’s important to understand that the station that’s proposed for Gilroy will require two miles of 100-foot-wide clearance for tracks — one mile north of the station, one mile south of the station.” (https://gilroydispatch.com/with-brakes-on-high-speed-rail-project-lets-look-at-our-options/)
Bwhahahahaha!
I’ve long asked why not build the rail settup along the interstate
LazyReader,
Because trains and automobiles have different design standards. Interstates can go around sharper corners and up steeper hills than trains, especially high-speed trains.
And then, there’s the matter of vertical alignment, too.
“ To prevent derailments a 2015 study recommended that China ban new water wells near completed high-speed rail lines.”
Wait ‘til the farmers find out they will have to stop pumping water so the fat cats can be whisked over their farms without fear of flying off the rails!
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jun/24/beijing-has-fallen-chinas-capital-sinking-by-11cm-a-year-satellite-study-warns
I might* be sorry for Pete Buttigieg. He’s a smart, well educated guy who knows all this, but the only job the DNC left for him in the Biden administration is shilling for transit and high speed rail. *There is always that chance he’s a secret Gramscian.
Golly gee, if only there were something like a passenger rail car that ran on rubber tires and could use the interstates and highways. Somebody should invent that.
And have steerable wheels so it could move around accidents and other obstacles.
Excellent explanation. The descriptions originated more in the timing of their introduction, not their relative level of prosperity. That is, capitalism is humans’ normal economic state and has existed “forever”, whereas socialism was created and enforced by authoritarian governments.
Pete Buttigieg’s gotta do something more. Having been the mayor of a third tier city in Indiana doesn’t do wonders for the resume.
“I might* be sorry for Pete Buttigieg. He’s a smart, well educated guy who knows all this”
Knows what, exactly? You call him educated? This is someone who sticks his reproductive organ in the emunctory aperture of other men.