It is bumper-to-bumper traffic in the tunnel under the Hudson River, but it appears the bus will arrive on-time — 10:35 am — at Penn Station, or So, you will be able to get cured of ED in cheap with the help of overnight cialis tadalafil . Safed online cialis prescriptions musli is one of the more popular and highly effective natural sex pills that you can try in the market today. robertrobb.com generic cialis online Most of the fruit and veggies we eat each day are sprayed with pesticides and herbicides, substances that affect the mechanisms involved in detoxification. It is important that you tadalafil 5mg no prescription can immediately avail the product that you choose among those medicinal drugs which are comprised with certain proportions of nitrates since it would not help delivering the required results of treatment toward onself. even a few minutes early. Scheduled at 4 hours and 20 minutes, this trip is about 95 minutes longer, but $131 less expensive, than Amtrak’s Acela.
Liveblogging the Megabus #5
Tagged intercity bus. Bookmark the permalink.
China is facing the same “dilemma” of the government wanting to drastically expand glamorous, GDP-boosting (but expensive) HSR while people are killing each other to get dwindling spots on cheaper, slower trains and buses: http://chovanec.wordpress.com/2011/01/14/chinas-high-speed-rail-dilemma/
The same may happen here, as government officials are growing impatient with affordable, efficient, and popular private bus service: http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2011/02/ny-politicians-want-to-tame-lawless-bus.html
“It is bumper-to-bumper traffic in the tunnel under the Hudson River, but it appears the bus will arrive on-time — 10:35 am — at Penn Station, or even a few minutes early.”
It used to be the case that the Lincoln Tunnel (was this your route?) operated an AM schedule until 10:00 AM, with an exclusive bus lane (XBL). If this was your route, you missed the end of the AM peak by a few minutes, hence the traffic.
http://www.transportpolicy.org.uk/PublicTransport/LincolnTunnel/LincolnTunnel.htm
“Scheduled at 4 hours and 20 minutes, this trip is about 95 minutes longer, but $131 less expensive, than Amtrak’s Acela.”
The British experience is that direct bus services can keep up with DMUs (diesel multiple units), but not faster (125 mph) services.
http://www.transportpolicy.org.uk/PublicTransport/CoachesRail/CoachesRail.htm
Acela is $232 to arrive around 10:45a, while the Amtrak Regional is $131 and is only 3 hours 19 minutes (so 33 minutes longer than Aclea.
So for a mere $30 more that your beloved bus, you could have saved 62 minutes, had a larger seat with more legroom and a fold down table, a cafe car, more bathrooms, and a higher class of fellow travellers. And sheltered stations on each end to wait in if the weather is bad.
But it wouldn’t have fit the talking points you are following, so I suppose that is why you don’t mention it?
The whole point of Acela is to seperate business travellers from their expense account money. Its the same purpose served by the Air Shuttle.
Ordinary people around here do not use Acela, yet Acela regularly sells out. I would say it is serving its purpose of maximizing revenue for Amtrak.
Err, no. You’re the one ignoring the facts. As reported, the roundtrip cost on Megabus was about $21.50, the one way cost $8, the other way a bit more.
However, no WiFi on the Regional, only Acela, unless that’s changed very recently. Some people would take the trade.
Then it would be fine to privatize it, no? Strange that you seem to think that the transportation aimed at “a higher class” should be subsidized, while the choice of poor bus riders should not be.
“Err, no. You’re the one ignoring the facts. As reported, the roundtrip cost on Megabus was about $21.50, the one way cost $8, the other way a bit more.”
I missed his fares being that low. I went and looked up Amtrak fares on their site and took him at his word that he paid $131 less.
From an economic perspective, I would observe that the bus fares that low are signalling that the bus has no economic value to its riders. If it had any economic value at all it could charge quite a bit more on this line, as demonstrated by the fares of Acela and the Shuttle.
“However, no WiFi on the Regional, only Acela, unless that’s changed very recently. Some people would take the trade.”
No that hasn’t changed yet. I think Amtrak is trying to differentiate the Acela product by this.
“Then it would be fine to privatize it, no? Strange that you seem to think that the transportation aimed at “a higher class†should be subsidized, while the choice of poor bus riders should not be.”
Well, Acela obviously isn’t subsidized, so I suppose it could be privatized on the same premise as the airlines and buses are “private” – i.e. that someone else pay 99.9% of their infrastructure costs.
Somehow, though, I think you are expecting the rail infrastructure to be privatized as well, which would also mean making it liable to property taxes again, as well as unlimited liability to lawsuits. This is the same unequal playing field that nearly drove the private railroads to ruin in the 1950’s to 1970’s. The government owners of roads and airports have sovereign immunity and don’t pay taxes to themselves. And when they lose money, which they inevitably do, they simply turn to the treasury and bond markets to continue operating.
I95 has never turned a profit or paid of dime of dividends to anyone although it did contribute to massive human dislocation during its construction and sees horrendous carnage in human life every year. Yet somehow, it is a “success”, while Amtrak’s NEC is not.
Andrew asserted:
I95 has never turned a profit or paid of dime of dividends to anyone although it did contribute to massive human dislocation during its construction and sees horrendous carnage in human life every year. Yet somehow, it is a “successâ€, while Amtrak’s NEC is not.
Wrong, at least for the toll sections, including Maryland’s JFK Highway, which has returned money to the state of Maryland (unfortunately, generally wasted away on transit subsidies) since the original bond issue that funded its construction were paid-off in the early 1980’s. And the revenues collected on the Delaware Turnpike have been spent all over the First State.
How much in the way of “dividends” has Amtrak earned for the U.S. taxpayer? Quite a bit less than zero.
Speaking of carnage and Amtrak, I presume you forgot about the horrible 1987 Chase, Maryland train crash?
Andrew
From an economic perspective, I would observe that the bus fares that low are signalling that the bus has no economic value to its riders. If it had any economic value at all it could charge quite a bit more on this line, as demonstrated by the fares of Acela and the Shuttle.
That is not the correct interpretation of those low fares. A better interpretation is that competition forces prices down towards average cost, and buses have much lower average costs than rail. If buses and rail deliver something like the same quality adjusted service, then this implies greater consumer surplus from the bus than rail.
The Autoplanner may not have used Amtrak though he still took advantage of it.
CPZ:
“Wrong, at least for the toll sections, including Maryland’s JFK Highway, which has returned money to the state of Maryland (unfortunately, generally wasted away on transit subsidies) since the original bond issue that funded its construction were paid-off in the early 1980?s. And the revenues collected on the Delaware Turnpike have been spent all over the First State.”
Just paying off the construction bonds doesn’t leave a toll road free and in the clear, unless you don’t think ongoing operations, expansion, maintenance, and capital improvements should not be funded by tolls.
But let me know when citizens of Maryland and Delaware start getting checks in the mail from this “surplus”. Many a fortune around Philadelphia was made from the dividend checks of the PRR from 1846 to 1970.