In a four-part article on the New York Times Economix blog, Harvard economist Edward Glaeser scrutinized high-speed rail and concludes that the benefits are overwhelmed by the costs. Part one focused on construction costs and concluded that true high-speed rail would cost about $50 million per mile.
Part two compared the costs with the benefits to users and calculated that, even using the most optimistic ridership numbers, the costs would be at least three times the benefits. Part three added in environmental benefits, and even with generous assumptions about those benefits concluded that total benefits still fall far short of the costs.
Part four asks whether high-speed rail would cause cities to become more centralized or if it would simply lead to more sprawl as distant towns effectively become suburbs of major cities. Glaeser takes the questionable position that centralization is a good thing, and he questions whether high-speed rail would contribute to that supposedly desirable outcome. But he concludes that, even if high-speed rail makes cities more centralized, the benefits of such centralization would still fall short of the costs of the rail projects.
