Thursday, May 09, 2019

why the USA is the only NATO country without high speed rail, coffee and donuts video



answers:
too many investors in car manufacturing
too many investors in airlines
politicians can't profit from supporting it, without losing campaign donations

8 comments:

  1. NATO member Iceland has high speed rail? Learnt something new there.

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    1. no where in the video does it say anything about NATO, I decided to add that to see if anyone bothers to read the headline. Also, Iceland is in NATO? What the hell is their contribution? A vacation island to get politicians away from the media?

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    2. I'm here to answer! :D

      Iceland contribution to NATO is the place where it is located. It was an "anchor" of GIUK line and natural guardian of Denmark strait. Every ship that want to break to Atlantic need to move through that region so Iceland is perfect base of operation from where you can control that area. Also it was important node of SOSUS in times of Cold War. To be sincere, being part of NATO was not decision of Iceland itself but imposed on them by major players, it was even under occupation for some time by British Army, soft type of "friendly" occupation but occupation nevertheless. After that Americans replace Brits and occupation became agreement that US recognize Iceland independence but in return Iceland will be the base of operation for Allies to control routes to Atlantic. And with form of NATO it was just "natural" way for Iceland to be part of it because... well, Allies and future NATO need it. So even if Iceland don't have any real military outside cost guard (that did "fight" with Brits over fishing areas) and some other paramilitary small formation. It's placement is very important for NATO and that it is Iceland contribution, being in right place. They are not "rich" nation and they are unable to support military force beyond that small organizations they have. Beyond Brits the have rather peaceful relations with almost everyone, it is that place they are that make them important for military planners... it is advantage and curse at the same time.

      And to the topic, do Hyperloop don't count as "high speed rail" even if they don't move on rails?

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  2. Im not sure the assesment of too many investors in car manufacturing/airlines causing politicians to not profit from supporting it is valid. In Europe for example there are many major car manufacturers and a huge number of airlines and yet quite a bit of high speed rail. Ironic as the distances are much shorter.

    I think it has more to do with the cargo train companies in the US owning the tracks and either not be willing to share to give their cargo trains priority and/or just not physically being able to put a slow cargo train on the same line as a 200mph train. The tracks need for high speed trains are much more precise than ones that carry slow trains.

    One thing is for sure...I highly doubt there will ever be a high speed train in the USA.

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  3. well, ok. My take is that the people who make money from investing, will go to great lengths to prevent competition. The people that made money from busses killed the street car/ trolley industry. The big oil companies killed off ALL mom n pop gas stations. I can provide more examples.... and maybe I'm wrong and every example I have is a result of non related circumstances... but I believe I'm right.
    Also, you're sure there are "many" major car manufacturers?
    really?
    Who? VW... and BMW? Then who, Benz? Because Rolls, Jag, Morgan, Ferrari, Bentley, Porsche, Lambo, Aston, Alfa, Maserati, Lotus, Peugeot, Volvo, Saab, Lancia, Citroen, etc are not major, they are mostly bankrupt has beens that sold out to bigger companies that can stay in business.
    So, again, "Many Major" has a numerical equivalent that I don't believe exists in Europe. "Many minor" I'll agree with, with detracts from your point of view's amount of impact.
    It's the distances across the North American continent which are also a factor, because it costs a prohibitive amount to build across 2000-3000 miles when each mile costs 15-75 million per mile.
    Not as bad when you have a couple hundred miles, compared to a couple thousand.
    Also, the US Govt can snatch back ownership, as easily as it gave away that property to the train companies, who are mostly out of business, I think there are 4 or 5 rail road companies left.
    But it all comes to money, and though it's impossible to raise enough money to make high speed railroads from any border of the USA to the other side, much less east to west across the south, and the North, and north to south across the west coast and across the east coast, and one in the midwest.
    I think the 25 miles of elevated rail in Hawaii proves that 10 billion per 25 miles is what it will cost to make a mess of elevated, and that equates to about a trillion to make on line of 2500 miles... which is not much better than Nashville to Los Angeles. That doesn't get a cross country high speed rail done.

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    1. Absolutely agree that to build new train tracks with the distances required would be an astronomical amount of money. That is probably the biggest stumbling block. Its simply never going to be a profitable proposition.

      The auto industry killing competitioon I think is not a factor though. As mentioned, there ARE many major manufactureres in Europe. If we look at the top 15 auto manufacturing companies, looking at the top ownership not breaking it down so that Jeep and Fiat are considered both FCA, then in those top 15 we have 6 which are European (VW, FCA, Renault, PSA, Daimler, BMW) the rest are Japanese/Korean and two are US based, GM and Ford.

      Also RailRoad companies in the US, cargo ones, are far from out of business. Their revenue is quite substantial;

      Union Pacific: $17bn.
      BNSF: $16.8bn.
      CSX: $10.6bn.
      Norfolk Southern: $9.5bn.
      Canadian National: $8.38bn.
      Canadian Pacific: $5.05bn.
      Kansas City Southern: $1.81bn.
      Smallish when compared to GMs revenue of $145.5bn but not peanuts. These cargo companies certainly dont have any interest in loaning out their lines for passenger rail when they make this much money.

      All in all yes, it comes down to money as your Hawaii example illustrates. Its just prohibitive to build from scratch high speed rail lines to cover those huge distances.

      The funny thing is that this topic crops up in the news every now and then, but meanwhile the regular commuter train lines and subways in many places have huge budget holes to cover maintenance and upgrades. Would probably be best to spend money doing that rather than building a high speed train line for trips that are already covered perfectly well by airlines.

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  4. If high speed rail was profitable, there WOULD be high speed rail.

    hi speed rail is a total money pit, as demonstrated repeatedly, how much is the train in Cali gonna cost?

    passenger rail is not profitable and wont ever be in north america
    most passenger rail is just a huge waste of taxpayers money

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    1. I can't think they could ever make passenger high speed profitable, the cost of 100 miles of rail plus a train, is about a billion dollars, based on the Bakersfield project. By my math, 200,000,000 people would have to ride at $10 for that to begin to turn a profit, once the costs of set up plus infrastructure, lawsuits, and employee costs are added up.
      that means half the population of the USA would need to make the trip once... and that's not going to happen.
      Or a more likely 10 million people paying 20 dollars a ride, riding 100 times, and that's only going to happen between Boston and New York, or LA to San Francisco, is my guess... though the distances vary and time would then be extended as the distances extend, just to break even...
      so, it's not likely to even make a profit in less than a couple years, while increasing costs extend that time even further, costs of supplies, repairs, and fuel or power

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