re: #185 garhighway

I agree that the NEC is the best place for high speed rail, but I have a hard time getting critical of the decision to not pursue it, because I think that cost-efficiency matters.

The idea of looking at city pairs that have sufficient air or ground traffic between them to make HSR practical works for me. (I would guess that rules out NYC-Albany, but I haven’t seen that data.)

I doubt that HSR will ever be truly cheaper than air or car or bus if all the costs are loaded in, but on one level this isn’t purely about that: it’s a technology and jobs effort, too. (Although we’ll never get an apples-to-apples on costs, since air and road have all sorts of subsidies supporting them that we never want to factor in when we talk about rail.)

But at any rate, we can’t have it both ways: we don’t get to rail (no pun intended) about fiscal responsibility and then bemoan the omission of a zillion dollar project in the NE. Much as I would love to take a 200 mph train to Boston.

A lot boils down to what the government collectively decides is the proper mode to subsidize and support. And that has varied with technologies coming on line, demogages going after one industry or another as a political expediency (or due to being lobbied), etc. etc.

The states and eventually Federal government supported canals, then railroads (which killed most of the canal system). And that went up to the point of their heavy subsidization of the Transcontinential Railroad (which made a *lot* of sense for the benefit of the country and the government.) Then, about the turn of the centry things turned on the railroads in favor of the trucking industry. And the interstate system from the 50s along with the airlines pretty much finished off rail passenger service.

And this is a two paragraph summary. It’s fascinating reading in detail in a lot of these areas.