re: #220 garhighway

You assume that our goal is connect every population center with every other population center. I doubt that makes financial sense, unless we decide we’re doing this without regard to the price (which I believe would be a mistake).

Some of the distances involved (particularly between the West Coast and the rest of the country) make HSR impractical. If you want to go from Seattle to Minneapolis, you fly. HSR will never be a better choice than flying for those kinds of trips.

Not at all.

A railway running parallel to I-10, from Santa Monica to Miami, doesn’t have to cross any mountains, and it will easily get enough passengers on each leg to be worthwhile (even if it’s uncommon for people to go the whole way.) Phoenix to Austin. Houston to New Orleans. You can’t think they’d be riding empty.

Routes parallel to I-40 and I-80 would have higher construction costs through the Sierras, but again… Denver to whatever’s an hour or two either way… if it’s really high speed, Kansas City people could make a weekend ski trip. Seattle to Minneapolis may not have tons of passengers, but I bet Detroit-Tacoma would carry plenty of freight.