President Obama's Plan for High Speed Rail
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if you read my post I was talking about train service; not just high speed rail...and you can not say that it doesn't work; only that it hasn't worked so far.
Lots of things will work in the future that haven't worked in the past--we need to be more creative.
I refuse to believe that the country that sent people to the moon in less than ten years, can not transport people from one place to another except in cars and planes, both of which have become unbelievely difficult lately with airports more clogged than highways...and both of them miserable.
If someone had not been creative and thinking outside the box, we would not have calculators, Ipods, mobile phones, the list is endless. Japan, Germany and France have been moving people via high speed rail for years--the technology is there for it to work here too; just as the technology has been there for years to have a vehicle that runs on something other than Middle East oil--it's just the lobbying force for oil has been stronger than the vision for saving the planet. The lobbying force for the trucking industry and the car manufacturers have been strong too, but that is changing.
Anyone can sit around and say it won't work--it takes a creative mind with a marketing attitude to do new and different things and have them be successful.
And, I do not believe that all the creative, future thinking people in this country have moved somewhere else.
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These are all countries you could fit inside Colorado.
We have train service today. It may costs us billions to keep running but works just fine for what it's good for. Why do we need to spend hundreds of billions building on top of something when the existing need is already served?
At a time like this, when we have all these issues and this mounting debt problem that nobody can solve, IMHO throwing billions at high speed rail is just plain reckless. We need to be figuring out how best to spend the money we have and borrow, not wasting it on special interests and a form of travel 99% of the country does not find useful. I'm all for innovative solutions, but this is just another form of waste. *Billion* down the rabbit hole. Much more to follow, and in the end, will our middle east reliance problem be solved? Nope. Your kids will not be thanking you when the bill finally lands on their table.
Arrrr mateys! Lets get drunk and spend! Arrrr!
Talk about timing - just got this in my travel agent's e-newsletter!
SPAIN?S BULLET TRAIN CHANGING THE NATION
To sell his vision of a high-speed train network to the American people, President Obama last week cited Spain, a country most people don?t associate with futuristic bullet trains. Yet the country is on track to bypass France and Japan to have the world?s biggest network of ultrafast trains by the end of next year, The Wall Street Journal reports. The growth of the Alta Velocidad Espanola, or AVE, is having a profound effect on life in Spain, where many people have been fiercely attached to their home regions and reluctant to live or even travel elsewhere. Now residents of Barcelona can be in Madrid in just over two-and-a-half hours?a journey that takes about six hours by car. In the year since the Madrid-Barcelona line opened in February 2008, the AVE, costing passengers roughly the same as what they would pay to fly, has snatched half of the route?s air-passenger traffic. (Wall Street Journal)
SPAIN?S BULLET TRAIN CHANGING THE NATION
To sell his vision of a high-speed train network to the American people, President Obama last week cited Spain, a country most people don?t associate with futuristic bullet trains. Yet the country is on track to bypass France and Japan to have the world?s biggest network of ultrafast trains by the end of next year, The Wall Street Journal reports. The growth of the Alta Velocidad Espanola, or AVE, is having a profound effect on life in Spain, where many people have been fiercely attached to their home regions and reluctant to live or even travel elsewhere. Now residents of Barcelona can be in Madrid in just over two-and-a-half hours?a journey that takes about six hours by car. In the year since the Madrid-Barcelona line opened in February 2008, the AVE, costing passengers roughly the same as what they would pay to fly, has snatched half of the route?s air-passenger traffic. (Wall Street Journal)
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I wish we would have vigorously pursued this back in the '70s as I also wish we would have gotten serious about increasing mpg averages of our autos then. After 40 years, I just don't understand why we are still sitting on our lazy butts and continue to say we can't, we don't need to, it's too expensive! We can be a progressive nation with the right leadership. I'm hoping that leadership has finally come along. And yes it will cost money, but our children may actually thank us some day in the future.
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I wish we would have vigorously pursued this back in the '70s as I also wish we would have gotten serious about increasing mpg averages of our autos then. After 40 years, I just don't understand why we are still sitting on our lazy butts and continue to say we can't, we don't need to, it's too expensive! We can be a progressive nation with the right leadership. I'm hoping that leadership has finally come along. And yes it will cost money, but our children may actually thank us some day in the future.
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I wish we would have vigorously pursued this back in the '70s as I also wish we would have gotten serious about increasing mpg averages of our autos then. After 40 years, I just don't understand why we are still sitting on our lazy butts and continue to say we can't, we don't need to, it's too expensive! We can be a progressive nation with the right leadership. I'm hoping that leadership has finally come along. And yes it will cost money, but our children may actually thank us some day in the future.
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Yes, autos can be made to be better on fuel economy. We rented some kind of big car/SUV thing in Italy. Drove from Rome up the coast to Portofino, all over Tuscany (a few times), down to Umbria a bit, to Florence and back to Pisa every night.....our villa was right outside of Pisa.
Then, back to Rome.....8 days, tons of wine and great food! One and one-half tanks of gas! We were amazed!
Here's the High Speed Rail Strategic Plan.
Interesting to note:
"The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) intends to seek structured input from stakeholders and the public throughout the process of developing and implementing the strategy."
Introduction
After 60 years and more than $1.8 trillion of investment, the United States has developed the world’s most advanced highway and aviation systems. Yet these systems face mounting congestion and rising environmental costs. Moreover, the Nation’s current transportation system consumes 70% of our oil demand – much of it from overseas sources – and contributes 28% of greenhouse gas emissions.
The highway and aviation networks will always remain indispensable elements of the country’s transportation system, and significant investment is needed in those modes to rebuild essential infrastructure and modernize aging technologies. But it is also clear that the existing infrastructure is insufficient to handle the Nation’s future passenger and freight mobility demands. A new approach is needed – one that responds to today’s economic, energy, and environmental challenges
High-speed intercity passenger rail can play a critical role in certain travel markets, but the United States has historically failed to invest in this mode.
Interesting to note:
"The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) intends to seek structured input from stakeholders and the public throughout the process of developing and implementing the strategy."
Introduction
After 60 years and more than $1.8 trillion of investment, the United States has developed the world’s most advanced highway and aviation systems. Yet these systems face mounting congestion and rising environmental costs. Moreover, the Nation’s current transportation system consumes 70% of our oil demand – much of it from overseas sources – and contributes 28% of greenhouse gas emissions.
The highway and aviation networks will always remain indispensable elements of the country’s transportation system, and significant investment is needed in those modes to rebuild essential infrastructure and modernize aging technologies. But it is also clear that the existing infrastructure is insufficient to handle the Nation’s future passenger and freight mobility demands. A new approach is needed – one that responds to today’s economic, energy, and environmental challenges
High-speed intercity passenger rail can play a critical role in certain travel markets, but the United States has historically failed to invest in this mode.
Because what we have are clunkers that had to weigh a certain amount. These laws will have to be changed. Also, since we have never made a significant investment in rail, there are simply not enough skilled engineers in the profession.
They discuss the lack of engineering knowledge in the HRS Plan I posted above. Also, we will not be spending hundreds of billions of dollars. The jump start amount is 8 billion and they will be seeking funding and bids from the private sector. That would be a good thing as far as I am concerned.
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I wish we would have vigorously pursued this back in the '70s as I also wish we would have gotten serious about increasing mpg averages of our autos then. After 40 years, I just don't understand why we are still sitting on our lazy butts and continue to say we can't, we don't need to, it's too expensive! We can be a progressive nation with the right leadership. I'm hoping that leadership has finally come along. And yes it will cost money, but our children may actually thank us some day in the future.
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What's the interest on 10 trillion?