If you follow lots×10¹⁰⁰ of <strike>rules</strike> Trains!
-
-
Coincidence?
Nope, I needed an avatar matching my user name. An asdfmovie character seemed like the obvious choice. Also, I'm bad at choosing avatars. ;)
I may or may not change it to the mine turtle in the future.
-
How often does that run? Once a day?
3-4 trains into Seattle in the morning, and the same 3-4 trains returning north in the afternoon.
-
GIMME! Why don't we use [airships], damn it!
Airlander 10: World’s largest aircraft slowly drifts toward commercial use
US Army gave up on the giant airship—but now the UK is giving it another shot.
-
3-4 trains into Seattle in the morning, and the same 3-4 trains returning north in the afternoon.
That's the difference. I'm talking 50–100 trains a day round here, each direction. It's a different order of magnitude.
On the main route between Leeds and Manchester there are at least 5 express trains an hour each direction, all day, with a service going all night though at greatly reduced frequency before 0630 and past 2200. Plus there are stopping trains on that route as well; can't be bothered to look up their frequency.
It's a bit more complicated on the pure commuter route that I use, but at peak times that's somewhere around 10 trains an hour each way, up to around 15 on the busiest stretch (only a mile or so and with no stations there). They're running into problems with getting the trains in and out of the terminus fast enough (and fixing that will require major investment in bridges and stuff so it ain't gonna happen any time soon) and they've already hit platform length limits elsewhere (because of junctions and bridges) so capacity's close to a wall. I've no idea how many traffic movements per day this translates into.
The UK runs on passenger trains to an extent far beyond anywhere in the Americas. The good thing about this is that I don't need a car to get around, or even to pay much attention to the timetable; if I miss one, I can just get the next one a few minutes later. (The car is for other things, such as visiting family while taking a load of presents. ;))
-
I don't.... care?
-
Look, you guys have better mountains. Much, much better mountains. We've got a better passenger train system.
-
We have a better train network? How bad is the US network for ours to be better?
-
How bad is the US network for ours to be better?
That depends. If you're a tank of oil or a truck of coal, the US system is just fine. Their passenger system is derisory though.
-
That's because our country's big enough, and our most important cities spread-out enough, that airports handle the problem significantly better. The alternative is building Chinese-style high-speed railways over extremely long distances, and that's significantly more expensive than the airport solution. (Although admittedly it uses a lot less fuel.)
-
That depends. If you're a tank of oil or a truck of coal, the US system is just fine. Their passenger system is derisory though.
Yes, and as @blakeyrat points out, freight makes more sense for trains and airplanes and cars for people. That has the added bonus of removing lots of trucks from the roads. And it's far far more than oil and coal. And if some dickheads wouldn't oppose oil pipelines, we could get more oil off the rails.
-
Yes, and as @blakeyrat points out, freight makes more sense for trains and airplanes and cars for people.
Nah, that's just you guys not knowing how to run trains properly.
You've told yourselves that so much you've started to believe it. (And if you want to move freight for real, you use a boat.)
-
Nah, that's just you guys not knowing how to run trains properly.
Right back atcha. Though I suppose you guys are at a handicap since your cars go on the wrong side of the road. I might prefer to ride a train if someone pulled that shit on me.
You've told yourselves that so much you've started to believe it. (And if you want to move freight for real, you use a boat.)
We use lots of boats too. But eventually the boat hits the land. Then it's time for a train.
-
Nah, that's just you guys not knowing how to run trains properly.
We're not exactly good at it either, y'know
As for the Japanese… now they know how to run a railway network. But then their standard of lateness is insanely short, like 10 seconds, and you can claim back the lost time from the operators via your employer. So they work really fucking hard to make sure the trains run on time.
-
That's because our country's big enough, and our most important cities spread-out enough, that airports handle the problem significantly better.
Except you're going to have major problems round your airports with congestion (and indeed you have exactly that) and so on. The one key thing to note about changing to a more rail-centric transportation system is that the best location for businesses will change; being closer to a major station (where the exact definition of “closer” is complicated, due to possible connecting mass transit) will become quite a lot more valuable.
But then the most valuable locations never were at a fixed site in the first place. Oh well…
-
We're not exactly good at it either, y'know
I've seen how the Swiss and the Italians do it. Their trains run on time virtually always. They do it by adding extra waiting time at stations so that if there's a minor delay they make it up at the next station. Simple! Except it takes a comparatively long time to actually get anywhere.
It's a bureaucratic hack.
-
Except you're going to have major problems round your airports with congestion
Largely because the airports are where the people are to begin with. That doesn't change with trains for long distance travel. Congestion due to an airport is usually dwarfed by all the other congestion factors.
-
Largely because the airports are where the people are to begin with.
Major transport hubs change where people want to be. Where people are affects where people want to put major transport hubs. The two are intimately connected.
-
Major transport hubs change where people want to be.
Is there a point here that's relevant to train vs airport vs something else?
Though I still think you're mostly putting the cart before the horse here. Unless we're talking about something like how the railroads facilitated settling populating the western US. And even that seems pretty remote from this discussion.
-
Largely because the airports are where the people are to begin with.
But you can have rail stations every couple of miles, you aren't doing that with airports? (My Sim City knowledge, finally coming in useful :) )
-
But you can have rail stations every couple of miles, you aren't doing that with airports?
I don't consider "every couple of miles" to be long distance travel, so I suppose that I'm glad that we don't.
-
You aren't forced to get off at the first station you know ;)
Just makes it more flexible for when people are getting on/off.
-
But then, if I'm going from, say, Edinburgh to London, I'm not exactly going to be happy on commuter trains stopping every three minutes; I want a fast train that stops maybe four times the whole journey
-
I was envisioning a few stops in each town/city passed through, not literally every 2 miles for the whole trip
I will again emphasise, this is based almost exclusively on SimCity!
-
I was envisioning a few stops in each town/city passed through, not literally every 2 miles for the whole trip
I know
My point still stands though; I don't mind stopping at Newcastle, York, Nottingham, Leicester, and Luton when going Edinburgh to London, but I don't want to be stopping more than once in each city; that's what branch lines are for ;)
-
Well, you don't have branch lines on planes either :P (no connecting flights don't count!)
-
Major transport hubs change where people want to be.
Unless you live north of Seattle, then it's "fuck you, you can't fly out of Everett, fuck you all!"
... ok the FAA finally approved it, but goddamned that took a long time.
-
Trains offer much better travelling conditions than aircraft. Unless you are a sack of potatoes, this quite an important consideration. Even the longer travel time can be compensated by the ability to do creative work while on a train. Travelling by plane is godawful. You could mail yourself in a crate just as well.
Aircraft are also still 100% dependent on petroleum. Trains can use basically any power source.
-
Even the longer travel time can be compensated by the ability to do creative work while on a train.
Not even close.
-
-
the FAA finally approved it, but goddamned that took a long time.
And we still have to wait for somebody to build a terminal and actually start flying planes out of there.
-
You must have shitty trains where you live.
No, our trains are awesome. They haul stuff like sacks of potatoes long distance like God intended.
SItting on a goddamned train for half a day instead of a couple of hours on a plane or several days vs half a day on a plane. I'm traveling to be somewhere else, not "get creative work done" instead of whatever it is I actually want to do.
-
Even the longer travel time can be compensated by the ability to do creative work while on a train.
Do you know how long it takes to go from Seattle to, say, Chicago on a train? And that's not even halfway across the country.
And we still have to wait for somebody to build a terminal and actually start flying planes out of there.
Right, but at least the NIMBYs are shut-up. For the time-being. (Note: these particular NIMBYs bought their houses AFTER the huge airport had already been in-place for decades; they ALREADY have to deal with several takeoffs a day; they're just assholes.
-
SItting on a goddamned train for half a day instead of a couple of hours on a plane or several days vs half a day on a plane.
Do you know how long it takes to go from Seattle to, say, Chicago on a train? And that's not even halfway across the country.
Like I said, shitty trains.
For air travel, dont forget to add the time wasted getting to and from and at the airport.
-
-
Do you know how long it takes to go from Seattle to, say, Chicago on a train? And that's not even halfway across the country.
Actually, it's rather a bit over halfway. Seattle to Chicago, 2042 miles. Seattle to New York, 2858 miles. Chicago is 71.45% of the way across the country. (All distances by road.)
Seattle to Chicago takes 45 hours by train, assuming no delays, and costs $386. Seattle to Chicago takes just over 4 hours by plane, and costs $317. Even allowing for airport time, the choice is a no-brainer.
-
Actually, it's rather a bit over halfway. Seattle to Chicago, 2042 miles. Seattle to New York, 2858 miles. Chicago is 71.45% of the way across the country. (All distances by road.)
Miami is the opposite corner, which is 3,296.9 mi. A little less than I thought, but still at least I'm not so stupid I don't know what "across the country" means.
Seattle to Chicago takes 45 hours by train, assuming no delays, and costs $386. Seattle to Chicago takes just over 4 hours by plane, and costs $317. Even allowing for airport time, the choice is a no-brainer.
Right; that's the real point here: the airlines do it better, and there's no foreseeable future in which the railroads can do it better. (If we built China-style long-distance high-speed rail, the cost would be astronomically higher than $386 and the time taken would still be probably double the airport + flight time we have now.)
In fact, the only reason China's building their high-speed rail is:
- "Look at us, we have technology, too! Ok, it's technology we've basically stolen from the Japanese, but you know, technology!"
- They have virtually no in-house capability to produce quality airliners
- So fat-cats can skin billions off-the-top while they install buggy, unreliable equipment instead of the stuff the Japanese specced-out. Which led to that crash when one of the switches was struck by lightning and none of the backup systems worked.
-
I don't mind stopping at Newcastle, York, Nottingham, Leicester, and Luton when going Edinburgh to London
What train do you get?
The East Coast mainline doesnt go via Nottingham, Leicester or Luton.
The West Coast doesn't go via any of those (but does do Edinburgh and London). The Midland mainline doesn't go past Sheffield.
-
What train do you get?
I've never taken the train from Edinburgh to London; I just made up the route
-
-
Most of the London -> Edinburgh (or vice versa) trains on the East Coast at least only stop at the 'major' stations. They skip the shitty ones.
The only time I get the train vs driving is when going into London because if I get the fast train I can leave my house, drive to the station, get the train and be in central London in under an hour. Driving to the edge of the M25 and getting the tube in is, at best, 90 minutes.
Including when I drove to Glasgow which was 6.5 hours each way
-
I was envisioning a few stops in each town/city passed through
There's I believe three airports within an hour of each other that I know of where I live.
This is true of just about every major metropolitan area I can think of. One will be a big international airport, but you can save some $$ if you fly to the smaller nearby airport instead, like SJC or OAK instead of SFO.
-
Seattle to Chicago takes 45 hours by train
Mostly because your trains don't even qualify as "low speed", on most routes topping out at about the same speed as EU motorways.
The UK's Intercity 125 is no longer considered high-speed rail on this side of the pond, yet is still almost twice as fast as much of the US passenger rail.
-
Most of the London -> Edinburgh (or vice versa) trains on the East Coast at least only stop at the 'major' stations. They skip the shitty ones.
I think most of the London/Edinburgh trains have their first stop (northbound) at either Doncaster or York (York is about half way). They also stop at places like Darlington and Newcastle. They might or might not be shitty, but Doncaster sure is; I've changed trains there a few times and wouldn't really volunteer to do it again…
-
you can save some $$ if you fly to the smaller nearby airport instead, like SJC or OAK instead of SFO.
The savings might not be in the actual fares. There is generally not much difference in air fares to/from SFO, SJC or OAK (at least from SEA), but rental cars at SJC and OAK are about half what they are at SFO.
-
They also stop at places like Darlington and Newcastle. They might or might not be shitty, but Doncaster sure is; I've changed trains there a few times and wouldn't really volunteer to do it again…
Maybe, but in the context of where the East Coast trains can stop, they're the more major stations.
By shitty I mean small stations like (just pre-Doncaster) Finsbury, Arlesey, Hitchin, Biggleswade, Sandy....
-
the airlines do it better
Transcontinental (and intercontinental) routes? Yes. Yet that's hardly the route that carries the most people. The argument has never been that rail should replace air on the transcontinental routes. There's plenty of shorter distance routes that can make a load of sense to use trains for, provided the rail network is configured to allow things to run smoothly.
Realistically, the sorts of connects that make sense for longer-distance trains are, say, from Seattle to Portland. Google claims that you can drive that in a bit over 3 hours. 173 miles should be (but currently isn't) doable by train in somewhere around 2 hours, depending on how many intermediate stops there are (you'd probably have a stop at Tacoma and maybe at SEA too; I don't know about further south, though Portland would be the first sensible stop on the Oregon side of the border). That'd be 2 hours where you can take it easy, or 3 hours in traffic with having to pay attention, or probably around 50 minutes in the air (but then you've got to add the time being friendly with the TSA at the airport).
Anyone saying “all or nothing” is usually an idiot when it comes to large-scale infrastructure systems.
-
-
There is generally not much difference in air fares to/from SFO
There is when coming from outside the US. For me to fly to SJC would require me to change in ORD or JFK…
Fuck off, discotoaster!
-
provided the rail network is configured to allow things to run smoothly.
Yes...things...not people.
