Stalin
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Apr 4, 2008
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Americans planning holiday travel may be facing some of the worst flight delays in years. Although the government shutdown has ended, it could take months for air travel to fully recover.
High-speed trains would offer Americans an attractive alternative — if they existed.
Nearly 200 years ago, the United States opened its first modern railway and by 1850, it was home to more than 9,000 miles of railroad — as much as the rest of the world combined.
Today, US train travel is unrecognizable from its heyday, yet there’s a proven alternative to gridlocked highways and overcrowded airports: high-speed trains. CNN has reimagined three of the busiest flight and road trip routes across the US mainland as high-speed rail lines – offering a glimpse into a faster, more connected future.
...
The closest any of these imagined routes comes to reality is the California High Speed Rail: The project's Phase 1 would connect San Francisco and Los Angeles by rail. Construction began in 2015, but legal and financial obstacles have plagued the endeavor since before it broke ground. This summer was the latest in bad news for the project, when the Trump administration terminated approximately $4 billion in unspent federal funding.
On the east coast, Amtrak's high-speed line Acela introduced a new train that reaches a max speed of 160 mph, but given its dated infrastructure, those speeds aren’t typically possible. Its average speeds remain far below that of the high-speed rails in Asia and Europe, which can average up to 197 mph and 169 mph, respectively.
While high-speed rail remains a fantasy in the United States, it is already hugely successful across the globe.
Passengers take 3 billion trips annually on more than 40,000 miles of modern high-speed railway across the globe, according to the International Union of Railways.
edition.cnn.com
comrade stalin
moscow
High-speed trains would offer Americans an attractive alternative — if they existed.
Nearly 200 years ago, the United States opened its first modern railway and by 1850, it was home to more than 9,000 miles of railroad — as much as the rest of the world combined.
Today, US train travel is unrecognizable from its heyday, yet there’s a proven alternative to gridlocked highways and overcrowded airports: high-speed trains. CNN has reimagined three of the busiest flight and road trip routes across the US mainland as high-speed rail lines – offering a glimpse into a faster, more connected future.
...
The closest any of these imagined routes comes to reality is the California High Speed Rail: The project's Phase 1 would connect San Francisco and Los Angeles by rail. Construction began in 2015, but legal and financial obstacles have plagued the endeavor since before it broke ground. This summer was the latest in bad news for the project, when the Trump administration terminated approximately $4 billion in unspent federal funding.
On the east coast, Amtrak's high-speed line Acela introduced a new train that reaches a max speed of 160 mph, but given its dated infrastructure, those speeds aren’t typically possible. Its average speeds remain far below that of the high-speed rails in Asia and Europe, which can average up to 197 mph and 169 mph, respectively.
While high-speed rail remains a fantasy in the United States, it is already hugely successful across the globe.
Passengers take 3 billion trips annually on more than 40,000 miles of modern high-speed railway across the globe, according to the International Union of Railways.
What if the United States had high-speed rail?
High-speed rail is a proven alternative to gridlocked highways and overcrowded airports. CNN has reimagined a faster, more connected future for US commuters.
edition.cnn.com
comrade stalin
moscow
