Why our railways suck (in two graphs)

[marmar]

from Grist:




Why our railways suck (in two graphs)

by Jonathan Hiskes
24 Aug 2010 3:53 PM


The New Jersey-New York-Philadelphia Amtrak mess that left commuters stranded this week just goes to show you that widespread passenger rails will never be a viable competitor to America's highway system. Transit just isn't as reliable. People prefer to drive.

Except not. Roadways didn't automatically sprout up everywhere. Driving isn't more convenient by nature. We chose to make it that way, thanks in no small part to the automobile and sprawl lobbies. When you look at federal capital investment in highways versus transit over the last half century, the difference is staggering:

http://www.grist.org/phpThumb/phpThumb.php?src=&w=615

Cumulative spending (everything since 1956, when the Federal-Aid Highway Act was passed) is even more nutso:



Governments at all levels have invested nine times more capital funds in highways than in transit since 1956, according to a report from the Federation of State Public Interest Research Groups (U.S. PIRG).

Imagine how much better our rail system could be if we started evening out that funding. That's what Ray LaHood's Transportation Department is, gradually, doing.


http://www.grist.org/article/2010-08-24-why-our-railways-suck-in-two-graphs/

[pinto]

1. Good find and excellent info. Thanks for the post.

:hi:

[BrklynLiberal]

2. Big Oil/automobile companies had more pull than RRs did starting with

the Eisenhower Interstate Highway system...
They took over where The Octopus left off...

The tragic loss of the late, great Penn Station was just one more symptom of the neglect and loss of interest in railroads in this country

[marmar]

3. True....the old pics of Pennsylvania Station are magnificent.

The current one is utilitarian butt-ugly.......but at least Grand Central's still a beauty.

[lib2DaBone]

4. Our rail system is old and outdated.... unlike China...

.. who is building 50,000 miles of high-speed Mag-Lev.

I can't help but wonder how many millions of jobs high speed Mag-Lev would generate?

How about a new over-nite Mail system (Fed-Ex) controlled by state of the art computers... serving big towns and small all across the USA?

Oh.. I'm sorry.. that would create JOBS and put money in the hands of WORKERS and create DEMAND.. which violates everything the Supply-Siders Washington stand for.

Besides that... Fox News would never support it.

[BrklynLiberal]

5. I wonder how few countries have WORSE rail systems than we do...

The vast majority of the world's rail systems are FAR superior to ours....but I guess they did not have Big Oil running their government to the extent we did.

[marmar]

6. One of the commentators in the film "The End of Suburbia" said:

"The United States has a passenger rail system that the Bulgarians would be ashamed of."

C'est vrai.

[BrklynLiberal]

7. So it would seem.......How sad.

[Kringle]

9. here is what you get with a Chinese-type rail system

China Traffic Jam Could Last Into September
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x9008326

haul people or coal, pick one

[david13]

8. Another factor to look at is ... who uses what more. That is to say

given an equal situation, what would the overweight, wasteful merican want to use. His gas guzzling sport ute or the train?
Take a guess.
Your american public transportation has always been underutilized. Only a very small segment of the population will use it.
Particularly here in Los Angeles, where nothing is in straight lines, it is quite inconvenient and time consuming.
Ergo ...
Passenger rail never made enough money to stay in business. That is why it went out of business back in the 40's and 50's and didn't return until the great government subsidy, Amtrak, signed into law by ... say it with a sneer and distaste, republican, name of Richard Nixon, who actually rode it to New York to go to the opera opening. As president.
If you look at passenger air travel, quite possibly, it has only broke even. It doesn't really make money. That is one of the major reasons that so many of the air carriers have folded, going back to PanAm.
dc