BIRCHES has run a series of notes and articles about the need to develop fast trains in the U.S. Now Amtrak is reporting that its trains are becoming more-and-more popular, even though we haven't invested as a country in our train system for years. We have not tried to develop any fast train transportation yet. Meanwhile, we spend billions on supporting air travel and maintaining roads.
In this commentary, Derrick Jackson of the Boston Globe talks about what the two candidates have or haven't done for train travel in the United States.
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8 comments:
Mass transportation,
can help the nation,
break its dependency on oil.
But this administration,
from the Texas station,
all attempts will foil!
Hah! They've been trying to run Amtrak into the ground for years, but it survives still. About George W and his endless stream of stupid comments - it's a pity you won’t get the joy of seeing the idiot voted out.
I just returned from a trip to Missouri via Amtrak. Honestly, John McCain is a numbskull. And all gas prices and carbon emissions aside, it's the only sane way for someone like me (who can't afford to fly and wouldn't if she could) to travel with a small child. Whenever my child started bugging me too much, I'd just go "Look a deer (or cow or horse or whatever). I love the train!
A train trip from Missouri to Michigan could be so much faster and smoother and comfortable than it is these days. And, of course, it could be safer. There are ways of doing these things that the U.S. has simply written off because we've invested so much in air travel that we've forced people either into heavily subsidized air bottlenecks, or heavily subsidized highway bottlenecks.
Time for new thinking.
P.S. If I ever get to Australia, one thing I would love to do is take that train trip across the outback North -to-South. When I saw that described in a magazine, I thought, that's for me.
I traveled across the country (Portland, OR to St Paul, MN) in February via Amtrak. It was delightful. Sure it was slow (about 37 hrs if I recall), but it should be slow to traverse half of a large continent. It was also comfortable, the staff friendly, the scenery gorgeous, and the food was pretty decent.
I never feel very safe on a train, but what choice is there? We can't keep flying everywhere.
They need to make them safer.
That rail from Adelaide to Darwin was only completed about 4 years ago - it's called the Ghan. There would be great scenery and places to stop off in Central Australia and in the Northern Territory. There's another great train journey you can take from Adelaide to Perth across the Nullarbor on the Indian Pacific. The scenery is the same for days (desert) and the track is dead straight for a 500km stretch. You gotta love rail travel or hypnotism for this one.
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