Comments on: The Interstate Rail Defense Network

By: Matthew Watkins

Matthew Watkins — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 16:49:57 +0000

I have to agree with Jerzy. Metropolitan transit agencies are in crisis. I work for the St Louis Metro, and we are in a dire funding situation. Earlier this year we had to cut 34% of our bus routes and decrease light rail frequency. Community members have been and still are hesitant to pass tax increases to fund transit. Before we start building a national network we need to make sure that our existing transportation systems don’t shrivel away due to a lack of funding. If you want to discuss more about these issues I write for Metro’s blog at http://www.nextstopstl.org

By: Art Lewellan

Art Lewellan — Wed, 27 May 2009 01:16:16 +0000

I agree with Jerzy. It’s obvious that “most transportation problems are within metropolitan regions, not between them.” Basic improvement to Amtrak service is money better spent than on enormously expensive, electrified high-speed rail lines through mostly rural routes where the environmental benefits of electrification are moot.

Electrification is more effectively employed on metropolitan area express (MAX) light rail systems. These have far more potential to solve traffic problems by guiding urban growth into transit-oriented development, as opposed to sprawl.

Automobiles are a ‘Constitutional Inequity’. They present a severe impediment to the other basic modes of urban/suburban travel — walking, mass transit and bicycling. In dominating this ‘modal split’, (~90% of all trips in US are taken by car), automobiles even present a severe impediment to their own optimal function. By constitutionally limiting gas tax revenues to roads-only investment, even roads don’t work optimally. Go figure.

By: John Niles

John Niles — Mon, 25 May 2009 22:29:19 +0000

The construction and materials activity (diesel trucks moving steel, etc) to lay down a new high-speed rail network will likely generate more greenhouse gas (GHG) than will be saved later by car drivers switching to train riding, IF future cars are made to emit less GHG into the atmosphere.

IF inter-city buses were to run cleaner, be more attractive, and increase in frequency of service, we could move as many people as trains would to more places for far less money. The roads already go everywhere. Train tracks never will. I hear that inter-city buses in the Boston-Washington corridor are already giving Amtrak’s fastest trains serious competition.

I do think spending Federal stimulus money to fix dangerous at-grade crossings and worn out sections of track on today’s rail network is a reasonable initiative, but let us remember that European and Japanese fast trains cost taxpayers in those countries billions and billions ongoing.

By: Bernie's Transportation Communications Newsletter - May 21, 2009 | Transport Gooru

Fri, 22 May 2009 04:25:29 +0000

[...] http://www.pbs.org/wnet/blueprintamerica/blogs/13line/the-no-13-line-the-interstate-rail-defense-net... [...]

By: jerzy

jerzy — Thu, 21 May 2009 23:42:14 +0000

The most serious transportation problems in the U.S. are within metropolitan regions, not between them. High speed rail is not useful for most of the short trips that currently generate huge levels of congestion and pollution in our living spaces. It would be folly to spend all of our transport money on making it easier to get between cities when the largest problem, by far, is within cities. Moreover, our cities are already very spread out and rail systems with their corridor orientations and very few access points simply cannot serve the majority of trips in a very diffuse travel pattern effectively. MASS TRANSIT works in just a few places, but cannot possibly meet the needs for internal travel in the great majority of our cities. Put in a High Speed line in the Boston-Washington corridor if you can find the billions needed but don’t allocate many more scarce resouces to the mythical national network. What a silly idea.

By: Jim Bush

Jim Bush — Wed, 20 May 2009 18:31:15 +0000

The recent surface transportation infrastructure commission found that user fees are accounting for only 60% of the costs of roads, down from 75% in the 1980s. No wonder roads are crowded and pot-holed.

The Soviets kept food prices below the cost of production and distribution and got lineups in the food stores.

Soviet-style pricing of roads is seductive for suburban motorists and housing developers, who typically manifest a sense of entitlement seldom seen in ADC mothers. Even when they move beyond the established infrastructure network in zero-sum growth metropolitan areas, they believe they are entitled to duplicate roads, sewers, schools, etc. at subsidized prices. Sprawl is bankrupting America.

A year ago, we were borrowing $1 billion per day to pay for imported oil. That’s one of the reasons the housing bubble popped — exposing the toxicity of the mortgage loans made in anticipation of ever rising housing prices.

Even Canada, which is our major oil supplier, does not subsidize fuelish sprawl. Even Edmonton (hockey team is the Oilers) has light rail transit and good bus service.

God Bless America!

By: sam

sam — Wed, 20 May 2009 14:57:38 +0000

Unfortunately your ideea to not fund capacity growth in highways is short sighted. While I agree that, as a resident of Phoenix, AZ, 8 lanes in and out of the core should be enough, to limit any rural capacity increases reduces the effectiveness and economy of short-haul, especially for truckers who make such small trips to supply farm-towns, insdustrial mini-centers, and the such.

I agree that urban capacity should be limited, but even then, if you spend 45 min in a morning commute, is that a problem with the funding/political transit adn construction business, or a socio-economic issue that encourages sprawl.

Sprawl and inter-city rail are sperate things, and the roadway capacity issue bridges that precariously.