Maybe THIS is what Obama meant by infrastructure...

Cool, even if they carry out all of that construction, I'd still have to drive 65 miles to reach the nearest regular rail station. If there was a real interest in reducing air/automobile traffic why isn't there a decent rail link across the country? Riding the current cross country routes is slower than driving and more expensive, and this plan doesn't look like it will address that.

SURE IS SOME EAST COAST BIAS GOING ON HERE.

Sucks to be in the middle.

>>120820
l2thirteen_colonies

Actually that map is from Clintons Department of Infrastructure, the designated corridors never went away Dubya just ignored it.
Only difference seems to be the addition of a rail line to Vegas.
Anyway the American idea of highspeed rail, the Acela, is pretty lame.
Due to both bad planning and funding and irregular infrastructure + weird rail regulations left over from the Eisenhower eras attempt to kill trains.
Or they want to do it with Maglevs, which is just stupid.
>>120816
Obamas put a couple billion, 6 or 8 I think, into rail for state and federal projects - and something on the order of 38 or 45 billion for roads.
>>120819
This guy raises an important issue, you cant even begin to discuss interstate rail when the cities and states being connected dont have decent commuter trains and rapid transit.

I like how everyone ignores the elephant in the room on these discussions. The contiguous US is around 3.1 million square miles whereas the EU is around 1.6 million square miles.

Can we see the difference here? Even just connecting the major population centers you'd have to spend 10's billions of dollars building the rail lines. You can't use existing rail as high-speed must be elevated or sunk to keep it segregated from ground traffic. The population density is also greatly skewed, Europe is packed in tight and the US isn't. Convenient public rail transit only works in areas that have high population density, anywhere else the maximum is a bus. Owning a vehicle in Europe is expensive the US is not expensive, the only exception being NY city.

In conclusion, stop trying to keep up with the Jones' and stop trying to spend billions we don't have. There is already a transit system in this country which covers it completely and effectively, it's called an airplane.

>>120828
The problem is that not everyone in the US can afford or drive a car for a vareity of reasons. And not every area in the Us has a accessable airport within a decent milage.

I rather have all the subsides currently towards airplanes, airports, and highways to rail transport. Improve basic passenger rail first, and when that's done, then we deal with high speed rail.

This is America, if we can build a man on the moon and build an extensive highway system, we can build an extensive railway system.

>>120820
East Coast = greatest pop concentrations. Ergo, those areas would get the most use out of this kind of thing.
>>120828 This is the main reason why America is no place for hish-speed rail, the same way it's really no place for Euro supercars: we're too fucking big. Even if you got high-performance diesel engines to run on the lines we have now, it'd still take at-least the best part of one full day to go coast-to-coast, and with planes making the trip in six hours, why bother? Not to mention all Ks of miles of brand-new lines we'd have to lay down to answer over sixty years of postwar growth.
Accelerating automotive tech for max fuel milage and getting the air corridors cleaned up would serve our continent-sized nation better.

>>120828
>I like how everyone ignores the elephant in the room on these discussions. The contiguous US is around 3.1 million square miles whereas the EU is around 1.6 million square miles.
>Can we see the difference here? Even just connecting the major population centers you'd have to spend 10's billions of dollars building the rail lines.
Look at the two maps posted you jackass - there is no coast-to-coast highspeed rail and no body has proposed it.
But for your information the Russians ARE going to be overhauling the Trans-Siberian Railway to highspeed operation, cutting traveling time from seven days to three.
>You can't use existing rail as high-speed must be elevated or sunk to keep it segregated from ground traffic.
Where has this been done? You dont understand what the words being used mean. Fot maximum operation of both and basic safety it DOES need to be grade-seperated but that doesn't mean in a subway or elevated, it means seperate from a commuter train & freight rail - and by that they're right next to each other but they don't connect in any way except maybe at a station or stabling yard, this can be done at ground level and is in most places, only going into subways or elevated at major stations.
>The population density is also greatly skewed, Europe is packed in tight and the US isn't.
Once again, LOOK AT THE MAPS - the designated corridors are in the dense North-East, East Coast, South-East, and surrounding Chicago and Texas.
>Convenient public rail transit only works in areas that have high population density, anywhere else the maximum is a bus.
Like in all the US cities that used to have public streetcar networks, torn up in the '50s & '60s? How is it working out for Houston to spend a billion a year on new roads to keep up with congestion?

TL;DR - you're a moron.

>>120838

Louisville will never have a high speed rail connection. They can't even paint a bridge across the Ohio River without paying 5 different companies to do it and it still isn't done.

Also that old PRR line from Louisville to Indianapolis is pure trash and the 20 mph speed limit was the reason Amtrak lost all it's customers and canceled the route.

>>120838
yeah it is a pretty bare bones, the Texas and Florida networks also aren't connected to the big South East/East Coast/North East network.

>>120828
>anywhere else the maximum is a bus
Buses are shit on their own. Where the fuck do you live?
Their best use is part of an intergrated transportation system, radiating out from and between stations on a commuter train or rapid transit network.
And in a city and the surrounding dense urban environment, a tram/streetcar or lightrail would be better.

>>120845
here is a grade seperated Shinkansen rail track
as you can see it is right next to two regular tracks.

>>120845
>>120849
although you do want to avoid curves and keep it as straight as possible so there would be places where it would deviate from existing railways to go under or over an obstacle.
But you know what this is the United States of America so that shouldn't be a challenge at all.

Hai. European here. High speed rail networks is the shit.

i'd be cool with this, Louisville is on there.
would sure be nice to be able to take the train from my home to... anywhere

>>120859
Are you a Brit?

>>120805
> Old. I already read this on the far superior http://www.anertalk.com/ (aner = anon) last night.
Kewl story, bro!