How to keep trains as popular in North America as they are in Europe

[Johnrankins]

On the job side, it does create jobs when people build the railroads, and the maintenance of the rail roads.

On a national level railroads decrease the cost of transportation and open up new eras for development, at least theoretically.

Both of which costs tax money. Considering how little they get out of it, the money spent on building and maintaining it is going to be far less than the money they get back, which is peanuts.

HSR only improves PASSENGER rail, which benefits some guy in Iowa not at all. They aren't transporting goods , just people. It makes no difference to the guy in Iowa if some guy in NYC can see his kids another 30 minutes a day or whatever.

 

[durante]

That people want to get cars and or get cars is not mutually exclusive with the politicians investing into the rail system.



And this part here

"In that case, if the Progressives pushed forward with publicly-funded elections, the "progressive" thing to do here would be to push those new-fangled horseless carriages, pushing passenger traffic into cars and buses and ripping up the tracks; alternately, the next best thing was the over-regulation of the ICC to make even freight as unprofitable as possible"

No, I do not agree with that. Nothing like that needs to happen. And you use that part as bases for your conclusion, I disagree with the premise.

All that is needed, is that the politicians decide to invest a bit more into public transportation sometime after ww2 , and this can happen if there are publicly finance elections, there is no need to over complicate things, but it was a nice read all the same.

Canada has publicly funded elections.

Passenger ridership declined in Britain after the 1920s with publicly funded elections and then began to rebound in the 2000s still with publicly funded elections.

I agree that they help, but they ain't the magic bullet.

 

[Mark E.]

HSR only improves PASSENGER rail, which benefits some guy in Iowa not at all. They aren't transporting goods , just people. It makes no difference to the guy in Iowa if some guy in NYC can see his kids another 30 minutes a day or whatever.

That may be true for states that do not lie along the coast-to-coast rail lines. Iowa and Missouri are major parts of the west coast to Great Lakes networks. The railroad crossed Iowa in 1856, allowing Omaha to become the launch point for the first transcontinental line in 1869.

 

[DougM]

Sorry but you are not stopping suburbia from happening. Once the car becomes cheep enough safe enough dependable enough and comfortable enough it IS going to happen. The car got there in the late 20-30s. The depression and WW2 delayed the suburbs a bit but it was already starting by that point. By the 20s most Street Car Systems and interubsns were already starting to get in trouble and branch line passenger trains we’re surviving on postal routes.
So this is not a post WW2 thing.
As for the Idea that the suburban bit is starting yo reverse.. Sorry but people are miss understanding what is happening. Infill is NOT an indication people are turning from Suburban expansion. It is an indication that we have such large suburbs that we have surpassed the distance you can reasonably commute. And is in an indication that we have TWO workers in most homes that both need to be withing commute distance of work so they need to live in close proximity to BOTH and thus can’t just move to be close to one of them.
It is also an indication that for various reasons we have in many places quit expanding the expressway system.
I live in Metropolitan Detroit and I had to drive from myWester Suburb to the east side (not even as far as I could have driven) and it took me 1:45 minutes in rush hour to get home and that was just normal traffic. I could have gone farther East and folks live farther west then I do. The problem is we have raided the road money to pay for the general budget for decades in Michigan so we have a major intersection of 4 expressways that has 8 lanes filtering into 3 and surprisingly it backs up (and we have similar issues everywhere) because our government is stupid. So we are in filling the suburbs as much as possible. But we still expand outward because people want houses and yards and prefer new vs old and undeveloped land is cheep.

You cant stop that. And that is why we expand.
You can try all you want but people only takele trains and mass transit when they don’t have a better easier more comfortable option. This is why in every city in Europe the roads are jam packed with cars. All you can do is build as good a mass transit or regional transit system as you can to try and get the hassle of dealing with mass transit and trains to a minimum to encourage folks to take them. But you still will get as many cars as your roads will handle. And your trains/mass transit will still need government money to pay for them.
The best you can hope for is to avoid the extreme capitalist view that the US developed that seams to think that trains and Mass transit need to make money (or at least not lose it)
So I think you need to go into the 1930s and have the US government take over all the passenger trains at a time where they are still popular. Keep in mind that overall even in the 30s passenger travel cost railroads money. They sort of broke even with the money from railway post offices but mostly they wrote off the loss as advertising. It is just most folks didnt realize they lost money. By the time Amtrak came along it was obvious that no one used passenger trains and that they were losing a ton of money (the reason Amtrak was started).
So perhaps if the US starts subsidizeing trains early when no one is looking they will keep the rail post and no one will care. The problem is the US has a different view on what the government should and should not be paying for. There is a reason why in the US most folks bel that government backed healthcare is impossible but most folks in Europe Canada and huge chunks of the rest of the world all get government backed healthcare. So you have to get ride of this capitalist paradise idea. And I have no idea how you pull that off.
Perhaps if Europe was paying for its own defense in the 50s and 60s and the US pulled back into just North America it would have had the extra cash? I don’t know that is just a guess.

But you also have to turn the railroads into regional systems paid for by regions. Note that Europe did not build HSR. France built it, And Germany built it and Italy built it and GB built it. But no one asked the folks in Scotland to pay for a train line to Berlin. And the distance from St Louis to NY is about the sane so why would you expect StLouis to pay for a system between NY and Bostan? THIS is why the Size of the US is the Problem. When comparing the US to Europe we have too stop thinking of the US federal government as equivalent to GB or Germany if France. That is closer size wise to our State government the Federal government is more like the EU. And the EU has much the same issue getting something done as the US feds do in that GB does not want something that helps Italy and Italy doesn’t want to help France and so on and so forth until we get to Brexit.
So you want Mass Transit you need to accept a few things such as that mass transit and trains are not that great a way to travel even in Europe and that folks even in Europe will take other options if given a true choice and that it will lose money. Same with trains. You also need to build and pay for them on a smaller regional area such as a state level or a couple states. And you have to prevent to idea in the US that has folks thinking that everything should be for profit that results in no subsidy for Trains or health insurance or the new target the Post Office. But until you accept these things nothing can be changed, The US is NOT Europe we have so much more space over here that it really really changes many many things. And we are much much less willing to be taxed and much more into “profit”

 

[Mark E.]

The problem is well stated. A passenger line between Chicago and Milwaukee, doesn't have good air-conditioned cars. There is no support for the shortest of links, be it from the riders or from the railroads. It all relates to the integration of rail links to autos and airports.

 

[Thomas Jefferson]

I did a timeline on this a couple of years ago. The way I came up with to get around the problem of economic viability was for politicians to support spending on Amtrak as the most politically palatable way to look like they're doing something about the cost of gas and as pork for districts served by the railroads.

 

[Johnrankins]

That may be true for states that do not lie along the coast-to-coast rail lines. Iowa and Missouri are major parts of the west coast to Great Lakes networks. The railroad crossed Iowa in 1856, allowing Omaha to become the launch point for the first transcontinental line in 1869.

In 1856 when rails were the most viable means of passenger transport. How does this pertain to 1956 not talking later?

 

[Salvador79]

The problem is we have raided the road money to pay for the general budget for decades in Michigan so we have a major intersection of 4 expressways that has 8 lanes filtering into 3 and surprisingly it backs up (and we have similar issues everywhere) because our government is stupid.

Elsewhere, you speak about passenger rail and public transport costing government money. Here, you realise yourself that roads and individual transport cost government money, too, and not too little.

But we still expand outward because people want houses and yards and prefer new vs old

That is not a universal. It's a cultural model, and while I grant you that it has aspects which reach back a lot further in time, it really only fully emerged during the "garden city" projects time and then even more ever since the 1950s.

If we're in agreement that a solid PoD needs to occur in the early decades of the 20th century, then that's the era of urbanisation.
Today, yes, we have cultural models in most developed countries in which "people want houses and yards" - even children, when asked to paint a house, paint one with a triangular roof, a rather anachronistic one. (But then agian, if you ask them to paint a train, you get a steam locomotive.)
But that is the outcome of 20th century suburbanisation. People moved away from their large houses with lots of space around it and into cities for many reasons. Cities were stinking, dirty places in the early 20th century. Both the underdeveloped countryside and the dirty, crammed cities had their drawbacks. And then came the "garden city" utopia of combining the best of both worlds: working in modern jobs, being on all facility grids, partaking of urban cultural life and its opportunities, and yet breathing fresh air and having a bit of personal space around you with neatly domesticated nature in it. That is not the only way to solve this dilemma. Without the suburban synthesis, people may well have come to associate "housing" and "modern dwelling" with modern, multi-storey buildings, and they might associate "house with green stuff around it" solely with the dwellings of the last few people working in farming. Children might paint a skyscraper when asked to paint a "house" if the 20th century had gone differently. If you look at Japan, things are not far from what I've described here.

You cant stop that. And that is why we expand.
You can try all you want but people only takele trains and mass transit when they don’t have a better easier more comfortable option.

I disagree. That depends on what you see as comfort. For you, not having to breathe strange people's air, not having to fear dark subway halls, sitting in a soft chair, listening to music or stuff over good speakers etc. might be more important. For me, being able to doze for another 15-20 minutes instead of suffering the stress of putting up with other people's driving habits when I'm already tired, being able to read the newspaper, a book, my smartphone etc. is more important when it comes to comfort.

 

[Mark E.]

Here is another issue for the demise of American public transportation in the forties and fifties:

The GM Streetcar Conspiracy: Was GM Responsible for the Demise of America's Streetcars?

In vintage car safety news, have you heard about how GM was involved with the downfall of the streetcar? Many people know about the streetcars in America,

www.motorbiscuit.com

 

[DougM]

You can disagree with my all you want but you arre wrong, plan sinple fact, you are wrong. Washington DC, Chicago, Boston, New York, Paris, London, Tokyo etc etc etc ALL of them have one thing in common. The streets are as. packed as. they can get. If people prefered Subways GB would have a tax on using the Subway to force people off the over croweded subways but they tax you for DRIVING not riding. Why? Because more people (by far) would prefer to drive if roads were not so full or other issues (lack of parking, coat of insurance over taxed gas, etc)
With the exception of Tokyo i have been there i have seen it. Those street's are full.
Driving is (without outside issues) simply a more convenient option then taking a train (or bus or. subway). It goes from where i am to where i want to go, i dont have to change cats part way, i dont have to walk to it or from it (if the city is built right) I can carry things with me. I can listen to what i want i can stay warm and dry i can bring friends or co workers we can have private conversations etc etc.
It is only when traffic gets crazy, parking gets impossible, taxes go nuts or other extenuating situations that we see mas transit get “popular”.
And as for any reasonable diatance… Trains really suck for that (go find my posts with the math). it is almost impossible to make even high spead trains a better option then cars unless you hapoen to be going from right near on station to right near another or (once again) you have major cities with horrible traffic issues. Just a few Examples. Both my longer tripsin France were better served if i had driven them. it would have been faster on one. by about a hour (two and a half after the train was delayed) and the other by 45 minutes. And it would have been cheeper.
The only trip that was close in France was the one leaving Paris.
The Chunnel being one of the few exceptions, but then again i was going from London to Paris and the channel was in the way.

Try going from Avignon to Tours… I will beat you in the car. And odds are you will want a car in both Cities as mass transit doesnt go very far in either. Why? because they are cities of small to medium size with a reasonable amount of space around them thus they work on the US system with a LOT of folks driving…. Kind of funny that. you get cities with similar size/geography to US cities and suddenly you see US levels of driving…

Show me a city with busy mass transit and empty roads…

 

[Bytor]

You can disagree with my all you want but you arre wrong, plan sinple fact, you are wrong.

You are like the oddest alternate historian ever if you cannot wrap your head around society developing in a different manner.

 

[marathag]

Here is another issue for the demise of American public transportation in the forties and fifties:

The GM Streetcar Conspiracy: Was GM Responsible for the Demise of America's Streetcars?

In vintage car safety news, have you heard about how GM was involved with the downfall of the streetcar? Many people know about the streetcars in America,

www.motorbiscuit.com

<sigh>
If there was even a conspiracy, it was to replace streetcars/trolleys with the bus, that most agree is public transportation as well.

 

[Cato]

You folks seam to lose site of something. The US HAD a very good passenger rail system that was dependable relatively in expensive as high tech as anywhere and covered most of the country.
And it was lucky to break even and folks who had access to it chose NOT to use it when given other options. So why would folks choose differently today?
As I repeatedly point out. Even in Europe the roads are packed with cars. So even in Europe if driving does not suck or cost to much.. people choose cars.

A lot of that is because air travel made the railroads obsolete. HSR only appeals to a very niche market of mostly business travelers who need to get to a city that's far enough away that simply driving there isn't ideal, and that's close enough that it's not worth the hassle of airport security to fly. As we found out in California, even a limited route like San Francisco-Los Angeles doesn't meet those criteria, nor apparently Baltimore-Washington, where another HSR proposal failed.



Looking at some of the arguments I've seen:

A) HSR would improve economic performance in distressed cities, and help promote equity for inner city areas

The reality is that an HSR connection isn't a silver bullet to fix the kinds of issues cities like Baltimore and Chicago face. A few extra dollars from day/weekend tourists or convention goers won't even begin to put a dent in inner cities' problems, especially when you consider all that money will be sorely needed to pay off the exuberant costs of HSR construction in the first place. I would actually wager building an HSR connection from DC to Baltimore, for example, would just exacerbate problems of gentrification, bedroom communities, government corruption, and petty crime.

B) HSR would have demand if it were just built

This is a classic "build it and they will come" mentality that unfortunately has not proven true in the context of economic revitalization attempts for American cities (see Gary's convention center for a good summary of this principle in action). The harsh fact of the matter is that people no longer have a tangible use for cities like Gary, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Detroit, Baltimore, and many others. Baltimore is not the shipping and steel center it once was, ditto for Gary, Pittsburgh, and the others. Most American cities in the northeast and Midwest are burdened by declining populations, high unemployment, and other issues, not to mention their reputations (true or not) of having high violent crime and low qualities of life. The fundamental issue is that people don't have a reason to travel between these cities, especially not by rail which is slower and less efficient than a car. Building an HSR connection from Cleveland to Detroit would be just like building a line from the ass end of nowhere to the front.

C) HSR is efficient, and would be competitive against other forms of travel

See my response to @DougM. HSR only appeals to a niche market, a market that, I should add, often has the financial means to blow on a plane ticket or Audi rental if they so desired.

D) HSR would be supported by the government and communities

This is not a given. HSR is extremely expensive, and in a union-dominated and regulations-heavy market like the US, doubly so. Likewise, HSR provides no tangible benefit for cities it isn't connecting. Citizens of Texas' 4th District don't benefit squat from a businessman in DC being able to arrive home a couple hours earlier than normal, and as such Texas' 4th congressman isn't going to just vote for this proposal unless he's getting something in return. HSR would require entirely new tracks to be laid, which would kick up a hornet's nest of eminent domain claims, lawsuits, accusations of inequity in land redevelopment/acquisition, etc. As I noted above, it's likely that HSR could exacerbate fears of gentrification, and lead to protests and even city leaders opting to fight proposals to route HSR lines through certain areas (ala I-70 in Baltimore). Then there's the environmental reviews that would have to happen, which would probably take years.

 

[Mark E.]

This is not a given. HSR is extremely expensive, and in a union-dominated and regulations-heavy market like the US, doubly so. Likewise, HSR provides no tangible benefit for cities it isn't connecting.

In, today's environment, there is little practicality for HSR. On the other hand, improvements to existing lines and occasional bypasses of congested areas could have improved short runs like Baltimore-Washington or Chicago-Milwaukee. The issue is that no effort was made to integrate railroads with expanding air and highway systems in the late forties and fifties. Tracks were abandoned right and left while more and more land was taken to expand highways.

 

[Cato]

In, today's environment, there is little practicality for HSR. On the other hand, improvements to existing lines and occasional bypasses of congested areas could have improved short runs like Baltimore-Washington or Chicago-Milwaukee. The issue is that no effort was made to integrate railroads with expanding air and highway systems in the late forties and fifties. Tracks were abandoned right and left while more and more land was taken to expand highways.

Those are separate issues. Highways come from an entirely different pool of money, and were funded as they were built by gas and other taxes. The roads themselves already existed in most cases; I-70 more or less follows the same route Braddock's army paved in the French and Indian War, for example. They were simply paved over at the behest of private groups, or later through a mix of federal and state taxes, tolls, etc. Railroads are privately constructed and maintained, but the problem is they are a lot more expensive than highway construction or even airport construction, less efficient, and slower, so companies and consumers naturally moved away from them as better alternatives sprung up (chiefly air travel, which became a lot more affordable during the 1960s). So, the solution is a lot more complicated than just connecting rail and road terminals.

I agree HSR has little practical use, especially in the post-Zoom world where businesses could just as easily hold a virtual meeting instead of in person one.

 

[Anacostia Pol]

A) HSR would improve economic performance in distressed cities, and help promote equity for inner city areas

The reality is that an HSR connection isn't a silver bullet to fix the kinds of issues cities like Baltimore and Chicago face. A few extra dollars from day/weekend tourists or convention goers won't even begin to put a dent in inner cities' problems, especially when you consider all that money will be sorely needed to pay off the exuberant costs of HSR construction in the first place. I would actually wager building an HSR connection from DC to Baltimore, for example, would just exacerbate problems of gentrification, bedroom communities, government corruption, and petty crime.

B) HSR would have demand if it were just built

This is a classic "build it and they will come" mentality that unfortunately has not proven true in the context of economic revitalization attempts for American cities (see Gary's convention center for a good summary of this principle in action). The harsh fact of the matter is that people no longer have a tangible use for cities like Gary, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Detroit, Baltimore, and many others. Baltimore is not the shipping and steel center it once was, ditto for Gary, Pittsburgh, and the others. Most American cities in the northeast and Midwest are burdened by declining populations, high unemployment, and other issues, not to mention their reputations (true or not) of having high violent crime and low qualities of life. The fundamental issue is that people don't have a reason to travel between these cities, especially not by rail which is slower and less efficient than a car. Building an HSR connection from Cleveland to Detroit would be just like building a line from the ass end of nowhere to the front.

These 2 answers, which from my reading of this thread, reveal the perceived lack of connection between land use, human l settlement, and economic development. I won’t even get into why you would believe a HSR connection between Baltimore and DC (and of course Richmond) would lead to the things you say it would lead to, but I think you miss the impact that the interstate highway system had in accelerating economic and settlement trends related to the expansion of the nation’s college-degree class and decline of traditional industry as a result of automation. HSR or a better passenger rail system leading to an American HSR system in the 20th century doesn’t stop any of this, but like the land use pattern would definitely be different and without a doubt the Industrial North and Midwest will look different than they do today.

 

[Katzman]

Did you actually read what I wrote? "to support passenger rail service on a continental basis." Northeast corridor can support rail service. Amtrak is actually profitable there. Chicago, St. Louis, Milwaukee. Houston, Austin, Dallas - Ft. Worth. Pacific Coast. These are all regional solutions. A national passenger rail system requires support from regions that see no benefit from it. Now add in the size of North America. Inter-regional rail is impractical.

The French high speed rail system, features a Paris to Milan route. That's a distance of about 643 km. The trip takes between 7 and 8 hours. NYC to Chicago is 1150 km. At TGV speeds that's still a 13-14 hour trip vs a 2 hour flight. Add 3 hours for check in and airport time it's still 13-14 hours vs 5.

You mention the automobile culture of freedom. That is true. Originally, it was freedom from the railroads.

Ich fürchte hier kann jemand nicht rechnen. Bei einer Entfernung von 1150km und Spitzengeschwindigkeiten von knapp 300 km/h und einer durchschnittlichen Reisegeschwindigkeit,neue sicher näher an 200 km/h als an 100 km/h liegt dauert die Fahrt von Paris nach Mailand eher 6 bis 7 Stunden im TGV als 13 - 14 Stunden. Andernfalls würde niemand dennAufpreis für diese Züge zahlen! In Europa schlagenndie Hochgeschwindigkeitszüge bei der Reisezeit City zu City auf fast jeder Relation den Luftverkehr. Man muss ja noch die Transitzeit City zu Flugplatz und zurück einrechnen.

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

Did you actually read what I wrote? "to support passenger rail service on a continental basis." Northeast corridor can support rail service. Amtrak is actually profitable there. Chicago, St. Louis, Milwaukee. Houston, Austin, Dallas - Ft. Worth. Pacific Coast. These are all regional solutions. A national passenger rail system requires support from regions that see no benefit from it. Now add in the size of North America. Inter-regional rail is impractical.

The French high speed rail system, features a Paris to Milan route. That's a distance of about 643 km. The trip takes between 7 and 8 hours. NYC to Chicago is 1150 km. At TGV speeds that's still a 13-14 hour trip vs a 2 hour flight. Add 3 hours for check in and airport time it's still 13-14 hours vs 5.

You mention the automobile culture of freedom. That is true. Originally, it was freedom from the railroads.

That's why one @TheMann inspired idea for my universe is that ITTL, the car become seen as the thing of leisure, while trains are what you use when you're on important business. At least until the airplane's advent

 

[GuildedAgeNostalgia]

Raise income taxes to European levels so people can't afford to buy cars.

 

[SealTheRealDeal]

Ich fürchte hier kann jemand nicht rechnen. Bei einer Entfernung von 1150km und Spitzengeschwindigkeiten von knapp 300 km/h und einer durchschnittlichen Reisegeschwindigkeit,neue sicher näher an 200 km/h als an 100 km/h liegt dauert die Fahrt von Paris nach Mailand eher 6 bis 7 Stunden im TGV als 13 - 14 Stunden. Andernfalls würde niemand dennAufpreis für diese Züge zahlen! In Europa schlagenndie Hochgeschwindigkeitszüge bei der Reisezeit City zu City auf fast jeder Relation den Luftverkehr. Man muss ja noch die Transitzeit City zu Flugplatz und zurück einrechnen.

English pls