Opinions on trains and planes.

Jochen Kriegerowski wrote:
"J. Clarke" schrieb

First you have to completely rebuild the infrastructure to allow
such
speeds.

That's the same over here - Those high speed routes are completely
new because the old rail grid is limited to 160 to 200 kph: Too
tight
curves, to steep inclines etc.

It's a bit different here--a "normal curve" on US railroads would be
on the tight end for European, and some of ours are tight enough that
some European railcars can't get around them without damage.

--
--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)

On 18 Aug 2008 10:14:25 -0800, (Eugene Miya)
wrote:

In article j5gqk.169$482.96@trnddc06,
James Silverton not.jim.silverton.at.verizon.not wrote:
Given the current cattle-car, skinflint conditions, two hour check-ins
cattle cars ARE train cars.
and waits including security, etc. I wonder how long a journey people
would undertake by train if fast European or Japanese style trains were
available (say, 400 kph)? I would think that Washington DC to San
Francisco might be a bit far. The journey would take about 10 hours as
the unstopping crow flies but more likely 15 with a few stops and as the
track is laid.

Who has a 400 kph train?
A 300 KPH train with stops is not a 300 KPH train.

I don't like to get up early in the morning but, allowing time to drive
to the airport, get thro' security, fly on a plane leaving at noon and
drive a rental car to my hotel or other destination, I have to allocate
most of a day (certainly at least 12 hours) to get to San Francisco.
I've never been able to sleep on planes so "red eyes" are really that!

The Europeans deal with this with overnight trains.
You get a sleeper if you can afford one. Or you tough it out in seats.
It's just not worth the money for most people on a plane, yet.

Because of the extensive network of pretty fast and very fast
trains, night trains are beginning to fade away. Today, as in the
past, on many night routes the night trains pull onto a siding
and stop for a while so that they don't arrive at the destination
too early in the morning. It becomes kind of silly to take a
night train that will take from 2300 to 0730 to make a trip a TGV
makes in four daylight hours.

In 1996 we made a trip from Copenhagen to Stockholm on a night
train, leaving around 2300 and arriving around 0800. That train
no longer exists; now you must take a local train to Malmo and
then a night train to Stockolm: overall time, 2223 to 0555. The
trip can be done by local train to Malmo and X2000 train to
Stockholm in 5:17. Nice trains, too. (In 1996 our train went all
the way to Stockholm, but first had to go west to Elsinor and get
put on a ferry across the strait.)



--
************* DAVE HATUNEN ) *************
* Tucson Arizona, out where the cacti grow *
* My typos & mispellings are intentional copyright traps *

Dave Smith writes:
Fifteen years ago I traveled around Europe on rail pass and had a great
time. The TGV from Nice to Paris was about 8 hours, going the top speed
for only part of the trip. ...

That was then. The high-speed line's been extended almost to
Marseilles, so that trip's now down to 5 hours and about 40 minutes.
However, it is generally accepted that when the train travel time
gets much over 3 hours, many people will prefer to fly.

By the way, the fastest conventional trains now in service (where
"conventional" includes TGVs and is in contrast with maglevs, which
require their own tracks for the entire route) operate on the line that
opened last year from near Paris to near Metz, serving routes such
as Paris-Strasbourg: their top service speed is 320 km/h or 199 mph.
On a test run before opening, a somewhat modified form of the train
reached a speed of 575 km/h or 357 mph, so there is certainly a
potential for faster trains to exist if someone finds it financially
desirable to build suitable tracks for them.
--
Mark Brader "They are taking to the new methods
Toronto like a duck takes to stock trading."
--Mark Leeper

My text in this article is in the public domain.

Hatunen wrote:
On Mon, 18 Aug 2008 17:22:54 GMT, Stefan Patric
wrote:

I doubt if we'll ever see "bullet" trains (other than for
commuting)
in the US. The rail system here, which is 60+ years old, just
can't
handle really high speed trains.

In the rest of the world high speed trains run on special tracks,
anyway; regular tracks have curves that are too "tight" for high
speed, and high speed tracks need to be very smooth. I've not
ridden teh French TGVs but I have ridden the Eurostar several
times and there is none of the clickety-clacking and swaying you
expect on regular trains. Similarly ofr the Germna ICEs (which
only run at 250kph).

Also, Americans have a different mindset than
Europeans with regards to travel: Americans are too much in a
hurry
to enjoy the trip.

I doubt that the business man taking a train from Hamburg to
Cologne is doing it for the enjoyment of the trip. If the
expectation is that HSR will make its money off people taking
trips for enjoyment, it will fail financially.

As far a maglev trains: The technology just isn't there. A US
company using a German company's maglev system has been trying for
about 20 years to build an elevated train from Las Vegas to
Anaheim,
CA--about a 300 mile trip. Total travel time, including two
intermediate stops, would be about 1.5 hours. Top speed of train
is
projected to be 350 miles per hour. It's still on the drawing
board.

Meanwhile, Shanghai has had a 30km maglev in operation for four
years and maglevs are being considered for other places in Asia.

That 30km maglev is a showpiece with as much relevance to practical
transportation as the monorail at Disneyland. Many things get
"considered". When there's a maglev running a major intercity route
let us know.

--
--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)

On Aug 18, 12:02*pm, Hatunen wrote:
On Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:42:11 -0700 (PDT), PeterL

wrote:
On Aug 18, 10:03*am, Dave Smith wrote:
European trains and public transportation are supported by huge tax
subsidies. *Also Europe as a whole are smaller geographically than
either the US or Canada. *So the two cannot be compared.

That's a misconception. Taken as a whole Europe is not all that
much smaller than the USA. The road distance from Nordkapp to
Gibralter is on the order of 6000km or about 1440 miles, and the
air distance from Lisbon to Kiev is abbout 2100 miles. From
Lisbon to Moscow is about 2425 miles.

The area of Europe is about 3,930,000 sq mi while the area of the
Lower 48 states is about 3,119,884 sq mi. There's some mushiness
in these figures due to land area or water area, and all, but
clearly the Lower 48 and Europe are of comparable size.

--
* ************** DAVE HATUNEN ) *************
* ** * * * Tucson Arizona, out where the cacti grow * * * * *
* ** My typos & mispellings are intentional copyright traps *


I should've said western europe.

On Aug 18, 12:19*pm, Hatunen wrote:
On Mon, 18 Aug 2008 17:22:54 GMT, Stefan Patric

wrote:
I doubt if we'll ever see "bullet" trains (other than for commuting) in
the US. *The rail system here, which is 60+ years old, just can't handle
really high speed trains. *

In the rest of the world high speed trains run on special tracks,
anyway; regular tracks have curves that are too "tight" for high
speed, and high speed tracks need to be very smooth. I've not
ridden teh French TGVs but I have ridden the Eurostar several
times and there is none of the clickety-clacking and swaying you
expect on regular trains. Similarly ofr the Germna ICEs (which
only run at 250kph).

Also, Americans have a different mindset than
Europeans with regards to travel: *Americans are too much in a hurry to
enjoy the trip.

I doubt that the business man taking a train from Hamburg to
Cologne is doing it for the enjoyment of the trip. If the
expectation is that HSR will make its money off people taking
trips for enjoyment, it will fail financially.

As far a maglev trains: *The technology just isn't there. *A US company
using a German company's maglev system has been trying for about 20 years
to build an elevated train from Las Vegas to Anaheim, CA--about a 300
mile trip. *Total travel time, including two intermediate stops, would be
about 1.5 hours. *Top speed of train is projected to be 350 miles per
hour. *It's still on the drawing board. *

Meanwhile, Shanghai has had a 30km maglev in operation for four
years and maglevs are being considered for other places in Asia.

--
* ************** DAVE HATUNEN ) *************
* ** * * * Tucson Arizona, out where the cacti grow * * * * *
* ** My typos & mispellings are intentional copyright traps *

The Shanghai train is a very limited one going only from the airport
to the city.

Mark wrote on Mon, 18 Aug 2008 14:34:09 -0500:

Dave Smith writes:
Fifteen years ago I traveled around Europe on rail pass and
had a great time. The TGV from Nice to Paris was about 8
hours, going the top speed for only part of the trip. ...

That was then. The high-speed line's been extended almost to
Marseilles, so that trip's now down to 5 hours and about 40
minutes. However, it is generally accepted that when the train
travel time gets much over 3 hours, many people will prefer to
fly.

In the US, checking in and security might require about 2 hours and
transportation to and from the airport at least an hour, so a 3 hour
flight requires 6 hours elapsed time. Adding a similar to and from time
to the airports, a 5 hour journey at 400kph is 2000 km. To name a few,
Quebec, Ottawa, Boston, New York City, Minneapolis, Omaha, Chicago, St.
Louis, Mobile and Miami are all within 2000 km of Washington DC as the
crow flies.

If the US has any sense, it will invest in the necessary infrastructure
rather than using the present rail tracks but I am not all that hopeful.
--

James Silverton
Potomac, Maryland

Email, with obvious alterations: not.jim.silverton.at.verizon.not

Hatunen wrote:
On Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:42:11 -0700 (PDT), PeterL
wrote:

On Aug 18, 10:03 am, Dave Smith wrote:

European trains and public transportation are supported by huge tax
subsidies. Also Europe as a whole are smaller geographically than
either the US or Canada. So the two cannot be compared.

That's a misconception. Taken as a whole Europe is not all that
much smaller than the USA. The road distance from Nordkapp to
Gibralter is on the order of 6000km or about 1440 miles, and the
air distance from Lisbon to Kiev is abbout 2100 miles. From
Lisbon to Moscow is about 2425 miles.

The area of Europe is about 3,930,000 sq mi while the area of the
Lower 48 states is about 3,119,884 sq mi. There's some mushiness
in these figures due to land area or water area, and all, but
clearly the Lower 48 and Europe are of comparable size.

You're comparing the continent, "Europe" with the nation "United
States". For a fair comparison either compare the US with the EU or
North America with Europe. Deadhorse, Alaska, USA, to Key West,
Florida, USA, is 5570 road miles or over 4000 air miles. That's not
the longest distance from one part of the North American portion of
the USA to another. Now want to compare any distance in Europe with
Dead Horse to Panama City, Panama?

Now, what part of Europe is actually served by your high speed fancy
trains and why is the rest not served by them if they are such an
ideal transportation solution?

--
--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)

"James Silverton" wrote in message
news:j5gqk.169$482.96@trnddc06...
Hello All!

Given the current cattle-car, skinflint conditions, two hour check-ins and
waits including security, etc. I wonder how long a journey people would
undertake by train if fast European or Japanese style trains were
available (say, 400 kph)? I would think that Washington DC to San
Francisco might be a bit far. The journey would take about 10 hours as the
unstopping crow flies but more likely 15 with a few stops and as the track
is laid.


Thats around 2800 miles, even at 200 mph thats 14 hours.
The TGV tops out at around 186 but an average of 150 including
stops would be good going and you wont maintain anything like
that through the Rockies or Sierras. Realistically even with fast
trains thats a minimum 24 hour trip

Shorter trips like NYC to the Carolinas , Nashville, Memphis
etc are much more doable.

However this is NOT a cheap option. High speed track is VERY
expensive especially around urban areas. The 200 mile line from
Paris to Metz is costed at almost $4 billion To make any impression
on US travel you are talking about 100's of billions of dollars in
investment.
I dont think thats going to happen anytime soon.

Keith

"tim....." wrote in message
...

"James Silverton" wrote in message
news:j5gqk.169$482.96@trnddc06...
Hello All!

Given the current cattle-car, skinflint conditions, two hour check-ins
and waits including security, etc. I wonder how long a journey people
would undertake by train if fast European or Japanese style trains were
available (say, 400 kph)? I would think that Washington DC to San
Francisco might be a bit far. The journey would take about 10 hours as
the unstopping crow flies but more likely 15 with a few stops and as the
track is laid.

I don't like to get up early in the morning but, allowing time to drive
to the airport, get thro' security, fly on a plane leaving at noon and
drive a rental car to my hotel or other destination, I have to allocate
most of a day (certainly at least 12 hours) to get to San Francisco. I've
never been able to sleep on planes so "red eyes" are really that!

I would have thought that 5 hours is going to be the absolute max.


Unless of course you have sleeper trains. A lot of people travelling from
Northern
Europe to Italy catch overnight trains. Waking up as the train pulls in
Florence or Milan after a good dinner on the train is rather a nice
way to travel.

Keith