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The first real one was the Texas Triangle: a project to use TGV technology to connect San Antonio, Houston and Dallas/Fort Worth was established nearlya two decades ago. Highways and above all airlines strongly lobbied against it. It was finally killed by, who else, Dubya.
The project coming closest to reality was a whole network for Florida. They evewn wrote out the main tender and announced a winner. That after voters even put it into the Florida constitution in a referendum. But after years of sabotage and a campaign consisting almost completely of flat-out lies, Jeb Bush put the question of finance on a referendum (simultaneously with the 2004 Presidential Elections) -- and people voted for it...
A project resurfacing again and again is LA to Las Vegas, also in maglev form. But as far as I know, it was never much more than daydreaming.
The project currently closest to reality is the California High-Speed Rail. Planning of the line is well-advanced, with extensive cost estimates and impact studies. But California had a budget crisis, and Schwarzenegger tried the same tricks as Jeb Bush in open support of the highway lobby ("we are a car state"), even though studies showed highway widening would be a more expensive yet lesser capacity option. Still, the project isn't killed yet, and there shall be a referendum on bond issuing.
Further proposals were for a Midwest network centered on Chicago, and lines in Virginia. In both cases, "medium high-speed", e.g. faster trains on upgraded lines seems to get support instead (if even that).
The most ambitious proposal resurrects the Texas Triangle: the insane project of the Trans Texas Corridors, with 16-lane highways and six railway tracks (two for each type of transport) and pipes of everything. I guess if part of it ever becomes reality, it will be the roads, and the rail part will be shelved for cost overruns. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
Although the last time I took it, a mechanical problem forced us to go very slowly from just north of Philly to DC. It was embarrassing, getting passed by the regular trains. :-(
It reaches a mere 150 mph on a mere 18 miles of track. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
you are the media you consume.
That's exactly why the 2 hour and 3 hour boundaries are so important. With a central metro point of access and a much shorter check in time because of no serious load balancing problem, you provide a quicker route to some, and that short-circuits the whole "nobody takes it because its more expensive because nobody take it" vicious circle.
New York to Boston is 300km, 187 miles. A VHS train could do the trip in under an hour and a half. You can be an hour and a half getting to La Guardia and getting through the check in and the security line, and still be waiting in line to board the flight. I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.
Anyway, the voters have already been spoken for: as Reagan said, Americans don't like trains. A bomb, H bomb, Minuteman / The names get more attractive / The decisions are made by NATO / The press call it British opinion -- The Three Johns
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