From: Bob Sullivan
It's the distance between cities that kills rail here.
Except on the east coast, travel times between big cities require an
overnight ride.
Planes are so much faster for anything over 200 miles.
Been that way since 1947...
Regards, Bob S.
There are a couple of flaws I find with that argument ...
Who says service has to be only between big cities? Seems to me local
services are what makes rail transportation viable. Feed from the small
towns into the big cities and back again; and take the high speed
expresses between big cities.
The government spends a whole lot of money building and maintaining
highways. Building and maintaining rail lines should get as much
attention, but we gave away the tracks built with government subsidies
to corporations who don't maintain them unless they get more government
subsidies.
And planes aren't a lot faster any more, once you factor in the time it
takes to get to the airport and the time you have to wait so you can go
through security.
... and all the delays once you're finally through the gate waiting for
the aircraft to load.
... and all the delays waiting to take off once the aircraft HAS loaded.
... not to mention all the fees and surcharges for boarding fee, fuel
cost surtax, security tax, extra fees because your bag weighs more than
25 pounds, extra fees because you have a camera bag as well as a
suitcase, extra fees because your camera bag isn't the exact dimensions
the airline specified for a carry-on bag ...
Don't get me started on jet-lag and breathing the crap the airlines pass
off as "air" inside the cabin if you finally manage to get off the ground.
The cattle going to the slaughterhouse in Chicago's famous stockyards
get better treatment than American Airlines passengers going through O'hare.
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