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It is much more of an economic issue in that we simply don't have the manufacturing might or the supply chain logistics to assemble, build and deliver parts for HSR trains.
Nah, that wouldn't stop it. We'd just get stuff elsewhere if needed, without blinking an eye.
It's more about trains vs. cars. We love our cars too much - and support them - to let trains take too much of a hold. It's a cultural thing. The culture of America is significantly different than Europe in this regard.
Plus politics. The oil & gas industry will make sure they don't lose demand, through more trains and less cars.
During the late 1940s, Talgo came to recognize that Spain, and the wider European continent, were in a poor economic condition following the Second World War and so were unlikely to be customers for new rolling stock from an unproven manufacturer. Furthermore, the company was keen to acquire advanced technical knowledge and designs, so a favourable agreement was struck with American Car and Foundry (ACF) to collaborate on the manufacture of the Talgo II in the United States.
ACF Industries, originally the American Car and Foundry Company (abbreviated as ACF), is an American manufacturer of railroad rolling stock. One of its subsidiaries was once (1925–54) a manufacturer of motor coaches and trolley coaches under the brand names of (first) ACF and (later) ACF-Brill. Today, the company is known as ACF Industries LLC and is based in St. Charles, Missouri. It is owned by investor Carl Icahn.
What most Americans are unaware of, is that our rail system has been sabotaged by ridiculous rules under the Federal Railroad Administration.
The following is from a German author (the English translation is a bit spotty, but sufficient)
Zierke #1 Quality of regulations
“In the USA, trains like the type 411 EMU are not allowed to operate. US regulations require a very high carbody strength for political reasons, which adds several tons of weight to a vehicle. If this mass is added to a European tilting EMU or DMU, it is no longer safe to operate at 11.8 inches of unbalanced superelevation, because the maximum safe axleload is exceeded.
The Acela Express is built to these strength standards. It is nearly double as heavy as European or Japanese tilting trains. Instead of restricting the axleload to 16 tons or less, the powercars weigh 25 tons per axle. No safety authority would allow values like those for the German 411 or 610 for this train, because the forces at the wheel-rail contact point would be too high for safe operation.
As a result, the "Acela Express" looses about half an hour between New York and Boston, compared to best practice in tilting train usage. (It also looses at least half an hour, compared to the calculations of US railroad engineers in the 1960s.) If this half hour of running time from New York to Boston needs to be cutted away by infrastructure investment instead, a three-digit number of millions in additional public investment will be needed at least. A similar situation will be found with almost all upgrade projects for curvy track.”
- end of excerpt -
An electric multiple unit or EMU is a multiple-unit train consisting of self-propelled carriages using electricity as the motive power.
In contrast, a DMU uses diesel engines.
ZIERKE #2
Federal regulations sabotaged American railroads, by imposing limitations that had no real basis in engineering nor safety, and hamstrung operators.
One of these issues is dealing with curves at speed. Outside of the USA, a combination of superelevation (one track higher than the other) and tilting cars enables far greater speeds. Conclusions about US regulations
Due to the [poor] quality of regulations, the state of the art in tilting train usage is not available in the USA. The FRA safety regulations do not allow safe operation of trains at very high unbalanced superelevation, because the resulting trains are too heavy for that. [FRA dictated the overweight cars]
There is an ironical aspect in this result: Lightweight tilting trains have been a US development, and predated European or Japanese revenue service by 20 years. You can find the arguments of this text in the dusty part of archives in the USA.
It needs to be stressed, that there is a difference in US regulations, but no difference in US engineering. In 2002, the California Highspeed Rail Authority published a study about route options between Los Angeles and Bakersfield, that showed the same cost savings for the 3.5% options, that have motivated other railroads to use steep grades for highspeed lines. (At this point, there used to be a link to the report, but it is no longer online.)
For passenger rail in the USA, a higher quality of regulations would mean a multi-billion dollar value, if the policy is pointed towards improvement and extension of rail service.
- - - end of excerpt - - -
"SOMEONE" passed laws and gave directions to the FRA to sabotage American rail with medieval rules and regulations, not based on sound engineering.
Speaking of sound, ever wonder why only American trains blast air horns at every $%!#@!$ intersection / crossing? Even in the middle of the night? Sure makes folks "LOVE" to live by a rail track. (Only the deaf would approve. . .)
Watch a video of a train in Switzerland, or Austria, or other European country, and note that no ear splitting air horn is blasted as it passes an intersection / crossing, gated or not.
[I live 4 miles away from a mainline freight track, and every night at 4:00 am - 4:15 am, an air horn blast can be heard, as it crosses a nearby road.]
Note the difference when this Swiss train passes a partially gated crossing. . . https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mw9qiV7XlFs&t=1432s
Last edited by jetgraphics; 09-06-2023 at 01:59 PM..
Lets not kid ourselves. The reason the US doesn't have high speed rail is because the will isn't there among those that have the power to make things happen. The US is covered in super highways from coast to coast (not a small anything considering how large the US truly is), airports all over the place, various seaports on all its coasts, multiple subways/metro systems in various cities, etc. Even the rail system that it has may not be high speed, but rails cover the country from coast to coast too.
The only thing preventing the US from having high speed rail is the will to do it, that's it.
The closest thing to a high speed train is the Acela which goes from Boston to Washington DC and stops in some places in between such as New York, New York or Stamford, CT among other places. Do you think that came into existence out of sheer luck? The people that could do something about it had the will to create it. Result?
Lets not kid ourselves. The reason the US doesn't have high speed rail is because the will isn't there among those that have the power to make things happen. The US is covered in super highways from coast to coast (not a small anything considering how large the US truly is), airports all over the place, various seaports on all its coasts, multiple subways/metro systems in various cities, etc. Even the rail system that it has may not be high speed, but rails cover the country from coast to coast too.
The only thing preventing the US from having high speed rail is the will to do it, that's it.
The closest thing to a high speed train is the Acela which goes from Boston to Washington DC and stops in some places in between such as New York, New York or Stamford, CT among other places. Do you think that came into existence out of sheer luck? The people that could do something about it had the will to create it. Result?
By now there should had been Acelas and faster trains crisscrossing the USA.
It's not will.
BLAME CONGRESS (and the special interests who hate rail).
[] Peak heavy rail mileage: 254,000 miles / 402,336 km (less than 160,000 miles today)
[] Streetcar track: 34,404 miles by 1907, in over 140 cities, with 60,000 cars in service.
[] Interurban track: 15,500 miles by 1917
(Total rail mileage was once over 300,000 miles - now, far less)
In contrast - - -
[] Interstate Highway System : 47,714 miles
Locomotives which are rumored to have exceeded the 126 mph (203 km/h) record include the Pennsylvania Railroad's S1 prototype which was unofficially clocked at 127.1 miles per hour, and the Milwaukee Road class F7. The Milwaukee Road had the fastest scheduled steam-powered passenger trains in the world. Both it and the Chicago & North Western (see CNW Class E-4) had timetables requiring running in excess of 100 mph (160 km/h); it is believed that both railroads' locomotives exceeded 120 mph (190 km/h) on a regular basis.
America had HSR 100 years ago. . . running steam locomotives (!)
Now, Amtrak is lucky to hit 70mph average speed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_s..._United_States
Class 3 : 60 mph (97 km/h)
Class 4 : 80 mph (130 km/h)
Class 5 : 90 mph (145 km/h)
Class 6 : 110 mph (177 km/h)
Class 7 : 125 mph (201 km/h)
Class 8 : 160 mph (260 km/h)
Class 9 : 220 mph (350 km/h)
These classes are the work of bureaucrats, not railroad engineers.
Railroads have to get PERMISSION from these jokers, to operate at speed.
Last edited by jetgraphics; 09-06-2023 at 02:25 PM..
On one hand it's a bummer, cause it's way more efficient than air travel. But on the other hand, if we had it, it would really aggregate us to the big urban centers. It would heighten the winner takes all type of environment with urban builds, I think it would have been more detrimental to small cities.
I dunno. I think the smaller urban centers did better with rail infrastructure when they could be actual hubs. On a highway, it’s much easier to bypass the little cities where by train you’d need to transfer in them.
Not to mention, rail in small urban centers have us the timelessly catch tune “Chattanooga Choo Choo”. Once upon a time (per wiki) there used to be 3 separate passenger rail routes that connected NYC to Chattanooga.
At the end of the day, it all comes down to politics. All of the money that we spend on roads and highways could go to rail instead.
Nationalize the railways, double/quadruple track important corridors, and get rid of the at-grade crossings. We could have high speed rail in a few years if the US could do anything right.
Location: When you take flak it means you are on target
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Also, we don't have Reardon Steel.
And I'm not sure American's are capable of building 200 mph trains, without collassal derailments. I sure wouldn't want to be on one when it flew off the rails in a turn because some dopehead forgot to nail the track down right.
NEVER EVER CONCLUDE THAT GOVERNMENT IS THE SOLUTION.
The "secret rule" of all government is "grow or die." Governments will embrace any reason to spend more, hire more, tax more and borrow more. Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it whether it exists or not, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies.
Any government that successfully resolves a problem won't have an excuse to keep growing.
Has government won the "War on Poverty"? "Crime" ? "Drugs"?
Of course not.
Why expect government to resolve the lack of public transportation with any better success?
The best remedy is to get government out of the way. Deregulate railways. Stop taxing it (income & property taxes).
Let unfettered free enterprise restore rail transportation.
Addendum:
Customer paying for a service is always superior to a customer paying government, who then pays for a service.
(Anything government does is paid for by someone else, minus a skim for their magnanimous administration.)
Last edited by jetgraphics; 09-06-2023 at 07:38 PM..
Politics is EVERYTHING.
Government meddling destroyed electric urban rail in the first half of the 20th century. (taxes, punitive regulations, and fare caps + collusion with the competition - see National City Lines) Government meddling destroyed passenger rail in the second half of the 20th century. (See: cancellation of Mail-by-Rail in 1967, punitive taxes, subsidy of the competition, and the bizarre rules of the FRA)
Expecting government to "save" rail is futile. Government is the problem.
Simple remedy - Zero tax liability and zero bureaucracy (abolish the FRA) for any company involved with the manufacture, installation, operation, maintenance and repair of rail based transportation, in all forms, and speeds. Ditto, for the employees.
America will be "back on track" in a New York Minute.
(FYI : steel wheel on steel rail is the most efficient form of land transport. 20:1 advantage over pneumatic tire on pavement.) https://www.city-data.com/forum/65711736-post60.html
I agree that the lack of HSR (or adequate rail, in general) is due to politics, but I have a different take, though I am no means an expert:
The Democrats don’t seem interested in being efficient, ever. They view government projects as a way to funnel as many jobs to constituents as possible.
The Republicans don’t seem interested in funding public works projects, or at least ones that involve progressive concepts such as passenger rail.
So we have this never-ending impasse thanks to our two political parties that can’t/won’t budge.
. . . I'm not sure American's are capable of building 200 mph trains, without collassal derailments. I sure wouldn't want to be on one when it flew off the rails in a turn because some dopehead forgot to nail the track down right.
The implication that American engineering and manufacturing is somehow deficient is not supported by any fact in evidence.
Government "regulation" (and bestowing permission) has never prevented mistakes. Look at "licensed" physicians, who do have a "license to kill." They are not infallable, and can make mistakes. But they are privileged and not liable for criminal prosecution if they "followed the rules" in the process of killing their patient.
Tolerating incompetence is more a characteristic of a bureaucracy driven enterprise, like big government, than a responsible enterprise, which can be held liable.
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