High-Speed Rail? Over My Dead Body!

Funny how moveon.org which is funded by George Soros is holy and just, but the Koch brothers doing anything is evil and misguided!!!

All of which doesn't come close to the money generated by the existing political establishment whether Republican or Democrat.

Anything that is associated with the Democratic Party is pure as the angel driven snow. Anything that involves the Republican Party is pure evil. Anyone funding a Republican campaign is classified as special interest. Anything that is funding a Democrats campaign is progressive and for the good of us all. That is the attitude that seems to permeate our political system in this country right now.

I think it is a nasty double standard for two parties that have done nothing other than to nearly bankrupt the country and the states they run and control now.

There you go again, making assumptions.

I keep hearing this and all I can think is where was my check? No one has paid me a dime for any of my activities. In fact my activities cost me treasure.

It's called projection. Every "protest movement" coming from the Left relies heavily on paid activists and participants. The TEA Party nope we're all true believers my friend we're genuine.

If the UAW caused the President to act in their favor, why did he force a renegotiated contract and strip thousands of people of their benefits and wages?

The UAW benefited from the act by keeping their jobs, but that's about it. If anything, the Obama administration has been staunchly in the corner of management during the little negotiations that have happened.

I'm not going to pretend there aren't any fat cats out there pumping money just to pad their own pockets but you're right here. There are a lot of genuine "little guys" involved in this as well.

It is funny, though, that the Dems would complain about special interest groups when it runs counter to their interests but Soros and union leaches taking advantage of the membership seem to be just fine with them.

There's true believers on both sides, but you're mad if you think they actually get anything done on their own.

I can't even think of the last time there was a popular groundswell that wasn't being pushed by special interests (I'm not convinced the anti-Vietnam War movement wasn't orchestrated by the Soviets at some level).

financing logistics is not the same thing as astroturf.

The difference in this movement and those typically seen on the left is that these people WANT to speak up, they are not getting paid to. sure you can find examples of someone financing commercials or buses or whatever - but the passion is real.

On the other hand, when you see the marches like 10-2-10 you see a bunch of people leveraged by their unions, you see people sometimes actually paid to turn out (I've seen for myself ads on Craig's list offering to pay protesters or activists or precinct walkers for left wing candidates and causes)

THAT is astroturf - when the people actually out there are not their of their own volition.

There is no difference. It's about a bunch of people who get angry at something and get manipulated into doing someone else's bidding.

This has happened before and it will happen again.

Quick search at kayak.com reveals that you can do ORD - SFO for $389 (round-trip), ORD-LAX for $369 (round-trip) with flights taking around 4 hours each way. I think you're slightly overestimating how much flights cost these days. I did Zurich - Boston, Boston - Las Vegas, Las Vegas - SFO, LAX - Zurich and paid about $1,050 total (separate legs as listed with only the two intercontinental ones with the same airline). Air travel is wonderfully cheap these days.

My son spends most of the year in LA. I've looked at prices from Chicago to LA at many different times of the year. Always, the price of plane tickets are about 2/3rds more than train tickets.

In fact, right now - Amtrak = $287 and Priceline = $396.

Not 2/3rds price difference, but, then ... that's today, not a holiday or summer. Also, one's from the Amtrak website, the other is from a discount airline sight.

How long is the flight? How many stops will the train make? With the train you are looking at what a day and a half worth of travel with no stops? Versus 5 hours by plane? All for a difference of a couple hundred dollars? For me my time is more valuable and I would a little more for the faster more effective mode of travel.

They're going to continue to get dismissed because it's easier to do that than to acknowledge that they've got something valid to say. Meanwhile, 70 House seats and 6 Senate seats are going to get followed up by some more losses in Congress and the White House if Republicans and Tea Partiers can manage to remember what won big for them on Tuesday.

That's why a high speed rail should be an option.

Even high speed rail is going to take double the time even without stops. How fast do you think they will go? They will also have to slow down greatly in the mountains and passes. They will also cost quite a bit more than Amtrak.

High speed rail would take a minimum of 12 hours Chicago to Cali. Jet, 4 hours. No go for most business people.

I'm going to say you completely and wholly miss the point of train travel. Of course if time is the sole factor you deem important, air travel is the way to go. But riding the train is like taking a road trip -- you're investing the time needed for the travel, enjoy the scenery, and not have to deal with the big hassles of airport security. And, the train has the added advantage over road trips that you're not cramped in a small vehicle, having to worry about which traffic laws you're inadvertently breaking in what state (exaggeration, natch, but point stands), getting sticker shock at the gas pump or when the car breaks down (been there, done that), getting stuck in traffic during rush-hour or when some asshat forgets how to drive and causes a pileup on the highway of a city you're passing through.

Whether or not the government should be subsidizing or building transportation infrastructure is almost pointless. It's a shame that private industry isn't aggressively looking into high speed rail, because it could directly compete with air travel in several corridors in the US. The Eastern Seaboard was already mentioned; others could include Chicago-Kansas City, Twin-Cities-Chicago, Portland-Seattle-Vancouver, Los Angeles-San Francisco... I read an article some months back that Russia was building a high-speed line from Moscow to St Petersburg with the explicit intention of competing with air travel (as mentioned up thread, Chicago-Los Angeles wouldn't be viable for that).

Yeah, well apart from you getting the time for the trip wrong, you are also, unsurprisingly, wrong on the price. 5 minutes on Travelocity.com found me 5 flights between Chicago & L.A. for $228. You'd really have to work at it to book an $800 ticket.

Conversely, Amtrak had two fares for less than the flight, but when you factor in time lost traveling, rail is actually more expensive.

4 lanes good, 2 rails bad.

For now.

No it can't which is why private industry moved from trains to airplanes starting from the 1950's and on.

#1 The expense to build and maintain is greater then the revenue the train can pull in from people. This is why almost all trains are freight. High speed trains require high speed rail and unless you're Henry Rearden and you made a metal breakthrough that is cheap you're screwed.

#2 Air travel is safer. Trains are at risk for hitting things on the track and derailment. Imagine a train at 200 mph derailing.

#3 Time of travel is a factor.

#4 Trains have fixed destinations. Planes can go to different airports when needed.

And how?

You've got to lay down new track. How do propose to get around people who won't sell you the land for the rail? Take it from them?

Then you pay for it.

Not taxpayers.

Wait, so private industry was responsible for the change? I thought the TRILLIONS the Feds shelled out to build airports and interstates had something to do with it. Huh, learn something new everyday.

The Feds, Washington State, and Seattle just spent billions to upgrade SeaTac and add another runway. Wonder if so much would be required if not for the all day half hour flights to Portland and Vancouver offered by Alaskan Air?

The Talgos used on the Cascades (Eugene-Portland-Seattle-Vancouver) are more than capable of the 139mph that they will be allowed to go once the track upgrades are complete.

Also almost all the upgrades being done benefit freight as well as passenger rail. Added sidings, active train management, straightening curves, double tracking at some chokepoints, grade separation, and closing at grade crossings, etc.

When completed it will be 2:30 Portland Seattle and 2:45 Seattle Vancouver. And this is city center to city center, so more than competitive time wise with flight.

Yeah, but most people have fixed destinations as well, so I'm not seeing the point. If I have a business meeting in Milwaukee then being able to divert to Minneapolis doesn't help that much. In case of problems with the trains, Amtrak Throughway is there as a backup.

Only if you want European/Asian HSR (like Cali and Florida). Truth is, for alot of these corridors the upgrades I mentioned will be enough to make rail more than competitive with flying and driving.

Can't imagine why you'd be against building railways, but fine with building airports and roads and ... every other means of transportation - including cars.

What you need to understand the PACs like Freedom Works or the Tea Party Express what have you they are basically their own thing. They're not the TEA Party, they could shut down tomorrow and nothing would change. And the reason nothing would change is they exist because of us we don't exist because of them. The TEA Party is your next door neighbor, your mother, your barber, it is anyone who wants to be a part of returning this country's government back to its Constitutionally defined role. Where do we carry out nefarious plotting to bring down Progressives and plunge America into the darkness and horror of increased liberty and limited government? The internet. Here's a somewhat accurate article.

You're projecting again. The Left are the ones who have to manipulate people to achieve their agenda with bogus climate models and the like. I want smaller government, lower taxes, more freedom, and fewer opportunities for leftists to adjust the temperature of my shower. And the folks I just put in don't work at givin' me that I'll vote them out and put someone else in. So please tell me how am I being manipulated?

I appreciate the clarification, but I already did understand that. The money, in this case, really is following the energy. It's delusion on the part of their opponents that cause Tea Party detractors to claim their success is all due to special interest money. As if a), those special interests were some very small group only interested in gaming the system and b) there were no "regular Joes" like yourself out there.

It's precisely like the people who say candidates buy elections (conveniently when those elections don't go their way) as an easy way to discount the reasons why they lost those elections. There are plenty of examples (Steve Forbes?, Ross Perot?) where money didn't do the trick to prove them wrong.

However, you get ideas and a strong message and the money will most definitely find you. That's just what's happened here. It doesn't bother me in the slightest except to make sure I keep pushing for full disclosure of where money comes from. Let me make my own decision on whether a candidate has been corrupted, mmmkay?

Do you really think that if high speed rail took off for some reason that security would not be very similar to air security? Do you really think the TSA would pass up thd chance to buttfuck rail passengers.

Airports existed before the government started taking them over. As for roads? Well we all pay for it in taxes. For high speed rail we'd all pay for it in taxes yet not all of us would be able to use it or afford it.

And the fact that government gets involved in roads and airports in no way obligates me or anyone else to support your stupid childish devotion to a system that would be a waste of money.

Another reason why airports should be private. Let them pay for it. Not taxpayers.

You missed my point because I should have expanded on that section.

If I build rail from A to B that's where that rail will be regardless of the business. If business drops off because the A to B route is no longer worth it to my customers I'm screwed.

If I have planes that fly from A to B and people don't want to go to B anymore but instead go to C then I can change to the airport in C.

We aren't going to get high speed rail in Florida thank God because it's a ridiculous waste of money. There were plans to build from Tampa to Orlando but you could drive there faster (only 85 miles) then it would take for a train.