Comments

You must log in or register to comment.

andersonfmly t1_irbqz78 wrote

The freight to passenger ratio in this article is VERY telling of priorities, especially when coupled with the funding and government regulation ones.

48

Hot-Specialist-6824 t1_irbsdaj wrote

Robert Caro's book The Power Broker about Robert Moses retells how time and time again how his answer was simply to build more highways and more lanes, and even when state governments wanted to put public transportation such as light rail alongside or in the middle of highways, Moses found ways not to do that, he was, in retrospect, somewhat elitist and didn't care about the poor having access to travel. Another example is he put a highway in on the west side of Manhattan and the park between the highway and the river, but put no way for pedestrians to access the park from the west side.

16

andersonfmly t1_irbug2c wrote

Sounds like an interesting read, thanks. I commute 21 miles each way for work, which takes about 35-40 minutes in the morning, and 50-70 minutes in the afternoon. As maddening as that is, to use mass transportation where I live would require... Four buses, two trains, walking or catching a Uber for 4+ miles, 4-4.5 hours of travel time each way, and cost north of $500 per month. It's utterly absurd, and there's not an ice cube's chance in Hades I will ever do so under present conditions. So me and my all electric car, that costs me zero to charge compliments of my solar array, spend a LOT of quality time together.

10

noise-tragedy t1_irc2rue wrote

US (and Canadian) public transport is grossly inefficient largely due to land use policy. Public transit only works in reasonably high-density urban areas and can't serve suburbs. Public transit doesn't work here because most places are low-density suburbs.

We can't have effective public transit on this continent without rebuilding our cities along the lines of the larger European cities (e.g. 4-6 story midrise buildings everywhere) or Tokyo (essentially no zoning rules and 4-40 story buildings everywhere), or rebuilding our suburbs along the lines of Switzerland (rural housing clustered around public transit nodes).

There's not an ice cube's chance in Hades of major land use changes ever happening. A society so dominated by reactionaries that it won't build enough new housing just to keep up with population growth is incapable of major change on the scale required to meaningfully change land use policies. We committed to car-only land use decades ago and we're stuck with it.

9

OtherIsSuspended t1_ircmb5a wrote

Interurbans/electric trolley railways could easily serve the suburbs between two decently sized cities

1

behind69proxies t1_ire11xx wrote

You guys really like the word 'reactionaries' lately. Just noticed it everywhere in the comments recently.

0

noise-tragedy t1_irgl7nt wrote

Would you rather people used 'senile Boomers,' 'rentiers,' or 'fascists' instead?

2

Hot-Specialist-6824 t1_irc6eh5 wrote

It's a great read, don't expect to go through it in one night. It's also absolutely fascinating how somebody who wasn't elected to any position managed to become one of the most powerful people in New York politics. Btw Caro as done a number of great biographies & won a Pilitzer.

3

pjabrony t1_iretj6a wrote

He also built the Cross-Bronx Expressway cutting right through some of the parishes that were officially recognized neighborhoods.

2

RogerKnights t1_irq6mjo wrote

As a child I played in the condemned houses along the site of the Cross Bronx Expressway

1

ash_274 t1_irc945d wrote

Considering the vast majority of all track in the US is owned by those freight rail companies (and always has been) they will prioritize themselves

9

skywrites8 t1_ircgc2v wrote

oh yes. CSX owns over 20K miles in rail and is a huge reason rail can't be expanded in many cities. Their ongoing battle with Amtrack is quite notorious, they basically have a monopoly on rail in the U.S. and rail in the U.S. has almost always been monopolized. The priorities are quite clear.

1

ThenaJuno t1_irbqkcu wrote

Yes, but the USA has more than 3 times the total area.

37

Straight-faced_solo t1_irbw44n wrote

The big problem is that it's all freight. Our freight lines work well and are actually pretty nice. A little old, but it's still a fully functioning rail system. When it comes to moving people though, we just pretend the U,S can't build rail.

28

skywrites8 t1_ircgp87 wrote

CSX basically has a monopoly on U.S. rail. They've had a longstanding battle with Amtrack over passenger rail. The rail system in the U.S. has almost always been a monopoly system, owned by $$$$$ freight companies. You can't just decide you want to lay down passenger tracks too, the system is set up to not allow it and the theoretical cost of adding to the rail system is astronomical, far more than many American towns and cities could afford. Very purposefully set so.

6

emaw63 t1_ircpy8j wrote

Fucking infuriating too given how easy it is for cities to throw down a new highway through a neighborhood or to widen an existing one to 20 lanes. Can’t ever seem to make it work for rail though 🙃

3

skywrites8 t1_ircri0v wrote

It's all about where the funding comes from- lots of funding for local highways. Not many want to go to bat with freight companies who rule the rail. Infuriating indeed :/

Also, highways were a very convenient way to keep black people out of white communities. Very important note in why the interstate system got so much support.

2

dprophet32 t1_ire4vo8 wrote

Is there nothing in America that is above naked profiteering?

2

turniphat t1_ircdtxg wrote

No. Europe is slightly larger than the US.

https://mapfight.xyz/compare/europe-vs-us/

The United States is about 2x as large as European Union

https://mapfight.xyz/map/eu/#us

12

graycatfat t1_irj32v8 wrote

correct but I'm not clicking those wacky links

10,000,000-10,400,000 is Europe (3,900,000-4,000,000) sq mi

depends which countries like Georgia you count for the 100,000-200,000 , but mainly how much toward the Ural mountains in Russia you count, and the water area in Scandinavia

4,236,351 sq km European Union (1,635,664 sq. mi)

https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/countries/european-union/#introduction

9,833,517 sq km United States (3,796,742 sq mi)

https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/countries/united-states/#geography

3,796,742 / 1,635,664 ≈ 2.32

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_European_countries_by_area

https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/field/area/country-comparison

https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/largest-countries-in-europe

https://www.quora.com/How-large-is-the-United-States-in-area-compared-to-Europe

The United States has a land and inland water area over 2.32 times the size of European Union

1

Hot-Specialist-6824 t1_irbrjpc wrote

No, the United States is just under one and a half times the geographic size of Europe. US almost 3.8 mill sq miles, EU just over 1.6 mill sq miles.

−18

WBurkhart90 t1_irbsqyb wrote

You realize that's 2.5x the size roughly, right? 1.6 x 2 is 3.2 mill sq miles.

14

sektabox t1_irbyrrn wrote

> EU just over 1.6 mill sq miles

The OP title says "Europe" - not EU.

14

sektabox t1_irbymzt wrote

That is not true and the data in this article is bogus.

Using the article's data - US rail network is slightly longer, by about 20,000 km when compared to European Union. In this case it's 200,161 km vs 360,000 km. But the World Bank estimates the US rail system at 150K km.

But EU is not Europe. Countries that are not in EU are Ukraine, Russia, Norway, Switzerland, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan [ (European parts), UK and a few Balkan countries.

I'm too lazy to do the research on all those individual countries, but nah, clearly not twice as long as in Europe.

18

Pharmere t1_ircosmm wrote

But look at the difference in area

2

Logothetes t1_irbz8s1 wrote

Maybe it just feels like it's longer because it's crappy and slow? :)

1

CoralPilkington t1_irc1o0x wrote

>because it's crappy and slow?

Not for freight it isn't...

8

DRScottt t1_irc6tt3 wrote

It's all considered freight if you don't own the line. It's just the freight that pays for itself has lower priority.

1

geon2k2 t1_irdzvkz wrote

Its not sure what they include in the european side. Current european union+/- few countries, whole european continent?

If its continent including Russia, yes its about the same size, however i don't think it includes Russia, as in Russia and former soviet republics the distance between the tracks is wider than the rest of the Europe, probably similar to US. And btw, i kinda think distance between tracks is narrower in europe on purpose, so that Russian trains cannot use the european rails to transport heavy weapons, and viceversa.

If its only European Union, then Europe its also half the size of US.

The rest remains valid, although the narrow lines also support a lot of weight, and rail freight is certainly feasible and prefered to road freight.

1

RogerKnights t1_irq734f wrote

The Russian rail gauge choice was made after Europe standardized on its gauge. I’ve read the Russia code a different gauge partly to make it difficult for a future Napoleon to invade.

1

PAUMiklo t1_irf1kop wrote

This post is like cat nip for the victimhood mentality.

1

RogerKnights t1_irq7v3v wrote

I’ve checked Google and it says that Europe uses the “standard” gauge of 4 feet 8.5 inches, or 1435 centimeters, the same as America.

1

PongSoHard t1_irdwtdj wrote

My two most recent AMTRAK tickets got cancelled. I love going by train but nowadays they aren't running on time.

0

ggd_x t1_irbxxnk wrote

Europe is also half the width.

−4

brock_lee t1_irbsch6 wrote

'merica, fuck yea!

−8