Windsor-Toronto in 2 hours?

[Junjie]

Junjie, I have never ridden high speed rail. As for pricing, please be aware that the price to ride is extremely subsidized, and that ticket prices are set artificially very low by their operating governments to encourage the rail travel. ...

Again, we massively subsidize highways and auto-oriented development as a general development policy in the US. I'd prefer balancing that with more HSR and urban development [[which are linked, as Bham's posts indictate - HSR is only as strong as the city and its transit network). As to ticket prices: the US has a severe problem with the cost of infrastructure. It is striking that nowhere else in the world are prices even remotely close to $300/ticket. We badly need to figure out how this process goes so wrong and correct it, because virtually every other country manages to do similar projects for much less money.

The comparison of rail's subsidies to auto and aviation related subsidies is not an honest one. While roads and bridges are largely paid for by the government, the government isn't generally buying the cars we travel in and paying for most of the gas and repairs. ...

But the government does pay billions for the mortgage interest deduction to encourage people to buy single family homes in less dense areas rather than renting in cities. It provides hundreds of billions each year to "stabilize" the middle east, an area of the world that would be the geostrategic equivalent of Latin America if our cars didn't run on oil. All of this is part of the subsidy to auto-dependency in the US, even if you bought your own car.

I am on record on DY as being very pro-public transit. I wish the RTA would take over DDOT & SMART buses, the People Mover, build the BRT system, incorporate some light rail elements, and extend and better integrate service. BUT, in both the US and Canada [[and everywhere else in the world), money for transit is not unlimited. For the finite amount of money available, high speed rail takes up WAY TOO MUCH of the pie for its very limited utility. Better buses for half a million is much preferable to fancy trains for hundreds.

Yes, I know you're generally very pro-transit. Maybe you're right about priorities, and it's a debate worth having [[for the Canadians, anyway). Obviously my preference would be to expand the fraction of resources going to all forms of transit, including HSR. I see HSR and transit as mutually reinforcing/dependent and part of the same network.

[Junjie]

HSR works very well in Western Europe, but would almost certainly fail around here.

Western Europe has low incomes, extremely expensive gas, very expensive tolled roads, much worse air pollution, high densities and centralized cities.

In Michigan [[or Ontario) HSR makes little sense. if you're headed from Paris to Lyon, yeah, HSR makes tons of sense.

Density is a red herring when it comes to arguing against HSR in the US. For example, Florida [[353 people/sqmi) has a higher density than France [[295), and in the midwest Pennsylvania [[284) and Ohio [[281) are very close behind. The density of people in Michigan south of Muskegon / Flint / Port Huron that might be served by a Chicago - Toronto line is plenty high [[458). The distances are also comparable: Paris to Lyon is longer than Toronto to Detroit and about the same as Detroit to Chicago.

On the other hand, you're absolutely right about fuel prices and centralized cities.

[Bham1982]

Density is a red herring when it comes to arguing against HSR in the US.

Density, by itself, isn't particularly useful, but weighted density is useful, and France has much higher weighted density than somewhere like Florida. And France is centered around a singular dominant transit-oriented metro. The Northeast Corridor works for HSR because it's centered around NYC.

Somewhere like Florida could, in theory, work for HSR, but not the way Floridians currently live. With $10 gas, lower incomes, highways all super-high tolled, more air quality problems, yeah. If people actually lived in walkable, transit oriented cities, yeah.

[Richard]

Density, by itself, isn't particularly useful, but weighted density is useful, and France has much higher weighted density than somewhere like Florida. And France is centered around a singular dominant transit-oriented metro. The Northeast Corridor works for HSR because it's centered around NYC.

Somewhere like Florida could, in theory, work for HSR, but not the way Floridians currently live. With $10 gas, lower incomes, highways all super-high tolled, more air quality problems, yeah. If people actually lived in walkable, transit oriented cities, yeah.

Each city has its own unique circumstances.

In the case of Fl and looking at Tampa to Orlando to Daytona Beach

Then from Miami to Orlando to Jacksonville.

Granted maybe residents in their daily life would not pack the cars,but what you are underestimating is the tourist aspect.Which Fl does get a couple here and there.

So you book a flight and accommodations staying at Disney [[the rat) You could then jump on the train to Tampa and visit bush gardens,the casino,ybor city and have a hand rolled cigar and bourbon then jump on the street car to go downtown to the aquarium or cruise ships.

After all of that you could jump back on and go to Daytona beach and catch the sunset over the water.

Lots more to it but you get the jist of it.

Sports fans would no longer have to spend two hours stuck on the freeway behind a moron on a cell phone going 50 in a 90 mph zone.


Lots of international tourism dollars.

I have Philippine friends that fly from Fl to Detroit then transfer for the flight to the Philippines sitting for hours in the airport waiting.

You realize how much money that is left on the table when you do not provide options? There are many international flights that depart from Detroit.

No problems supporting billions for a bridge and surrounding infrastructure that increases traffic and smog, but talk about rail to move people and goods efficiently is kinda like talking about implementing a clothingless society.

Saying I am not going to support something that I am not going to use is short of understanding that the resulting financial impacts effects everybody.

[bust]

Density, by itself, isn't particularly useful, but weighted density is useful, and France has much higher weighted density than somewhere like Florida. And France is centered around a singular dominant transit-oriented metro. The Northeast Corridor works for HSR because it's centered around NYC.

Somewhere like Florida could, in theory, work for HSR, but not the way Floridians currently live. With $10 gas, lower incomes, highways all super-high tolled, more air quality problems, yeah. If people actually lived in walkable, transit oriented cities, yeah.

Have you seen a population density map of Florida? Here's one:



There are some obvious routes for rail there, along very densely populated corridors.

As someone with lot of family who has retired in Florida I can tell you driving long distances loses its appeal for many people when they get old. Especially in Florida traffic. Diving around South Florida is nerve-wracking. I have family who kept moving North up the East coast of Florida to get away from it. Others who do their best never to venture South of Palm Beach. If they had better rail options maybe they would. I think high speed rail would make sense for a lot of Floridians, and like Richard said, tourists too.

And walkable cities, it would encourage that. I shouldn't have to tell you dense development clusters along popular transit lines. That would be just as true in Florida as everywhere else it's built.

There is however one big problem with the high speed rail proposal in Florida. The tracks they'd use on the East coast run along the coast, right through the middle of many of the cities and towns. A lot of people there are opposed to it because they're afraid of increased noise and disruption from high speed train traffic. They have a point but it seems to me far overblown.

[bust]

Again, we massively subsidize highways and auto-oriented development as a general development policy in the US.

So true.

I shared this on another thread, but it's just as relevant here.

The True Costs of Driving
https://www.theatlantic.com/business...-costs/412237/

“Car owners don’t come close to covering the price of maintaining the roads they use.”

“The amount that road users pay through gas taxes now accounts for less than half of what’s spent to maintain and expand the road system. The resulting shortfall is made up from other sources of tax revenue at the state and local levels, generated by drivers and non-drivers alike. This subsidizing of car ownership costs the typical household about $1,100 per year—over and above the costs of gas taxes, tolls, and other user fees.”



Roads in 2007 cost us more than $600 Billion annually than we collected in taxes and fees to pay for them! That was 10 years ago. And you can see the trend.

Do Roads Pay for Themselves?
Setting the Record Straight on Transportation Funding
http://cdn.publicinterestnetwork.org/assets/28b773b9f18cdb23da3e48a8d7884854/Do-Roads-Pay-for-Themselves_-wUS.pdf

[bust]

I've ridden HSR in Spain and China [[both well after 9/11, the 2004 Madrid bombings, and the 7/7 London attacks) and never encountered anything like that, so obviously we have had different experiences. In both places I went through a metal detector and bag x-ray, like in the good old days at US airports, and in China the only real constraint on showing up is the fact that they cut off ticket sales about 15 minutes before departure. Certainly there were no huge crowds waiting to get through the security lines [[wait, aren't we trying to avoid providing easy targets for the terrorists??), no ridiculous body scanners, no TSA hassling you to rip apart your bag or throw away your bottle of Coke, etc.

This has been exactly my experience too. I've taken high speed rail throughout Spain, France, and the Chunnel to London. And regular speed trains [[though still probably faster than ours) in Italy, Belgium, and the Netherlands. Never did security cause more than a few minutes delay. I'll grant that I haven't taken the Chunnel in many years and that train now has more need for security than the others, so things may have changed, but when I rode it it was not an inconvenience at all. Quite the contrary.

European trains are so incredibly convenient because not only do they take you directly from city center to city center in a peaceful and dignified manner, you can usually show up just minutes before the train leaves and still catch it. And if you miss it you can usually just hop on the next one. Most times it won't be more than an hour later.

Meanwhile, I've never been frisked so thoroughly as once when I flew out of Amsterdam. My wife was subjected to a similarly invasive search last October when we flew out of Detroit to New York. To be safe you have to arrive at the airport at least an hour and a half before your flight is due to depart -- for a domestic flight.

[bust]

Last thing I'll say on this topic for now. Growing up in Detroit both Toronto and Chicago were places we went for big city culture. We took the train to Toronto once. It wasn't bad. I had my first Canada Dry ginger ale in the cafe car. It had a pull tab. Strange what you remember.

Today I've left Detroit but my parents still live there. They still go to Chicago often to visit family. They rarely get to Toronto any more but they still go to Stratford every year. They drive.

Once a few years ago they decided to take the train to Chicago. The family they visit in Chicago has cars and they live within a nice weather walk of the L. Having another car there is an inconvenience. Unfortunately, my parents' experience with the train was so bad they never repeated it. It was so darn slow. If it weren't so slow they'd definitely always take it.

High speed rail would be a huge benefit to them. Both from Detroit to Chicago and Detroit to Toronto. If the route to Toronto passed through or offered a transfer to Stratford much better still.

We have an aging population in the US. According to the Population Reference Bureau the number of Americans aged 65 and older is projected to more than double from 46 million today to over 98 million by 2060, and the 65-and-older age group's share of the total population will rise to nearly 24 percent from 15 percent. High speed rail would be a major convenience for many americans, and perhaps especially to them.

Fact Sheet: Aging in the United States
http://www.prb.org/Publications/Medi...act-sheet.aspx

[ABetterDetroit]

Clearing up one point:

I have never been the slightest bit put out or inconvenienced by lines, barriers, bag searches or early arrival. If an earlier post implied that was an issue for me, it was not intended. I was just stating an experience that I had, again things change, sounds like the early arrival time allowance has. When I run into these situations, I chalk it up to what has to be attempted to make women and children safer. Security work is not a job that I would want and always have empathy for people that take those tasks. Nothing is perfect and mistakes get made, but I am not one to think that my time or inconvenience is worth more than other people's lives. Security will be an added cost that is only going to rise for the foreseeable future, unfortunately.

[iheartthed]

I have not been on any of the other European high speed rail trains. Regular passanger trains yes, High speed rail, No.

This was my exact experience as a passanger on the Eurostar. "Passing under the tracks" is not exactly the same correct?

My trips where closer to the years after 9/11/01 than now. I would expect that someone who has actually rode the London to Paris Eurostar more recently would be more qualified to confirm.

Did they take the metal detectors away? Is the secure boarding area now gone? I would find it very hard to believe but I suppose it is possible.

Wikipedia seems to say what I experienced is still in place. See Security.

I throw it back at you Iheartthed. What you are saying is Not True.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurostar

I have been a passenger on this train line and other HSR lines in Europe multiple times. Security has never been anywhere near as complicated as airport security.

[casscorridor]

Eurostar isn't a "normal" European train. Obviously the UK isn't Schengen [[heck, now they aren't even Europe, really).

And "check in" isn't "show up". For U.S. airports you are required to be "checked in" 30 minutes prior to scheduled departure, which is about the same as Eurostar.

Trains work very well within the Schengen zone, but I don't see the relevance here in the U.S./Canada [[again, excepting the unique conditions in the Northeast Corridor).

I take the Eurostar regularly, check in does mean show up. There is no comparison to air travel. It's very fast to go through security and pre-boarding customs. Then the train from London is about 2 hours and you exit the train right in central Paris, from both city centers you can take trains to get anywhere. Meanwhile in Detroit, the People Mover 2.0 moves so slow that you can walk faster! Americans are clueless.

[Bham1982]

I take the Eurostar regularly, check in does mean show up. There is no comparison to air travel. It's very fast to go through security and pre-boarding customs. Then the train from London is about 2 hours and you exit the train right in central Paris, from both city centers you can take trains to get anywhere. Meanwhile in Detroit, the People Mover 2.0 moves so slow that you can walk faster! Americans are clueless.

Yes, we all know that PT sucks in Detroit and is fantastic in Paris. What this has to do with anything or why it means "Americans are clueless" is beyond me.

[softailrider]

My brother took the train to Chicago 2 weeks ago to attend a wedding. The trip over there was fine but coming back there was a delay of almost two hours due to a signal problem crossing a bridge. He wasn't too happy about that, don't know if he'll take the train again.

[Canadian Visitor]

So, the Ontario budget came down today.

It includes 11B for the High Speed Rail project, Phase I.

[[that's Toronto-London).

Will it happen? Maybe. But the current provincial government is a wee bit unpopular.

They announced a ton of new deficit-financed goodies today, this one included.

How much depends on their reelection [[a dubious, but not impossible prospect) remains to be seen.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/windso...dsor-1.4597729

[Pat001]

You can take Via Rail from Windsor to Toronto in just a little over 4 hours. The Windsor station is convenient and parking isn't a problem. Plus, you don't have to let Barney Fife grope you before you get on board like at the airport. No need to spend billions on high-speed rail just to save two hours. IMHO.