hey I got a great idea
 

So, get this, Amtrak is losing millions, fare prices on trains keep goign up and ridership keeps going down, lets put MORE money into trains! Thats my new, innovative idea to move this country forward. Railway!
So, whatcha think? Innovative huh? Its my new "back to the future" approach, like 1869!

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Obama unveiled his administration's blueprint for a new national network of high-speed passenger rail lines Thursday, saying such an investment is necessary to reduce traffic congestion, cut dependence on foreign oil and improve the environment.

President Obama, with Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, called for clean, efficient travel Thursday.

The president's plan identifies 10 potential high-speed intercity corridors for federal funding, including California, the Pacific Northwest, the Midwest, the Southeast, the Gulf Coast, Pennsylvania, Florida, New York and New England.

It also highlights potential improvements in the heavily traveled Northeast Corridor running from Washington to Boston, Massachusetts.

Each of the corridors identified by the president's report are between 100 and 600 miles long. The blueprint envisions some trains traveling at top speeds of over 150 mph.

Federal grants would also be directed toward separate individual rail projects that are deemed "ready to go," with preliminary engineering and environmental work already completed.

"My high-speed rail proposal will lead to innovations that change the way we travel in America. We must start developing clean, energy-efficient transportation that will define our regions for centuries to come," Obama said at an event near the White House.

:kewl::kewl: :rotflmao::rotflmao::rotflmao::rotflmao::rotflmao:

"We're going to make travel in this country leaner and a whole lot cleaner," said Vice President Joe Biden, speaking before Obama.


Biden? I think I remember that guy......

Jimmy, is that another article from The Onion? What's next, allocating $12 billion for a covered wagon network across the country?

come on kids, we're headed to the beach this weekend!

The only reason I don't take the train when traveling between Boston and New York or DC is because the time it takes doesn't warrant the price.

I just looked into prices and times for a mini-vacation I took the little lady on to DC. Trains were slightly less expensive than flying, but took 10 hours to get to DC.

We ended up driving. Took us 7.5 hours and the cost of fuel/parking were cheaper than 1 train ticket. If the trains weren't so heavily inefficient, we would have taken a train.

I have a great idea.
Instead of complaining about everything, why not present a solution?

You have kids, I'm sure you got to a point where it didn't matter what your kids were whining about, it all sounded the same. That's what posts like this have come to and why they get little response.

thanks for asking!

1. Its a fact that most white collar businesses are moving away from cities to suburban campuses. This has been a growing trend over the last 10 years. Look at the boom for cities like Raleigh, silicon valley, waltham MA and others. Costs are much less. As a result, people drive farther. Trains are not going to help this situation. No one complained trains are slow, so how is a high speed rail going to help???
My suggestion is to explore options to make it less expensive and less dependent on transportation.
- work out benefits for companies to offer more work at home options. Hell, all day I work with people all over the country and India and Ireland. I can easily do my job from home. Also, I wouldnt shower every day so that would save more resources.
- in San Fran, the bridges offered no toll for people carpooling. this is 4-5 bucks each DAY that people save for people with multiple passengers. The feds need to come up with ways to benefit people who carpool. How about some gas tax credits for people who have more than 2 passengers in a car? Just a thought, not sure how it would work.

Johnny, the key is THOUGHT, not throwing money at things! lets think about how businesses can make money while we clean transportation, put a benefit on INNOVATION!!!

hahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahhahaha

suck it

7.5 hours! Holy crap, you were hauling. It takes me 10, And I'm pretty fast. You must have really needed that quality time alone.:angel:

How many of the Obamarites are going to cry when a couple hundred thousand acres are cleared, homes and land are taken, and a 100 mph train blows through their hood.

Sounds like a good idea if you ask me. I'd much rather take the train than drive between cities.

-spence

Yeah, Spence. The train is great if you don't mind a long ride in a crowded compartment with a bunch of strangers. It's even better if you can limit your travel between a handful of cities along specific corridors of the US. While you're riding the rails, why don't you go back to wearing peasant pants and a derby hat?

That is moving but in the realm of not too bad traffic, well, not too bad. I used to go from Dedham to halfway between Baltimore and Annapolis and would typically average 6.5-7. Did it once in 6.5 towing a 20' boat.

Personal best was 5 hours 15 minutes (including a 125mph stint over the Tappen Zee) :bo:

Oh, where were we? Train, umm, yeh. If the Acela was able to live up to its design requirements (vaporspecs) it might be a worthy alternative to flying...

My point from the other thread made... :claps:

i'm kinda of glad that you guys do not drive for a living. use to drive for a r.i. tr#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&g co. from cranston r.i. to fredricksburg. va. it's considered to be a legal 10 hr. trip in a 18 wheeler. needless to say, we were a lot quicker than that. use to run 13 from del mem. bridge to 50 w. outside of d.c. a hell of a lot quicker than 95.

Isn't he the US VP who said it's Patriotic to pay more taxes???

If so I heard, according to author Arthur Brooks, going back 9 years on Joe's Fed income tx returns the most he gave to charity in a year during that period was a whopping $360.

Then in 2008 while running for VP his adjusted gross income was $270,000
and suddenly he got very benevolent and gave $1800 to charity.

What is that like .60 of 1%?

Funny, I usually take the train to NYC and have never had that experience.

Also, just because we have better train service DOESN'T MAKE IT MANDATORY.

-spence

I've taken the train to NYC as well and would rather either drive or fly. As much as 95 south in CT is terrible, if you time it right, you can make it to NY faster than on the train.

High speed Overhead Mono Rail trains over existing major highways
connecting cities would do alot for cutting traffic and polution imho.

That coupled with more work at home and staggerd work hours would
go along way in helping stop and go congestion.

No way, not if you're going into Manhatten. I'll never drive again...faster to ride the Acela in business class where I can work the entire ride instead of dodging semi's. Even with zero traffic it's faster to take the express from Providence.

-spence

The big problem with the Acela is that the tracks between New Haven and Washington are a series of curves, and there are a number of old bridges that they have to slow down to cross. They can boogie along between Boston and Pawtucket, and again when they get out of Providence, but once they hit New Haven, it's like playing Twister the rest of the way into NYC.

To make this work, you'd have to rebuild the entire Northeast Corridor by straightening the tracks and eliminating grade crossings (there are several grade crossings in southern RI and estern CT that don't even have gates :doh: ).

Outside of the Northeast Corridor, Amtrak doesn't own the railbeds and rights of way, and their trains are often delayed by the dispatchers from the freight railroads that do own the tracks, as they'd rather make an Amtrak train wait while their profitable freight traffic proceeds.

This would be a multi-trillion dollar operation, and even then ridership isn't guaranteed.

I remember reading frequently in the mid 90s that Acela would do this and Acela would do that, problems would disappear etc... Back when journalism had someone research the cons to a proposal there were a few people saying it wouldn't be possible to hit their times because of New Haven west through nothern Jersey. Who knew the naysayers were correct??

Off topic, but speaking of trains.. I thought i would share one of my favorite youtube clips.. :bl:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1F84UqpvhU

Google maps says 7hrs 28minutes, but that's driving straight with no stops. Stopped once for fuel and a second time so the little lady could pee. 15 minutes each stop.

How fast I drive depends on the people around me. If I can, I'll hope in a group of people driving fast to give me a PD buffer in front and behind me. Otherwise, cruise control is set at 4-6MPH over the speed limit.

It all comes down to planning your trip. Have to plan it early enough so you are on the early end of rush hour in Providence but the tail end of rush hour in New Haven.

Right! Its only mandatory that I PAY FOR IT !!!!!!!!!!!

Good point...

RIJIMMY, you're officially banned from driving on any of MY roads. I also assume you're going to opt out of Medicare when you retire.

-spence

A BIG ear to ear Grin says
 

RI JIMMY ? :hf1:
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.keep them great ideas coming :rotflmao:

I think it's spelled Manhattan, and Acela goes to Penn station only doesn't it? When we've gone to visit my wife's aunt in Manhattan, we've flown and driven. If you're flexible, you can fly for about the same or less than the express train. Also, when we've driven it hasn't been too bad. I can do the drive in right around 4 hours. The Acela is about 3 hours and then the cab to Manhattan, plus the drive to Providence and parking. I've taken the regular Amtrak to NYC and it takes about 3.5 hours and costs about $100. I don't mind the trains, but I prefer to drive or fly.

Of course, when I go to NYC it's not for business. I could definitely understand taking a train over driving if you want to get some work done or relax.

My only complaint about putting money into the rail systems now is that to me, there are areas where the money could better be used. The rails are used by a very small percentage of people. I'm all for less auto emissions and less traffic, but right now there are bigger fish to fry than the choo choo's.

I mean I'm paying for a "new" high speed rail which will provide VERY little impact to the problems O is trying to address. It wont be mandatory, but it wont be successful either.

Instead of trying to attack me, please tell me how a multi-billion dollar investment in rail is the way to go? Its a waste of money that could be better spent elsewhere. What happened to the "Manhattan like-Project" to find a solution to oil? I'd support billions for that. TO me, I thought that was the big "change" we'd get from Obama. Not some re-hashed attempt to revitalize a dying industry.
Its weak and a waste of money, please convince me otherwise.

Sooner or later, you have to spend money on infrastructure. The federal interstate highway system was begun 50 years ago, and parts of the major N/S and E/W routes are almost that old. Pretty soon we're going to be dropping a bridge a week into major rivers across the country if we don't start throwing money into it. Or developing an alternative. As much as it will cost to build high speed rail links between major cities, it will cost 10 times as much to rebuild the entire Eisenhower Interstate system, and 100 times as much to build its replacement.

Have you drven over the Braga Bridge lately??--tell me that your knuckles don't get a little white when you look up, see all that rust on the superstructure and grab the wheel a little tighter. Trucks with more than two axles can't cross a bridge on the major N/S Interstate route between Boston and NY, as we speak.

There aren't any easy answers. Train travel between cities is going to look mighty attractive come the day that we spend as much money per gallon on gas as the Europeans do, or we piss off the wrong sheik and have to spend 2 hours in line on odd/even days waiting to get enough fuel to get to Grandma's for Thanksgiving.

The big problem is, we ignored it for too long. We should have been looking for solutions like this 36 years ago when our dependence on foreign oil was brought to light by the first embargo.

more and more businesses are moving out of cities, look at the massive growth in suburban campuses. Why invest to support a declining need?

your right Mike, the answers are not easy, but apparently throwing billions at a problem is. Thats my gripe. Show me a detailed cost benefit analysis for this project? My company doesnt spend 500K on anything unless we do a detailed analysis. Is it too much to ask our government to do that? Where is the new, smart, hip approach???????