279
This image works for canada as well, 😭😭😭
I hate living next to the US.... we take all their bad ideas and almost none of the good ones
I just watched a talk about a local commuter railroad here in Sweden (the only narrow gauge railroad in the country with commercial traffic), and the improvements that has been done on it in the last decade.
And it is staggering, new trains, new track, higher speed, higher capacity, safer track with fewer crossings and more bridges/tunnels, new plattforms with better lighting to enhance safety for lone travellers, better singage, and more.
Yes it costs a lot, but the added tax revenue from people being able to reach better paying jobs and bring the money home will more than compensate for that.
It is just so sad that this isn't realized in the US.
People have to drive cars, because the United States is too big. If you overlaid the U.S. on the map of North America, it'd stretch from Tierra del Fuego to Helsinki! That's why we don't build compact, walkable cities with the necessities of daily life near where people live, the country is too large and there's just not enough space!
</most reasonable carbrain take>
I just wish there was a way I could frighten pedestrians or throw waste out the windows on trains. I really like doing these things in my truck and would hate to give that up.
If I can't nail someone upside the head with a pissgallon while I drive over their toddler, I'm frankly disinterested
Well rolling coal on trains is well-established technology, we just have to go back to it.
Yeah, but have you considered one more lane? Checkmate.
"This time it'll be different! :D"
Also, trains don't really exist, let's not waste time on would-be tech
wait wait wait wait wait wait wait
fuck cars obviously but more than 250 million PER MILE sounds like it was taken out of "tales from the 1923 hyperinflation".
I assume it was the full cost, not the cost per mile
The full cost is (conservatively) expected to be $126 BILLION.
holy f-ing shit!
I know in France, ten-ish years ago, high speed rail cost about 1 Million € per km... even if it increased ten fold, that still would be roughly about 20 MILLION per mile.
insane ! either I'm missing something crucial, or you guys are getting ripped off
The Texas government is heavily Republican, and Austin is heavily Democratic, so the state has a grudge against the city. The cost for this project is to literally destroy large areas of the central city to make room. It's worth the cost in their minds to "pwm the libs."
It's hard to convey to people outside the U.S. just how psychopathically evil Republicans are.
wow
Most of that cost is not from construction itself, not even from buying the land, it is legal (a lot of openly anti-rail legislation intended to inflate costs and risks), red tape, judicial stuff, frequent replanning due to insecure funding, political infighting ...
Hard to find where that exact number came from, but nope, that's approximately the cost per mile.
pure insanity
Damn I really thought trains could work, but you have convinced me! I love cars now!
I have some hope of rail being built in my area. I really hope it doesn't fall through.
Trains work great in the USA. We didn't invent them but we've sure had our way with them.
- We have thousands of miles of track which ships millions of tons of freight every year.
- We have a system of moving passengers around the country which, while not perfect, still manages to function despite multiple alternatives.
- We have thousands of miles of commuter trains around metropolises that move people to the city and out of the city everyday.
- We have above ground light rail trolleys in some places, though not as many as we once had.
- We have multiple kinds of underground trains; ones that move people through subways and ones that move material out of mines.
- We even have trains that are purely for entertainment value, usually called heritage railroads or tourist trains.
- Oh and lots of airports have a small automatically controlled train that ferries passengers along the terminals.
Freight trains work great in the US, much better than in much of Europe btw, with a considerably larger freight share. In terms of passenger rail, the US is however a developing country, at best. Some metropolitan areas still have proper dense rail based transit but really but not many. Those systems are basically limited to the East Coast and Chicago, with only NYC really having an impressively large network but even that has seen disinvestment for pretty much a full century.
Sure but every large city and many medium to small cities have mass transit via buses. Not technically trains but if we're talking passenger mass transit it's better than nothing. America isn't really a developing country when it comes to passenger service, that sort of insults everyone. India is a developing country and they pack so deep onto trains that they ride the roofs and hang off the sides. America had a very large passenger network at one time, which downsized because of the publics adoption of automobiles. It's very developed, you're ignoring cities that have a metropolis rail system like LA, Philly, etc. The cities that tend to have none at all are southern cities that got built up in the last 50ish years once AC became common place (Texas.) Even then I think some of those communities are pushing for some passenger rail service.
Thing to remember is we'll never have anything like Europes system because most European countries are the size of an American state. We have such vast distances between some major cities (new york to LA) that you can't reasonably expect a passenger rail system.
The USA has the largest passenger rail network on earth… if you’re willing to hop freight. Schedules & customer service leave something to be desired.
And the precursors to the freight companies were often the railroad companies themselves who at one time offered passenger service until the services became unprofitable. Society killed mass passenger service. The government then bailed them out and created a subsidized passenger rail service, which the public widely mocked for decades, because car culture was king.
And while this was happening the more profitable sectors of passenger railroads in the USA (big city subways/trolleys and metropolis rail) were actually profitable and experienced a continued growth for the most part. Amtrak still has its problems but has achieved some success in these areas (east coast is better suited for passenger rail and sure enough Amtraks most popular lines are on the east coast.)
Everybody get out there on the freeway. Support America's Job Creators!
Bro the fact this needa a [Satire] tag is really sad.
If they could just make Amtrak run on time…
They could but we sold all the rail to corporations if they promised to let the people go in front of freight. Then don't bother enforcing that.
TBF I'd love to be able to check my car on a plane
There are trains where you can check your car… the Auto-train between DC and Florida is one example.
I know just like I know I can air cargo my car but the idea of the clerk asking if I'll be checking anything and replying with something like yea my VW makes me smile.
Air ferries were a thing.
Where are you flying to that doesn't already have cars?
plenty of airstrips in alaska don't have cars by them
Do you know how much rental cars cost these days?
Less than airlifting a 2-tonne car, I'll wager
I think it would be fun to say fly into Munich and take a road trip to Lake Garda in my own car
trains need to appear better to the average american in order to get the funding to improve their infrastructure
this post was submitted on 14 Oct 2026
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