[Ache]

www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,91 ... 23,00.html

I rode a train from Miami to Orlando — and I liked it.
I relaxed in a comfortable seat with Shaq-worthy legroom. I avoided the hassle of the airport and the maniacs on the highways. I did some phone interviews, read a book about the Compromise of 1850 and watched Funny People on my laptop; it wasn't Amtrak's fault the people weren't funny. In the dining car, I enjoyed a chat over lasagna with a train buff who shared my aversions to traffic jams, exurban sprawl, global warming, gas-guzzling SUVs with ludicrously rugged names, car alarms that go off at 3 a.m., the Chrysler bailout, the Toyota scandal and other by-products of our automotive culture. At one point, our train stopped in the middle of a classic old-Florida ranch, alongside a majestic oak dripping with Spanish moss, and I remember thinking, There's no better way to see America.
Unfortunately, for the next half hour, we remained beside that oak tree. Door to door, the entire journey took 10 hours for a trip I usually drive in four. My seat cost only $36, but taxis to and from the stations cost twice that. Even for car haters like my wife and me — at our wedding (in a train station), the rabbi advised us to stay off the road if we wanted to stay married — slow-speed rail is a tough sell. And most Americans aren't car haters.


Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... z0x0XAxMUk

[Plantagenet]

Obama missed a huge opportunity in 2009 to direct more then a TRILLION dollars in stimulus funds and budget supplements Congress voted through to target the building of something useful, like high-speed rail across the USA.

Instead, the money was wasted on thousands of make-work projects and political boondoggles that did little permanent except add another 1.5 trillion dollars to the national debt.

[Sixstrings]

Obama missed a huge opportunity in 2009 to direct more then a TRILLION dollars in stimulus funds and budget supplements Congress voted through to target the building of something useful, like high-speed rail across the USA.

Instead, the money was wasted on thousands of make-work projects and political boondoggles that did little permanent except add another 1.5 trillion dollars to the national debt.

I posted at the time that the stimulus should be used for a new national high speed rail infrastructure. That's the only way stimulus can work, if it creates a game-changing platform for private enterprise to build upon. Paying teachers is not stimulus. Creating something new that didn't exist before is.

Anyhow Plant.. I think the writing's on the wall that the US is going to be left to rot and go the way of Detroit and the dodo bird. The powers that be are spending infrastructure dollars in China, not the US. That's what you have to understand here.. they don't WANT to modernize our infrastructure because the future is in Asia, not here.

[Newfie]

Can High-Speed Rail Get on Track?

Not a chance.

For oh so many reasons.

I we aren't even really trying for high speed rail, just HIGHER speed rail.

Estimates for PTC are in the 3 to 9 billion dollar range.