For the map enthused!
Rules:
post relevant content: interesting, informative, and/or pretty maps
be nice
The US absolutely needs more and better trains. But also, the US has large areas with no population. That's why when you look at electoral maps you need to control population density.
Even with a high quality rail system with support for populated areas of the US the map would still have large gaps and wouldn't be nearly as full as the EU map.
Simply putting two maps side by side and saying "this one bad" isn't great. Yes, it's absolutely bad, but for the exact reasons this map shows.
US also has the advantage of being one big federation with established standards bodies and a federal budget. A train that goes Between Belgium, Netherlands, Germany has to pass through 3 different electrical standards (yes, they are very different), 2 traffic regulations (left or right side), and 3 signalization standards. And they make it work.
Yeah, but excluding entire states is ridiculous.
Is it? There are entire states with populations less than that of major cities.
All roads lead to… Chicago?
Chicago has been a major transportation hub for nearly 200 years, it is the furthest inland you can reach from the sea by ship. cattle arrived from Texas ranches to Slaughterhouses on their way to the east coast. Wells Fargo was founded because American Express didn't want to operate further than Chicago, but they saw there was the opportunity of linking NY to San Francisco by Chicago
Is this joke?
No :(
Why is no one concerned that europe has taken the place of mexico??? Where is mexico now??? How is this not international news?
It's an exchange program so that the Scandinavians can learn to cook Mexican food for us
I once decided to take the train from Denver to Chicago rather than flying. Just to see the country.
One train per day.
Just fucking one train per day.
Amtrak, and the dots in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Illinois saw this and added just a second train between Msp And Chicago daily and ridership exploded, trains sold out. A frequent thing that they do to save money is cut trips, but it's doing so much more harm than good. They're now finally realizing that if you want ridership people want options, they want to be able to arrive close to when they want, and some may want to just show up day of and ask when the next train is.
Here in Seattle they just added a 5th or 6th roundtrip to Portland because each time they do, ridership goes up. Turns out there's a lot of people who would rather not drive.
Germany used to have more 30 years ago. Scheiß Kohl und Schröder
In Europe there is definitely a difference between TGV quality lines and the regional ones which are rarely better than taking the car, sadly (speaking from my years of experience).
I wonder what the map would look like if you at least greyed out the slow lines.
Goes to show how successful the oil and automobile lobbyists. The US passenger railway network is a fucking flop. When will they finally use electric locomotive instead of the pollution belching diesel electrics.
bUt tHe US Is a yOunGEr coUnTrY! wE haVeN't HaD mUCh TiMe tO caTcHuP.
My baby doesn't take the morning train?
It also doesn't acknowledge that a lot of that is just empty space. The US is ranked 180 of 242 nations in population density.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependencies_by_population_density
The US rail system has been bastardized since its inception, but this map is basically useless. The UK has 7x the population density as the US.
And still here in Europe they are not a meaningful alternative to the plane. Taking for example an Amsterdam to Barcelona is an exhausting 12-14h deal (almost 10x as long) and 5x more expensive.
What we need is express trains that go from A to B without stopping anywhere, avoiding city centres and constantly running max speed. If I'm going to Barcelona I don't want to stop in Schiphol, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Antwerp, Brussels, and various cities in France. There should just be a dedicated departure just for that (and judging by how many planes go back & forth daily these trains could certainly be filled). This would cut down on that exhausting travel time a lot. But we lack the high-speed network capacity for that. And won't have it for at least 15 years even if they decided to build them now :( So planes it is.
honestly I wouldn't mind it taking 12 hours, but it also being more expensive just doesn't make any sense at all. Europe needs to stop subsidizing air travel and needs to up its rail subsidies
Yes. In Italy train travel, and especially bus travel, is still somewhat affordable. In most other places you feel just stupid in paying 100€ to cross 300 kilometres when you can go much farther with 30€ on a plane...
Twelve hours to get across a whole continent is fine.
I think we must stop thinking of the whole world being just a few hours away. Travel has to include some actual travelling again.
The will never be enough capacity to connect capitals with no intermediate stops. And let me tell you, it's in general a stupid idea.
12h is not a big deal if travelled overnight. Which is currently not possible. So this what we really miss, not constant 300 km/h direct connections.
And of course, we need to stop taxing passenger rail companies. And maybe re-nationalise them, while we are at it. Forcing free market in the railway has been one of the biggest mistakes of the European Union.
Yeah but what about the size difference between the two countries?
... Oh wait...
...the density is the flex here, not the size of the country. If you put the US rail on your map, you'd think Europeans hate trains.
I mean yes this does show passenger trains but it doesn't actually show all of the passenger trains such as the lines that run in Utah nor south well over a hundred miles carrying passengers for commuter purposes. So there's quite a few lines that are missing on here there's also lines that run up and down the East Coast I know as well and there's other passenger trains and other cities such as salt lake as well.
And Europe is zoomed in too
And, living in enclaves as I have, I always think we don't have much. But it's kinda terrifying how bad the US have it.
Apparently the situation with freight is the opposite, where the US networks are efficient compared to Europe (and even China), hence so much stuff is trucked across Europe instead.
As always, take YT videos with grains of salt, but it makes good points:
Meanwhile, other videos suggest that the US's own passenger rail suppliers (like manufacturers/designers) are basically gone because the situation is so bad, hence companies like Amtrak end up importing EU stuff.
And as a Canadian, I'm even envious of the trains in the US. Pretty much the only thing but here we are.
Anecdote time: I was visiting Europe, sitting in Liège and arrived there from Aachen with a train ticket I bought the day before. My next step was Brussels or Ghent but I wasn't decided yet and didn't have a ticket, so I just bought one on the spot for the next train, in an hour. While eating fast food and waiting for that train, I was trying to book a train in Canada next week when I'd return, to go from Montréal to Drummondville. However I was already too late. There was still available tickets but there were over $100 CAD for a trip that would normally cost about $32 CAD if I would have booked it a month in advance. And the next departure was 3 hours later, still overpriced. So, no train in Canada for me, even a week in advance.
In short, in Canada, there's only 5 trains a day between major cities, and you have to book weeks in advance otherwise the prices can triple if you're last minute. And they don't take bikes. And they weigh your bagage.
So I was in Europe, taking trains last minute here and there, while unable to book a train ticket at a reasonable price for the next week in Canada. VIA Rail sucks so much.
When I got off the ship I worked on in NYC, I could have taken a plane, train or bus back to California and I opted for the bus because I don't like flying (unless I get to be the pilot) and it was cheaper.
I should have taken the train. Fuuuuuuuck the bus.
