Wasting a lot of money on trains is an obsession with liberals. One, it is a good way to transfer money to their union paymasters. Two, it enables them to feel that they are doing their part to turn America into Europe. I mean, europe has a lot of trains, so we should too. The one thing liberals hate is cars. Cars represent freedom. Freedom to live where you want and do what you want when you want to. Those are troubling concepts for most liberals. They would like you to have to get the government's permission to move, change jobs or stay out late at night. Forget about smoking a cigar. Cars enable the suburban lifestyle that is considered by most people their birthright. For liberals it is an abomination. They want people to be jamed into central cities, arranged bySoviet-style central planning. After all, in europe most people live like that so it has to be a good idea. I will admit the I-95 corridor from Richmond to Boston is at or above its capacity to handle traffic. One good idea would be to force trucks off the hghway and onto rail, but that won't happen. So, we need to either build another road or lay some high speed rail track. Neither will happen. It takes decades these days to do a simple bridge repair or build a tunnel. Somehow our forefathers were able to build the Golden Gate bridge, the George Washington bridge, Manhattan skyscrapers, numerous big dams and the interstate highway system in less time than we have spent trying to build a stinking fence on the mexican border. Oh yeah, they also sent some guys to the moon. Think we could do any of that stuff today? I don't.
This hits it exactly. The Green people also detest air travel. They feel vapor trails kill polar bears. This is a perfect example of Obamaâs plan of incremental Socialism. The backside of this rail program is to put cost pressures on auto and air travel in the form of higher taxes, fees and fuel. They want a world of electric cars and rail. This is a good goal as long as it is market based.
We SHOULD be developing natural gas as a transportation fuel. We're said to have a 100 year supply in the US, and the end-point distribution network is already in place... just have to add natgas pumps to gas stations. There are already commercial fleets which run exclusively on natgas... like UPS. We don't have to invent anything, just do what they do. We don't have to come up with new technology.. .no new engines... just add conversion kits to petrol engines. American unemployeds could be working... building the distribution network and making and installing the engine conversion kits. AND... we at some point could stop sending $60B/month to oil exporters. I know, I know... this makes too much sense. Spending $Trillions on bullet trains is the bomb.
I'm not getting on any train that goes 350 mph. Look at Chicago, there are train disasters nearly every year and those trains go maybe 70 mph. If they can't manage traffic at 70 mph then I have zero confidence they can manage traffic at 350 mph. Even here in LA our little metrorail trains cut cars, trucks and people in half pretty regularly. A full-length loaded train travelling 350 mph has the kinetic energy of a small nuclear bomb.
Well, they could make all the seats 'ejection' seats that would deploy in the event of imminent collision. Of course, you would want to keep your seat belt on at all times because it would be one hell of a ride!
Exactly. Plus, liberals like to build on past "successes" which are actually failures. Like Amtrak and stimulus spending.
Obama has put his bullet train plan into his 2012 budget starting with an $8 billion down payment. But, California has been trying to create a bullet train with our tax dollars and so far has nothing but a "train to nowhere". http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/02/14/bullet-train/
Heaven forbid we spend money on our own infrastructure, when we can pour trillions into Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.
It ain't infrastructure when its just for city folks. I mean, how are they planning to get 80% of the population to use it? Personally I will never ride a train outside of an amusement park for the rest of my life. Trains are marxist-leftist.