The big difference is of course that you can electrify trains, as has happened in much of Europe and Asia, but not for most of Amtrak
The big difference is of course that you can electrify trains, as has happened in much of Europe and Asia, but not for most of Amtrak
tldr: The article is about a specific case that involves old trains + lots of space per passenger + very long distance + diesel engine.
Yeah, which is what you get in the US. Very different in Europe, where distances are shorter, passengers are packed tightly, and the trains are often electrified.
Just to note, this doesn’t apply to every journey, only the really long distance ones.
The problem with electrification however is that while it on average half’s an railroads operating costs, it takes significant upfront investment. Given most of Amtrak runs over fright railroads, and even if it didn’t fright is by far the larger source of carbon, you need to convince said fright railways to make the upfront investment.
Since they are currently in a state of self described ‘managed decline’ as Wall Street and private equity loot the old giants for everything they can, we probably arn’t going to see much progress on that front until Conrail 2, nationalization repairs the US rail system after private companies messed it up round four.
or you just nationalize the railways
Um yes, that’s what I said it would take?
Conrail was taken over by the US government to be privatized as quickly as possible. That is really not the kind of nationalization you want for a railway. It is basically just government support for the private sector.