European Tribune - Comments - Monday Train Blogging: Highest Speed

Monday Train Blogging: Highest Speed | 26 comments (26 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)

America ain't leading this parade! (4.00 / 2)

You're probably familiar with America's pathetic efforts in this area. All we have is the Acela, which runs in our only high-traffic train corridor, Boston to Washington. The train can get up to 150 MPH, but the track has a lot of curves and there has been a whole series of technical problems with the equipment.

Here's a picture, anyway.

There is also a high speed test track in a remote region of Colorado, left over from the energy crisis of the 1970s. It's still in use, but dedicated mostly to freight issues like equipment wearout and signaling.

by asdf on Mon Nov 14th, 2005 at 09:53:17 PM EST

Re: America ain't leading this parade! (none / 0)

Yep, I'm familiar with this mess. But others might not, so a few points:

A big crime was to not invest into building dedicated high-speed track on at least part of the corridor. It's not just that the Acela can't reach its top speed on 95% of the distance, but the big US freight trains on the same route cause delays, and a rough track surface, and thus also wheel wear and a rough ride.
The root cause of the technical problems were US safety requirements for passive crashworthyness, which had to be met by making the body much stronger and hence heavier than the French original (the Acela is a TGV spinoff). But this was bureaucratic idiocy: at low speeds, the TGV's active crashworthyness (crash zones like in cars) make up for less strength, while at high speeds, passive crashworthyness doesn't save you, it might kill you: instead of walls beding in, you have to fear hitting the next seat or the compartment wall at a speed a highway vehicle would hit a pedestrian.
True high-speed lines have been proposed at many places in the USA, getting rather far in three places, but Republican politicians fought against it. First in Texas, killed by Dubya. Then in Florida, where a referendum wrote it into the state constitution, was killed by Jeb Bush (in a long campaign of breaking the law and putting forth lies, ending with a second referendum on withdrawing finance - people CAN be fooled). The project still alive is the Californian one, but Schwarzenegger already made noises about wanting to widen highways instead (which was shown to be the worse alternative even on economy in several studies, but who cares).

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Nov 15th, 2005 at 11:02:08 AM EST
[ Parent ]

America's fastest train (none / 1)

BTW, the rail speed record in the USA doesn't belong to the Acela - it belongs to Budd railcar M-497, which the New York Central fitted with two jet engines in 1966:

The image shows it while achieving the 183.85 mph (295.9 km/h) record on 23 July that year, unbeaten to this day. (But, tuasfait, I believe all Shinkansens are nice when compared with this...)

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Nov 15th, 2005 at 11:13:31 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Monday Train Blogging: Highest Speed | 26 comments (26 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

. Home
. About
. Contact
. New User Guide
. FAQ
. ET Editorial Guidelines
. Search
. Search (Google)

Username:
Password:

. Make a new account
. Reset password

Recommended Diaries

Recent Diaries

$1,000,000,000,00
0 or what we must remember
by Metatone - May 19
69 comments

The balance of anger and fear
by Frank Schnittger - May 17
43 comments

Stable pricing is to metaphysics as variable pricing is to...
by Upstate NY - May 16
8 comments

A little American intercine battling
by rootless2 - May 14
27 comments

Another NRW election
by DoDo - May 13
118 comments

Bundesrat saves PV (and loses Röttgen)
by DoDo - May 12
18 comments

The mainstream German Magazine Spiegel asks, has the US mixed ...
by Democrats Ramshield - May 10
27 comments

Short Term Climate Forces: Black Carbon, Methane, and...
by gmoke - May 9

Twenty days of Crisis for Cameron
by ceebs - May 9
22 comments

SYRIZA and the Eurocrats: a letter of intent
by talos - May 9
363 comments

French Parliamentary Elections: a look under the hood
by Bernard - May 8
59 comments

Sunday Train: The Rock Island Line is a Mighty Fine Iowa...
by BruceMcF - May 6
18 comments

Greece election day II - Election diary and info
by talos - May 6
129 comments

Greece: Election day I - some background
by talos - May 6

The Change They Believe In
by ARGeezer - May 5
152 comments

Sarko - "null" points
by Ted Welch - May 3
10 comments

The Rubble Of Neoliberalism
by afew - May 3
100 comments

Bastille May Day 2012 Photos
by Ted Welch - May 2
4 comments

Paris Meet Up 2012 Photo Diary
by Wife of Bath - May 2
32 comments

Antiausterian policies in small countries - feasible?
by talos - May 2
70 comments

More Diaries...

Occasional Series

Click for full list