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With HSR, endpoint inhabitants in major cities will have a new alternative to travel fast and convenient from city to city. But the people in between are likely to end up with fewer train connections (high-speed trains make few stops), or no train station at all. Because of the need to make HSR-lines very straight, it is also likely that the in-between stations will be built away from city centres, surrounded by malls and shopping centres in connection to the new station. The effect of that is - as we all know - increased car dependence.
Here they touch on some real problems with some HSR projects, but assume that it can't be done another way.
Building HSR is extremely expensive and, as a consequence, so is their ticket price. Since the HSR service started running from Paris to Brussels, there is no regular train service left on the route. Ticket prices on the HSR-line are very expensive, and so the budget traveler ends up with two options: bus or car.
There are no direct trains, but there are lots of trains on partial sections. And it was the original system in France that showed how things can be done differently: on the first high-speed line, ticket price was the same as for trains on the parallel conventional line. Then higher peak hour and lower off-peak prices were introduced as a means to limit rush-hour crowding, and advance purchase is favoured... Paris-Brussels tickets range between 44 and 82.
The author also forgets to mention the increase in the number of Thalys passengers relative to the old number of train (and plane) passengers. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
BTW, forgot to give a comparison. Paris-le Mans, TGV: 17.00-51.60 (with 31.50 appearing the most common reduced price), TER: 29.00. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
Those three cities alone are going to be utterly transformed by this project, and in very positive ways. Each city has a lot of potential to thrive - they just need something to encourage greater development in the city centers, and need better connections to the Bay Area and LA. I wonder what might provide that... And the world will live as one
However, the HSR system will be the demographic equivalent of putting Lenin on a sealed train bound for the Finland Station. It will make Fresno a desirable place to live for people currently priced out of LA or the Bay Area, producing over time a more Democratic electorate. This is what happened further north, when the Tracy area became home to folks priced out of the Bay Area who ousted a longtime Republican member of Congress in the 2006 election.
Fresno will be utterly transformed by HSR. If its right-wing residents understood the nature of that transformation they'd fight the train to the death. So far though, they have other things they're focused on...for now... And the world will live as one
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