Instead of "shovel-ready projects" (which was the requirement because politically they wanted to show quick results), there should have been a call for "great ideas that were quickly shelved because in normal circumstances you could never get them funded".
Amtrak train derailment in Philadelphia
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I agree entirely.
Unfortunately, at least in my opinion, the smoke-and-mirrors stimulus programs represented the first example of opacity in what was promised to be the most transparent of all presidential administrations.
Democrats take billions from bridge/road tolls and give the money to their billionaire friends for stadiums and pork projects.
Would you agree that money from bridge tolls should go to the bridges?
Weird. I heard a report on NPR this morning they are one if not the safest form of transportation.
And it's not wrong.
It's not just a question of passenger safety, it's a question of overall value. Additionally, you have to look a bit beyond the statistics.
The safety stats bear scrutiny because the numbers quoted on passenger safety are specifically limited to the number of train passengers killed per year. That number is really low.
What isn't low is the number of incidental fatalities related to commercial rail. The overwhelming majority of rail-related fatalities - nearly 99% - come from vehicle and pedestrian incidents, both on and off grade crossings. On average, about 7 passengers per year die on trains, but the overall average fatality number including non-passengers is just shy of 700. The former number puts rail travel on a par with air travel. The latter compares more favorably with automobiles.
On top of that, rail travel is pretty expensive compared to other modes, both to passengers and to governments. A lot of what I've been saying in this thread is to make the point that rail travel in this country lacks real value. Committing to it would basically mean committing to a U.S. version of "National Rail". I think it's been demonstrated that nothing else works. Amtrak has been hemorrhaging for decades, absent full subsidy. Public-private partnerships, the mere mention of which was tantamount to porn in the transportation industry just five years ago, has yet to become much more than an interesting idea.
I don't think it's any secret that the core of the problem is simply how the country is laid out. It's vast, with a lot of population centers to service over a very wide area. We have good roads. Air travel is plentiful and inexpensive - and safe. Since the American 547 crash in Queens in November of 2001, fewer than 80 people have been killed in 3 separate commercial air crashes. Fifty of those were on Colgan (Continental Express) 3407, which went down outside of Buffalo in 2008.
All this, added to the fact that the speed of rail travel in this country is handicapped by the infrastructure, means that rail travel in the U.S. shows little value. There are exceptions, of course. Commuter rail in the New York metropolitan area is nothing short of amazing. But it's still expensive, even while it subtly colors our perceptions of the overall issue.
Anyway, enough babbling. If you've gotten this far... well, I don't know...
Well I got this far...
Just wanted to say 4Real that everything you've said in this thread (since your OP) has been pretty spot on and hard for me to disagree with (and most of it easy to agree with). With that, I hope you understand why I may have taken your OP as a bit inflammatory.
One minor point of contention I do have though is your counting of "pedestrian and vehicle incidents". I say this only because, as I'm sure you probably know, when it comes to grade crossing accidents, tresspasser fatalities, etc. 90+% of the time the train is not the one who is "in the wrong place at the wrong time".
You're absolutely right.
My point is simply this - if you want to cause any kind of a track incursion on the I.C.E. in Germany (for example) you have to try really, really, really hard.
Within hours of the train derailment, House Republicans voted to cut funding to Amtrak by $251 million to $1.14 billion -- less than half of the $2.45 billion the Obama administration had requested.
Good. Obama would have wasted it just like the $800 BILLION that was supposed to go to shovel ready jobs. Where is the $800 billion? Why would Rs approve ANY more money when Obama wasted the first $800 billion?
Do you want high speed rails like in China? IF so then let me k now when you are ready to follow the same rules they have in China. Let me know when you will support building the rails NON union at a fraction of the cost. Let me know when you will support taxing illegitimate kids like they do in China and we can put that money towards infrastructure.
THe bridge and highway tolls in Pa, NJ, NY take in BILLIONS. Where is the money? Why does a port authority collecting BILLIONS of dollars not have money to fix the bridge? Dems love to divert funds to their pork projects for their billionaire campaign contributors. No money to paint the bridge but plenty of money for sports stadiums. Good job DEms.
YOu still did not answer my questions. Why would we give the DEMs more money for infrastructure when they already wasted billions that was supposed to go to the same infrastructure? Do you agree that bridge tolls should to towards bridge maintenance?
European countries have better infrastructure than we do, more unions, and they pay more wage. It's about a commitment, in this country in certain quarters there is a mentality that the only thing we can spend money on is the military, even when often times the military does not want or need, and is vocal about, whatever the government is trying to "give" them against their will. There is also a "me and mine" mentality where government representatives will bank roll their own districts while everything else rots.
Here in NJ most people make use of our infrastructure every day, and it's in atrocious shape. The idea that we should let bridges collapse because it's just too expensive is abhorrent and the people advocating it would be the first to sue the government if they or their loves ones were on the collapsed bridge, overturned train, etc.
Here in NJ most people make use of our infrastructure every day, and it's in atrocious shape. The idea that we should let bridges collapse because it's just too expensive is abhorrent and the people advocating it would be the first to sue the government if they or their loves ones were on the collapsed bridge, overturned train, etc.
Please take your ridiculously partisan viewpoints over to the CE board where I can have fun mocking you for them. Thank you.
Europe also spends less on education per student, less crime, and they tax welfare. Their unions also get much higher production which results in a lower production cost.
Let me know when you are willing to copy Europe. In Europe they don't need a dozen cops in a school like they do in some of the inner city schools in the US. Not much diversity in Europe.
I never said we should let the bridges collapse. Did YOU? Why do you support liberals who take infrastructure and spend it on NON infrastructure projects? I suggest we pass a law that REQUIRES EVERY dime from bridge and road tolls go to the bridges and roads. Which of YOUR liberal politicians would support my plan? NONE!
How about we copy Europe and stop wasting money on public housing and the money can go towards infrastructure. According to Dems infrastructure creates jobs. Do you prefer jobs or welfare?
Sometimes it does. When you start speaking the truth, I'll let you know if it hurts me.
And again, which parts of what he said vis-a-vis the stimulus wasn't said from a purely partisan viewpoint? I guess you don't like the obvious answer.
If he just said "the stimulus was not spent as it should've been", then I would've agreed. But to claim that it's just Democrats or just Republicans that participate in misspent funding efforts is just pointless, useless, partisan nonsense.
I never said it was a r vs d thing....yes, both parties piss away money...we agree
I was simply pointing out that at the end of the day the stimulus was a failure
I am like Peetey Green. I speak the truth. The stimulus money was supposed to go to shovel ready jobs. Where are the jobs and where is the infrastructure?
Where is the $800 BILLION?
Do you think bridge/road tolls should go to BRIDGES/roads or do you think the tolls should pay for sports stadiums for billionaires?
No doubt lots more could've been done with that money that was apparently done. It's an old story that keeps repeating itself.
I don't disagree with your points regarding spending. I disagree with the contention that it's only Dems that are the problem. It's everyone that's the problem. And I don't just mean politicians. I mean you and me and everyone. We're the problem. When we start accepting that, then we can start to make progress. But not until then.
The problem in America is the average person on the street doesn't pay much attention to an issue until something catastrophic happens.
I agree that that's one problem of many. I think a larger problem exists with those who are paying at least some degree of attention to the issues. I think the average attentive person on the street recognizes that there are problems and wants the problems solved.
But that same person is likely to (a) believe that the problems are mostly the "other" political party's fault, (b) accept as fact the overblown scare tactics funded by special interests and magnified by the media, and above all (c) want someone else to fund any necessary change (be it through tax increases or spending cuts).
I read all of it (and I just went back and double-checked in case I missed something). Why?
Because you seem to be trying to suggest that none of the debate is fact-driven and all of it is partisan. I specifically avoided that, in this thread. There was some solid dialog about infrastructure spending which you seem to want to dismiss, in favor of focusing on one poster in the whole thread who decided to inject a partisan tone.
I'm not dismissing anything that was being said about infrastructure spending. That was informative and interesting and I quietly took it all in. It stood on it's on merit.
When someone posted some partisan crap, then yeah, I felt the need to comment because, IMO, that type of partisanship is doing great harm to our country. If you go back and look, you'll see that I requested that such partisanship be moved over to the CE board in hopes of not cluttering up this thread. But I don't get to make that choice for other people.
To quote Will Smith: "And to be honest, I'd appreciate it if you eased up off my back about it."
I'm a big proponent of infrastructure - and (responsibly) spending money toward that end - especially if it puts people to work.
I would love to see better train service in this country. Whether it is public, private, public-private, or whatever. I want whatever will work.
There has been some good discussion in this thread, but there has indeed been stupid partisan bickering over this issue - at least among politicians. They've got to come together and figure out how to advance rail in this country, one way or the other.
A high-speed national system is almost certainly a pipe dream, but there are populated corridors where it could make sense. Here on the west coast, for example, I think high speed rail would be quite popular, if it existed, between Eugene-Salem-Portland-Tacoma-Seattle-Vancouver, in addition to the planned route in California.
I would love to see better train service in this country. Whether it is public, private, public-private, or whatever. I want whatever will work.
There has been some good discussion in this thread, but there has indeed been stupid partisan bickering over this issue - at least among politicians. They've got to come together and figure out how to advance rail in this country, one way or the other.
A high-speed national system is almost certainly a pipe dream, but there are populated corridors where it could make sense. Here on the west coast, for example, I think high speed rail would be quite popular, if it existed, between Eugene-Salem-Portland-Tacoma-Seattle-Vancouver, in addition to the planned route in California.
Says the winner of this year's Oscar award for his leading role in the CE board comedy: "Partisan Purity and Me".
All of what you propose makes sense to almost everyone. The problem arises during the planning phase, when every jerkwater town that the rail line will run through demands a station. Does it really take 3 - 4 hours to travel from NYC to DC by rail? Not really, until it has to stop at EWR, Newark Penn, Metropark, Trenton, etc.
Doesn't there have to be a balance between efficiency and usefulness? If the train goes from NYC direct to DC with no stops, wouldn't that cut back on how many people actually use the train? I don't know what the Amtrak schedule looks like, but presumably there are "express" trains that make fewer stops and the numbers of such trains are adjusted by Amtrak based on usage metrics.
Edit: A quick perusal of the Amtrak NE corridor schedule shows that there are indeed express trains that bypass several of the stops. So people have a choice about that, which seems fine to me.
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Yes...
The problem with the "local / express" concept in this country is that they run, for the most part, on the same tracks. So it limits the capabilities of the express trains and limits how fast they can go.
The optimal solution is to have a dedicated line for high speed rail making few stops. The people who want to ride Amtrak from Newark, DE to D.C. can take a slower train.
I'm looking at it from a high-speed intercity transport system involving hub-and-spoke route design. I've taken Amtrak from NYC to BOS, PHI, and DC. I've never understood taking Amtrak from Newark to Princeton Junction; that's what NJT is for. I'm pretty sure that's how the high-speed trains in Europe and Asia function too.
Makes sense to me. I wonder how much more expensive it would be to stack railways vertically as opposed to trying to add more adjacent to the one's we have. Obviously expensive either way.
So restrict each state to having one high-speed rail stop? Then people would switch to local trains for intrastate travel? I could live with that.
I think, though, that the fighting in Congress would be intense. For example, Texas and CA are going to argue for more stops due to geographic size. NJ will argue for more stops due to population and percentage of contribution to the tax base.
This is so off I don't know where to begin so let's start with the bolded. Are you implying that diversity requires more policing?
There is actually a lot of diversity in Europe....London is as diverse as NYC and Berlin and Paris, among others, are not far behind.
In Germany, college is free, because the government knows having an educated work force will stave off recession. We don't even have to completely copy that. We can just try to fund higher ed a little.
Europe has less crime because it's more educated, does not treat drug crimes as harshly as we do, they don't allow the mentally unstable or criminal to be armed to the teeth, and they use prison to reform rather than provide a taxpayer sponsored gang incubator.
And your last point is absurd, considering our Republican governor is under SEC investigation for using rail funds to fix the Pulaski Skyway, who allowed the PA to take more toll and PATH money and sqaunder it on One World Trade and employee salaries among other things...not to mention that his employees used the funds to stop traffic for 4 days.
You just want to rant about "liberals" to either distract from Republican obstruction or not address actual problems,
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