That's because English. I've had very nice journeys where I've chatted with perfect strangers on Spanish trains, and to a lesser extent in other countries in Europe. You do want to understand the unspoken codes that signal "let's talk" or "leave me the fuck alone". Same happens in bars, for example. But yeah, my experiences in trains in Spain have been generally great, with the odd near horror story.

That whole project is a testament to American stupidity. Let’s all get into cars that drive themselves on a 3 mi underground track. It’s like Elon shits ideas from a toddler.

Yes, and it's important to identify why that happens and how it functions, not satisfy ourselves with the certainty that it is bad, or unjust, or unreasonable; which many of these posts end up doing.

The US is the way it is because that is what settler-colonialism and capitalism require to continue. Even when there were periods of "reform," such as the labour and state policies of the welfare liberal era in the 1930s-40s (which is how suburbanism and car dependency came about), or the civil rights movements of the mid- to late-twentieth century (which is how neoliberalism and the liberal appropriation of social justice was achieved), victories in reform are inevitably eroded by these fundamental imperatives.

you must have a job or you will die in the street

And here's the punchline: no more jobs!

It’s the same everywhere. Not just American thing.

And it's all shit that should be paid for with our taxes. But instead, they need to use that money to bomb kids on the other side of the planet.

I don't think having one track would necessarily mean there is only one train route.

They actively don't want that. That means someone else is getting credit for their political capital, and as we all know it's a zero sum game: if someone else is winning, you're losing

Car infrastructure has lower up-front costs, but much higher lifetime costs than rail. That's the real profit making scheme here. That, plus you have to buy a car to opt-in, which is a major expense and one that has to be made every 5-15 years.

Tbh they don't even prioritize the freight, that went away with psr

Passengers is the term you mean, not commuters. I read the first sentence and thought you were going to suggest something that is only open to people coming from and going to work.

But yes, we need passenger rail that's exclusively passenger rail.

Reverse the polarity

Trams for short distance, metro for medium, trains for long and high-speed for very long.

It's trains all the way down.

Well my train has blackjack and hookers

Don't worry, the cost inflation of HS2 could easily be achieved on any maglev project too.

maglev is the closest we can get to a portal network.

Most industry nations around the world are running high speed trains by now. They're doing petty fine I'd say. China threw a ton of money into German maglev tech and there isn't really much to see still. There's a reason most countries gave up on it.

In the end the maintenance cost for maglev vs bullet trains are about the same. Bullet trains focus more on mechanical maintenance of the track and wheels. While the maintenance of maglev is typically more technical, it requires constant recalibration of the electronics and constant monitoring for alignment.

Maglev is definitely more expensive to build and probably to run, but it seems like it'd be far more reliable? And also a much smoother experience for those on-board?

Traditional steel on rail is actually more reliable in practice. Theoretically the basic mechanics of maglev are more reliable, but in practice they tend to suffer from longer delays when they do fail. This is mostly because the repairs/maintenance for traditional rail can be done by just about anyone, where maglevs tend to be locked in by a single vendor contract.

Maglev has much greater theoretical speed limits than typical contact tracks, as, well, we basically remove the friction between the wheel and the track?

They are theoretically faster, but in practice the speed of trains are most often governed not by the limitations of the trains themselves, but instead are limited by the surrounding infrastructure and terrain.

The cruising speed of railed bullet trains are around 200mph, while the cruising speeds of maglev is around 265mph. Maglevs have gone significantly faster around 375mph, but thats not really a realistic expectation for daily operations.

Imo both are extremely cool, but traditional rail is just a lot more practical for a plethora of reasons. The most important being that the installation and operational cost are just a lot more realistic than maglev. There's a reason there's only a total of 37 miles of maglev in operation today compared to over 30k miles of high-speed rail.

Built to spec does do a lot of heavy lifting. American distances are larger than European distances. China has the advantage of a dictatorship which can be decisive.

But the Interstate system was expensive and had a crazy spec and was built and continues to be maintained at an extremely high cost.

Last I heard, maglev is mostly vaporware. Just build good tracks.

“It seems like this experimental tech is going to be more reliable than the proven thing that’s existed since the 19th century.”

You sure about that, hoss?

Trains just don't have the capacity for a 9/11

Not to bring down buildings, but in terms of terrorism they sure do.

Any modern 9/11 attempt will be made by cargo jet. So protection against aircraft bringing down buildings is provided by the US airforce, not the TSA.

A similar number of people would be injured/die from a plane explosion as a train explosion.

Your arguments against no security checks apply equally to trains and planes (and busses).