http://dc.streetsblog.org/2009/08/28/toward-a-positive-argument-for-high-speed-rail/ Your daily source for national transportation policy news and analysis. Thu, 09 Feb 2012 23:57:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 http://dc.streetsblog.org/2009/08/28/toward-a-positive-argument-for-high-speed-rail/comment-page-1/#comment-81821 Andrew Sharp Wed, 02 Sep 2009 11:10:48 +0000 http://dc.streetsblog.org/?p=22681#comment-81821 When I read this article, I was reminded of a lunch-hour lecture given by Dr. M. J. H. Mogridge at University College, London on 17 October 1985: finding this in my archive took a little time. His thesis, "Jam yesterday, jam today & jam tomorrow - or how to improve traffic speeds in central London" was that the best way to improve road traffic speed was to improve the quality of the parallel public transport link. Speeding up a train service between two points would attract people away from the parallel road - allowing traffic remaining on that road to run faster in less congested conditions. I suspect that building high speed rail in the US will have a similar effect. It will attract short distance air traffic out of the air, decongesting the airways and the runways. It will attract medium distance road users - especially those travelling city to city - out of their cars. This will decongest the highways, creating more space for the traffic which has to use them. I agree entirely that transport infrastructure is not built for reasons of financial profit - just to make the place work more efficiently. When I read this article, I was reminded of a lunch-hour lecture given by Dr. M. J. H. Mogridge at University College, London on 17 October 1985: finding this in my archive took a little time.
His thesis, “Jam yesterday, jam today & jam tomorrow – or how to improve traffic speeds in central London” was that the best way to improve road traffic speed was to improve the quality of the parallel public transport link.
Speeding up a train service between two points would attract people away from the parallel road – allowing traffic remaining on that road to run faster in less congested conditions.
I suspect that building high speed rail in the US will have a similar effect. It will attract short distance air traffic out of the air, decongesting the airways and the runways. It will attract medium distance road users – especially those travelling city to city – out of their cars. This will decongest the highways, creating more space for the traffic which has to use them.
I agree entirely that transport infrastructure is not built for reasons of financial profit – just to make the place work more efficiently.

]]> http://dc.streetsblog.org/2009/08/28/toward-a-positive-argument-for-high-speed-rail/comment-page-1/#comment-79961 Robert Pulliam Fri, 28 Aug 2009 21:27:29 +0000 http://dc.streetsblog.org/?p=22681#comment-79961 This all might be true if we were actually talking about building High Speed Rail. The vast majority of plans submitted by the States were for modest upgrades of passenger speeds and not High Speed Rail by international standards. If you're going to do it, do it right. Robert Pulliam Tubular Rail Inc. Houston TX www.tubularrail.com This all might be true if we were actually talking about building High Speed Rail. The vast majority of plans submitted by the States were for modest upgrades of passenger speeds and not High Speed Rail by international standards. If you’re going to do it, do it right.
Robert Pulliam
Tubular Rail Inc.
Houston TX
http://www.tubularrail.com

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