Biden announces funding for high speed rail... like we'll ever see it happen
Look. I want it. I want to believe. But California is the perfect case to show that this won't happen. Especially through different Presidents. The next Republican president will undo this funding.
Additionally, $8 billion is nowhere near enough for this investment. It's off by a factor of 10, at least, I think.
Today, the Biden-Harris Administration is announcing $8.2 billion in new funding for 10 major passenger rail projects across the country, including the first world-class high-speed rail projects in our country's history. Key selected projects include: building a new high-speed rail system between California and Nevada, which will serve more than 11 million passengers annually; creating a high-speed rail line through California's Central Valley to ultimately link Los Angeles and San Francisco, supporting travel with speeds up to 220 mph; delivering significant upgrades to frequently-traveled rail corridors in Virginia, North Carolina, and the District of Columbia; and upgrading and expanding capacity at Chicago Union Station in Illinois, one of the nation's busiest rail hubs. These historic projects will create tens of thousands of good-paying, union jobs, unlock economic opportunity for communities across the country, and open up safe, comfortable, and climate-friendly travel options to get people to their destinations in a fraction of the time it takes to drive.
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How Atlanta owes MARTA to Seattle
So I was perusing the Seattle subreddit and there was a post asking people to take the bus rather than drive. And in the comments there was a mention that Seattle's subway was actually in Atlanta. Digging into that, I discovered this article from 2015 which recounts what happened and why money which Seattle could have used to build a subway ended up funding Atlanta's MARTA.
Seattle once moved commuters mostly by rail. Electric streetcars and trolleys crisscrossed town a century ago, while Interurban trains ran every half hour or so, carrying passengers to stations located on a line traveling from Tacoma to north of Everett at speeds up to 60 mph.
But in the 1930s, as cars became more affordable, they pushed out trains. Buses replaced city street cars. The rail era faded even more quickly in the post-World War II boom years.
Rail almost made a comeback. As Seattle's population grew in the 1960s, civic leaders formulated a plan to build a 49-mile rapid transit system – a subway that would carry people underground throughout the city, then speed commuters above ground to points north and south. The proposed system would have crossed Lake Washington on I-90 to Bellevue and on to Redmond.
The federal government offered hundreds of millions to cover 80 percent of the costs. The project was named Forward Thrust.
Opponents feared mass transit would spur more growth and said it was too expensive. The Boeing downturn that prompted the famous Seattle billboard, "Will the last person leaving SEATTLE – Turn out the lights," doomed it for good.
King County voters rejected the regional bonds necessary to fund the rail plan—first in 1968 and then more decisively in 1970--leaving $900 million in federal funds on the table, or more than $5 billion in 2015 dollars.
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"How to Quit Cars"
The article is a high level review and summary of two books: Carmageddon by Daniel Knowles and Henry Grabar’s Paved Paradise.
Carmageddon by
Paved Paradise by
I strongly agree with the thrust of this article. Ending cars and changing the perspective from necessity to outright evil. Sadly, as the article explains, it is not an easily solved thing - especially in America.
My work is about to change offices. Out of curiousity I looked up the comparative commute times for me. If I drive my own car. I can make it in 20-30 minutes. Using public transit I'm looking at 75-90 minutes. Now, there is some attraction to this in that I am not paying for gas. The responsibility of driving is gone. I could even sit and work on the laptop or something possibly. But that difference in time is dramatic. If I could make the trip in 45-60 minutes I very much would make this change. But that length of commute increase is tough as it would require me to be away from home for an hour more each day.
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