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The USA's rail lines are privatized and they're anything but "shitty" and "expensive" considering they're lower cost than trucking.
by dffdsa432 3y ago
The USA's rail lines are privatized and they're anything but "shitty" and "expensive" considering they're lower cost than trucking.
- lostlogin 3y agoUS rail has been in the news lately, with apocalyptic skies and chemical rain. Safety issues abound. What are you seeing that I don’t?
- dffdsa432 3y agoThere are 3 million rail cars moved per day that haven't produced apocalyptic skies and chemical rain. You misrepresent the overall safety of private rail lines.
- katbyte 3y agoUs rail lines are horribly mismanaged https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jNkYNjADoZg https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jNkYNjADoZg
- ben_w 3y agoMy experience of American railways as a tourist is having to show my passport to book a ticket from Davis to Sacramento (I assume I also did that on other trips like to SFO but don't remember), and it being expensive. My experience in the UK and Germany is show up, pay, go, and it being cheaper.
- dffdsa432 3y agoUS consumer rail way is a quasi public corporation (Amtrak) that has lost money for decades and is still funded to the tune of over $1 billion per year. You are confusing that with private US rails.
- ben_w 3y agoIf you're going to insist on focusing on that, I think you'd already missed the point of what you were replying to in your comment that I replied to.
- dffdsa432 3y agoThe parent is still wrong. Customers of private rail lines can use competing services (trucking) which they often do.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- Qwertious 3y agoUS private rails own the railways and, while in theory they are required to give way to passenger rail, are so long and take so much time to cross that in practice passenger rail is forced to adhere to the time-schedule of private rail. This is arguably illegal and only exists because the govt refuses to enforce the obvious interpretation of the agreement. Meanwhile, the US DOT has historically always taken the approach of "the solution is more highways. What's the problem?", losing far more than $1B/year.
- ClumsyPilot 3y agoUS rail is okau for cargo, but there are third world countries with better passenger services.
- giaour 3y agoWe're talking about passenger rail here, not cargo. Amtrak has a legally mandated monopoly, so you can only compete with them by building your own rails or using a different travel mode (e.g., bus or air). If you find their service to be good and cheap, I can only assume you've never ridden a train in Europe.