More on the (bad) high speed rail idea

I worked as a transportation planner in what seems like eons ago. One of my assignments was to be involved with California's plans for high speed rail. The agency that I worked for even commissioned a study to identify potential sites for high speed rail stations in the Bakersfield area. Consultants love these kinds of projects--easy money, with no liability arising from their conclusions because everybody knows that the project will never come to fruition anyway!

I am glad I got an opportunity to exit this agency and return to academia where I did not have to hide my analyses and ideas behind facades--thanks the intellectual freedom we have. (Or so I thought until I found out otherwise; but, who cares for my sob stories, right?)
Anyway, one reason why I was convinced that high speed rail will never be economically feasible without extensive--I mean extensive--public subsidies was a simple back of the envelope calculation. The calculation was about the out of pocket expenses that a family of three would incur if they drove from their home, say in Bakersfield, to the destination in Los Angeles, compared to the expenses involved with completing the same journey on a high speed train.

To take the train, there are the following explicit cost factors in addition to the fare for each passenger:
transport to the station of origin
transport from the destination station
and then the transport costs to move around in the destination city.

You add these expenses to the fares for the family of three, and it turns out to be way, way, more than the out of pocket expenses if that family had simply gotten into their car and driven. And then, add to this the need to stick to the train schedule as opposed to leaving from home, well, whenever.

Anyway, that is all water under the bridge. That is what I thought, until the recent rah-rah for high speed rail in the US. I suppose such policy ideas are like mythical monsters that never die!

It was not a surprise to me that my graduate school professor, Peter Gordon, has blogged about it--he has a long track record voicing his opposition. It was, however, interesting to note that the UK too is planning on big time expansion of high speed rail. As Johnny Carson would say, "I did not know that!"I liked this comment about the the UK discussions:

Obsessing about high-speed rail also misses the point that every form of transport has its strengths and weaknesses. There are all sorts of factors that people take into account when choosing if and how to travel, like cost, convenience, speed, comfort and flexibility. If you want to travel from city centre to city centre, trains are great for journeys of up to three hours. No check-in, no driving, just turn up and let the ‘train take the strain’. For longer journeys, the hassle of air travel is off-set by the speed (and, given the stupendous prices charged on Britain’s railways, flying is usually cheaper, too). For trips to less popular destinations, or where you need transport at the other end, the car is often the best choice.

So, to make Britain a truly mobile society, we need trains, planes and cars, and the best possible infrastructure for all three. And we need a government that is committed to the idea that mobility is a good thing rather than one that puts the brakes on our transport future.

Yes, sir!