Quote:
Originally Posted by P-hack
Oh, and apparently the high speed trains are electric (without needing fancy batteries), with a large renewable component, and they have an extensive network with some measure of privatization, serving even small villages.
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High speed trains ...
Horribly expensive, both the trains and the required infrastructure.
So expensive they'll never pay for themselves.
Sharing the rails with slower trains adds complexity - and even more cost.
You need long stretches of extra tracks and some serious planning to get slow traffic out of the way of the HST.
If you google Fyra, you can see what a disaster the HST train between Brussels and Amsterdam has become.
Information on fyra.com is completely bogus : service has been suspended due to abysmal reliability and severe safety reasons.
Fyra usually blocked the track completely, and as a safety measure, in both directions ...
HSTs are even more intrusive on the landscape than a highway, as corners and grades are very limited.
If you let them serve small villages, it's not a HST anymore.
The electricity can have a renewable component, but it doesn't necessarily.
Unless the train company buys into renewable electricity on a grand scale, it'll be nukes, gas and coal ...
Trains are usually safe.
But when things go wrong with a HST at speed, they go seriously wrong.
Over here, they're government - read union - controlled, so they are the ones who decide wether or not your train will be running ...
For me, that's enough to pass 'm up.