I tried to make it fairly realistic. Obviously I would like HSR absolutely everywhere, but a line through middle of nowhere Montana probably would not see much ridership and would come at extreme cost (especially in the mountains).

  • Magister@lemmy.worldEnglish
    3·
    1 year ago

    Imagine Montréal<->New York in 2h instead of 11h… We could go there the morning like leave at 6AM from Montreal and be in NYC at 8AM, spend the day there, and go back at like 10PM

    • Fried_out_Kombi@lemmy.worldOPMEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      I tried to keep it semi-realistic. There’s a ton of mountains and very few people east of the Cascades. Regular non-HSR trains would still run there. HSR can’t handle nearly as sharp turns or nearly as steep gradients, so building HSR through mountains gets crazy expensive crazy fast. Without population density to support it, it’d probably be a boondoggle to build HSR there. Plus, the vast majority of travel is regional, so most trips in the PNW would be served quiet adequately by having that West Coast HSR line.

      Of course, if the goal were to completely replace airplanes and demolish the interstate system, then HSR might make more sense.