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[quote user="Railway Man"] [quote user="Bucyrus"] The question should be this:  Will HSR attract a large enough number of business travelers who would otherwise fly or drive, to make HSR profitable or be able to be built and operated without a public subsidy?   But I suspect that the proponents’ assertion that begs the question does not go that far.  The assertion probably stops at attracting a substantial number, and argues that even if HSR does not turn a profit, it is justified by taking a substantial number of cars off of the roads.  Moreover, nobody can argue whether a number is substantial or not. [/quote]  The question is not whether HSR can be built and operated without public subsidy.  The question is higher level:  "What is the best value that can be delivered for the input?"  Take all the dollars spent on all the cars, highways, airplanes, airports, railways, etc., and the benefits delivered, and the future growth rates, and the discounted value of money, and run the spreadsheet to show which has delivers the best cost-benefit ratio.  This is a lot of work, but it's not impossible or impractical, especially in a defined corridor such as Los Angeles-San Francisco or Chicago-Minneapolis. It's not only possible to argue how many cars will be taken off the roads, it's possible to demonstrate a highly reliable estimate using data that has been collected from a broad variety of different examples. It's also possible to demonstrate the reductions in accidents, air emissions, pavement maintenance cost, new highway capacity cost, wasted time in traffic cost, reductions in property values, inventory carrying cost losses, excess warehousing charges, and lost tax revenues.   I and the people that work for and with me do this on a regular basis (though not yet with HSR specifically). I haven't yet seen in this forum a link to a convincing, sober, honest, alternatives analysis, not prepared by an ideological advocacy group, that compares investing XX dollars into HSR vs. XX dollars into more airports, airplanes, highways, and cars.  It could be done.  Maybe someone's already done it, AASHTO perhaps. RWM     [/quote] Well that is another question different from my question.  And my question is only my interpretation of the question posed by Aricat.  Your question of determining the best value that can be delivered for the input seems like a rational approach, but I don’t know how anybody can trust the answer to a question arrived at by such a complex formula.   How can you measure benefits delivered when comparing the power efficiency of public transportation with the freedom and convenience of the private automobile, for instance?  And how can you factor in all of the competing agendas and special interests of the public and private sectors that will skew the argument?  There are lawmakers who already have an irrational view of the private automobile.  Trying to come up with an objective assessment of the best value for the input seems like that proverbial example of scientifically predicting how the weather is affected on one side of the earth by a butterfly flapping its wings on the other side.
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