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[quote user="YoHo1975"]I agree that not all subsidies are equal. Also, to be clear, I never meant to imply that any specific subsidy was ongoing, only that at any given time for the past 150 years, the government was subsidizing the railroads for the benefit of the public. There is a common misconception amongst the public that commuter or passenger trains are overly subsidized and thus somehow bad. That if the route was worth while, a subsidy wouldn't be needed. My contention is that that is obviously not true. Witness the entire history of transportation. By that logic, airlines are not useful or needed, Railroads of all types are not useful or needed, cars are not useful or needed. In other words, the fact that the government will subsidize this rail line is not a proof the the rail line is of less value than any businesses it may displace. It only means that the immediate business of creating and running that railroad all other things excluded is not a viable private undertaking. The health, and vigor of Wisconsin taken as a whole and the communities of Madison to Milwaukee inclusive specifically may very well see incredible benefits that are not tabulated in there narrow view of the financials of that section of railroad.[/quote]    I agree that the question of whether or not something needs to be subsidized is not a good measure of whether or not it is worthwhile.  And I also agree that Madison/Milwaukee corridor may see benefit beyond just the obvious benefit of transportation.  The only question is whether it is worth it to the rest of the country who must contribute to pay for the Madison/Milwaukee rail project.   <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p> It is not hard to benefit a small region with an improvement if the cost of doing so is spread out to the rest of the country.  The problem is in extending the improvement to the entire country.   <o:p></o:p> Another problem is that these transportation improvements are not just proposed on the basis of transportation need.  The are actively pushed by advocacy groups with an interest in social engineering and changing our lifestyle.  They are pushed by government in interest of expanding government.   <o:p></o:p> HSR is always promoted as a way to give people another choice in transportation.  But, ironically, the massive public spending by the many for the few on HSR undermines the choice of air and highway options.  The promoters of HSR openly admit that the main point of HSR is to get people out of their cars and out of the sky and onto the rails to reduce CO2 emissions.  If it were a matter of choice, they would not be on a mission to change peoples’ behavior. <o:p></o:p> I sometimes wonder if peoples’ love of trains blinds them to these social engineering and socialism aspects of public passenger rail.  If they understood these issues, they would understand how some of us can love trains but reject HSR.  Instead, they give evidence of misunderstanding this with their stated belief that if you oppose HSR, you must be a “train hater.”
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