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High speed Trains.
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I'm not really sure there is that much demand for HSR for freight--if you want your stuff hauled across most of the USA in less than a week, there's always UPS-Blue and DHL, FedX, even priority mail. Rail excels at hauling commodity but I doubt anyone's going to be much better off paying vastly more money to get, for example, PRB coal to the Gulf of Mexico in two days instead of a week-plus. <br /> <br />Where I DO think HSR is necessary, in addition to the NEC and California corridors, is in situations where two metro centers are fairly close to one another and flying makes no sense. I know of no European country that would entertain the idea of commercial flight from Chicago/O'Hare to Milwaukee/Mitchell, a scant 90 miles away. The pitiful thing is we have -- almost -- a direct link already. Almost. It would require changing on the Antioch line to another depot, preferably Amtrak or Metra-to-Amtrak. The respective train stations are as of now not linked but it could be easily done by establishing a new route. At worst the trains would have to back in and out of Franklin Park. <br /> <br />Just imagine what a fast rail link would do if commercial flights from O'Hare to Milwaukee could be eliminated. The terminal at O'Hare would not be so desperately overcrowded and a proper rail link connection would not take much more time than a flight. And if no one is overadvantaged with a connecting flight, all would benefit. It could even be done with fast diesel trainsets of the regional type that are now available in the US (I think of foreign manufacture). It would also buy some time because even with terminal expansion, it looks like O'Hare will fill up again in not so many years because Peotone planning isn't going anywhere. In essence the terminal would be shedding inefficient flights to Milwaukee for more flights in which the plane truly excels, time-wise (perhaps some day we will have true HSR to Detroit or St. Louis, but not anytime real soon). Imagine how convenient a direct rail link would be if it included only a few intermediate stops: O'Hare - Glenview - Grayslake - Mitchell - Milwaukee downtown. And it wouldn't just be for airplane transfers! <br /> <br />Of course, much the same case has already been made for L.A. - San Diego. Have you ever flown in or out of the San Diego airport? It makes Midway look positively rural. <br /> <br />The problem is, and I think practically all of us would agree, is that nobody looks at the transportation infrastructure in a unified way. Plane is plane and train is either bilevels from the 1950s or even F7s from the Forties in the public's mind. Acela is a privilege of the Eastern Establishment, or so the feeling seems to be among the general public here in the Midwest. Effectively speaking, a fast train would break even in time between O'Hare and downtown Milwaukee and perhaps lose 20-25 minutes relative to O'Hare to Mitchell. Bear in mind, though, that almost no one wants to fly INTO O'Hare and then transfer to Mitchell. Maybe someone coming in on ATA from the west and gathers up baggage to head to Mitchell and Jet Blue, but that's so farfetched the system isn't made for that. And as we know the train doesn't get cancelled for fog or stack up across Lake Michigan.
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