this post was submitted on 11 Oct 2023
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[–] Neato@kbin.social 48 points 1 year ago (6 children)

Hyperloop was invented to try to kill light rail. It succeeded at killing Maryland's new venture and Illinois'. Neither were built because Hyperloop promised bullshit. Elon hates public transport.

[–] Rozauhtuno@lemmy.blahaj.zone 25 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Elon's main thing is selling cars, of course he actively opposes whatever would let people not buy a car.

[–] gatelike@feddit.de 2 points 1 year ago

guy who sells cars spreads FUD about competition to cars

[–] wowbagger_@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago

Wait, what did Hyperloop kill in MD? It looks like the proposed route was from DC to Baltimore underneath MD 295 – we already have Amtrak and MARC serving that corridor.

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[–] red@sopuli.xyz 41 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Ya all looking at this like it's a conspiracy. It's just a guy looking to sell more cars. Shame on anyone who thought it's a real thing.

[–] Peppycito@sh.itjust.works 8 points 1 year ago

I'm looking at China like this-

[–] Peaty@sh.itjust.works 40 points 1 year ago (4 children)

China has the advantage of not having to care about the citizens' desires in regards to be relocated to make the rail possible.

[–] zephyreks@lemmy.ml 28 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Kelo v. City of New London. That's all you need to know about the US' "care" for citizens' desires as far as eminent domain is concerned.

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[–] Peddlephile@lemm.ee 21 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

They also provide apartments to live in permanently for those displaced in the development.

Meanwhile, the US has not built high speed rail and has tent cities.

In the case of national infrastructure, China wins hands down.

Although it's kind of ridiculous to compare California with an entire country...

[–] sweeny@sh.itjust.works 19 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Honestly not that ridiculous of a comparison considering California's size and GDP, we could be doing a lot better

[–] Peddlephile@lemm.ee 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] clutch@lemmy.ml 9 points 1 year ago

Except it is considered "unamerican" for government to help people, and tue generosity of billionaires is hoped for instead

[–] bufalo1973@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 year ago

Spain wants to have a little chat with you

[–] xenoclast@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

I don't think America gives any shits either. They let the world's most useless CEO dictate their future

[–] uniqueid198x@lemmy.dbzer0.com 12 points 1 year ago (4 children)

This is misleadingly reductionist. California high speed rail has made consistant progess in that time. That progress has been slower than ourslowest expectations. It demonstrates the void of expertise the US has in rail megaprojects. However, that expertise is being built, slowly and painfully. Its still forward progress for a nation which tore up half its rail overthe last 50 years.

[–] DragonTypeWyvern@literature.cafe 7 points 1 year ago (3 children)

America invented rail megaprojects.

America still has the largest rail network by far. It's well more than twice the size of China's.

The only interesting note is that it's almost all freight compared to other nations' use of passenger rail.

[–] corship@feddit.de 4 points 1 year ago (8 children)

Hehehehe

With 0.92% of electrified rail it's a joke to say that NGL. Absolute numbers are meaningless.

You have to see it into perspective per area then you'll get to feel how dense and therefore useful the rail network actually is. Because what good is a rail network if you can't reach your desired location.

And then you'll see that swiss, Germany and Luxembourg for example end up with less than 10 square km per km of rail while the usa has around 40.

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[–] uniqueid198x@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 1 year ago

Thats true. And then America stopped. And then the people who had actual on-the-ground experiance died of old age. Its really another effect of the slow tragedy that is the auto industry

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[–] Album@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 year ago

Misleadingly reductionist is what /c/memes should be renamed to.

[–] zephyreks@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

California HSR expansion is going to get cancelled the moment the minimum viable route finishes, they're going to lose the ROW and the expertise, then 10 years later the next leg will get approved.

This is what happens to transit projects in America, so there's no reason to expect anything different for rail.

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[–] Nobody@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago (4 children)

The mistake is thinking Elon is a moron screwing everything up on accident. He isn’t. He’s an Afrikaner white supremacist Nazi who is causing all this damage on purpose.

Starlink and SpaceX should be nationalized before he gets a chance to weaponize those companies against the western world as well.

[–] Filthmontane@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

He literally came up with the hyperloop because he was afraid of a high speed rail hurting Tesla sales.

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[–] balderdash9@lemmy.zip 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

China wants unity, even in places where it doesn't make economic sense.

edit: 100% downvotes are coming from people that don't know the situation. The CCP wants fast travel to major population centers even when the rail line isn't profitable.

[–] zephyreks@lemmy.ml 14 points 1 year ago

It makes economic sense but not financial sense. Railways are almost always profitable once considering second and third order effects.

It's the same story with Amtrak, so I'm not sure why people are so confused. Amtrak loses money on every train that's not the NEC.

[–] off_apparition@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

Are they siding with the hunter or the emissary this time?

[–] CheeseNoodle@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Isn't that a good thing? sounds like the rail is being run as a public utility rather than a business. And its still likely profitable if you average the cost over all the lines.

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[–] Blamemeta@lemm.ee 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (9 children)

Its a lot easier when you have slave labor and don't care about the enviroment or human lives

It's also a lot easier when you cut costs and all the rails will be unused in a few years due to poor construction materials.

Tofu Dreg construction and corruption is very real in China.

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[–] COASTER1921@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago (12 children)

It's much easier to build rail in places that weren't designed around cars. Even in rural China people live in condos and apartments with parks between. This helps with NIMBYism and combined with the already large amount of green space left in Chinese cities such systems can be built with the only real concern being the engineering itself. But China is also in a good position for that, as their workforce is incredibly well educated with more engineering talent than they can even fully employ domestically. All that PLUS the political will of a single party state meant it was a very different situation than California.

And that's before you even consider ridership, where even the best possible SF to LA route would still pretty much require you to get a car or taxi once you get to LA (because LA was basically torn down and redesigned for cars).

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[–] nucleative@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Giant infrastructure projects are a weakness of democracies. It's tough to get everyone to agree and pay for huge projects that take long term vision and planning.

Or you could call it a strength because it's stable and can't be changed too fast by one guy with a short term bad idea.

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[–] nephs@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

Wouldn't high speed rail go bzzz, instead?

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