Tag: transportation

Sunday Train: NYT taking Koch Bros. dictation on Florida High Speed Rail

Burning the Midnight Oil for Living Energy Independence

Suppose that you wanted to inject a framing into a purely political strategy which also happened to involve sabotaging the future of the nation’s economy? “We sabotaged the future economy” would be a bad talking point there.

“The project we sabotaged was not justifiable on its merits, and was only pursued for purely political reasons”. Aha, much better: the benefit of this framing is when someone points out that the cancellation was purely political, now you have charges of pure politics going in both directions, making it sound “controversial”, which in itself makes it sound risky to support spending billions on a useful piece of infrastructure.

And where better to inject this framing than the pages of the New York Time or the Washington Post? Well, this time it was the Times taking dictation and not bothering to report the whole story. NYT new slogan, it seems, should be “All the news that can fit the Village Frame”.

Sunday Train: Making a ‘national HSR plan’ into a National Network

Burning the Midnight Oil for Living Energy Independence

Way back before the Super Bowl, the White House had a series of exciting announcements, covered at The Transport Politic under the heading The White House Stakes Its Political Capital on a Massive Intercity Rail Plan.

That article is accompanied by the map reproduced here ~ and I stress that the map if Yonah Freemark’s work, not a map presented by the White House ~ of what a HSR system that rises to the “80% of Americans” target would look like.

And one reaction to that map is the same as the reaction to the designated DoT HSR corridors: how is that a national network? Its just bits and pieces.

How to fix this image problem, while also providing a substantial upgrade to the program, below the fold.

Sunday Train: Northeastern HSR Alignments & The Move to Tuesdays

Burning the Midnight Oil for Living Energy Independence

For the Daily Kos edition of this essay, I wrote:

This is a fairly short Sunday Train, but I thought I better get something posted, so I had somewhere to put this scheduling announcement:

  • Due to a new prep on Monday Morning this coming Fall term, the Sunday Train is temporarily moving to Tuesday Evenings until the end of year Holidays, starting next week (19 October)

… but, hell, given the haphazard scheduling of the crossposts (eg, posting on Sunday and crossposting on Wednesday evening), y’all likely won’t notice the change.

The actual Sunday Train portion is about one element of the Amtrak proposal for a High Speed Rail corridor for the Northeast: the alignment. At the preliminary proposal stage, an alignment must be selected for study so that preliminary cost and patronage estimates can be performed. However, if the decision is made to go ahead, a range of alignments will be (and, indeed, must be) studied.

So tonight I take a brief look at the alignment options from the report.

Sunday Train: 1:36 NYC/Boston, 1:23 NYC/DC, $117b, 30yrs

Burning the Midnight Oil for Living Energy Independence

As The Transport Politic reported earlier this week: Amtrak Unveils Ambitious Northeast Corridor Plan, But It Would Take 30 Years to be Realized

After months of sitting on the sidelines as states and regional agencies promoted major new high-speed rail investments, Amtrak has finally announced what it hopes to achieve over the next thirty years: A brand-new, 426-mile, two-track corridor running from Boston to Washington, bringing true [Express] high-speed rail to the Northeast Corridor for the first time.

Some questions and answers, over the fold.

Sunday Train: HSR Plan A and Plan B Thinking

Burning the Midnight Oil for Living Energy Independence

This last week, I have been staring at The Transport Politic post, Republican Wave Could Spell Trouble for High-Speed Rail Projects from Coast to Coast.

Living in Ohio, that is doubly true: first, adding the impact of the recession on top of the impact of sixteen years of Kasich/Portman style policies is, ironically, the best opportunity for those who helped cause the mess to gain political power from it. Second, because of the blocking position of the Republican Majority in the State Senate in the last two years, the odds are stacked against the project: even as things stand now, we need to flip a Republican for the project to go ahead.

So, is there a Plan B?

Natural Gas Vehicles: an ‘ethanol’-like boondoggle?

Despite all the green washing out there (and there is lots of it, lets be clear), corn-based ethanol is far from a panacea in terms of reducing America’s dependence on imported oil, dependency on fossil fuels, reducing greenhouse gases and representing a good investment for the taxpayer.  While supporting corn ethanol is, it seems, great politics to get through the Iowa primary, independent study after independent study shows that it is not a good deal for the taxpayer, the economy, and the environment.  The absolute ‘best’ case, from honest analysis, is that this is a very costly and inefficient path for very marginal reductions in fossil-foolish dependencies and minimal greenhouse-gas emission reductions. Other analysts come out with the conclusion that we actually lose ground in GHG emissions in returns for the $billions being pumped into corn ethanol.

Right now, we seem to be watching (in slow motion?) a headlong rush into another “ethanol”-like boondoggle driven, in no small part, by the $70 million or so that T Boone Pickens has put behind promotion of The Pickens’ Plan.

Utopia 24: First Day of School


And I  say the sacred hoop of my people was one of the many hoops that made  one circle, wide as daylight and as starlight, and in the center grew  one mighty flowering tree to shelter all the children of one mother and  one father.

Black  Elk

Sunday Train: Getting Ohio’s 3C Line Into Cincinnati

Burning the Midnight Oil for Living Energy Independence

While EnergyFreedom Transport is an issue that has been brought back onto the “front burner” (so to speak) …



… there has been ongoing work on this front ever since the supply-drive oil price shocks of the 70’s and 80’s.

Ohio won $400m in competitive HSR funding from Stimulus II, to do the first work toward a 110mph Triple-C corridor, supporting a starter Amtrak-speed service at first and then building toward a 110mph.

But it aint 3 C’s without Cincinnati, and getting into Cincinnati is tricky.

Utopia 16: Student Driver

               An optimist isn’t necessarily a blithe, slightly sappy whistler in the dark of our time. To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places–and there are so many–where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.  Howard Zinn

Considered Forthwith: Senate Environment and Public Works Committee

Welcome to the 16th installment of “Considered Forthwith.”

This weekly series looks at the various committees in the House and the Senate. Committees are the workshops of our democracy. This is where bills are considered, revised, and occasionally advance for consideration by the House and Senate. Most committees also have the authority to exercise oversight of related executive branch agencies.

Well, DK Greenworks week has come and gone, but the group lives on. Click the link and join us. In keeping with the green theme, this week I examine the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works.

Who Resurrected the Electric Car?

The startup company Better Place, that’s who!

The scheme these guys have undertaken solves one of the major problems of electric cars: recharging.  Better Place’s approach: replace the whole battery in less time than it takes to fill up a tank with gas!  Recharge the batteries at leisure and reuse.  If you buy an electric car, you subscribe to their service and can swap out drained batteries for recharged ones at properly equipped stations.  The other crucial step in the process is to connect up with fuel stations to install the replacement bays.  Wherever you can get gas, you can get a battery! Here’s a cool demo of the technology.

Who knows if this will work?  But it seemed to me to be a pretty interesting concept.

On Being American, Or, “A Hybrid? Not Unless It Has Tail Fins”

It’s great to see that people are starting to think about hybrid vehicles, but so far, they really haven’t been for me.

You know why?

Because for the most part, they have no…style.

The Prius?

If you look at it sideways, and squint, it looks more like a pepita than a car.

The Insight?

They say it’s stylish…but it looks like a Prius to me.

You know what I want?

I want someone to build the biggest, nastiest, most oversized hybrid the world has ever seen.

Something drenched with chrome, with seating for…many, and a convertible top; and maybe, if all my dreams come true: tail fins.

Something crazy.

Something ridiculous.

Something…American.

Well, guess what?

Somebody’s already gone out and had one built-and ironically, that somebody is Neil Young, Canadian.

Load more