"Doug Miller" wrote in message
...

If high-speed rail were commercially viable in the United States, it would
already exist.

Urban rail systems in America disappeared in large part because after WWII
the automobile and petroleum industries saw far greater profits to be made
selling cars and buses and the fuel to run them, not because streetcars
weren't a good form of public transport.

And looking at how air travel is going these days, the idea of high speed
rail is starting to look pretty good. In recent years my wife and I have
elected to make 1,500 mile road trips rather than set foot in an airport,
and that was before air travellers had to choose between being groped or
x-rayed.

Fuel prices are going to have the final say on this issue. When gas
eventually gets back to five (or ten) bucks a gallon the train is going to
be a lot more attractive at any speed. A lot of things happened because gas
was cheap, but the clock is ticking on that situation.