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Anon likes trains
(sh.itjust.works)
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this post was submitted on 19 Jun 2025
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We do. Not as much as we used to because privatisation is a plague upon mankind, also we have very diverse geography which makes developing new lines prohibitively expensive, even more so when you're a private company. Add to that a lack of political backing and yeah, it's all rather turgid, even if there are some extremely recent talks concerning transeuropean night trains and such.
Those are going to be for our nice flat and speedy routes no doubt, but hey, it's an effort in the right direction.
But yeah, things are not gonna get better fast as long as we are cursed with privatisation. What a shit show to see our glorious TGV reduced to a shell of its former self.
Meanwhile I just got an article yesterday that Wuhan is now connected to the super high speed network and the first 450kph train now connects it to Shanghai. Last time I was there the train was already TGV levels of speed and much more modern, and only a year later they are leaving us on the fucking dust...
China sees investment in mass transit as a loss leader. It costs more to put in than it generates in fairs, but the boost to connected economic zones pays back the cost several times over.
The US sees investment in mass transit as a detriment to the airline, automotive, and fossil fuel industries. It would shrink the economy in three places where the nation has tried to goose growth for the last 60 years.
For real. If those idiot neighbours would stop fucking around, we get trains from Wuhan to Bordeaux in about a week. It's a real game changer.
What if we told them they could keep killing each other, just on the train, and then we'd make a murder mystery about it?
I never really understand why historically trains were so rare in the US. They had loads of trains at one point left over from the industrial Revolution and then they seemed to decide to get rid of them all. Even Beaching didn't shut down that many lines
Rail lines were converted to highways. They weren't simply removed and abandoned, they were cannibalized to clear space for more lanes
Oil and auto industry were literally buying tram tracks to dismantle them and make the roads only for cars. For the curious:
How The Auto Industry Carjacked The American Dream
https://yewtu.be/watch?v=oOttvpjJvAo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOttvpjJvAo