High Speed 2: The UK's £100 Billion Rail Project
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- Опубліковано 24 лип 2024
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Please make a video about Bar Lev Line, costing around $300 million in 1973.
Heathrow's Expansion would be a great Megaproject.... if they can ever agree to do it. 😅😅 Or better yet, how about a video of ALL the proposed solutions to Heathrow's capacity problems? Some of the proposed solutions are simply wild!
Do megaprojects vid on Wembley station or the o2 arena
Fair few problems with this video, you only really talked about those who oppose HS2 and not those who support it. Your explanation of the cost and how the project is funded was totally inadequate! HS2 is being funded through bonds and not general taxation. You totally missed out the main benefit of HS2 which is to massively increase overall network capacity by moving long distance high speed trains off the current network freeing it up for local and regional rail. You need to speak to people like Gareth Dennis, rail engineer and proponent of HS2 to get a better picture! ua-cam.com/video/4gy1GNAD9Yk/v-deo.html&ab_channel=GarethDennis
6:23 i am seriously doubting that the usa planned the protests...
Honestly never ever did I think my little home town of Wigan would ever be mentioned on mega projects 😂😂
I heard that and went ‘That’s heavily racist, they wouldn’t name tha-‘ then I look at where I live
Another fellow Pie eater, Personally I live about a mile and a half from where hs2 is set to terminate up here.
I'm quite near the town centre myself. I believe it's merging near Golborne
@@kriss_b Yeah, between Abram and Golborne. It's due to take out a dog day care centre in lowton, that we'd use occasionally
Wigan Pier is Mega.
Is there ever a right time for something like this?
How about 45 years ago?
The best time to plant a tree was 50 years ago, the second best time is now
Evergreen trees for Britain though...need greenery during winter
@@FrozenDung now would probably be a good time actually as they're better carbon sinks when growing if we move the trees from the ancient woodland for the chop along with the soil as was done with HS1 but interspersed then with saplings then they'd grow much faster soaking up more carbon.
@@jakehowie442 other than holly and Ivy, I don't think there are many native evergreens in the UK.
@@johnharrison6808 well John you need to plant this sampling’s and seeds give the UK what it needs evergreens
As a journalist working overseas, I was one of the few lucky ones to board the maglev between Tokyo and Nagoya. It's quiet and stable, and when I closed my eyes, I really could forget that I was moving at 500km per hour.
In the North we don’t need to get to London quicker, we need to get between places in the North quicker.
exactly. £100 billion on a train that will get us to london 20 minutes quicker. what’s the point? it takes a train from liverpool to leeds over two hours and it’s a third the distance between liverpool and london, which currently takes two hours. waste of money, especially when the nhs is chronically underfunded, there's a housing crisis, wage crisis, homeless crisis, care crisis. imagine what £100 billion could do for all of those things instead of a train.
Yes we need some sort of ... cross... rail project. I wonder what they could call it?
@@mouthpiece806 £100 billion that's forecast to bring in £150 billion... So that's £50 billion EXTRA that can be spent on things like the NHS or improving other rail lines after deducting the cost of HS2 itself.
It's just how an investment works. Pay money in now, get more money out later.
£50bn for the NHS is tiny, it's only a 10% increase for 3 years vs £100-£150bn for a HS2 line that will be used for 120 years. I'd rather they spent another £50bn on a HS3 East to West Line.
@@Si_Vert that's $50 billion in profit though. Extra money that we wouldn't already have.
Countries that prosper invest in their economies, even if it's costly upfront.
I'd probably get more use out of an easy west line too... But the geography of the country means the major cities are spread out vertically, rather than horizontally.
Hopefully at some point we will have a full high speed network (though it almost certainly won't be in my lifetime). But at least we can leave improved infrastructure and thus an economy for the following generations, as I wish people in the '70's had done for us (like other nations, rather than just maintaining some of the same antiquated old network and economy revolving around a single city).
Simon will be over 50 when it’s done?!?
WTF I’ll already be dead!
In my case, for a while. 💀
That would make him younger than I would have expected
@@charleshaynes815 33 or perhaps 34 by now I believe.
my bet ,it will never get done
do you want to sit close to strangers on a trina after all this bs pandemic?
just ike movie theatres things need to change
think mini bubbles around each seat that after doen are vaccumed auto like and disinfected like a freaking car wash
No one will actually be able to know when Simon turns 50. One word: beard.
A lot of the reason for the cost of HS2 is that it includes costs that aren’t generally included on other schemes such as stations, rolling stock, etc. There’s also a vast amount of environmental mitigation on the line with well over half of it being below grade or in tunnel. The 16km tunnel through the Chilterns doesn’t come cheap.
Most people don't care about the details or the facts. They have their prejudices and follow the misinformation. Look at many comments here. They don't want to know. They just want their biases confirmed. This video does nothing to dispel the mistruths either. Hence you'll get the constant parroting of lines like "It only saves 15 minutes, vanity project" etc.
Mitigation or litigation ..... either way, it don't come cheap any more
170bn of costs...okay pal. We just need you and all your HS2 train spotting friends to pay for it from your bank account. But by estimation you probably couldn’t afford a weekly shop from Aldi...you socialist train lover
@@jakehowie442 When traffic comes to a standstill, there is no space in trains and you can't get your goods shipped, how much does that cost? Much, much more.
@@jakehowie442 the published buget (in 2020) of phase 1 is £45bn that includes roughly £10bn of contingency, phase 2a budget of £4.4bn plus 36% contingency, phase 2b £28.7bn plus 36% contingency. Your given figure is very inflated.
So as a Brit who also happens to be not just a train fan but an infrastructure fan, I've yet to speak to another train and infrastructure nerd who thinks that this project isn't necessary.
This is the single most important infrastructure that Britain will build for the next 100 years, and the more it's delayed the more expensive it will be. If it had gone ahead back in 2010 then not only would it be cheaper but we'd be looking to see the benefits from it come the mid 2020s.
The interesting thing is the massive misnomer that the name High Speed 2 gives. Whilst yes it is the building of a high speed route, the main idea of HS2 is that by putting the high speed trains onto their own line, you increase capacity on both the high speed line and the normal speed lines by allowing the trains to run closer together because you don't have to worry about the high speed trains catching up otherwise.
Without HS2, train ticket prices in the UK will continue to rise at ludicrous rates and catching a train will become untenable for your average commuter. The problem is that the UKs rail system is the 4th busiest in the world by number of passenger journeys each year. The system simply doesn't have the capacity in it's current form and unless the high speed trains are shifted off to their own lines away from the slower trains, it never will.
On the environmental effects, it's less about what the trains themselves put out and more about the amount of cars and trucks they will take off the road. It's like saying how a single busses worth of people (generally around the 50-60 people mark) requires some 24 cars, well with a train that equivocation is even better with a train generally carrying some 200 or more cars worth of people meaning the amount of CO2 put out for all those people to reach their destination is vastly less than if they were to drive.
Also on the note of the "Ancient Woodlands" bit, I've looked at the path that HS2 will take and it never goes through the centre of any existing ancient woodland, it only ever clips the edges meaning very little woodland will actually be damaged or destroyed during the creation of HS2 and as they'll be planting some 1,000,000 trees along the route, some woodlands will be expanding although they wont therefore be "ancient" anymore.
But convincing the average person of all that is difficult enough, and convincing politicians to actually open up the purse and spend the money now so that it doesn't become more expensive down the road, yeah that's almost impossible. The reason why every large scale infrastructure project has cost overruns is that politicians will always drip feed a project money rather than give it enough to actually get underway at a good pace (unless it's some vanity project).
Any case though, HS2 is good and needed for Britain.
But there are no plans for tracks above Manchester or Leeds, so the HS2 trains will need to run on existing tracks to Scotland and thus sharing the network with other trains?
I can almost hear 50 yr. old Simon now - "Where is my train?!?!?!"
While Simon buying his first flying car, the news announcement: HS2 has been finally finished.
You can check where the first section goes through, all these long underground section screams over budget to me...
ua-cam.com/video/1bkoGvw9kbA/v-deo.html
Except that he lives in the Czech Republic :)
If Japan can do it in the 1950's I really don't see the issue. I've lived in Japan for two years and one thing I have noticed compared to the UK is the general attitude the government has when it comes to deciding things for the future. Here in Japan they build things first and care about the costs later. Is it a risk? sure but you have to take risks in order for them to pay off. I'm not just talking about high speed rail but everyday things like road repairs, construction etc. Growing up in the UK I remember seeing pot holes taking years to repair and when council's finally got round to fixing them it would take days just to fill them up with mismatched tarmac only for them to need repairing again months later. In Japan they hire an army of workers to do it in the shortest amount time, all the while maintaining minimal disruption to the public. Coming from a construction background it's a joy to witness.
As someone designing suspension systems for a number of OEM's bidding for HS2, I'm afraid you missed a point on the reasons behind it. A lot of people seem to be under the impression that we are only building it to make journey times shorter. This simply isn't true. We are building it to start the process of future proofing our rail network. The rail industry works in 40 year cycles. Trains and infrastructure are designed to last 40 years and then be replaced by the next generation equipment. The majority of our equipment is way past this and as parts of this network start to wear out we will be in the position of not being able to service our system.
We need to upgrade to the latest generation before its too late. We either build this new network or we remove the rail network entirely.
So they're gonna spend this much money on something that they're just gonna need to rebuild in 40 years? And is that 40 years from the total finish time, or are they gonna have to start replacing parts of it 20 years after the whole thing is finished?
Cool remove the rail network entirely.
HS2 will exist primarily to free up track on the existing lines for local services and freight. There were a couple of references to freight, though none explained that HS2 is needed not to shave a few minutes off an already reasonably quick journey - that outcome simply is a by product of a more modern line - but to increase much needed capacity, and also take the burden off worn out infrastructure allowing it to continue to provide value. The existing lines are now at capacity so there are few local services and freight has to take a circuitous and costly route, meaning it is uncompetitive with trucking. The new line will improve things and give options for the future.
Just be clear, is HS2 meant to replace current networks?
Are there plans to meet up East to West connections with HS2 rather than just North to South?
@@Guesswhokk eventually but not something that will happen overnight. A couple of decades at least before the full plans are worked out.
One of my oldest memories from when I was a child was watching construction on a freeway project in my city. I remember it because they were moving old houses out of the way. Houses on wheels was fascinating to my 4 year old mind. The project will complete next year. I am now 50 years old.
I remember them building the M60 ring road around Manchester. There was a big dip we used to go past whenever we went into the city that would eventually become one of the junctions and I recall it being "finished" but not quite for years, presumably because the whole network wasn't all connected yet. It was kind of odd as a child seeing a finished new shiny bridge over a wide dirt track below.
The Pendolino tilting trains deserve a mention. London to Manchester in 2 hours was hardly a low point.
The 2007 government white paper that estimated that HS2 would be bad for the environment probably underestimated the UK's remarkable shift from coal to renewable energy. If (big if) the country is carbon neutral by 2035 then faster trains won't lead to more carbon emissions. But we're already using a lot less coal than we were in 2007
The concrete alone is bad for environment , hs2 not carbon neutral for a century
@@jamesdeacon6810 hempcrete could be used
You also forget, less trains are required - because they can keep up a higher frequency as they complete the route quicker and as a result - reduce costs of running compared to classic lines.
I have done my own video on this project now, it's about all the other reasons why HS2 is required apart from the really obvious ones! Check it out!
Depending on how fewer trains they would operate.
Take too many away and people would refrain from using it for inconvienience. If you only have one line, every 30mins from London would be neccessary as it splits later on. At least.
By the time this fast rail project will be finished, people will drive electric cars and electric fan jetliners will be powered by hydrogen fuel cells, thus the whole ecologic argument for this rail project will disappear even before it's finished, but you will have your own white elephant railway project like Spain to show off to tourists, thus creating an image of a wealthy developed country with too much money to burn despite accumulating a lot of debt during pandemic just to be like certain middle eastern country planing to build Elon Musk's inspired high-speed railway for the sake of creating yet another tourist attraction like supertall skyscrapers, that will never pay off...
@@IonorReasSpamGenerator Railways are already electric powered, for years. Well ahead of electric cars.
@@Rule1ModelRailways Not sure how that's even an argument for some future railway project that will need to compete with these emerging technologies which are far more likely to happen in their full glory than some constantly reviewed project with likely increasing cost that will be dealing with the fear of being UK's copycat of "Spain high-speed rail success"..
Not as far north as "connecting south and north" would suggest.
Actually Scottish independence may make the project significantly cheaper.
@@arctic_haze how’d you figure that one?
Everything north of London is T’up north
You want them to go over The Wall. They consider them wildlings in the Queen’s landing.
@@arctic_haze What facts to do you have to back up that random claim? You sound like a Brexiter who just makes up amazing claims. Typical Nationalism.
When considering the carbon emission differences between high speed train, slower train and airplane it should also be considered how much speed effects the actual passenger numbers. If slower trains are more efficient but longer travel time makes more people fly the extra emission of high speed would be worth it, also the per person emissions would be lower the fuller the train.
That moment you realise that Simon has used clips in his video from my videos 😀
Lol
...but do you know how to say 'Solihull' ?
That moment? What moment?
@@foxkenji Did u get the memo? Of the moment? The memont?
@Tetahi Wikaire Ha. I can't believe a bloke who lived in England said it that way. The Brummie accent would almost be better...huuuuuum....hold on a minute... ;)
If you've watched the latest Grand Tour episode, they cover this new coastal ring road for Reunion - it is MEGA!
Jeremy exaggerated it. It's not around the entire island. Just a northern section
@@ryanwood93 It's still a huge project
@@ryanwood93 It costs 100 mil for 1km, and it's like 12-something km... If that's not an expensive project I don't know what is.
Wait what... theres a new grand tour?
@@SD-tj5dh Yeah it's called "The Grand Tour presents The Massive Hunt". It's kind of like a hour and a half special, like "The Grand Tour Seamen". On Amazon Video - go on Grand Tour and select Season 4, both will be there.
HS2 is needed for 2 reasons: to replace old crumbling infrastructure, and to free up capacity for local services and freight, which can't get a look in at the moment on the congested lines. The faster speed is simply a bonus that comes from a modern train line and is a red herring. HS2 is not being built to get to somewhere half an hour quicker.
Old network still isn’t being replaced fast enough though and hs2 will reduce its revenue . There is currently no capacity issue and numbers down by 50% on some lines .
HS2 is so slow. China and Japan have far better trains
@@HaydenLau. When HS2 is opened it's line speed will be 250 mph making it he fastest line in Europe
@@peterwilliamallen1063😂😂😂
@@saifalik6226 🤘🤘🤘🤘
The sad thing with this, there was a counter proposal for "Ultraspeed", it's a maglev train from London Euston, to Birmingham, to Manchester, to Leeds, to Newcastle, to Edinburgh, terminating at Glasgow.
This was rejected because the proposal would cost 60bn and HS2 had the sticker price of 30bn and because it was 2010 at the time it was trendy to not spend.
but the ultraspeed proposal stated the HS2 30bn sticker price was dubious since it failed to account for land acquisition costs whereas ultraspeed only required access because it will be suspended on stilts.
so now at 100bn we could have had something cheaper, faster and more high tech and covered more of the country.
Possibly, but that assumes the cost of the maglev project wouldn't also have similarly risen. The vast majority of large infrastructure projects cost more than originally envisaged.
Maglev is orders of magnitude more expensive than classical wheel & steel. It would likely be in the trillions if we had gone that route now.
Ah yes the "cheaper" option. Another decision well made
I wonder how many MP's have fingers in the construction pie
Not true at all. Maglev would be more expensive and at the time the technology was an issue.
i will never understand, why no country has been brave enough so far to embrace Maglev trains as their main intercity train system!
It's "Gallic" cousins, not "Gaelic". Gaelic refers to Scotland and Ireland.
Yes, I think I would notice high speed rail and a tunnel under the Irish Sea
Isn’t Brittany in France considered the 6th Celtic Nation. Not saying he was referring to that but maybe.
The Celts spanned from the British Isles to Turkey.
Gallic refers to Gaul, Gaelic refers to Scotland and Ireland. All three are Celts.
Bit galling that.
I think a cool topic for a Megaprojects Video would be the VDE. The VDE (in German: Verkehrsprojekt Deutsche Einheit, English: Infrastructureproject German Unity) is Project with the goal in mind to improve the east German Infrastructure and get it up to par with the west. Thats being realised by building new highways, new railway connections, new trainstations, new electrical lines and much more. It's being going on (I believe) for about 30 Years and its actually nearing completion. I might be a bit biased but trying to connect two parts of a country that have been divided for nearly 50 years sounds kind of a cool topic for a Megaproject video. :)
During the 2 Decades that the UK has "Planned" building 350km of High Speed Rail - China has actually Built 35,000km of High Speed Rail.
It started with just a few billions to 10 billions now. It will cost tax payers hundred of billion when the project takes decades to complete.
@Taiga I don’t think they “evict” they just dig up the entire house and move it out of the way
To be fair, most of china new lines run at a huge loss and were done primarily for the vanity of the chinese government. the UK lines, despit their cost, look set to actually make sense economically and run a profit.
@@alex29443 the cost of China High Speed Rail network including debt financing of public and private sector investment works out at around $45Million per km compared to the costs of both Californias HSR and the Comparable sized UK HS2 are running at over $100Million per km.
Chinese Rail usage and ticket revenue has declined since outbreak of Covid-19 but is projected to grow significantly as GDP and disposal incomes continue to rise during coming decades.
When and IF the small scale US and UK HSR project are eventually completed it will be interesting to see wether ticket revenues will be sufficient to pay debt interest on infrastructure investment let alone reach any meaningful level of "profitability"
@@Siempre1978 That's not true, they have been running on a permanent massive loss since before the pandemic. Except for a few operators in the densely packed costal region, they nearly all make huge operating losses, and simply don't and never will have the income to cover their operating costs. Spain has a similar problem. The fact is that high speed rail is too slow and too expensive to compete with air travel outside of a couple of very densely populated, highly urbanised regions (like Japan, costal regions of China, England and California).
It is certainly true that they have a lower cost per km, but then they have no environmental legislation to speak of, their government can kick people off their land with virtually no compensation, and their labour cost is a fraction of the price, frankly I'm surprised they have managed to make it so expensive given that reality.
Since we are talking about rail projects, how about the Grand Paris Express ? More than 40 Billion euros, 200km of automatic metro, all built before 2030, currently 10+ TBM in action, for 4 new lines which will carry more than 2 million people a day.
Nobody cares about french trains. Allegedly
Is it true that French trains have only one forward speed but 5 reverse speeds?
Then you could rather cover Kopenhagen-Metro, which already exists.
@@ptshyu2 The TGV holds a bunch of world records and has an operating average speed of 320kph. So, there's that. Insulting people doesn't actually make you look better.
@@Hamsterzilla1349 thats pretty fast in reverse
The larger loading gauge option, please! Cheaper and more roomy trains are good!
Then just have a policy that any future rail network upgrades to high speed should include increasing the loading gauge to the European standard. Thereby over time modernising the entire network while minimising the cost by combining it with work already being done.
All of this was supposed to happen with the Eurostar. It was originally supposed to terminate in Manchester and would have bought all of these improvements with it decades ago! The yard for the trains is now used as one of the Metro Link tram depots.
European standards itself are smaller than Asian ones. UK's is even smaller
HS2 will be European GC gauge like HS1, but upgrading existing sections are extremely expensive for which you could simply build another high speed line
1:55 - Chapter 1 - High speed railways
3:15 - Chapter 2 - High speed 1
4:10 - Chapter 3 - High speed 2 proposal
5:50 - Chapter 4 - Opposition
8:30 - Chapter 5 - Oakerve review
9:05 - Mid roll ads
10:40 - Chapter 6 - The lines
11:00 - Chapter 7 - Phase 1
12:10 - Chapter 8 - Phase 2
13:35 - Chapter 9 - Changes afoot
15:05 - Chapter 10 - Trains
16:30 - Chapter 11 - Costs
18:25 - Chapter 12 - Let work commence
Mid roll
The Advanced Passenger Train (APT) is a mega project in itself given that it greatly influenced many tilting train designs for the future.
Funny how they have a specific team that spent over £1 million to find out why/how they are spending so much money...
The joys of government contracts!
These days it doesn't surprise me. I live in Wales and will not see a single benefit from HS2... It's a way of not increasing the world outside London... just makes it easier to travel to London for work.
@@rhyswilliams4893 London is OK to visit, briefly. Or travel through to somewhere you actually WANT to be lol.
@@rhyswilliams4893 Whales to London will be HS3.
@@rhyswilliams4893 As someone living in Kent, I find it really weird that HS2 is completely separate from HS1. They won't event terminate at the same station, despite you can easily walk between St.Pancrass and Euston. And both stations are even oriented (most tracks leaving station are going north) in similar way.
I live in Northern Ontario. It takes 3.5 hours by car to get to the next closest city. Our train system shut down about a decade ago. I LAUGH at your travel times!
I had a car like that once upon a time. ;)
That's nothing, try living in the Outback of Australia where it takes around a full day+ to drive to the nearest small Town and around 3 to 4 days to the nearest City.
Eh, at least you have roads! Living somewhere that can only be accessed by boat or helicopter is a different level of isolation altogether.
Try being Matt Damon, he’s on mars.
@@kristinehayes4885 do you have to carry your own gas in Jerrycans? (I'm not tryna be sarcastic, genuinely curious are there refueling stops out there?)
Another consideration is that it's *not our money*. Taxpayer money isn't being used in this; it's an investment against future returns. It'll be funded by borrowing, and given how low interest rates are and will probably continue to be, this is potentially the best time in history to borrow massive amounts of money. Also, it's so expensive *because* it's so environmentally friendly. It'll be planting more trees than it rips up, creating more habitats than it destroys, and is already pegged to have carbon neutral stations - not to mention that we're talking about probably getting trains in the 2030s, hopefully being built in the UK - especially if Bombardier/Alstom, Hitachi, or CAF is chosen. That likely means electricity usage per train will go down, and eco-friendly energy production will have increased massively.
You're kidding right?
@@ExplodingPiggy Nope. Please explain to me where I'm wrong - or was this just a fire and forget comment, deriding the obvious merits and facts of HS2 without bothering to actually do the research?
We need projects like this that actually is good for the environment v
@@josephharrison8354 this is simply a vanity project, the money should be spent on local, regional and national rail. Every line station and siding that was buried in the 60's could be reopened. As for being environmentally friendly the base work for this line has already destroyed several areas that cannot be recovered, not to mention buying newly built housing estates simply to knock them down.
when it's eventually running it'll be so expensive that the average person will not use it. The virus has also fundamentally changed our society and working practices meaning the people that would use it no longer will.
It was a stupid endeavor when it was conceived and should never have left the drawing board.
@@ExplodingPiggy Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong and wrong again. HS2 tickets will cost the same as current Avanti tickets do; the problem here is that you have no idea what HS2 actually is. Once the line is built, Avanti, or whoever's operating the west coast intercity network by that time, will drastically reduce intercity services on existing rail and basically move those services to the new high speed tracks, thus reducing congestion on conventional rail - the main problem currently with the WCML is that there are too many types of train all operating at the same time - commuter, regional, semi-fast, intercity and freight. Removing higher speed intercity services from the existing line will free up exponential amounts of space for slower services, which can be packed closer together because they're travelling at more similar speeds and stop at more stations. So HS2 will provide faster journeys and more capacity for intercity travellers, and exponentially increase services at intermediate stations along the WCML.
In addition, London Euston is currently at capacity. There's no scope for more or longer trains to increase available seats without a major expansion of the station, and the same applies to the south section of the WCML as a whole. There would need to be a new pair of tracks anyway; why not make them the best?
Which brings me to a question; what's your alternative? British railways are at capacity, and there's only so much that can be done by making trains longer or realigning sections of track. Every analysis shows that the only thing which would deliver capacity increases on the same level as HS2 would be expanding the WCML, which runs through and right next to built up areas, and would require major reworks of existing stations, which likewise are usually right in the middle of built up areas. Such work would mean decades of disruption and huge decreases in capacity until it was eventually done, and massive environmental and social damage due to needing to demolish woodland, farmland and buildings which are next to the existing line. HS2, for the most part, bypasses that, causing as little damage as possible, building stations in brownfield sites and redeveloping the areas around them. Again I ask the question, what would you do instead? How would you provide the same benefits in capacity without any of the environmental cost?
Also, you mention Beeching; I have to say, this line of reasoning is moronic. You know what that would do? Increase congestion in terminus stations and make the rail network even more convoluted than it already is. There are certain lines which can and should be reopened because there's spare capacity and actual demand, such as the Border railway, which is doing rather well for itself. But even reopening every single line cut by Beeching would do nothing to address the underlying problem of congestion and complexity. HS2 does, by freeing up vast amounts of space on the WCML and allowing more stopping services along the line.
An impressive presentation, in a compact format. Thank you.
One correction. The first high speed line in Britain was the Selby Diversion, not HS1, we just don't run high speed trains along it.
A correction to your correction... Most of the mainlines were built as high-speed lines (only in the age of steam when what was considered high speed was somewhat lower). For years the world record speed for trains was set on the East Coast Mainline.
"A little bit Gauling." Haha, well played sir.
Great work as ever Simon. Would you possibly consider doing a episode detailing the 1955 British Rail Modernisation Scheme (the replacement of steam with diesel and electric motive power and associated infrastructure)?
You made a mistake, you said Old Oak Common railway station will be outside London. But it will be within the *London* Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham. So that's in (Greater) London and within the boundaries of the London Assembly and Mayor. So, London.
YESSSSSSSSSS OMG THANK YOU FOR THIS VIDEO!!!
Edit: 2:31 that train in the photo isn't an APT, it's a class 91/intercity 225 train in East Coast livery
the 91/225 was a product of APT though? or did the 225 come from the 125?
@@LordInter The pendolino is more closely connected to the apt than the 225. But, either way the wrong train was on the video
regarding carbon emissions: in 2010 (around the time when CO2 emissions were first looked at) only about 7% of electrical power came from renewables, by 2020 that figure has risen to 48%. A HS rail by the time it will be running (2075?) could very well be powered entirely by wind and solar.
If you are electrified there is no reason you can't buy 100% renewables. If you are connected to the national grid then there are providers to buy from right now. Its exactly that sort of demand that helps fund new developments and get that national renewable figure up.
also if you get modern, comfortable high speed rail running at full capacity, that people use instead of a slow theoretically more efficient rail that people ignore in favor of even less efficient modes of transport it will result in a net loss of CO2 emissions even when it is nor powered by renewable.
I get the cost argument, although i think a project like this is well worth it. The environmental arguments in this case are just retarded.
This will help the North South divide
Wales: Guess I don’t exist then
newcastle: what the fuck
building to wales won't be easy to the land, and they aren't really any big cities in wales, it's only going to London, Manchester and Birmingham.
🏴f**kers
Sheffield: So, I can get from meadowhall to london a bit faster? Yeah, thats not bad I guess....HOW FUCKING MUCH!?
Probably because Wales is smaller then London (population) and GWR seems to doing well in Wales-England
It’s cheaper to get a plane ticket from London to New York then a train from London to Manchester. They still not announced how much a ticket on this train set will cost
You won't be able to get a train ticket. This is strictly for the nobs in parliament so they don't have to mingle with the commoners.
Think of a number and triple it
yep, it's cheaper to fly north. it's cheaper to fly south too, i have friends on the isle of wight and i might as well go biggin as do all the changes the train offers.
The way Simon said Solihull made me kinda die inside
same for Controversy lol
How old is he now then?
@@thomascrimlisk8297 30/earky thirties I think
@@alexander1485 Apparently that is how they say it in Britain, he has talked about that before.
The way Simon said it is not the way we say it in the UK. Sometimes I wonder if Simon deliberately mis-pronounces UK place names to make up for murdering foreign languages.
The Great Central had the same idea 130 years ago. It got built to the EU loading gauge but the bit through London and onto Paris via a tunnel didn't so it ended in Marylebone short of cash. Then BR closed it about 1963 - 68 and ripped it up. Random bits of trackbed might be used still. I think Toton was on the GC and the tram from Toton to Nottingham does use bits of ex railway.
Rubbish the GC was NOT repeat NOT for the hard of thinking built to any continental loading gauge but to a middle of the road British one. It is usually reported by the ignorant as having been built to the Berne Gauge. However as the GC was built in the late 1890's and the Berne Gauge was agreed in 1913, there is an obvious problem with this belief.
Another awesome video Simon! Absolutely love this channel!! Forgive me for asking but have you done a video on California's HSR project? Would be fab if you made one on it if you haven't already :)
Excellent video!!!
Thank you.
Japan's high speed railway system is so advanced that their trains could transform into fighting robots, lol.
Yes, it also cost them dearly. The Japanese railroad company went bust under massive debts in the 1980s.
They started building high speed network in 1960s, Britain will have it done in 2060.
China has 11 times more than Japan now. And it's smoother than the Japanese.
@@fleyua7176 China's high-speed rail technology is from Japan
@@user-s45c No it isn't.
Blimey I thought the Margaret Thatcher video would be divisive and controversial and now this!!
I'm still keeping 🤐
Not finished. Feel lucky, we in California can't even get it started.
Well, I think you have already started, but it has a REALLY SLOW construction pace.
At least you guys have a plan set in motion. Up here in the PNW we're just stuck fantasizing about it. I hate this country.
Dude, in the states we wish we could have rail. Hell, in my state we announced Amtrak HSR back in 2008, my state's capital has been the only holdout with underfunding old track removal, under and overpass building and the construction of a transfer house. Needless to say, a good deal of this has yet to be done with the more extensive work on the new station and underpasses downtown are set to be started in 2023, my 40th birthday. It took them 5 years to complete 2.5 underpasses already. At their current rate they won't be finished until I'm 50.
1881-1886: Men with shovels span a railway 3500km across Canada. 2017-2033: Men with advanced machines span 300km sorta kinda across the UK.
It’s laughable isn’t it.
300km is how much HSR track china builds in 2 weeks. I kid you not.
@@VarietyGamerChannel And here’s the England just plodding along. Embarrassing really.
Well in the 1800s the railway was the only form of fast travel, so it was essential to link the country. In the 21st century, there are other methods like air travel and freeways, so it’s isn’t at the top of the priority list.
@@dionemoolman I think because it’s costing billions of pounds, people expect it to be moving forward quicker, rather than at a snails pace. If you pay billions then you expect results.
Reminds me of California High-Speed Rail
@@PerryDaPlatapus can't agree with you more
What a hot mess that project is!
HS2 is a *Y* configuration. *The eastern section of the* *_Y_* *has been put on hold.* The Midland Mainline from London to Leeds was recently announced to be enhanced, complete with with full digital signalling. This means trains from London to Sheffield on a more direct route, pretty well much equal HS2's journey times. Hence the eastern leg is clearly redundant.
It is highly unlikely the high-speed track will progress further north than the Crewe junction on the west of the country. High-speed trains can then run off high-speed track onto existing classic track - which is classed as high-speed entry level track - then using existing track into the cities. Then no disruption tearing out a gouge in cities, or running over countryside for new track, only using existing infrastructure.
The APT project was sold to the rail division of FIAT after cancellation. The FIAT rail division was later aquired by Alstom, and the APT technology has since developed into the tilting tchnology of the Pendolino family of higher-speed trains, which is operated as the Class 390 by Avanti along the West Coast.
15 trains an hour is 1 every 4 mins. Compare that to the typical 2-4 trains an hour, meaning if you miss your train home, not only the train journey is greatly reduced but the risk of a lengthy wait at a cold and crowded station is.
As someone who commuted to work by train for a while, that sounds like the best quality of life thing ever! Plus trains would be less crowded, it all just sounds like luxury!
"The north of england".. lol. Not even half way up the country??
Obviously Newcastle, Durham and Sunderland just aren’t important enough.
Manchester and Leeds are over halfway up the country
@@TheSepticPizza I suggest you take another look at a UK map. This uses tax money from all of the UK yet provides no benefit to Scotland
@@panaxion it actually will take business and tourism away from Wales as estimates show. Get out as soon as you can. Wales, Scotland, and N Ireland need to leave this sinking ship
@@panaxion Yes it does. It cuts travel times from Scotland to cities south of Leeds, it lowers emmissions and if there is ever going to be a high speed line from Edinbugh to London then you'd need the track HS2 is building anyway.
simon, i love what you have done with the music. very industrial
In Spain we use trains than can go up to 250 km/h (155,3 mph) in high speed railways and can change the gauge non-stop to the so called iberian gauge (1668 mm, wider than the high speed rails). I believe the new Talgo AVRIL can do the same but reaching a much higher speed.
But I dont know if these trains can be introduced into the particular dimensions of the english railway network (stations, bridges.. etc)
By the time its finished hyperloop will take over and the train line won't even get used
Doubt it as there is no Hyperloop in operation and it would cost 5 times as much as HS2. Not sure where people are getting this ideas of Hyperloops from, may me anouther Gerry Anderson Puppet Show Thunderbirds are go!!!!
You really think that thing can be built faster? lol And that it would have less opposition from locals and enviromentalists?
Unearthed skeletons? Great, the trains are going to be haunted.
You've not heard of the service that only transported dead people for over 100 years?
excellent info, absolutely loved the explanation
The APT was to be used on the West Coast Main Line. However, at 2:32, the train shown after the APT-E (Advanced Passenger Train - Experimental) looks like an Mk4 set around Princes Street Gardens on the approach to Edinburgh Waverley station on an East Coast Main Line Glasgow to London service with the Class 82 DVT leading. While the APT did indeed have a designed top speed of 155mph, its service top speed was to have been 125mph. ECML Mk4 sets had a designed top speed of 140mph and a service top speed also of 125mph.
China would have built this whole thing in like 1 week and at less than 0% of the budget.
And half the workers would be dead and all the local residents would be forcibly uprooted and sent hundreds of miles away from their homes!
Interestingly it's a the same companies who planned this global high speed rail link.
I learned about this in school years ago.
@@tsu8003 wow it’s almost like you can make up anything about China and people will believe you
@Astolfo Desu yeah, because gentrification isn't doing that .
@@DJWESG1 hard to tell if you're exaggerating gentrification or if you're downplaying the doings of a totalitarian government for some reason.
Would love to see an entire vid on the stations for HS2. Mainly Euston and Old Oak Common
Geoff Marshall has done this I THINK. He covers lots of stations across the u.k and the underground network.
Just search for the name or "all the stations" on youtube
Euston needs knocking down and rebuilding. It's a fucking horrific station. Getting off at that drab shit hole then emerging from the Tube at Waterloo is a massive contrast in what a terminal should and shouldn't be like.
@@TalesOfWar when it was first done up when West Coast main line was electrified they didn't put seats on the concourse because they stupidly though all trains would be on time.
@@vincitveritas3872 Trains? On Time? In the UK? Did we go back in time to when British Rail was a thing? HAHA!
@@PerryDaPlatapus yes due to Covid we have nationalised railway again
THere is a problem local to me, where a road is planned from the docks, right through a park rich in wildlife which is also partly a water meadow, preventing local flooding. The whole project could be replaced by modest rail improvements and increased rolling stock, but the corporate stakeholders have already accounted for their future profits, and they're not giving that away without a radical change in government thinking.
An excellent presentation, thank you.
Somehow I think the most significant change for passengers will be ticket price, rather than travel time.
I started with a "Today I found out" video, Now I'm subscribed to 4 or 5 channels and "allegedly" addicted to videos about massive construction projects and Zebra sex masks.
Business Blaze
Mega Projects
Side Projects
Top Tenz
Today I Found Out
Biographics
Geographics
Highlight History
Xplrd
Visual Politik EN
The Simon Whistler Show
I may have missed one.
Visual Politk EN is now hosted by someone else. The Simon Whistler Show hasn't had new content for a while.
Whoa which video have I missed on the zebra sex masks👀
@@kiwidiesel this one. ua-cam.com/video/-VdzoocLZ9o/v-deo.html
@@sandybarnes887 Legend thank you mate🙏
@@kiwidiesel u r most welcome
Hello There, thank you for producing this video, it's really informative. Cheers Peter :)
Not sure if this would be a Megaproject or a Sideproject but would it be possible to do a video on the planning and building of Gravelly Hill Interchange (Spaghetti Junction) in the UK? When it was built it was considered an engineering marvel, and engineers from all around the world visited to learn from it. I've driven through it many times, but don't actually know much about who, or how it was planned out.
I’m 63. Getting old is depressing. Get used to it. By the way, I still have all my hair AND a beard. ; ).
Just kidding.
You’re great, I’m a big fan.
I'm almost 70 and still have beard and hair all over the top of my head. Some of my other original issue equipment isn't what it used to be, but hey, those are old, used, parts.
@@fredericrike5974 I like how you're cheerful about it.
@@mwanikimwaniki6801 Would pissing and moaning about it make me feel better? FWIW, I enjoyed a great many of the events that have "aged" some of my original equipment- only smoking cigarettes would be left out if I were to get a "do over". I also have a cousin who was totally bald by age 25 explain that the hair had only slowed the rate of charge for is sex machine.
@@fredericrike5974 Bald by 25? Holy smokes. That seems surreal
@@mwanikimwaniki6801 Hey, who knows, my cousin may have been either on to something or just on something; none of his four wives and many girlfriends are talking!
This is a classic Keynesian mega project similar to the New Deal in the 30’s to drag UK out of any economic woes caused by Brexit, COVID, and financial recession.
Public infrastructure projects have to be *needed* and create economic growth. HS2 is neither.
Great video with lots of interesting detail, but you didn't mention that the existing rail system is full, and expanding the total rail capacity would allow for more freight, regional and commuter traffic.
Strange that Post Brexit that HSR is the main infrastructure choice. In theory massive upgrades of ports, regional airports (to allow for bigger cargo planes), canals and rail cargo depots should be the big spend. The heathrow expansion is one indication, albeit in supercongested existing airport in the south, of infrastructure that will benefit trade efficiency. Sometimes flagship megaprojects work (Hong Kong new Airport, Oresund bridge from Denmark-Sweden, Channel Tunnel, Crossrail (when opened), Chinese megaports, Panama canal etc) but sometimes not so mega but spread out further is best (village and town road bypasses, electrification of rail lines, canal dredging, moving London port out of London docks)
This whole ordeal reminds me of the electrification of the Tennessee Valley during the Great Depression
I love when he covers projects from the UK and starts speaking British !!!
I used to journey between Reading and Stockport frequently by car while Virgin did London to Stockport in 2 hours dead. Door to door the car was qicker with a start time of my choosing. With a rail time saving of only 20 minutes (to Manchester) it still will be. It is a simple problem, the faster you go the less time you save with each step. It only makes sense on very long distances. It is also worth noting that my early life was spent on the London side of Reading but I do not live there now.
In Germany: VDE8, 515km railway to connect Berlin with Leipzig, Halle and Nürnberg (connecting with the HS Line to Munich).
Speed between 200 - 300 km/h.
27 Tunnels, 37 Bridges, some of the longest and tallest in Germany.
Saving good 2h between Berlin and Munich.
Last Segment open end of 2017
Costs: around 10b Euro
170 billion pounds and then the dramatic music finished me 😂😂😂
Airport/Air base built by the UK, 8000 miles away in just 80 weeks must qualify for a video? Mount Pleasant in the Falklands
Another excellent video, thank you. Will you be doing one on the Queen Elizabeth aircraft carrier?
Thank you for nice video 📹 SER whit my respect wishing You plesend weekend,
These are almost the same issues that have come up with the HSR construction in California. When you set about to construct huge public infrastructure projects like this, it's not uncommon to have these issues. It's the nature of the beast, but they are well worth it. The intercontinental train network was met with the same issues as was the construction of the huge Hoover Dam and the aqueduct in California. However, in the end, they were all built and the nation and it's population were better for it.
These are multi-generational projects that can take decades to complete, but that are necessary for the development of our society. They transcend the currently political environment just like so many other huge public works projects to the betterment of mankind.
The USA is still woefully behind the rest of the world with not only HSR, but airports too. The USA was at the forefront of airport construction in the 50s and 60s. We were the envy of the world. Now, our airports, are still stuck in the 50s and 60s compared to other nations around the world. This is what happens when countries don't continue to invest in public infrastructure for decades and resting on their laurels. They are left behind the rest of the first world.
HSR and future modern airports are needed to succeed not only today, but in the near and far future. We can't wait until the future to build the future infrastructure. We have to build it NOW!!!
Missed the important fact that by taking pressure off the existing lines, it will unleash a whole load of new local connecting services. This should improve connectivity and therefore see fewer car journeys taking place.
I thought he did mention something along those lines?
4:40
@@johnturner4400 I stand corrected. Could have explained this ina bit more detail however
Will it now? Who will pay for that then? You and your council flat, with low income or benefits?
The HS2 spur will pass less than a quarter of a mile from where I live. Yet if I want to use HS2 I would have to travel up to 20 miles to pay airline prices. I may as well carry on and just use the car to travel the whole way on my hypothetical journey. All it will do is turn the distant places into dormitory towns for London.
All of the other major European countries built their HS rail networks decades ago and already benefit from being much more joined-up countries with efficient and reasonably-priced rail travel over longer distances. The UK dabbled with the APT project in the '70s (a half-arsed compromise option of a fast train to run on existing tracks) then even abandonded this. Trying to build this now, is of course much more disruptive and expensive than it would have been decades ago. It's another pretty fine example of our UK 'exceptionalism'.
1960's - 1980's "But the shiny new car with the jingly keys that runs on tarmac which degrades in less than ten years. I need shiny new toys to play with don't I?".
Video idea: the Canal of the Pharaohs. It was an ancient version of the Suez Canal and connected the Nile River to the Red Sea.
Also the Great Dam of Ma'rib would be awesome too.
Hi Simon! I'd love to see an episode about the *Grand Paris Express*! A 38.5€ (yes 38.5!!) Billion project to relieve the ever packed actual Metro.
It'll also be 100% automated! The largest project of this size in the world right now! allegedly®
2:06 Maglev testtrack, not Shinkansen in operation. If we are to be technical 😏🤓
Yeah that one is going to operate around 500 km/h, something HS2 will never go at.
13:13 "The East Midland Hub, near Derby"
That would be Nottinghamshire then. As it is closer to Nottingham than Derby.
Notts/Derbys. Border being to the east of HS2 the hub will be in Derbyshire.
Watch Rory Sutherland's videos on high speed rail travel where he suggests make train travel more enjoyable rather then spending on high speed trains. Generally here in the US the projection of passenger is wildly optimistic, a lot fewer people will use it then are projected. There will probably be massive cost overruns if history is a guide.
I love the how different the attitudes towards building hyperloops are compared to railways. For high speed rail they’re like “if we try we could build a few hundred miles of track on a decade (maybe)” while for hyperloops they’re like “we’re gonna build thousands of miles instantly and make them so frequent that people will use them to get to work”.
Yeah but the difference is that the people 'making' hyperloops are snake oil salesman.
@@kevadu Elon tends to refine ideas over time, first Tesla cars even the reliability of the 2012 Model S were rather miserable, while nowadays they are viable alternatives to ICE cars, same with early SpaceX rockets, Thunderfoot mocking of Elon's ideas goes a bit beyond pointing flaws as he may not truly understand the whole plan.
You can argue if Elon shouldn't think about his designs a little bit more before throwing money on production or if he should ever show his rather moronic ideas for intercontinental rocket transportation or early propositions for underground tunnels for cars riding on e-wagons, but some of his projects need a lot of trial & error prototyping before becoming viable regardless how much time you spend in the office thinking about them beforehand, and you also need to show something to investors in order to get more money before business model become profitable (where purpose of his rather questionable visions likely come to play), so snake oil salesmen may be sort of name of the game for early adopters of new technologies but most of investors are fully aware of Elon's business model intended to eventually produce worthy products and generate profits even when this may come at the expense of early adopters that often got sort of snake oil products especially in the case of early flawed Tesla cars promoted with eventual self-driving just to find in manual in small print later stated otherwise. Personally, I think the low-pressure maglev design which evolved from the "original" Elon's blowpipe suction propulsion (principle tested over a century ago) is overcomplicated, but you can hardly go much faster than in today maglev trains in thick low altitude air without dumping a large amount of inefficiently used energy into the magnets, so you either accept additional complexity required for the low-pressure environment or give up on innovating trains all together and just buy newest Japan maglev designs which further upgrades will be likely mostly in room-temperature superconducting materials...
You may not like Elon's approach but the fact is that many car and aerospace companies try much harder nowadays due to fear of being left out than they would without Elon's initiative and determination for progress regardless of some collateral damage in unsatisfied customers and his own reputation. I wouldn't want to be an early adopter of any of his newest yet unproven technologies, but you must ask yourself if life would be better without him, cheap satellite internet and acceleration of EV development will be his legacy no matter how much more mess-ups he manages to add up to his tarnished image..
@@IonorReasSpamGenerator That was quite the wall of text...also totally irrelevant since 90% of it was kissing Elon Musk's ass but Elon Musk *isn't making a hyperloop* so that doesn't really matter. He threw an idea out there, built up hype, then a bunch of other companies started getting funding to make shit that's...not even based on Musk's idea. Seriously, not a single company 'making' hyperloops is designing anything according to Musk's original paper, they've gone back to maglev which isn't even new technology.
Which is not to say that Musk's idea was great an these companies are all dumb for not doing it. They're not doing it because they decided it wouldn't work. However there's still the fundamental question of what problem is sticking a maglev train in a vacuum supposed to solve? It can go faster, you say. Well, sure, but most high speed trains rarely reach their maximum design speed as it is today. And not because it isn't possible, but rather because there are practical issues that restrict it. One of the biggest is that the faster a train goes the straighter its tracks need to be. You have a larger turning radius the faster you're moving. This means you can't reuse existing track infrastructure if you want to go as fast as possible and acquiring land rights to build those super straight tracks is extremely expensive. Hyperloop does nothing to solve that problem. In fact it only makes it worse.
How does this country make building a relatively short high speed line over benign terrain such an expensive, controversial and long drawn out drama. The Chinese must be laughing their heads off.
Well yeah that’s a byproduct of democracy.
Probably because our government are the biggest cheap scapes.Lmao
here's the truth though, Chinese construction are limited in the sense that they can't adapt to the environment of every country. they bid cheap to win the contract but a lot of problems arises during construction such as safety violation, environmental damage, lack of preparedness, sloppy construction. as a result, forcing delays after delays. that's why no country wants Chinese trains.
Easily.
Because the CCP can bulldoze, literally, over any opposition like they did in 1989.
Glad to hear Wigan on here!
I think the main reason Wigan is a current end, is that it's one of the routes from Scotland to London, so ita ripe for expansion.
That being said, Wigan recently had a good route to manchester stopped and relegated to using the shit local routes to Manchester on the, now retired, pacer train.
WHIT MY RESPECT THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR NICE VIDEO 📹 HAPPY WEEKEND TO YOU SER,
Chinese are probably laughing at the estimated costs and time it takes to build one tiny railway lmoa
So? Do you have any idea why they can build it so cheaply and we can't?
@@JohnnyZenith standardization, mass production of specific slabs that is the first in the world, research and development and a massive amount of planning. All the standardization lowers cost. China's geography is immensely hard to work on, and China's tracks and trains can work across the differences in weather there, the Japanese one cannot.
Cheap labor alone will not fix those issues.
@@fleyua7176 Couldn't have said it better
@Yong Zhou The Chinese have perfected it so well partly because they have made it an industry...
@@fleyua7176 You are missing so much.
A nice “side project” could be the fortress of “eben emael” in Belgium.
It was considered to be the strongest fortress in the world that couldn’t be taken. But Germany attacked this first when the started their invasion in wo2. And they took it in a matter of minutes... they used special forces, landing on the fortress with gliders. And used a new kind of explosives (hollow charges) to take out the big guns (one of the purposes of these guns was also to shoot down the bridges over a few big rivers and canals in the region, to stop the German invasion)...
He definitely mentioned this somewhere in one of his videos. I remember him talking about it.
Im pretty sure that's in a side project video
@@MineZilla123 then the UA-cam algorithm is broken. I have already watched a lot of Simons videos, so they often show up in my feed.
But yet when I search eben emael, I can’t find a video made by Simon.
And I would certainly have watched that one, because I live in Belgium, 30minutes away from the fortress...
@@kristofsportingdogs3549 the YT algorithm is not as weird as facebook but it's definitely not the smartest.
Video on Simons TIFO channel
ua-cam.com/video/JHQ0TuF9HFg/v-deo.html
@@mulgerbill thanks 😊 👌
By the time England finishes this America will have teleporters.
No that will be for transportation of fish from UK famous fisheries.
Thats second photo of an APT was actually a Mk4 DVT with Mk4 coaching stock (class 91 loco at the other end I'd imagine) on the east coast mainline.
How about a video on the Nouvelle Route du Littoral (NRL) on Réunion Island. Estimated cost is about €1.66bn for 12km of road
This sounds interesting.
UK government spent almost £15 million on one mile of tramway in Birmingham city centre
High speed rail in the US is a pipe dream, we seem to be pretty determined to be stuck in the past.
If we live that long, LOL.
The east coast has Amtrak Acela. The west coast was planning something, so HSR in the places that it would actually work is probably going to happen.
US is not suited for high speed rail. There are thousands of civilian airports in the US, and everyone drive cars everywhere except for some very dense cities. Zero incentive for high speed rail other than to create jobs and stimulate some local economies
A pipe dream is an especially fitting name for the currently pushed flawed Hyperloop still under development indeed...
US have trains.. US doesnt need rail trains... It has alot airpot for long distance travel and even alot of trains actullay for mideum distance. It doesnt need to.. Maybay teaxes and california are a expetin beacuse they are very populat.
For reference, it is about 1 hr + to drive from my house to downtown Portland OR. There is very little discussion about high speed rail in the US (I believe California is an exception). As near as I can tell, the main objection to rail is an issue of "FREEDOM!" People seem to believe they have to have a car and they don't want to rent one. Let alone, there is a significant lack of decent local public transport. And, the issue of distance. Drive from San Diego to Florida sometime.
First High Speed Rail happened in Japan pretty much under the same opposition