Is it a wise use of taxpayers dollars to spend $13 billion in the next five years ($8 billion in the recovery package and $5 billion in the next five annual appropriations) in a down payment on constructing a high-speed rail network? Or are there better ways to spend this money on transportation? That was the subject of a recent weekly debate on the National Journal's Transportation Blog. The debate revealed a spectrum of opinion among the contributors, with proponents of high-speed rail outnumbering the doubters by a wide margin.
High-Speed Rail
Follow the Money: Funding High-Speed Rail
California's proposed high-speed rail line is to be funded by a patchwork of federal, state, and local funding mechanisms. Reporter Dierdre Newman sorts through the morass.
spot.us
Going Backwards on the Tracks
Author Tom Vanderbilt suggests that train service has been headed in the wrong direction for the better part of a century.
Slate.com
George Will Slams LaHood
George Will, fresh from denouncing denim as 'the infantile uniform of a nation', is disturbed to find that Ray LaHood has bought the Obama administration's beliefs in regards to mass transit, bicycling, and 'transformation'.
Newsweek
Dukakis (Hearts) Rail
'Dukakis is a rail man,' says Alex Marshall, after the man speak on his history with Amtrak and promoting and building rail in Boston. The cure to our transit woes, according to Dukakis, is competence.
Citiwire.net
High-Speed Rail Means Real Estate Boom
Peter Gertler of HNTB says that the Obama administration's high-speed rail investments will attract new development around stations.
Forbes
Florida Looks At High-Speed Rail Plan
Richard Florida compares the Obama administration's suggest HSR corridors to the mega-regions they will serve and likes what he sees.
The Atlantic
The Train in Spain
By the end of the year, Spain is on course to have a more extensive high-speed rail system than both Japan and France. The system is changing hearts and minds across this usually home-bound nation.
The Wall St. Journal
Obama Trumpets High-Speed Rail
Quoting Daniel Burnham, Obama announced that America should "make no little plans" as he affirmed his administration's commitment to building high-speed rail across the nation. Ten corridors were highlighted.
Washington Post
Obama Advisor on the State of Transportation
GOOD Magazine talks with Joseph M. Sussman, an external adviser to the Department of Transportation and professor at MIT, about high-speed rail, intelligent transportation systems, and more.
GOOD Magazine
O'Toole Says Trains Are For Tourists
Randall O'Toole- in a curiously non-audio opinion piece from NPR- says that trains around the world are fun but are otherwise overly expensive transportation systems used mainly by the elite.
NPR
Playing Catch-Up with Rail
Have high-speed rail stimulus funds put us any closer to technology like mag-lev? A long record of underfunding makes many of such projects shovel-unready, but hopes are still high.
Miller-McCune
The Battle Over The Transbay Terminal
The Transbay Joint Powers Authority (TJPA) and the California High Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA) are sparring over the size of the "train box" in the new Transbay Terminal. Streetsblog makes sense of the brouhaha.
Streetsblog SF
How Does Maglev Work, Anyway?
A new sixty-minute TV documentary explains how maglev technology works, and covers the first major accident on a maglev track.
Parallax Film Productions
How to Spend $8 Billion in High-Speed Rail Funds
Transportation reporter Tom Belden of the Philadelphia Daily ponders how and where the $8 billion in stimulus funds allotted to high-speed rail should be spent, referencing a report by the Progressive Policy Institute.
Philadelphia Daily
High-Speed Rail Needs Private Investment
California's high-speed rail project is a triumph for rail advocates, but made possible by private sector funding. A Canadian rail project must also follow the model of public-private partnerships.
The Globe and Mail
More High-Speed Trains
Rail advocates are getting their day, as they push for more high-speed rail lines- not just in California, but across the country.
ABC
Obama's Energy Platform Has a (Small) Livable Cities Plank
Discussion of high speed rail, livable cities and federal transportation funding reform is starting to make its way into presidential candidate Barack Obama's campaign talks and energy platform.
Streetsblog
High-Speed Rail Ready to Go- Just Add Money
After significant debate, the Pacheco pass route has been approved for the high-speed train between Los Angeles and the Bay Area. Next step: pass a $10 billion proposition on the November ballot.
San Jose Mercury News
High-Speed Transit Comes to Second Life
UC Irvine student Cristi Lopes is writing software for "SkyTran", a virtual high-speed train based in Second Life. The virtual world will actually serve as a useful simulator for the real thing.
The Times Of India
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