0
0
Sitting in traffic, waiting for the person in front of you to move up a little, so you can inch up toward the traffic light…only to have to stop again because the light turned red on you. This is a common problem for anyone trying to move through traffic. Would you want to wait five minutes for a light and then not even get to go? This problem is easily fixed with high speed railways, an idea that will clean the streets as well as the amount of car emissions throughout the US. However the goal is not just to reduce the use of cars on busy streets but to reduce the time it takes to go from city to city. This reduced time would increases the efficiency of America as a whole especially because the population in the USA is only expected to increase. The New York Times article by Wallace Turner stated the United States should be the next country to invest into the high speed rail transportation system because it would increase businesses productivity by 15%! Other countries like Japan and China have already implemented the railway successfully, showing high speed railways are a good infrastructure and financial investment. As stated by usher.com, a nonprofit website, the creation of this high speed railway would save $87.2 billion in automobile gridlock which translates to 4.2 billion hours of wasted time per year. In addition to the automotive world it would also save money and time during air travel. Railways would decrease to cost of operating planes from $41 billion to $19 billion saving another 12 billion hours. If the United State were to not take this opportunity to build such a productive railway it would be like placing your money under your mattress because the stock market is doing too well.
There are also people who believe that introducing this high speed railway would be harmful to society. They argue that it would create the same air pollution during its construction as cars would in five years delaying the benefits of the trains for five years. The maintenance of the train would burn through resources and fossil fuels faster and in larger quantities than cars would in ten years delaying those benefits for ten years. This air pollution and burning of fossil fuels will have to be paid for by our generations to come. It is also way too expensive for the United States to invest into right now costing over $68.4 billion. All the money should be spent fixing roads, bridges, and tunnels that already exist. More jobs would be created if the money was spent fixing these roads and bridges. Aside from all the jobs it would create it has been researched by nytime.com that the railways would must likely not even be used by you or me because only 8% of commuters would use this railway system. That is a very small percentage of people to spend all that money on if 92% of us wouldn’t even use it. Also some people would argue that riding a train does not have the same appeal as driving yourself in your favorite car because driving a vehicle and being in complete control to where they are going giving them a sense of security.
Dr. Christopher Barkan, a professor and executive director of the Rail Transportation and Engineering Center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, has twenty-seven years of experience talking about the effects of such a railroad. He believes that instituting a high speed rail system would be beneficial to boost the overall productivity of the american public because travel from workplace to workplace would be drastically reduced. Investing into the railway would help increase – increase the economy, especially the profits of every company business trip that was time sensitive. An example of a time sensitive business trip could be an interview for a new job that you need to get to help your family pay the bills. If this railway didn’t exist you would be late to the interview and your family would have to go through more problems to pay the bills. As said by heritage.org “ The cost of biulding a railway in the US would prove to be a good venture in 10 to 15 years after its creation.” Another supporter for the termination of the railway, James Fallow in the theatlantic.com article writes a redherring to describe the better solution to spend the money on other structures how they will create more jobs and prevent people from going homeless because of lack of jobs.. He claims that if the train would be built then less jobs would be created and help the economy less than if the money was spent on upgrading pre existing roads and bridges. These jobs are needed in order to reduce the amount of newly homeless people. They would find it easy to get a job building railways, tunnels, bridges, and maintaining the trains, for a long enough time for them to get an education and get back on their feet financially. This is a completely different issue that should not be look at as a direct effect from building the railway. When in fact this is a problem throughout the entire united states. High speed railways do not cause homelessness, lack of jobs or lack of effort cause homelessness. This is why it is a good idea to build the railway, not because it reduces homelessness, not because it won’t increases as many jobs, not because it is too expensive, but because it will help increase America’s business productivity.
You may think that there is nothing that you or me can do about this debate but there is. Visit www.cahsrblog.com and leave a comment to help pass the bill for California ‘s fist high speed railway system. You could also introduce this problem to five of your closest friends to spread the word. Tell your friends to tell five other friends about this cause to spread the word even more. This will then cause a snowball effect as more and more people know about the issue. How many people would choose to live in a world with crowded streets, especially if they could control the world around them? The railway would reduce this and add many other benefits. If your friends already agree with you one this issue then leave a comment on this article and share the article on social media, like twitter at (#iwillride), and facebook, or even use your email to spread the word.
High-speed rail would be a strong benefit to the public transportation of America. Mostly every other nation has a high-speed rail network, and it benefits the nation’s ability to move people to and fro quickly. Brightline is a good small introduction to high speed and could be great for public transportation, and areas of railroad like the North East Corridor show that high speed can be achieved.