Reply #35: there are other difficulties, too [View All]

[jobendorfer]

Europe has some advantages over the U.S. in terms of planning
rail transport. First, there's simply a difference of scale.
The distance between Los Angeles and Seattle is about 1200
miles (roughly). It's 2000ish miles from the West Coast to
Chicago. Even at 150mph, you're looking at lengthy travel.
By way of contrast -- Marseille to Paris, 300 miles. Naples
to Milan, maybe 400 miles (I don't have a map handy).

The second advantage is the density of their cities. Athens
has a population of 4.x million, roughly comparable to the
population of Seattle. But the geographic "footprint" of
Athens is perhaps 500 square miles; the footprint of the
Seattle conurbanation starts at the 100 mile mark on I-5
and is a corridor 20+ miles wide for over 120 miles (until
you get north of Everett). It's a lot easier to build an
urban transit network in a 500 square mile space than a
~3000 square mile space.

I don't think you can separate urban planning, growth
management, and mass transit.

J.