They used to run a high speed passenger service between Cincinnati && Cleveland back in the '70s. It passed my area twice a day, and was the weirdest train that I ever saw. One long car, with controls on each end so they didn't need a roundhouse to turn it around for the return trip.
They do -- on the East Coast. There is a car/train from Sandfod (Orlando) to just outside Washington, DC. The problem is -- it is expensice!
Most of the commuter trains in So Cal are that way..engine on each end..or on one end only. Often times the engine is on the back of the train going one direction..and on the front going the other way.
"Metrolink"
It usually works fine. However...occasionally......
Same crap going on here in Kitchener Waterloo Cambridge Ontario. They are going to call it the ION. It will run from the shopping plaza on the North end of Waterloo to the shopping plaza on the east end of Kitchenr, connecting from there toCambridge via Express Bus. Close to half a billion dollars.
We had a perfectly serviceable electric trolley system here until the mid sixties that did virtually the same thing and they tore it all out to go with deisel busses. Now they are going back to light rail (basically trolleys)
SAounds like the Budd Dieselcar system.
If the city planners had their way that's how we'd all be living. Density Density Density combined with public transit, not those nasty personal cars.
There has never been a public transit system in modern times that covers it's own cost. Typically less then 50% of the construction costs are paid by the actual users and once operating it's rare that more then 20% of the ongoing costs are paid by the users. People in thousands of small towns all over the US pay for the transit subsidies of perhaps a dozen large cities. And those subsidized systems mainly benefit the construction and real estate industries of those few cities. It's just like Football stadiums - socialism for the rich.
In my little town..they tore out the train tracks 20 or so years ago. No taxis in 18 yrs and we have a community bus that spends most of its time sitting in a shady spot waiting for someone to call for a ride. I wonder how much thats costing the California taxpayers?
Very well stated!
Gunner
: :
.... NEVER....
Google,,, Trains that turn into Airplanes
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