• 14 Posts
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Joined 3 years ago
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Cake day: June 13th, 2023

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  • grue@lemmy.worldMtoFuck Cars@lemmy.worldTrains
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    1 hour ago

    There are many parts of the US where highways have chronic congestion because they just can’t scale enough, nor could we afford to maintain them, where intercity rail would be a much better choice.

    The examples I can think of chronic congestion are pretty much all intracity (which I consider to include between the central city and its suburbs), not intercity (the long rural stretches between metro areas). Intercity rail is better than freeways (but more importantly, better than airplanes) for efficiency’s sake, but doesn’t necessarily have much to do with reducing congestion. Intracity rail (commuter rail, subways and streetcars) is what’s needed for reducing congestion.





  • grue@lemmy.worldMtoFuck Cars@lemmy.worldTrains
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    5 hours ago

    Metro Atlanta’s only passenger rail station that still exists, a tiny thing on Peachtree Road in Brookwood (just north of Midtown), was originally a commuter stop on the way to the big, beautiful stations downtown. They were all torn down decades ago.

    I’ve just realized I don’t even know how many traditional train stations (including ancillary commuter ones, but not including streetcars or the modern subway system) the city/metro area even had. It’s gotta be dozens, at least.







  • grue@lemmy.worldMtoFuck Cars@lemmy.worldTrains
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    7 hours ago

    The “relative” peace of the USA during the 1800s is one reason we have so few trains.

    No it isn’t. The US was absolutely full of trains by the end of the 1800s. Our map looked a lot like Europe’s until after WWII, when we started ripping them out!



  • grue@lemmy.worldMtoFuck Cars@lemmy.worldTrains
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    7 hours ago

    Cities in the US are spread apart because of car-centric zoning. It’s the laws governing land use that drive the infrastructure design, not the other way around.

    (Note that I said “spread apart,” not “far apart,” by the way. I’m talking about travel within cities, not between them. Intercity travel has no excuse to not be rail regardless.)


  • grue@lemmy.worldMtoFuck Cars@lemmy.worldTrains
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    7 hours ago

    More likely a new map, and the lines you’re thinking of have been shut down since the last time you checked.

    (Or you’re thinking of train tracks in general, not specifically ones carrying passenger service, which is what this is a map of.)