frito bandito said:
agnerd said:
Every single person in the state of Texas will have to spend $1,000 on this train for it to break even.
For just the INTEREST on the money it take to build the train, you can build a new runway and terminal at both DFW, and IAH, purchase 20 737s that do nothing but fly back and forth between the two runways, replace the planes every 20 years, and never charge a dollar for a fare. That's for JUST THE INTEREST on the money. Everybody should be angry about how bad the math is on this project and the impending taxpayer bailout.
You are not comparing apples to apples. High speed rail is a whole new concept, and it is being built literally from the ground up. To make a real cost comparison, purchase the land, build the runways, terminal, hangars, parking and air traffic control systems at your airport. Then train and staff the hundreds of folks that it is going take to make that happen. Pay taxes on the real property, too. Compare those numbers. Then increase the price of jet fuel by a magnitude of three or four, and lets see how the numbers look..
doesn't matter. the fact is, thanks to the fact that the airports already exist, they don't have to do all of the capital expenditures HSR requires. imagining a scenario where they had to start from scratch is worthless...they don't.
Bottom line: HSR is a land grab by a private corp., enabled by the state gov't, for a project that is very likely to fail unless subsidized by taxpayers.
On top of that, it is a solution in search of a problem.