Europe's High-Speed Rail Revolution May Spread to U.S.

By Paul Nussbaum
The Philidelphia Inquirer, August 8, 2010
Straight to the Source

MADRID, Spain - At precisely 10:30 a.m., with quiet jazz wafting from its speakers, AVE Train 3103 glides out of Atocha Station in central Madrid, its sleek nose pointed east toward a rising sun and Barcelona.

Even with a stop in Zaragoza, the 385-mile trip, which takes seven hours by car, is scheduled to last two hours, 52 minutes. Without the stop, it's two hours, 38 minutes. Cruising speed: 186 m.p.h.

Of course, the train will be on time: If it's more than five minutes late, the passengers get their money back.

Compare that with the Pennsylvanian, the daily Amtrak train that travels a similar distance - 353 miles - from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh. That laborious journey takes almost three times as long: seven hours, 23 minutes, a half-hour longer than it took in 1941. Twelve station stops. No jazz. No refunds.

Or compare it to Amtrak's Acela Express between Philadelphia and Boston: When it's on time, the train makes that 318-mile trip in about five hours. Slightly faster than driving, but slower and more expensive than flying. And it's late 30 percent of the time.



In Europe, fast trains are transforming the continent, bringing cities and countries within a few hours of one another, erasing centuries-old regional divisions, resuscitating long-dormant towns, cutting air pollution, creating new economies and manufacturing jobs, and, in a reversal of 20th-century fortunes, making some air travel obsolete.

Is this America's future, or simply a glimpse of a far-off world we'll never inhabit?

After decades of false starts, the United States is making a push for high-speed rail, which could bring many of the same changes to this side of the globe.

The Obama administration this year gave $8 billion in stimulus funds to jump-start high-speed rail projects on 13 corridors in 31 states. And the administration promised $5 billion more over the next five years.

It could be, as the administration claims, the biggest advance in U.S. transportation since construction of the interstate highway system half a century ago.



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