1) There are tons of airports in Spain...It aint airports we lack here... Nore is it highways. …
2) The Spanish high speed system is still under construction...
3) ...The Spanish rail carrier is in profit. The French AVG is in profit. The Chinese high speed rail is in profit. The list goes on. Once the investment has been made in the tracks, then these trains are nothing but money makers IF put in the right places.
Then the right places are few for
actual profit, because contrary to you claim most of the European HSR lines are money losers. For example, the Congressional Research Service (2009) reported:
Experts say that virtually no HSR lines anywhere in the world have earned enough revenue to cover both their construction and operating costs, even where population density is far greater than anywhere in the United States. Typically, governments have paid the construction costs, and in many cases have subsidized the operating costs as well.
https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R40973.pdf
and
Inaki Barron de Angoiti, director of high speed rail at the International Railways Association, said it is estimated that only two high speed routes in the world have broken even (that is, covered both their construction and operating costs): the Tokyo-Osaka and Paris-Lyon routes. Victoria Burnett, “Europe’s HighSpeed Trains Holds Lessons for U.S.,” New York Times, May 29, 2009.
And as Ron Cole of Amtrak admits:
It is a fact that no nationwide passenger rail system anywhere in the world is considered profitable when all costs -- including capital -- are accounted for," wrote Cole, in an e-mail to CNNMoney.com. "Like all national rail systems worldwide, Amtrak requires annual funding to support both its capital and operational needs.
To invest enormous amounts of money into a new HSR infrastructure to compete with "tons of" roads and existing airports makes little sense if the net result is to create another government money sucking beast subsidized to steal traffic from other non-subsidized and subsidized forms of public transportation. And it makes even less sense to take usury level gas taxes from drivers, and then establish toll roads anyway, so as to subsidize those other elements of money losing ROI public transportation.
Now this Daniel Albalate guy....
Eh? That comment makes NO sense whatsoever. Yes Madrid is the capital and happens to be in the middle of the country.. so any system would have to go through the middle of the country. Also regional capitals are usually the largest cities in said regions, so of course that would be logical to connect them. However there are also trains to non regional capitals.. explain that? ...I am not saying that the Spanish system is perfect, far from it. However at least they have dared to think ahead and outside the box, ... where as the US sticks its conservative head right into the ground and hopes nothing bad happens. There is no better system to move large amounts of people fast between two points...
Oh please, "this" Daniel Albatale is also a Spanish transportation economist and academic, who written on the subject including in a book, the Economics and Politics of High Speed Rail. His criticisms of high speed rail implementations is strongest for that of those in Spain, a country whose "thinking outside the box" is to ignore cost-benefit results, ignore EU guidelines for minimal ridership numbers to even have a shot at breaking even on operations, and whose "thought" is to blind and gushing admiration in "modern" nation building with white elephant HSR's, burning 10s of billions.
A few brief facts speak for itself:
- The Spanish network far surpasses all countries, except China - despite the fact that Spanish HSR passenger numbers only slightly more than 6 percent of those transported by the Shinkansen in Japan. It is also easily the most expensive per mile of track.
- Cost-benefit evaluations of the Madrid–Seville line have appeared (de Rus and Inglada, 1993), as well as of the Madrid–Barcelona line (de Rus and Román, 2006). In both cases, the results were that AVE’s economic profitability and its contribution to social welfare was dismal. Not that Spain's leaders care.
- Unlike other European nations, economic analysis of high-speed rail has played a small role in the formation of infrastructure policy in Spain. Hence, all HSR track lead Madrid for political, not economic reasons. Economics simply don't play much of a role in Spain's decision making.
Cont:
