Talk:High-speed rail

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There is an unacceptable level of POV in the History section that needs to be adressed. Two points:

Fuel efficiency does not equal competitiveness. Only the total cost is important

High speed rail is not that fuel efficient. Its main selling points are speed and capacity

Klafubra 10:02, 26 September 2005 (UTC)

-Klafubra, what is important is up to the planners POV. Fuel efficiency vs. total cost are gross oversimplifications, there are other considerations, including national prestige, environmental pollution, convenience (which depends on interacting systems, like city urban transport, parking, highways, etc), traffic jams, government kickbacks (yes, a real consideration!), economic stimulus, funding availability, safety (cars are killing machines, so is alcohol & sleepiness), war bomb shelters (stations), that often can't be calculated in dollars, but have social well being impact. Regarding solely the two however its important to remember total cost is dependent on time, total cost over time may vary widely with age, so its not as simple as comparing two figures. However, we know that high speed rail is designed to be considerably more fuel efficient than airplanes and/or private automobiles, but again that depends on actual usage patterns, design of trainsets, route design, maintenence, driving patterns...in practice, some stations are built far from city centers, requiring substantial extra time/distance to/from to the station than other alternatives. (e.g. Taichung station, Taiwan and Tsubame-Sanjo, Japan)

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"Passenger rail service has been seriously downgraded since, due to declining demand". Not true. Demand for passenger rail has INCREASED overall since the WW2, while demand for air and road has increased at a much higher rate. As for the serious downgrade, what exactly do you mean by that? closing of intercity lines? decline in passengers? fewer trains on the timetable? slower trains? where is the evidence? Surely the introduction topics in this article refer to the countries that have notable high speed rail initiative, ie. Japan, Korea, China, Western Europe? I think you'll find that in those countries there has been no such 'severe downgrade'.

-People often write from a national perspective than a global one. People need to cite which nation they are referring to, and if they don't know, then they should not write at all.

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Although there are a few exceptions, most high-speed rail projects never set out to be an excercise in running a profitable business. Both high speed and conventional rail are, like it or not, inevitably loss-making, government-subsidised systems whose existence is justified by the claim that their macroeconomic benefits outweigh the microeconomic losses. Using an ambiguous clichee such as "market" for the utilisation of something that has more resemblance to a public service than a to market product is slighlty inadequate and lazy writing. Although the english language seems increasingly infested with business jargon, most people still wouldn't say "market for police officers", "market for pavements" or "market for traffic lights" for instance. I therefore replaced the word, at least in the title, with the slighlty better description "Target areas".

-Profitable business, again, is a very narrow minded way to evaluate a high speed rail system, or for that matter, any system! Please see the first discussion regarding fuel efficiency vs. total cost.

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I am moving some MAJOR POV to the talk page. I'll let someone else figure out what to put back and how:

[begin material from page]

The railroads, which had been built with private capital, were not given an equal playing field.

In Europe and Japan, with important conventional rail services, their extension and adaptation to a higher speed technology was a more obvious choice than in the United States, where decisions are dominated by the highway lobby rather than reason.

Other widely cited complaints against the air and highway modes are their externalities: pollution, noise, accidents, etc. Neither air nor highway modes can avoid these.

[end material from page]

Railroads do not make noise? Ever lived near one? Building a highway system was unreasonable? Amtrack is disadvantaged by the government? Come on!

-Whether one system makes noise has no effect on whether all systems make noise. We all know that some cars are noisy as hell and others are quiet as a mouse. People need to separate one individual design from facts of all systems...useful info would be highest, average, lowest noise decibels of major systems in operation, future designs/improvements that would reduce these figures and their costs, not a bitch fight whether specific systems are noisy or not.

I was also confused by the following sentence: As with its inauguration, the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano Japan are a target for the opening of a rail line extension.

Does this mean that this sentence hasn't been updated since 1998?

Cos111 00:29 26 Jul 2003 (UTC)

It seems to come from Levinson, David. 1995 [!]. Rail Reinvented: A Brief History of High Speed Ground Transportation, http://www.ce.umn.edu/~levinson/papers-pdf/RailReinvented.pdf I updated this line. - Patrick 08:05 26 Jul 2003 (UTC)

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This is a great article! Did you write it specially for Wikipedia, Qbmessiah? --Larry Sanger

Unlike other modes, whose emergence have at least in part been the result of a forceful entrepreneur, rail?s George Stephenson and Peter Cooper, the automobile?s Henry Ford, or the airplanes Orville and Wilbur Wright come immediately to mind, high speed ground transportation has been a product of planning from the central government in Japan, France, and the state governments in the United States.

Who cares whether an "entrepreneur" is involved? Just mention it's the result of central planning and be done with it. Americans are so weird.

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I disagree with the above remark. This seems to be a very important difference in the way this technology was developed. I'm sure you'll agree that one cannot discount the importance of entrepreneurs in the development of many technologies; given that, it's notable that (if it's true) entrepreneurs weren't involved in the development of this technology. This has social/political implications, of a sort that ought to be interesting to you, particularly if you don't (ever) care whether entrepreneurs are involved in a project.

--A weird American :-)

You're begging the question. You're assuming that it's notable (ie, important enough to be noticed) that "entrepreneurs" (whatever that Americanism means) weren't involved in the development of high speed trains. And from this you conclude exactly what you're assuming!

Entrepreneur as defined by a dictionary, and under its definition, it says:

French, from Old French, from entreprendre, to undertake.

Does not say anything about American, U.S., USA, North America, Western culture, ...

…Guy M… ^(soapbox) 10:09, July 11, 2005 (UTC)

and now back to the previously scheduled tirade...

Actually, the word "entrepreneur" should be taken out even if for the sole reason that it's an Americanism and a propaganda word for neo-liberalism. Neo-liberalism is a POV which should be moded away. If you wish to say that "Neo-liberals think it important that blah blah blah" then go right ahead. At that point, I can leave it to someone else to take it out as completely irrelevant. -- Not an American

Read more carefully; I'm not given to begging questions. Entrepreneurs (a French word found in the OED) were important in developing very many technologies; that you must not be denying, because it's obviously true. It follows--but arguably, inductively, and non-trivially--from this that it is notable that entrepreneurs were not involved in the development of high speed rail. No "neo-liberal" assumptions are involved here, as far as I can see.

This said, given that you have some objection, and that other left-leaning people would too, adding a qualification would be very apropos (that's another French-sourced word). I think I'll do that.

--An anti-bigot.

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This article read like many of my draft articles - full of "moreover", "nevertheless","maybe", "possibly", "however" etc. I quite like that style, but most readers do not! When it comes to the crunch, very little is added by including words like that, though they can work well enough in informal text, or perhaps in speech, though we don't really speak like that, do we?

I think it is often better, have produced the draft including all the words mentioned above, plus a few more, to then go through and fairly ruthlessly prune most of them out. Also many sentences can be split into separate sentences, and while people with complex minds may find that too simplistic, there is evidence that for most people this makes the articles more readable.

I have tried to maintain the same tone, and information as the original, but simply to shorten it, and to make it clearer, without redundant words.

David Martland 18:08 Dec 10, 2002 (UTC)

Well done! Patrick 21:10 Dec 10, 2002 (UTC)

Contents 1 Duplication 2 Some Technical stuff 3 UK Aspects. 4 Must be corrected! 5 Merge with article shinkansen 6 Irish Highspeed? 7 Confusing Statement about Japanese Trains 8 High speed railways in Norway 9 Weasel wording... 10 Article split? 11 Lack of Organisation (Talk)

[edit] Duplication

The whole article seems to be duplicated. I'm not sure if there are differences between the two parts, so someone should compare them and fix it. --SPUI 11:04, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)--SPUI 11:04, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Some Technical stuff

• Highspeed rail is in the international technical use defined as something faster than 100 mph (160 km/h). The UIC definition is more suitable for Europe, but not for the rest of the world.
• The dual gauge train in Spain is called Talgo 250
• The Swiss ICN is a very nice, but this is not really a high speed train. It belongs more to the tilting train category like Pendolino or VT 611.
• The new Talgo 350 for Spain is built by Talgo togehter with Bombardier. The design of the power headds is from Switzerland.
• The Acela Express train is not tilting. It was only designed to do so, but it never did in revenew service.

Hmmmm... I've read that it tilts, but the loading gauge doesn't permit it to tilt as far as had been hoped-for.

Atlant 16:07, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

Hmm I wouldn't say any definition which is based on mph is suitable for the 'rest of the world' For the US perhaps, but not the rest of the world. Besides that, where are the sources? Who is the one who defines it as faster then 100 mph? Saying it's an international technical use is not particularly informative without saying who defines it as faster then 100 mph. Is it defacto? The UN? Who? Nil Einne 19:49, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

To quote the start of article "According to UIC, "high-speed train" is a train that runs at over 250 km/h [155mph] on dedicated tracks, or over 200 km/h [125mph] on upgraded conventional tracks.", the UIC being the International Union of Railways (Ref: General definitions of highspeed.). So this is an international definition with a proper reference. Tompw (talk) 21:04, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] UK Aspects.

It seems a little silly that the UK is the only country which gets its own section devoted to how it doesn't have high speed rail. Perhaps if the UK needs to be mentioned, then it would be sensible to refer to the Channel Tunnel Rail Link (which will start domestic services in the nearish future) as the main backbone, while saying that the East Coast Main Line is close in terms of speed and straightness, while not being a purpose built High Speed Line, and that the West Coast Main Line is upgraded to 125mph on sections along its length.

[edit] Must be corrected!

In Europe High speed definitions varies from country to country, but is commonly designated with +250 km/h.

I fixed the statement about Pendolino deriving from APT train: this is wrong. The first tilting train with active technology in the world was italian ETR Y 0160 in 1969, while the first commercial runs were made in 1975 by ETR401 from Rome to Ancona. APT in 1975 started the building of the first three prototypes, completed only in 1981, while the 1972 APT was only a test train (so it came 3 years later the italian one). So it is wrong to say that Pendolino is derived mainly from APT technology. APT patents were acquired to improve the bogies of the second generation of italian trains, the ETR450.

Talgo is NOT the fastest diesel train. The fastest one was the TGV001 Turbotrain prototype, back in the '60s (315 km/h).

--Jollyroger 16:26, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Merge with article shinkansen

The editors for the Shinkansen article are saying that "Shinkansen" is the universal term for all bullet trains because Japan dominates the field.

I disagree, and most of the article shares the same content with this article.

Let's make Shinkansen article provide information for Japanese bullet trains, not the bullet trains for all of the world.

And then incorporate many of the similar elements in that article into this. (Wikimachine 18:17, 17 May 2006 (UTC))

• Disagree with merge -- IMNSHO, Shinkansen means exactly what it means: "New Railway" and it refers only to that new railway (which falls into the larger, more-general category of high-speed rail). Atlant 18:33, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
• Strongly disagree with merge - Shinkansen refers uniquely to Japanese high-speed rail, not to the rest of the world. -- Arwel (talk) 18:40, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
• Disagree with merge - I find it hard to believe this merge was proposed. This is the "High-speed rail" article, not the "bullet train" article. This article discusses world-wide high speed trains, Japanese trains (regardless of name) are but a small part. The main Shinkansen article should be linked in the relevant section (under the english term for them - "Bullet trains") but not merged. It should be treated just like all the other networks - TGV, Eurostar, ICE etc. Canderra 22:50, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

You guys don't get this. Thanks for the participation anyways.

If you search the word bullet train, it leads to the Shinkansen article. This is what I am complaining about. This has the implication that Shinkansen is the universal term for the field bullet train.

Well, in that case case "bullet train" is synonymous with "Shinkansen". It is not, however, synonymous with "high-speed rail". -- Arwel (talk) 20:10, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

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2nd proposal: Make the redirect on bullet train to high-speed rail article. (Wikimachine 19:09, 17 May 2006 (UTC))

• Disagree with redirect "bullet train" is normally taken to refer to the trains running on the Japanese high-speed network. I have never heard of any other nation's train network being called by that name. The current article for "bullet trains"/"Shinkansen" is very good and much more appropriate for the term than this more generalised & global article. Canderra 23:07, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Folks, let's stop the discussion here and move it to Talk:Shinkansen. I've removed the merge tag as it's obvious this idea has little support. Jpatokal 02:01, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Irish Highspeed?

Whilst I agree it's good that IE have introduced their new mark 4 CAF built trains on internal routes it states right here that they only run at 160kph and the introductory sentence says that High-Speed rail is consider to be above 200kph. Therefore should the Republic of Ireland be included? Yes it's a much quicker and improved timing on certain routes be it is really just an upgrade of the existing services with new stock etc, not at all comparable to 'proper' high-speed like TGV, ICE, AVE etc running at 300+ kph. --Achmelvic 12:23, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

I think it should it should be included because the 160km/h is just a minimum speed not a maximum speed.

It should be included although 160km/h is not a minimum speed. Have you ever heard of anything that has a minimum speed of 160km/h? That's impossible. (Wikimachine 18:29, 23 May 2006 (UTC))

Does anyone know what the projected max speed is? --Achmelvic 18:55, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Confusing Statement about Japanese Trains

"As with other high speed rail lines around the world, some Shinkansen lines cannot handle the highest speeds. Some rails remain narrow-gauge to allow sharing with conventional trains, reducing land requirement and cost."

Are some Shinkansen run on narrow-gauge lines? Is this a three-rail setup, where one rail is used by trains of both gauges, while the other rails are used by trains of the different gauges? Or do they change the wheels on the trains like they do for some international trains in Europe where different countries use different gauges?

I guess the sentence refers to Mini-Shinkansen line, the upgraded conventional line with a through service to a main Shinkansen line. In other words, it is technically not a "true" Shinkansen, although announced as so. As far as I know, its truck is widened to standard gauge, except of very short 3-railed segments.--Kzaral 13:55, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

>>A direct train between Lahore and Karachi will commence operations from July 26th 2006 and will reach a top speed of 140 km/hr and will be equipped with VHF walkie-talkies<<

140 km/h? VHF walkie-talkies? Unbelievalble! A true 21st century railway engineering feat.

I mean, really, this entry does not belong in this article.

[edit] High speed railways in Norway

I've included some text on the current political climate for high speed railways in Norway. I'm not sure how much of my sources I should mention in the article itself, but at least I can list some of my sources here:

• http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/iriks/article1542417.ece (Norwegian)
• http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article1547788.ece (English)
• http://www.norskbane.no/ (critism of the investigation, Norwegian)

129.241.139.132 23:41, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Weasel wording...

"Japan might be considered the spiritual home of modern high-speed railways."

Could somebody fix the thesis with something more neutral? Sounds like original research to me. The burden of proof is on you guys. (Wikimachine 22:05, 29 December 2006 (UTC))

-I think a better sentence would be "Japan is considered the pioneer of modern high speed railways". This would be accurate as it was the first to design, build, and operate them, an undisputable fact. Spiritual Home sounds more like a religious sect.

[edit] Article split?

The article is currently 57 kilobytes long (and 8,400 words), and it's not going to get any shorter. (The Technology and Hitsory sections both nmeed expansion). Consequently, I would like to suggest that the sections "Countries with high-speed rail networks in operation" and "Countries planning high-speed rail" be split off into their own articles. I would suggest something like High-speed rail networks by country and Planned high-speed rail projects by country or similar, though alternative names would be helpful. Tompw (talk) 19:57, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

How about we do split the articles but we keep the current and planned high-speed rail joined? GCFreak2 16:16, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

That sounds okay. (Wikimachine 05:43, 6 January 2007 (UTC))

Having both current and planned together would create an article over 42 kilobytes in size and containing over 6,000 words... which would be long enough it justify splitting in itself! Plus, a lot of countries only have sketchy coverage, so the article will get longer. So, I really think there hsould be seperate articles for countries with HSR, and countries just planning it. Tompw (talk) 14:07, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

People need to move all unnecessary info to subarticles, and then adding links such as "See artice ...", which would reduce size. Splitting is not the right decision. France, the nation in Europe with the most developed network, has the least coverage here...due to a proper redirect. Other nations with networks in operation should move nearly all info to their respective subpages, keeping only brief short statements. (e.g. Japan uses and pioneereed the Shinkansen system, See high speed rail in Japan <-- this is sufficient!!)

There are 32 countires listed - if each had 86 words (like France), then that makes 2,750 words. The non-country stuff comes to about about 2,300 words, so this would make 5,050 words, makeing the article about 34KB in size, which is still too big. Also, as I said earlier, the Technology and History sections both need expansion, so the article will only get bigger. Tompw (talk) 16:13, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

OK.... in view of the lack of response to my most recent commment, I've created High-speed rail by country and Planned high-speed rail by country. Tompw (talk) 12:33, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Lack of Organisation (Talk)

I was considering making some contributions to this article, but I was put off by the very unstructured talk page. It is just anarachy ... the contents list is halfway down the page!! This page is very un-professional ... not what I would expect on Wikipedia. Sheepcot 14:20, 8 April 2007 (UTC)