High-Speed Rail, America, and One Bangin' Cool Future by 2030

"Make no small plans. They have no magic to stir humanity's blood and probably themselves will not be realized." - Daniel Burnham

That kind of thinking is the kind we admire the most and the worst thing which can ever come to anyone is the realization you did not dream big enough in your life.  We believe, as ever, Dream Big, It Just Might Happen!

Daniel Burnham's thought opens the page for the United States High-Speed Rail Conference which is a group of far-thinking individuals even more enamored of the potential for high-speed rail in the United States than I have been.

Here at the Rockhouse, we strongly believe and have evidence to support the potential for huge and positive sociological change which will come out of a large-scale high-speed rail complex through the large number of jobs which will be created and by the long-term effect of ready access to high-speed transportation for We, the People.  We strongly believe this will bring about long-term goodness in a similar manner to the Interstate highway system started by Eisenhower.

Here's a current view of the system proposed by the US High Speed Rail Association.  For additional reading on the political status of this initiative, see Mass Transit: USHSR Conference Creates Open Dialogue on HSR Funding

Note:  thanks to Kannafoot, the ardent Goldwater Republican for garnering these links on high-speed rail.  Despite the evidence of the GOP Presidential candidates, GOP is not synonymous with stupid.

Part of the current interest in U.S. high-speed rail is due to the recent news of funding for high-speed rail between Moscow and Kazan in Russia.  Other countries (e.g. Germany and China) are falling over themselves to offer billions in investments in the initiative which will build a train service with 400 kph vehicles.  (RT:  German consortium offers ‎€2bn to invest in high-speed Russian railways)

You may have noticed the speeds for the proposed rail lines in the U.S. map are not particularly compelling relative to high-speed rail elsewhere in the world.  We regard this as a crucial design element because whatever infrastructure gets built will be in-place for at least a century, just as we have seen with the Interstate system which is now about sixty years on.  Thus, we must build to the highest levels of existing technology since the consequence otherwise is it will be obsolete before it's even completed and that would be worse than doing nothing at all.

A fundamental right in America has always been anyone can go anywhere and no-one can get up in your face to get your papers to discover if you have the right to do it.  Americans have always had that right and it's relatively recently that such a right has come elsewhere in the world since the Soviet Union never had it and it wasn't even possible in Europe until they formed the European Union.

Having the right to go wherever one will is an important thing but it's constrained by the infrastructural ability to do it.  Whether you have an equal right to be in New York City or Los Angeles makes no difference when you have no physical ability to move between them.  We strongly believe the Interstate highway system is already obsolete and a modern train system will bring the systems needed for the future to ensure the ongoing freedom to go wherever the hell we like whenever the hell we want to do it.

This is a prime view of Socialism but we don't need any old Communist stiffs in a jar (i.e. Lenin's waxy ass in Red Square) for the essence of Socialism.  One thing it's not is Stalin conducting pogroms to murder millions of people.  Tyrannical dictators do that and that's a matter of behavior and not of political philosophy.  As to any reverence for Stalin in Russia, do keep in mind it's Lenin in the jar on Red Square and not Stalin.

Socialism is jobs for everyone who is capable of working and benefits for everyone in the land which comes from full and satisfying employment for as many as possible in work which has meaning for them and the country.  It's not an endless parade of homeless orphan waifs with their hands out for food because we fervently believe there will be far fewer of such helpless people in a healthy economy.

We want to build this thing even though we will never live to see it completed because beginning it is the start of the realization of the dream.  We have always believed Dream Big, It Just Might Happen!