Comment by wil421 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by wil421 | Hacker News Reader

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Meanwhile in America we have a world class freight system between America, Canada, and Mexico that’s unrivaled anywhere else in the world. Europe uses trucking which is less environmentally friendly[1] than rail. The United States also runs the largest rail system in the world[2] vs any country (and the combined EU[3]).

Europe is leading the world in electrification and they are likely getting that power from greener energies. The US’s diesel-electrics are nasty but hopefully they will become fully electric in the long term or offset in the short term by improving passenger car pollution and building more renewable energy sources.

China’s energy sources are very nasty pollution wise and impact the environment in bad ways (hydro power, Three Gorges dam).[4]

Anyone know the pollution difference from using coal to power a train or using an ICE train?

I’m all for passenger trains and would love high speed rail but I also enjoy a healthy debate with some sources.

[1]https://theconversation.com/rail-travel-is-cleaner-than-driv...

[2]https://www.railway-technology.com/features/featurethe-world...

[3]https://www.railjournal.com/regions/europe/european-passenge...

[4] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_China

> world class freight system

Word. I once stood on a bridge counting the cargo cars in a train passing beneath us, and gave up at 88 or so because I was pointlessly delaying a friend ...

They don't look like much, but they work like that quip: "Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes".

Keep telling yourself that…

Here in Europe, we actually use mostly trains. Trucking is for the smaller deliveries, like some five bathtubs from Sweden to Germany.

And we use trains for humans too.

The reason your trains are so long is because they need to go so far.

While around here, we use more local products. As we are still actually separate countries, not one big lowest common denominator culture mush. ;)

Is there a need to boast about your own perceived superiority and is that an attractive trait?

That is not the case at all[1]. I appreciate the thought out post and tone /sarcasm.

For further reading.[2]

> The picture for freight is different. According to Panorama 2009 , 46 percent of EU-27 freight goes by highway while only 10 percent goes by rail, while in the U.S. 43 percent goes by rail and only 30 percent by road. (In both cases, nearly all of the rest is waterways and pipelines.)

So, it isn’t so much that Europe decided to move people by train rather than by automobile. It is more that Europe decided to use its railroads to move people while the United States decided to use them for freight. America moves almost six times as many ton-miles (or tonne-kilometers) of freight by rail as Europe, while both move about the same number of tonne-kilometers by road. While Europe moves about twice as many tkm of freight by waterway as the U.S., we move six times as much oil by pipeline.

[1] https://ti.org/antiplanner/?p=11847

[2] https://www.freightwaves.com/news/railroad/us-and-european-f...

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