Flutterby™! : Moving people vs moving goods

Moving people vs moving goods

2011-06-06 21:36:14.293528+02 by Dan Lyke 4 comments

Interesting: Patrick Chovanek on China's high speed rail:

Rather than moving people more quickly, [China] should build a rail system that moves goods and makes people more productive where they already are.

(alt link, an expansion of 1, 2)

[ related topics: Work, productivity and environment Trains ]

comments in ascending chronological order (reverse):

#Comment Re: made: 2011-06-06 23:25:03.650554+02 by: meuon

Forget China, the USA needs that badly. Why are so many large trucks doing long haul?

#Comment Re: made: 2011-06-07 00:30:26.371444+02 by: Dan Lyke

Because we sank the costs of the railroads back in 1890, and haven't been publicly subsidizing it nearly as heavily as we have the infrastructure for trucks since.
Because trains don't go places trucks do, and the infrastructure was too costly to maintain in all of those places.
Because trucks are easily re-directable, and don't require months of forethought and planning in your supply chain management.

(Not being snarky, brainstorming about these sorts of issues is very valuable to me.)

#Comment Re: made: 2011-06-07 03:06:21.267001+02 by: ebwolf

Ya forgot one:

Because trucks require more drivers than trains.

#Comment Re: made: 2011-06-07 03:44:23.410133+02 by: Dan Lyke

Hmmm... Wonder what the tons per employee ratio is in trucking vs trains...

Comment policy

We will not edit your comments. However, we may delete your comments, or cause them to be hidden behind another link, if we feel they detract from the conversation. Commercial plugs are fine, if they are relevant to the conversation, and if you don't try to pretend to be a consumer. Annoying endorsements will be deleted if you're lucky, if you're not a whole bunch of people smarter and more articulate than you will ridicule you, and we will leave such ridicule in place.

Flutterby™ is a trademark claimed by

Dan Lyke

for the web publications at www.flutterby.com and www.flutterby.net.