It's a similar distance to Paris to Marseille, a 3 hour journey. Price for that seems to vary between 29 and 80 EUR depending on time of day.
That's "get on the train, get off the train three hours later", so in practice is much faster than a 90 minute flight, which is "get to airport, go through security, walk seemingly endlessly to gate, fly, walk seemingly endlessly through baggage claim etc etc, get out of airport". The train is, of course, also _far_ more comfortable than a plane. Personally, I'd opt for the train...
I suspect if the damn thing ever gets built, flying between SF and LA will more or less become a thing of the past. Like, why would you?
I love trains! And I agree that they are superior in comfort and ease than flying. But the train still has to generate massive amounts of new traffic that doesn't currently exist to justify its huge costs.
Eh, ICE journeys of similar distance seem to be in the same general price range.
> But the train still has to generate massive amounts of new traffic that doesn't currently exist to justify its huge costs.
There are apparently about 130 SF Bay Area to LA flights daily. Let's say on average 200 person planes, at 80% occupancy, so 20,000 people. The biggest high speed trains have a capacity on the order of 1300, though those are very long trains; 800 or less is more common. Assuming an 18 hour day, that's a train every 45 minutes or so. That seems... fine? You'd also expect some traffic to the intermediate destinations, and possibly some increase in travel because, really, it is so much less bloody awful than flying (anyone who tells you otherwise has either never been on an intercity train or never been on a plane).
One weird aspect of American exceptionalism is that it is not _just_ Americans saying "we're the best"; sometimes it is Americans saying "we can't have the nice things that all other large rich countries have because [whatever]". The US can manage a high speed rail line or two.
That's "get on the train, get off the train three hours later", so in practice is much faster than a 90 minute flight, which is "get to airport, go through security, walk seemingly endlessly to gate, fly, walk seemingly endlessly through baggage claim etc etc, get out of airport". The train is, of course, also _far_ more comfortable than a plane. Personally, I'd opt for the train...
I suspect if the damn thing ever gets built, flying between SF and LA will more or less become a thing of the past. Like, why would you?