Open Thread (1/29/2010)

Posted January 29th, 2010 at 06:45 AM by IlliniPundit
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Friday, January 29, 2010.

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IlliniPundit's picture
On January 29th, 2010 at 09:25 AM, IlliniPundit said:

It's growing:  GDP up 5.7 percent.  Woot!  Let's do this three or four more quarters in a row, please.

On January 29th, 2010 at 09:51 AM, illinipunditposter said:

GDP up 5.7 percent.

Those (&*(%%$#  Democrats leading the nation to ruin

 

illinipunditposter

 

redstatewannabe's picture
On January 29th, 2010 at 09:55 AM, redstatewannabe said:

I don't believe it - let's see what it shows after they do their adjustment.

On January 29th, 2010 at 10:02 AM, UrbanaJake (not verified) said:

What ever happened to...?

The priest arrested for selling cocaine on campus at the Newman Center/Catholic Church complex?

On January 29th, 2010 at 10:17 AM, Anonymous (not verified) said:

Well. I suppose you could go to the Circuit Clerks website and look it up. I would, but I forgot his name.

On January 29th, 2010 at 12:00 PM, Anonymous (not verified) said:

What ever happened to the guy who shot Dr. Tiller?

The jury only took half an hour to find him guilty of first-degree murder.

On January 29th, 2010 at 03:24 PM, Lostinspace (not verified) said:

http://www.news-gazette.com/news/local/2010/01/29/ui_offering_early_retirement_with_short_deadline

On January 29th, 2010 at 03:32 PM, UrbanaJake (not verified) said:

Answer: No jail time for selling COCAINE to college kids at the big U.

Bet the residents north of Bradley would love this kinda deal. Sentence: 02/12/2009 Sentence: Fines and/or Cost/Penalties and Fees Sentence: Probation 48Mos Supervised Court Service Sentence: Jail 2Days Sentence: Credit Time Served 2Days Just Google 'newman center cocaine"

On January 30th, 2010 at 05:25 PM, M@ (not verified) said:

http://www.newsgazette.com/news/local/2010/01/30/champaign_not_on_track_to_enjoy_high-speed_rail_grant

Fast, quality and cheap - pick any two. I pick quality (quantity) and cheap over fast -- give me MORE rail trips to MORE places at LESS cost -- I don't really need to get there as fast as a air travel, I need it to be cheaper and more convenient than it is now.

We go to Chicago A LOT to visit the in-laws, but unless it's just one of us, it's cheaper to take the car (not more convenient or safer).

What *I* need is the round-trip cost of a family train trip from Champaign to Chicago (or St. Louis/Indianapolis) down below a trip by car. It's already nearly time-competitive (wikipedia states 2h 50m, a good 45-60 minutes of which seems to be spent in Chicago going "backwards" and my wife recently traveled and said it was 2h25min, 11 of which were 'going backwards').

As a taxpayer, lopping an hour or so off the route with high speed rail does me little good if it is $$$ and the price-point is such that it is STILL cheaper to drive the car than it is to take the train. Get separate rails for the freight trains and passenger rail and you'll drop the travel time even further without the overhead of high speed rail (overpasses).

 We have a hard enough time keeping airlines in Willard (even with large incentives) without using taxpayer money for competing high speed rail... then again, IF we had MORE plain old normal-speed rail (that didn't have to compete with rail-space with frieght trains) that terminated at the airports of Chicago, St. Louis and Indy, the need for Willard would greatly diminish.
 
The question is do the bulk of taxpayers need rail to compete with air travel, or car travel.  I see it as the latter -- if I'm traveling by air, most often I'm NOT flying out of Willard as in the past it's been MUCH cheaper to drive and fly from BMI (free parking, which Willard doesn't have) or drive to Indy/St. Louis/O'hare.

 

 

 

On January 30th, 2010 at 05:59 PM, JohnBoy said:

High speed rail? 100 miles per hour...hmmmmmmmm?

Ernest Terga's picture
On January 30th, 2010 at 07:31 PM, Ernest Terga said:

Rail service in the USA has built-in inefficiency.  It is designed to fail.

akibare's picture
On January 30th, 2010 at 07:50 PM, akibare said:

M＠ - Something else very important, in addition to cost (or speed) is the ON TIME FACTOR.  Even if the trip were comparatively slow (compared to actual high speed rail in countries that have normal decent rail systems), if it were on time 100% of the time, you could just budget in the time the trip takes, and ONLY the time the trip takes, into your schedule.  If that's 3 hours, so be it, but you'd be able to know that you'll arrive on time.

 

If you have a hypothetical train that can make the journey in an hour but is routinely an hour or more late, you gain NOTHING over the on-time three hour trip, simply because you have to assume on any given day that you'll arrive at your destination that two hours late, but at the same time make sure you can catch the train if it's on time, so you have to show up at the leaving station on time anyway.  You might get the two hours to yourself if all works well, but you can't plan around it.

 

The abysmal on time factor is my main problem with Amtrak as it passes through here.  Particularly the early morning City of New Orleans is bad.

 

 

Local Voter's picture
On January 31st, 2010 at 06:15 PM, Local Voter said:

The US has the largest rail system in the world and moves more goods by rail than any other country.  Yes, its inefficient but then so is democracy, even our representative form.  No other country has come up with a better governing method for their people or rail system than moves more than ours.  If the rail system was designed to fail, how many hundreds of years will that take Ernest?  Japan has an amazing passagner rail system which fits their minimal usable land area and massive population concentrations however, its very small and hauls little freight compared to other countries.

akibare's picture
On January 31st, 2010 at 08:16 PM, akibare said:

Even the trains in the ass end of nowhere in the countryside are absolutely on time, even if they only come once an hour (or even more infrequently).

 

Meanwhile, the US is also far from the only democracy, and there are features that suffer from early adopter syndrome, from my POV.  If I were designing the system from scratch, I wouldn't choose all the features of this one.