this post was submitted on 29 Sep 2023
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I'm not that guy, and I'm all for rail, but here's an article that talks about it. https://seattletransitblog.com/2009/10/26/the-highway-vs-fixed-transit-debate/
"While a few rail-transit lines may have had a marginal effect on rush-hour congestion, the cost is exorbitant. The average light-rail line under construction or in planning stages today costs $25 million per mile ($50 million per mile in both directions). Heavy rail costs more than twice as much. By comparison, the average lane mile of freeway costs only about $5 to $10 million."
But the average freeway is not 1-lane, but has many lanes. Also roadways have much higher maintenance costs than rail.
Rail maintenance is more expensive than road maintenance
Where can I find those figures in the post you linked?
I might be mistaken, but by that quote and given that every motorway has three lanes in each direction, or at least two I assume in the USA, the cost of the road is at least comparable and at most a bit dearer. I'd even say it constitutes fudging the numbers to pull the wool over.
Only if you compare 3 roads to 1 track. If you're arguing about which costs more then it doesn't make sense to include the cost of the whole 3 lanes as all that traffic doesn't need to go by rail.
Well, the difference is that three lanes of traffic have about the same capacity for passengers as a single railway track, no?
I wonder if these high costs are due to it being passenger rail inside a major city. I'm curious if this cost applies to freight rail as well.
Out here in the countryside it seems that a mile of freight rail should be worth much less than a mile of highway. Everything from easement size to site prep, equipment needed and bill of materials seems a fraction of that required for highway construction.
As mentioned elsewhere the maintenance is minimal compared to a highway as well, with the trains plowing snow themselves and the rails being very hard-wearing. The only work we ever see them doing on the rail lines is occasionally replacing sleepers and fixing up the road crossings - and it's heavy trucks that ruin those, not the trains.
Yeah, I'd definitely be curious on more detailed numbers.
This is about light rail though, which is usually built in cities (or, at least between a city and its suburbs). So I wonder how much of the cost (for both rail and road) is for land rights.