A recent Inhabitat article brought to my attention by Karen Walrond shows Obama’s well-intentioned high-speed rail plan. I like the idea of high-speed rail in the US; it is long overdue, as the President admits.
However, there is a glaring omission on the map, as highlighted by Karen in her original tweet. There are no links planned from Houston to any other Texas cities. The omissions do not stop there: the “South Central” network does not connect to any other networks. Houston to Austin? Gas up the car, because it’s not happening on the train. Dallas to St. Louis? Forget it. Likewise, getting to, say, Chicago won’t be easy from the Big Easy (New Orleans).
I can understand leaving most of the western states out of the plan simply because there are more cows than people across large portions of states like Wyoming and Montana, and likewise for Iowa and Nebraska where there are almost certainly too many well-utilized corn fields to consider building any serious high-speed rail.
But really, Houstonians want to go places besides New Orleans and further down the Gulf Coast. Riding a high-speed train beats the heck out of uttering profanity at traffic while driving down I-10 to San Antonio.