Imagine telling someone in 1950 that train travel across Europe will one day be the expensive alternative chosen by well-off people with environmentalist opinions, while unskilled workers will only be able to afford air tickets, and arrive in a fraction of the time.
#trains #climate
miki
in reply to Martin Rundkvist • • •Martin Rundkvist
in reply to miki • • •@miki
You mean who runs the services, not who does the travel.
The market on which air travel companies compete is wildly subsidised. That's mainly what makes the tickets cheap, not the competition.
miki
in reply to Martin Rundkvist • • •Most of these subsidies go to the traditional (and expensive) air carriers. Ryanair, which is the low cost king, is very famously anti-subsidy. Sure, there's some subsidization for airports and specific routes that governments care a lot about, but it's not like rail isn't subsidized either.
Rail is so inefficient that even cars are often cheaper. If you have 2 or more people in a group, especially if they're on a normal ticket, it's often cheaper to go by car than by train. A car can seat five, a train can seat hundreds and runs on efficient tracks instead of inefficient roads. It's all just utterly ridiculous.
Martin Rundkvist
in reply to miki • • •Economic efficiency takes back seat to long-term sustainability.