> the cost to build a HSR route to go between population centers is super high
The cost is high, but more painfully, the cost per-mile is higher than for the same distance of railroad in Europe or East Asia. That's not a result of pure geography.
Also, while the cost is high, it's not actually that large in comparison to the overall DoT budget, which is projected at $142B for FY2023. You could build a lot of train for that. Political will is a much more important factor. We just dropped $40B on the Current War without blinking.
Even so, this misses another key step: intercity rail in Europe usually connects seamlessly to metro rail, which is what makes it so easy and nice to use. But the cities themselves in the United States do not usually have rail systems to connect to. That's why the best near-term rail corridor IMHO is NY-Buffalo (subway) - Youngstown (possible Pittsburgh metro extension) - Cleveland (subway) - Toledo (possible Detroit metro extension) - Chicago, connecting to six subway systems.
Toledo directly to Chicago doesn't make a lot of sense. Most of the track would go through Indiana, which is at best indifferent to Amtrak.
Consider instead putting Detroit in between the two. The Chicago-Detroit route already operates at 110 mph, Amtrak and the Michigan Dept of Transportation already own the majority of the track and give routing priority to passenger trains. Amtrak and VIA are already talking about a Chicago-Toronto train that doesn't require passengers to disembark for immigration/customs, and their systems are already connected via a rail tunnel under the Detroit River.
Oh, yeah, that sounds pretty good. My main point is that you want to connect the long train to short trains.
In theory, if Raleigh and Richmond (both very "blue" cities and maybe open to it) built LRT systems, you could get another route in DC-Richmond-Raleigh-Charlotte-Atlanta, where the other three have existing intracity rail.
> the cost per-mile is higher than for the same distance of railroad in Europe
how does this make any sence, we have to deal with tonneling under or demolishing existing densely populated real estate along the route, literal mountains in the way, etc.
HS2 in UK caused an outrage, someone's farm was cut in half, houses had to be demolished, etc
The cost is high, but more painfully, the cost per-mile is higher than for the same distance of railroad in Europe or East Asia. That's not a result of pure geography.
Also, while the cost is high, it's not actually that large in comparison to the overall DoT budget, which is projected at $142B for FY2023. You could build a lot of train for that. Political will is a much more important factor. We just dropped $40B on the Current War without blinking.
Even so, this misses another key step: intercity rail in Europe usually connects seamlessly to metro rail, which is what makes it so easy and nice to use. But the cities themselves in the United States do not usually have rail systems to connect to. That's why the best near-term rail corridor IMHO is NY-Buffalo (subway) - Youngstown (possible Pittsburgh metro extension) - Cleveland (subway) - Toledo (possible Detroit metro extension) - Chicago, connecting to six subway systems.