On the trains: America has a lot to learn from abroad

The train sped through the rice paddies that shone intense green in the bright sunshine. Some of the paddies seemed already be turning yellow, somewhat early for the season in the beginning of August. Behind the fields rose the Ōu mountain range that separates the central valley of Iwate from the Sanriku coast. It was a hot, clear day but thick white and black clouds were lingering over the mountains. We were heading north towards the highest peak in the range: Mt. Iwate that reaches 2,038 meters above sea level and is the tallest mountain in the northern part of Japan’s main island, Honshu.

This was a local train with just a few cars, with seats arranged on the sides facing the center aisle, subway style. We could see the conductor standing behind the glass in his cabin at the front of the train. Beyond him, we saw the tracks opening ahead of us. The train was quite crowded on this Sunday afternoon. High school kids, boys in soccer uniforms, old people dozing off, middle-aged women with shopping bags. Two pairs of young people were wearing beautiful cotton yukatas that looked cool in the hot afternoon. I was the only gaijin – foreigner – on the train, which we had caught at the station in Mizusawa, my wife’s hometown, about 70km south of the prefectural capital of Morioka. While we waited at the Mizusawa station, tens of nambu furin wind chimes provided a lovely soundtrack in the light breeze. The Japanese Ministry of Environment has designated Mizusawa station as one of the 100 Soundscapes of Japan.

The train ran smoothly, reaching high speeds between the stops. The stops were rather frequent: not just the bigger centers of Kitakami and Hanamaki, but numerous smaller places: Kanegasaki, Rokuhara, and others. A few passengers were traveling with suitcases, heading to the Hanamaki regional airport, which in addition to domestic airports serves international destinations in Taiwan and Shanghai. Due to the frequent stops, the trip to Morioka took over an hour. We could have taken the shinkansen bullet train, which would have been much faster – the elevated shinkansen tracks run more or less parallel to the local train tracks – but would then have missed the pleasure of slower travel at ground level. Traveling on these local trains in Japan is to me a distinct pleasure. It gives meaning to the tired old saying, attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson: It’s not the destination. It’s the journey.

It is also such a joy to see that these local train lines are doing well and are in heavy use. They are carefully maintained and widely used by a variety of people. Apart from the bullet train and the local train line, there’s an superb highway – the Tohoku Expressway – that connects all these places. Yet, because of the excellent and affordable public transportation options, not that many people feel the need to jump into their own car. Consequently, the highway is not excessively crowded. Why bother driving yourself when you can just jump on a train and enjoy the scenery?

Despite my love for the local trains, I do appreciate the shinkansen as well. The bullet trains are, well, fast, smooth, reliable, and environmentally sound. It impresses me that the ride is so even that you can leave your drink unattended on the tray while the speed approaches or exceeds 300 km/h. The trains run so punctually that you can literally check your watch based on when the train departs. There is not even half a minute’s deviation from schedules (unlike in the US, where Amtrak staff only start thinking about getting the train ready a few minutes after the scheduled time). A couple of weeks ago we took the Yamabiko shinkansen from Tokyo to MizusawaEsashi, a trip of 500 km, which takes just over 2.5 hours.

Last April, I had the pleasure of taking the Nozomi shinkansen from Tokyo to Japan’s second city, Osaka, in the west of the country. That trip runs just below Mt. Fuji, Japan’s tallest at 3,776 meters. The iconic mountain boasts a perfectly symmetric cone rising close to the sea at Suruga Bay. Admiring the handsome landscape as we sped by it, I remembered years ago hiking to the top. It took several hours and, despite some additional oxygen, gave me a splitting headache. However, staying overnight on the summit was definitely worth it for the gorgeous sunrise over the Pacific Ocean. It’s easy to understand where Japan got its moniker as the Land of the Rising Sun.

These types of train are not the only ones in Japan. All major cities have functioning subways, and in many places – from Tokyo to Osaka to Naha in Okinawa – there are convenient and comfortable monorails running on elevated tracks connecting the cities to their airports. All rails in the country are, naturally, electrified, another major difference with the US. Of the Amtrak network, only the Northeast corridor, running from Washington, DC, to Boston, passing through Baltimore, Philadelphia and New York City, runs fully on electricity. The rest still relies on diesel and thus contributes to pollution and climate change.

The US situation is globally the exception. Countries from Europe to China have clean and efficient high-speed trains. As it happens, this year has allowed me to experience several of them. In May, I rode the Frecciarossa, which connects the north of Italy to the south, from Turin to Salerno. That train can reach even higher speeds, up to 360 km/h. I only took it from Rome to Florence to see a friend there. In July, while in Finland, I rode the intercity train from Helsinki to the second city of Tampere to visit another old friend. He had advised me to pay a few euro extra to reserve a seat on the second floor, which I did and could thus enjoy the scenery in quiet comfort (that is, until I descended to the restaurant car and joined a crowd of cheerful fellow travelers for a cold beer). The return to Helsinki was on an Italian-made Pendolino train, which is used in more than a dozen countries across Europe, as well as in China and some routes in the US.

Continuing from my native country to Switzerland, I landed in Zurich and had to travel to the capital, Bern, where I was to teach a three-day workshop hosted by the university. Naturally, I took the train. On the way back, there was an unfortunate delay due to an obstacle on the tracks, which forced the train to divert. The operators apologized profusely for the 6-minute delay in our arrival to Zurich.

This to me is the normal state of affairs. Virtually all developed countries have invested in high-speed electric rail networks. They are fast, safe, and environmentally sound. Only the US lags behind. Amtrak is losing money, with only the Northeast corridor operating on a profit. The ticket prices are exorbitant, making the train trip from, say, the national capital to New York City a luxury that is beyond the reach of many travelers. While the Acela trains would be capable of traveling at high speed, the state of the old rails prevents it from doing so, thus rendering the trip much slower than necessary – not to mention unreliable with frequent delays. As much of freight in the US moves by rail, the freight trains get the right of way, forcing the passenger trains wait for their passing.

Lack of basic services, such as reserved seats, even in business class, makes the boarding process into a mad rush, a deficiency that could so easily be remedied. (I do have to admit that there have been significant improvements to the boarding process at New York’s Penn Station, which I could experience early in the year.)

In addition, there are occasional derailments that give the perception that train travel is not safe. A recent poll showed that a majority of Americans think that traveling by private car is the safest mode of transportation, which obviously is far from truth, statistically. Still, derailments do happen and give Amtrak a bad rap. Recent ones include a derailment in Missouri in June 2022 and in Montana in September 2021, both of which resulted in loss of life. Add to that accidents, such as the February 2023 Ohio tanker train derailment in East Palestine close to the border to Pennsylvania, which spilled over 115,000 gallons of highly toxic and flammable vinyl chloride, it’s no wonder many Americans are suspicious of train traffic.

California, arguably the most progressive state in the union, has worked on a high-speed rail link between Los Angeles and San Francisco since the $33 billion project was approved in 2008. It was supposed to be completed in 2022, but is nowhere near there. The cost overruns are staggering. The latest estimates have placed the real cost to $113 billion. According to the New York Times, the difficulties have been mostly due to political compromises that have sent the tracks through various diversions through difficult, geologically complex, and costly routes in the mountainous and earthquake-prone area. With the costs escalating and the heavy delays holding back progress, political and public support to the project is flagging.

There are many explanations and excuses why rail traffic doesn’t catch on in USA. The above-mentioned difficulties with efficiency, cost, safety, and perceptions certainly all are important. There is also the issue of long distances. However, Europe is large, as well: it’s 3,300 km from Stockholm to Madrid, for example, or about the same distance as from Chicago to San Francisco. Distances in China are also long: about 2,300 km from Shanghai on the coast to Kunming in the Southwest. Americans take flying as a basic human right. But with the mess the airline traffic finds itself – frequent delays and cancelations, onerous security checks, crowded planes, poor service, unruly passengers – one would think that other alternatives would appeal to travelers. But for most people, the alternative that comes to mind is driving, even if it takes hours and sometimes days on crowded highways with aggressive drivers. Supposedly, this reflects the deep rooted individualistic on-the-road culture of Americans.

Then there’s the politics. In general, American politics from the Federal through State and local levels is highly contentious and polarized, making it hard to pass any major legislation involving costly investment. The general position, especially on the right, is that public investments – even as so much of infrastructure is crumbling – is unaffordable, as it would require raising the taxes for the rich. And, in particular, public transport smacks of socialism. In this atmosphere, making the needed investments for improving – and electrifying – the rail network would not be an easy task. The good news is that the $1.2 trillion Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill passed in 2021 does include $102 billion to improve rail infrastructure over the 2022-2026 fiscal years. It remains to be seen how far this will reach. But you have to start somewhere.