• Spzi
      link
      fedilink
      English
      21 year ago

      What does that mean? I’m not sure if I correctly interpret that as somewhat dismissive, as if a good train system was a given or not. It’s the result of political will and investment.

      in 2017, Germany invested €69 per citizen in its railways, ahead of France’s €38 and Spain’s €32. It’s still far behind other countries, however, with Switzerland and Austria investing €362 and €187 per citizen respectively.

      A bit like when you get Zerg rushed in Starcraft and say “Well sure but that’s because they built so many units early on”. It’s a decision, and becoming good in that metric was precisely the intent. Also not to do so is a decision. Unlike in Starcraft, the decision to neglect your public transport is not a similarly viable strategy.

      • @gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        1
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        I mean that Switzerland has a local and regional rail system that is damn near perfectly sized, scaled, and engineered for its geography and citizenry, which also integrates pretty well with the rail systems of all of its neighbors.

        They could have made faster trains, but with the way they wanted to run them, it made more sense to design the rolling stock to have good top speed, but excellent acceleration, thus improving the average speed more meaningfully than a higher top speed would. The rail network is fairly pervasive - you can from and to just about anywhere in Switzerland using trains, with perhaps a bit of bus travel tacked onto either end.

        Source: was just over there a couple months ago visiting a family friend, and used the train system a lot.