Talk:Transportation in the United States
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[edit] POV/Unsourced claims
"Such mass transit as exists in the U.S. requires massive subsidy -- about 90% of the real cost of providing one trip is paid by those not maming it -- ticket prices do not come close to covering system costs. There is always a minority advocating more mass transit in the US. Such advocacy is rarely successful. When it is, the ridership that in fact occurs falls well short of the inflated projections used to justify its construciton."
- Heh, I agree 100% with the statement, but it's very POV.--Rotten 05:16, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
This paragraph doesn't conform to NPOV. It's clearly written to make transit advocacy in the US sound like lunacy. I'd like to see this rewritten, and I'd like the statistics to be sourced. You only see numbers like 90% coming from anti-transit groups, libertarian think tanks, Wendell Cox and the like. "rarely successful"? Ridership falls short of projections? This is clearly not encyclopic language, in addition to being pretty much untrue. Passdoubt | Talk 20:09, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
- this is a statement of fact, therefore it is NPOV. And since mass transit funding is lunacy, it sounds fine to me.
Clearly not encyclopedic, sounds about as much like propaganda as like encyclopedia to me... 86.219.105.185 15:29, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
- That's funny, since defenders of monorail systems (the chronically unprofitable Las Vegas Monorail comes to mind) keep pointing out that no local mass transit system has ever maintained a balanced budget without any public subsidy over the long term. Only long haul mass transit like planes and trains can make the numbers work (and even then, just barely). --Coolcaesar 11:37, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Rail Freight
This article needs more info about our huge use of freight rail. We have more miles of rail than any other nation of earth and they aren't there for looks only (as this article would imply).--Rotten 05:17, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
- It says very little about freight in general. Not pipelines, trucking, anything. Water freight gets a mention. Hey, at least it's not as light on freight as Transportation in New York City. So, does someone who knows something want to put a freight subsection into each section, or create a separate freight section? There are, incidentally many articles about individual railroads, connected through a link to their list. Jim.henderson 04:42, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Transportation in Alaska, proposed merge
No thanks. Would make this page much too long plus Alaska is far away distinct enough from the rest of the U.S. to earn its own page. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jarfingle (talk • contribs) 01:46, 24 February 2007 (UTC).
- Also a no. Alaska is a large place with special problems and opportunities in transport, just as New York is a small place with special problems and opportunities in transport. Both of them properly have their own article. Jim.henderson 00:35, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Rail vs Truck
According to my information from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, truck freight accounts for more than any other mode of transportation. While rail freight accounts for more tons per mile traveled, truck shipments dominate the transportation industry both in value and weight of shipments. I checked the sources for the claim of "40% of all shipments are by rail" and the source is understandably biased (Association of American Railroads) and they provide no source for their claim. The other recently added, and more reliable source, shows that rail owns a 38% share of the freight movement by ton-kilometers. They have no mention of the total amount of freight hauled by value or weight. According to my source, in 2002 the rail industry shipped 31% of all ton-miles, and trucks accounted for 34% of ton-miles. However, if you look at the total value or weight, there is no comparison. Rails are mainly used to haul bulk freight over long distances... hence their dominance in the ton-miles catergory. Trains carry freight over longer distances without stopping, which is why they are more efficient than trucks. But as far as the total volume/value of freight, trucks dominate the industry. Therefore, I am changing the intoduction... if anyone has further proof then just let me know. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 18:47, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Article quality
Not to sound harsh, but this article needs a lot of work. The sections are not uniform and there is a whole table for shipping while pipelines has only numbers? For anyone working on this article, a good place to start would be the Bureau of Transportation Statistics and the U.S. Department of Transportation. They have lots of good info and stats that are needed for an article like this. I'm willing to do some work on this, and I made a few changes today, but this whole article needs to be rewritten. It has no "flow" and seems disjointed. Not to mention some glaring errors and uncited material. I'm not trying criticizing anyone's work, but transportation is my primary area of interest (and also my occupation), so I'd like to see this page look a little better. If anyone is willing to work on this with me please let me know. My field of expertise is trucking, and as a result of that I know a lot about highways and interstates. I'd like to see this article reach Featured status, and if anyone would like to collaborate with me on this, you know where to find me! --ErgoSum88 (talk) 19:56, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
