So, we are two weeks into the Trump administration, and we see a runaway rush to promote economic suicide through pandering to oil and coal companies. Because, it would seem, the slogan was really "Make America Great At Propping Up Dead End Industries Again", but #MAGAPUDEIA" had to be edited down, both for length and because too few of Trump's core base supporters were confident they could pronounce it.

One implication is that much work for sustainable transport and Living Energy Independence has to shift down to the state and local level, which was the focus of last week's Sunday Train and the Sunday Train two weeks ago.

We still do not have a firm outline of the promised "$1T infrastructure" policy, but early indications are that it will be (1) a package of tax breaks for private investment in infrastructure, (2) wide open to grabbing tax breaks to spending that would have been done anyway, and (3) at a level too small to back $1T in total spending, even setting aside the tax breaks going to infrastructure spending that would have happened anyway.

It is a $1T infrastructure plan in the same sense that putting a fiberglass body that emulates a Ferrari on a go kart would make me a Ferrari owner. And still, if the Republicans push it through Congress, there is still an opportunity to use such a system to make progress toward sustainable long distance intercity transport ... through the Steel Interstate proposal being advocated by Solutionary Rail.

How and why, below the fold.

I really hate to make this kind of post, but I'm at my wits end and I don't really know what else to do. I really need to find a new therapist, but I don't know what my insurance is going to do next year and I'd hate to try to find one now and maybe get one appointment only to have to find a different one if my insurance changes.

OK, so after years of (off and on) writing about High Speed Rail, I've finally been on a High Speed Rail train ... on the Beijing - Tianjin Intercity Railway.

Though I have to say that I went to Tianjin by Subway and High Speed Rail, given that substantially more time was spent en-route on subways than on the HSR ... given that Beijing South Railway Station to Tianjin Station is only 35-41 minutes (depending on whether there is a stop at Wuqing).

So today the old lady and I had our first experience with Uber because my mother-in-law wasn't available to bring us to Urgent Care (Our county school board is riding her like hell with regards to training teachers). The experience wasn't bad and the drivers did their job well even with the minor traffic jam on the way home. We'll probably use them for trips we might have to make on our own that we can't do so by golf cart.

This past Thursday, thanks to twitter, I learned that just one county to my west, a Cycle Track was being opened: Akron opens new bike trail through downtown:

The path is part of the city’s effort to become more bicycle friendly and to encourage people to leave the Towpath Trail and experience downtown.
“Downtowns that are attractive centers, especially for a young workforce, have amenities like cycle tracks and bike trails,” said Suzie Graham, president and chief executive officer of the Downtown Akron Partnership. “It positions us more as a forward-thinking community.”
...
The path is part of the larger iTowpath effort funded by the Knight Foundation. It is one of more than 20 projects attempting to connect the Towpath to local attractions.

{Picture: Karen Schiely/Akron Beacon Journal, follow link for slideshow}

As you are probably well aware, the US Government is gridlocked, which means that for years and years, nothing has been getting done.

However, because of the appropriations for "High Speed Rail" in 2009 and 2010, things are being done right now. "Bullet train" High Speed Passenger Rail services often grab the headlines (and you can watch a fairly hokey California HSR Authority youtube video on what they did in the first six months since construction started), but much of the actual services that we will see starting up in the final years of this decade will be work on or preparation for the "Rapid Passenger Rail" services that upgrade top speed from the sluggish conventional US corridor speed of 79mph to 110mph or more.

The primary Rapid Passenger Rail project is the Chicago to Saint Louis "HSR", which will cut about an hour from the present five and a half hour trip. The majority of this project will be completed next year, though some work will continue into 2018. Other projects are underway in Michigan, on the Northeast Corridor, and in the Pacific Northwest.

I have ridden the Beijing Subway and lived to tell the tale!

(NB: video embedded at end of essay.)

Of course, the youtube clips you might be able to find about incredible overcrowding on the Beijing subway is just part of the story. Indeed, when riding on my "home" subway line, I often not only find plenty of standing room on the train ... I often get a seat.

So follow me as I wander through the Beijing Subway System, below the fold.