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Taras Grescoe 🚇

Sep 17 • 4 tweets • 4 min read

Did you know that #Canada had one of world's fastest passenger trains?

The Turbo Train made the run from #Montreal - #Toronto in 3h 59m in 1970.

It could top out at 270 km/h...

@ViaRail

The lat time I took a @ViaRail train to #Toronto it averaged 90 km/h, and took over 5 hours. (Actually it was half an hour late, par for the course.)

Boggles the mind that in the 2020s we don't have frequent high-speed electric rail from #Quebec City to #Windsor. 50% of Canada's population is in the red zone below. People fly and drive instead. Such low-hanging fruit, but no government grasps it.

@thewalrus

What happened to the Turbo Train?
Here are all the deets, from a @thewalrus Magazine feature. It was published in 2009, but the history is good:
thewalrus.ca/off-the-rails/…

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More from @grescoe

Taras Grescoe 🚇

@grescoe

Sep 19

By 1920, the network of interurbans in the US was so dense that a determined commuter could hop interlinked streetcars from Waterville, Maine, to Sheboygan, Wisconsin—a journey of 1,000 miles—exclusively by electric trolley.
🧵🚋

The tracks, and often the wires, extended deep into forest and farmland, making the railroads de facto intercity highways; after nightfall in the countryside, farmers would signal drivers to stop by burning a rag next to the track.

Streetcars and interurbans became the dominant mode of urban transportation in North America, carrying 11 billion passengers a year by the end of the First World War.

Read 8 tweets

Taras Grescoe 🚇

@grescoe

Sep 18

Look what year Soylent Green (1973) is set in...

World Population Clock, Sep. 18, 2022.

"...is people!!!"

Read 4 tweets

Taras Grescoe 🚇

@grescoe

Sep 18

In #Europe, scores of places are lowering speed limits to 30 km/h. Almost 200 cities in #France have implemented the measure; traffic deaths in some have decreased by as much as 70 percent.
Meanwhile, Conservative Party in #Quebec campaigns on raising highway speeds to 120 km/h.

More info on the movement in France:

20minutes.fr/bordeaux/32089…

And I'm aware highway/city speed limits are different.
🥱

Just trying to show how tone-deaf this (non-city-tax-paying) would-be politician is.

Read 4 tweets

Taras Grescoe 🚇

@grescoe

Sep 18

"We'll always need big diesel trucks in our cities to deliver freight. It's just reality."

Not so fast. The electric "Cargo Tram" has long been a fixture in many cities in #Europe.

🧵🚋

The city of #Karlsruhe uses light-rail vehicles and "tram-trains" to carry consumer goods between city-center hubs, which are then delivered by electric cargo bikes.

TramFret employs old trams to shuttle groceries around in the city of Saint-Etienne, #France.

Read 7 tweets

Taras Grescoe 🚇

@grescoe

Sep 17

Ever heard of the train-tram?

Not the same thing as the tram-train!
A system that lets lightweight trains travel quickly between cities, but also operate on city streets like trams.

The RegioSprinter is currently operating in Zwickau, #Germany, though above video is from #Czechia

They even trialled it in #Calgary #Alberta in the mid-90s. Note the name: DiscoTrain !

Read 5 tweets

Taras Grescoe 🚇

@grescoe

Sep 11

I’ve been to Lago di Garda in northern #Italy—spectacular! (olive trees and lemons on a blue lake with the Dolomites looming).
Seeing the bicycle route they've built since makes me want to go back.
🧵 global bike path #bucketlist

Submarine cycling.
In Limburg, #Belgium, the Bokrijk bike path takes you below the surface of a lake in a national park...from a distance, it looks like bike riders’ heads are plowing through the water at speed.

Another Belgian stunner.

Fietsen door de Bomen, "Cycling through the trees," a corkscrewing bike path that takes you up to the treetops in a park in Limburg, #Belgium