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One thing that some cities have done where awkward infrastructure is required to get a train to the airport is to, essentially, borrow money to do it, and make the fares to the airport very high to compensate.

Notably, getting to Brussels airport, which takes about 15 minutes from Brussels Nord, costs about 15 euro. For a 15 minute train journey. Hands-down the most expensive train per minute (or per km) I've ever been on. But, at least in theory, it's paying for this thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diabolo_project

(That's by no means the only one; lots of airports are in awkward places so running rail to them is expensive, and it's common for it to be paid for by special, more expensive services. And people use them.)

by SJetKaran36 minutes ago|

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Yep, Stockholm's Arlanda express train is costly as well

by youngtaff5 hours ago|

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Even at 15 Euros I bet its way cheaper than a helicopter or electric VTOL aircraft

by rsynnott3 hours ago|

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Oh, yeah, and it can and does handle a scale of traffic that a helicopter service obviously couldn't. I think each train takes about a thousand people and they're every ten minutes or something.

The "use helicopters for airport access" thing seems, at best, extremely niche.

by lmm7 hours ago|

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Funny how every other developed country manages to build more infrastructure cheaper despite having stronger unions and stricter regulations.

by maccard2 hours ago|

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> Funny how every other developed country manages to build more infrastructure cheaper despite having stronger unions and stricter regulations.

Every country says this about every other country. The UK has HS2, and we point to Germany. Germany has Stuttgart 21 and they point to Spain. Spain has the Sagrada Familia. Spain points to China, and China has the HZMB [0]

This stuff is really really hard, and standards have evolved hugely. The london underground would never be built today, because of the ignored costs. HS2's massive problem isn't that we spent £100m on a Bat tunnel [1], it's that nobody was willing to say no because that decision is pinned to you but the blame absolving is "someone elses problem".

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Kong%E2%80%93Zhuhai%E2%80.... [1] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9wryxyljglo

by digital-cygnet2 hours ago|

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I'm not exactly sure the point you're making about each country pointing at another as a positive example. The chain you've listed (US->UK->Germany->Spain->China) is a pretty good list of countries in descending order of cost to build infrastructure (it's not a straightforward analysis, but see https://transitcosts.com/new-data/ for example). There are always boondoggles, but the scoreboard is pretty clear -- each country in that list is better than the country before at building rail infrastructure.

Your analogy is like saying that everyone thinks someone else is a faster runner: amateurs point to collegiate athletes, collegiate athletes point to elites, elites point to Olympians. You can find someone in each of these categories who has run a bad race, but that doesn't invalidate the existence of the differences in ability.

by maccard1 hours ago|

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No, my analogy is that everyone assumes that everyone else is an Olympic runner, when we’re all just college athletes.

by rsynnott1 hours ago|

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I mean, I'm not sure that the Sagrada Familia is a good example. It taking a long time to build was arguably part of the _point_, and was planned from the start.

by maccard1 hours ago|

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I wasn’t sure if I should leave it in or not, it was more tongue in cheek than anything. The train between Madrid and Barcelona is a real example [0]

[0] https://english.elpais.com/elpais/2014/05/13/inenglish/13999...

by hakrgrl7 hours ago|

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Isn't it? Look up the California high speed rail. There is massive corruption, incompetence, and red tape.

by orwin3 hours ago|

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I guarantee France have stronger unions and regulations, and still managed the GPE. 3 years late and with 20% cost overrun, sure, but to be fair, they had to deal with floods twice, which wasn't planned and broke equipment and reseted some tunnels.

by cromka2 hours ago|

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20% cost overrun is nothing if you look at the typical cost overrun of a US infrastructure project. UES extension in NYC a prime example of that. And 3 years late? How about 50 years late?

by jbxntuehineoh39 minutes ago|

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yeah lol, in NYC 3 years and 20% would be regarded as an unprecedented success

by AngryData6 hours ago|

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I don't see how unions cause any of those problems. Corruption and incompetence comes through administration and management not the average worker wanting a decent pay and 2 weeks of vacation.

by prasadjoglekar5 hours ago|

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NYC unions are not your average worker. In my north of NYC town the labor rate for a union worker is 3x that of non union..and state laws mandate govt projects must pay that rate.

by bluGill2 hours ago|

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unions are often a form of corruption themselves. If, as is often the case, there's only one union that can do a job, that means that that union is a monopoly.

by HWR_148 hours ago|

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There's a free bus to LaGuardia from the subway.