Exactly my point.

>>The fact is many Australians have a desire to have a high speed train network.<<

Trouble is, they won't want to pay for it.

>>My point is this; that we don't want to build the slowest high speed rail network in the world by using dated technology of wheel on rail.<<

But that's not really the point, is it. It isn't a matter of technology, it is a matter of utility and value.

Maglev could well be a perfectly satisfactory way to go in comparison to wheel-on-rail, sometime in the future (unless of course it too is superseded).

But the cost to build is fundamentally similar, even allowing that the figures are presented for a largely unproven process. The longest operational maglev system is presently... how long? And the distance between Sydney and Melbourne is...?

So, once in place, will it be competitive with other modes of transport, which will also have progressed in the meantime? Quite possibly. But that still leaves the question whether either mode is actually viable at all, in a country with a mere 23 million inhabitants.

In the past year, my own inter-city travel has halved, thanks to one simple piece of technology, the video conference. My guess is that the financial equation "can I really justify the need to travel" will be the measuring point of the success of any such project, rather than the somewhat wishy-washy "many Australians have a desire".

Thanks - but no thanks!

I do not aspire to greatness - I am not a megalomaniac.

There once was a megalomaniac who aspired to greatness - 1000 years of greatness, and he built the first, longest, fastest and greatest autostradas in the world: in fact they still serve the public today, who drive there with no speed-limit 80 years later.

I want no share in that. Please keep this social-nationalistic infection away. Please leave us alone to live our humble life without interruption.

Did someone say we are getting 'TeleVISION'... at last? That's better than tunnelVISION which some poor unfortunates suffer from on this very forum!

What many Australians want is a return to trains in their area and High Speed rail simply doesn't work for a train a day each way branch lines.

Just how would we power this high speed rail?

There is also terrorism to consider, one small clamp-on de-rail would see a high speed train take flight and with a landing verging between horrendous and catastrophic.

As Pericles has pointed video conferencing will cut down travel between Sydney and Melbourne and many other places; I think that the voters and shareholders will see to that.

Wonder of Wonders.
My number two son just had a video conference with me.
He's in Ireland and I'm in NSW, he was going to telephone but the visual link was cheaper, just as quick and had the added advantage that he could show me how well his garden is growing.

Great thing, a high tech world. Maybe teleportation will become a reality.

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