The night train revolution has been hailed as an alternative to airplanes

• OpenRailwayMap

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  An OpenStreetMap-based project for creating a map of the world's railway infrastructure.

  

France has an excellent high speed rail network it has less need for domestic flights. Other countries in the EU could learn from that.

Germany particularly is a basket case. If you take the "high speed" train from Berlin to Köln, it takes nearly five hours, the train stops lots of times, and with the exception of a few tens of kilometers never hits anywhere near its maximum speed. Combined with all the delays, cancelled trains, strikes, etc. It makes for a bit unpredictable experience. Domestic flights are well under 1 hour, typically. Even with the hassle of getting to and from airports, it's way faster.

https://www.openrailwaymap.org/ has a nice map that you can show the maximum speeds on rail segments. Spain and France are the best. I've taken high speed trains in both and their high speed trains go the maximum speed most of the journey. Germany is notable for just not having a lot of rail suitable for its trains to drive their maximum speed.

Germany could do a lot better. But it will require massive investments.

I think the idea of a night train is more attractive than the reality of it being very slow, expensive, and relatively uncomfortable (at least I never managed to sleep well on one).

IMHO domestic flights in many countries can start transitioning to fully electric hops in the next decade or so. Anything under 700 miles is fair game for that. The battery technology is getting there. So, investing in lots of rail might not be the smartest thing.

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