They are spending 445 million USD on this.
I wonder how many of these flights are to other Midwest cities that could be easily replaced with HSR?
They could even build the rail station into the airport. It is on the edge of the city so there is ample space.
If I were king of the US, I’d connect all of the Major Midwest cities between the Appalachians and Rockies and then run the lines through the SW desert cities and then north up to Spokane and Seattle. Building through the mountains is expensive, so let’s not make perfect the enemy of good and go after the most cost effective locations. It would be feasible to run lines from Miami up to Bangor too. Connect it to the Western system through the deep south cities.
I’m from Pittsburgh, PA, and the last time I visited my Mom was telling me that they’re going to replace the airport.
She said that they’re going to build an entirely new airport just next to where the current Pittsburgh International Airport is. Likely a smaller one, since we have less traffic now than we did when the current one was built. Then they’ll just bulldoze the existing airport, I assume.
I asked her how much better spent that money would be to just make a train that takes people from our distant airport into the downtown. It’s just nuts.