As public transportation popularity grows, the importance of investing in the upgrade of America‘s public transportation network seemingly is still not obvious. Therefore here is my take as to why America needs to invest in rail and its derivative thereof.
America needs rail because current transportation options are inefficient. The options for transportation in America are currently the following: driving, airplane, rail, bus and boat (boat will not be counted in my analysis).
Today’s post is concerning the cost to the consumer per travel. Admittedly there are a lot of variable that can determine the expense of transportation to the consumer. However, in this post, I have taken the most pertinent cost factors of each transportation mode in order to determine an overall cost to the consumer. Again, I stress that the figures presented here can change based on circumstances specific to each consumer (for example: If a consumer owns his own car, leases, or rents the figures may be slightly different accordingly).
In order to start analyzing the cost of transportation to a consumer, I decided to use a long trip as a base catalyst in order to see how each mode reacts to the trip on a financial scale. In other words, how much is a person actually paying to take a long trip on each mode respectively? I decided to use as a catalyst a trip from Gainesville, FL to Austin, TX using the capital as my final destination. Based on the figure from Google maps, this trip is 1,015 miles long.
NOTE: Any destination can be used to determine costs.
With the origin and destination determined, I proceeded to calculate the corresponding costs per mode.
The Automobile is the most complex mode for the consumer to calculate since all of the cost associated with the automobile is the consumer’s responsibility. This analysis does not take into account environmental impact costs.
I analyzed two options. Car styles vary and depending on the car type and style, different gas mileages can have a different cost association. Therefore, in order to come about an agreeable average I looked at two car options. The first car (Mitsubishi i-MiEV Electric Vehicle) is considered to be the most gas efficient vehicle according to www.fueleconomy.gov. Here are its stats:
Car: (2012 Mitsubishi i-MiEV Electric Vehicle MSRP 29,125 – 31,125) Most Gas Efficient
According to http://www.fueleconomy.gov
Cost to drive 25 miles = $0.90
I also looked at the most popular vehicle according to http://www.edmunds.com
Most popular vehicle (2012) Toyota Camry According to www.edmunds.com
Vehicle MSRP=23,220 according to http://www.toyota.com/camry/
Cost to drive 25miles= $3.00 (according to http://www.fueleconomy.gov)
Gas national Average: Regular $3.388 according to fuelgaugereport.aaa.com (July 13, 2012)
With these two cars in mind I proceeded to calculate the cost for a consumer to make this trip on these cars given that it takes 17 hours 2 minutes non-stop (According to Google map) on car to make this trip.
Moreover, I took into account cost associated with other aspects of the vehicle:
NOTE: these are national averages:
Cost for car: (according to commutesolutions.org)
Fixed cost (insurance, registration, motor vehicle taxes) = 11.9 cents per mile
Maintenance and tires = 5.3 cents per mile
Accidents (personal costs of injury and property damage) = 10.9 cents per mile
Finance charge = 6.3 cents per mile
Depreciation = 27.9 cents per mile
English: Mitsubishi i-MiEV in Spain (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Mitsubishi total energy (gas/electric) cost: trip = $36.54
Insurance = $120.79
Maintenance = $53.8
Accident = $110.64
Finance = $63.95
Depreciation = $283.20
Total = $668.92
2007-2009 Toyota Camry photographed in College Park, Maryland, USA. Category:Toyota Camry (XV40) Category:Silver Toyota sedans (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Camry total trip: trip = $121.8
Insurance = $120.79
Maintenance = $53.8
Accident = $110.64
Finance = $63.95
Depreciation = $283.20
Total = $754.18
Note: Please understand that when you purchase an airline ticket, they take into account (according to http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/storysupplement/airline_costs/ ):
- Labor
- Fuel
- Aircraft rent and ownership
- Non-Aircraft rent and ownership
- Non-Employee labor
- “Misc” which include
- Food and beverage
- Landing fees
- Maintenance supplies
- Insurance
- Agent commissions
- Communications
- Advertising
- Office supplies
- Payment to regional partners and agents
- Interest
- Other airline expenses
- Federal Taxes
- And of course profit
The airline makes you pay for any expense they incur + their profit, therefore, the above car analysis is not unrealistic. It is a standard analysis that all transportation agencies do.
Airplane
Flight time (time the plane is actually in the air): 3hours and 40 minutes (according to Delta)
Boarding trip time (trip including layover): 5hr 5minutes (According to Delta)
Total time (including 30 minute recommended early arrival, 1hour for international flights): 5hr 35 minutes nation 6 hours 5minutes international
Ticket prices: As of 6:11 pm 7/13/2012 for travel dates 07/20/2012 return on 07/27/2012 the
prices ranged from $473.20 to $848.00 at Delta.com
NOTE: Ticket prices are tricky to determine since you can use sites like priceline.com or Kayak to get lower priced tickets. It also depends on time and date. However, an average for ticket prices is $364 according to Air transport association (check out the report here http://www.airlines.org/Pages/FINAL%20A4A%201Q12%20Review%20and%20Summer%20Outlook.pdf)
This price does not include food bought on the plane.
Bus
According to Greyhound.com
Travel Time 24-26 hours (this includes one layover)
Price for Ticket: Standard round trip fare as of 6:25pm 07/13/2012 is $382.00 for travel dates 07/20/2012 return on 07/27/2012. This price can be lower or higher depending on the type of fare or discount you get.
Train in America (Amtrak)
English: Amtrak Downeaster conductor standing in Amfleet car doorway, as the Downeaster train leaves Durham, New Hampshire. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
According to Amtrak.com they do not service Gainesville. Therefore, I had to use Jacksonville Fl, for this analysis. for travel dates 07/20/2012 return on 07/27/2012:
Travel time: 72hours and 22 minutes
Ticket price $525.00
High Speed Hypothetical
With the above statistics completed I wanted to pose a hypothetical. A “what if” if you will. The fact is, we do not have a high speed rail service from Florida to Texas therefore I had to use the given information and calculate what the statistics for a high speed rail could be. It’s a hypothetical based on my reasoning.
According to Eurorail. The Alta Velocidad Española’s (AVE) train top speed is 300 km/h or 189 mph. Using this as a model train for my hypothetical analysis calculated how fast the train would make the trip from Florida to Austin. I divided the total miles of the trip by the top speed in order to get the time it takes for the train to cover that distance (1015 miles/189mph = 5.37 hours). Granted realistically the train would not travel consistently at 189 mph however for the entire duration of the trip. However, for analysis sake let’s say it does. Thus if the train travels non-stop from Gainesville to Austin, it would take the train 5hrs to get there. That’s as fast as the total travel time of a plane!
However, we know that there are areas where trains will have to slow down. Moreover, trains will have to stop and train stations to load and unload passengers along the way. Therefore lets say, there is a total of 20 stops between Gainesville and Austin TX. At 15 minutes per stop, that would add 5 extra hours to the travel time, that’s 10.37 total hours of travel (and this is a very conservative figure, normally high speed trains don’t stay for more than 10 minutes at a minor station in Europe.)
Cost?: This is hard to determine on a hypothetical situation. However, if we look at the current train ticket prices of Amtrak for a similar trip (Jacksonville, to Austin). It can be said that, per hour, Amtrak charges $7.30 (525/72= dollar per hour). If this is the case than10x7.30 = $70.30. To check I found a trip that is roughly 10 hours on train. A trip on Amtrak from New York city to Charlotte NC takes 13 hours and costs $162 according to Amtrak.com as of 07/13/2012 at 7:29 pm. This trip has a total per hour cost of 12.46. Nevertheless even at 12.46 dollars per hour, the train option would be the most economical option available.
Keep all these figures in mind since I will come back to them on the next post (next Friday). This is to lay the foundation of how I am going to tackle this question.
A few things are obvious.
1. No matter where you live the car is just expensive. No matter how economical it is.
2. The car takes more time than other modes.
I have laid the ground work for my coming arguments, tune in next week for the second post on this “Why America needs rail” series.
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- Spain I Roald Smeets (iroaldsmeets.wordpress.com)
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