Quote Originally Posted by Brown, Jon Brow View Post
Well China is pretty big and high speed rail has devastated the domestic airline industry there.

The argument for high speed rail is that for journeys under 500 miles it is quicker and cheaper than air travel. East coast to west coast wouldn't be suitable for rail travel, but surely it is suitable in US cities that are within 500 miles of each other? Baltimore to NYC (200 miles) on the Acela Express takes 2.5 hours. A proper high speed line would be about an hour quicker (station to station).
I just did a quick search.
Washington DC to Detroit, Michigan via AMTRAK is 13 1/4 hours and costs $183. Via Southwest Air its $165 and 4H 20M (that's a plane change, didn't quickly see a direct flight).
Washington DC to Atlanta Georgia via AMTRAK is $116 and 13 3/4 hours. Via Southwest its $124 and 1H 50M (direct flight).

You are correct that travel anywhere within the very heavily populated northeast corridor is probably better by the train, however that most definitely does not apply throughout the rest of the country. Both of the ones just above are about your 500 mile distance and here those are relatively short hops.