Never mind those jets with WiFi. For e-book lovers traveling in the Northeast Corridor, trains win.
Oh, trains take longer to rumble to their destinations than jets need to whiz there. But the extra time just allows more immersive reading, with fewer distractions than you might suffer in a racket-filled airport. What’s more, although security hassle exist, they’re minor compared to the horrors that the Transportation Security Administration inflicts on air travelers. The latest joy for the TSA sadists and voyeurs? Full body scans. No trains ever flew into the World Trade Center; so let’s hope that the ‘crats kindly spare AmTrak riders from that.
The foregoing positives, or omissions, are just the start of AmTrak’s glories for e-book lovers. I love trains’ steady rumble. It helps me immerse. Just be sure to bring along either an LCD gizmo or an E Ink reader with a book light, if you’ll be traveling at night. Nowadays you can can even buy a legal e-book edition of Look Homeward, Angel in Kindle format or others; relish Thomas Wolfe‘s love of trains.
No rumble across the Pond, alas
Granted, I’m not expecting to rumble across the Atlantic in a train, but given a choice between AmTrak and air travel to New York from Alexandria, VA, I shudder at the possibility of having to fly. It’s probably been decades since I flew to NYC. What’s more, on AmTrak, I don’t have to shut down my e-reader during take-off.
Leave it to certain idiots in Washington, D.C., however, to be threatening A Good Thing. The Iraq War has already cost the United States at least half a trillion, and yet some ideologues in Congress are quibbling over over the billion or so that AmTrak loses a year. We hear the usual privatization mantra. Fine. But whatever the business model, just remember AmTrak’s environmental advantages, a trait shared with e-books.
32.9 percent less fuel per passenger mile than a jet
"Amtrak can move a passenger a mile with 17.4 percent less fuel than a passenger car can, and about 32.9 percent less than an airline can, according to the Oak Ridge National Laboratory," reports the New York Times. What’s more, AmTrack saves oil "since much of the fuel Amtrak uses is in the form of electricity, made from coal, natural gas and nuclear power." The Times says that "The railroad is not radically more energy-efficient than other means of travel." But that 32.9 percent differences with the airline in hardly minuscule.
Even if you don’t live in the States…
Beyond that, AmTrak’s efficiencies often can promote commerce. Add in all costs of getting to the airport, or leaving your car there, and AmTrack may win handily in, at least for the Virginia-New York trip. I know. You live outside the the Northeast Corridor and, very possibly, not even in the United States at all. Regardless, wherever you are, I hope you’ll root for trains. And if AmTrak and the rest can ever solve the WiFi riddle, so much the better.
Since I started riding the train a few times a week, I’ve turned commuting time into productive time. I generally take both my eBookWise (loaded with proposals) and my HP Jornada (loaded with whatever my current WIP might be), and bang away.
I was surprised that the percentages aren’t much better for the train. Unless they’re comparing themselves to full passenger cars (something I never see on the freeway).
Rob Preece
Publisher, http://www.BooksForABuck.com
All good points, Rob–and coming of course from someone trained in economics. Anyone else a frequent train rider? Doing some e-reading?
I can recall some expensive airport ads displays that Sony did for the Reader. I wonder if it’ll also consider AmTrak. Same for Amazon. Will the Kindle’s wireless work on trains.
Thanks,
David