Obama bringing modern transport to the USA?

Well, it's not a bike..

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/02/obama-high-speed-railroad.php

Changing the way people conceive convenient long distance modern travel?

"It’s amazing. I’m stunned,” he said in an interview Friday, hours before the bill passed Congress. “I’m glad I get the credit in Nevada, but this is Obama’s No. 1 priority. This is his legacy issue out of this bill, because we need these high-speed corridors. ... I’ll take credit but frankly didn’t have much to do with it other than carry forward with what Obama wanted.”

But it is a landmark transportation investment with regional effects in almost every corner of the nation. Just last October, former President George W. Bush signed a bill authorizing up to $1.5 billion for high-speed rail through 2013. Obama’s commitment in the same period will be eight times that. -not me.

More on high-speed rail:
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/02/realizing-potential-high-speed-rail-climate-protection-business-productivity-security.php

And who doesn't like taking the train?.. Sure, it may take a bit longer, but just like the Porter experience, you'd expect bonuses... better food, higher capacity for bodies, sausage, and luggage (how you say, less dense?), get to fool around with your girlfriend, explore different cars and visit different stops, etc... definitely a different experience. It just must be as cheap as flying. In that way it can start to challenge the aviation industry in terms of both convenience and emissions.

One of my best train experiences, filming 'Where the Change is' was on a cross country millennium-timed mokumentary film trip (false millennium - 2000 - for the geeks), documented with Where the Change Is. We took VIA across to Vancouver and up to Churchill on what I seem to remember being a 15 day pass; an absolute life enhancing experience. Think free sleeper cars, open roof cars, trying to sneak into sleeping cars, waiting on the Edmonton VIA stop for only 15 minutes, learning to knit from a octogenarian, shooting a uni movie with your friends, polar bears, sled dogs, and the bore of Ontario.