The US Has The Best Rail System in the World, and Matt Yglesias Actually Pointed Out the Reason
美国拥有世界上最好的铁路系统，Matt Yglesias其实已经点出了背后的原因
Yglesias has a very good article on why passenger rail is not a bigger deal in the US. In it, he says this (emphasis added):
关于为何客运铁路在美国并未大行其道，Yglesias写了篇很好的文章。在那篇文章中，他说道：
Instead the issue is that the dismal failure of US passenger rail is in large part the flip side of the success of US freight rail. America’s railroads ship a dramatically larger share of total goods than their European peers. And this is no coincidence. Outside of the Northeast Corridor, the railroad infrastructure is generally owned by freight companies — Amtrak is just piggybacking on the spare capacity.
相反，美国客运铁路的萧索其实很大程度上可视为其货运铁路兴盛的另一面。比起欧洲的铁路，美国的铁路承担全国货物运输的比重要大得多。而这并不是巧合。除了东北走廊线，美国的铁路设施基本由货运公司拥有——Amtrak【译注：美国国家铁路公司，其全部优先权股份都由美国联邦政府所有，并接受政府投资以维持公司运转。公司的运作模式为准政府机构，董事会成员皆由总统提名经参议院同意而任命】）仅仅肩负了剩余的运输能力。
It is a short article, so it does not go into more depth than this, but I have actually gone further than this and argued that the US freight-dominated rail system is actually far greener and more sensible than the European passenger system. As I wrote years ago at Forbes:
这是篇短文章，所以只是点到为止，但我其实做过更深的研究，并提出货运占主导的美国铁路系统其实远比欧洲的客运系统更环保和更合理。正如多年前我在《福布斯》上发表的文章所说：
The US rail system, unlike nearly every other system in the world, was built (mostly) by private individuals with private capital. It is operated privately, and runs without taxpayer subsidies. And, it is by far the greatest rail system in the world. It has by far the cheapest rates in the world (1⁄2 of China’s, 1⁄8 of Germany’s). But here is the real key: it is almost all freight.
与世界上几乎所有其他铁路系统都不一样，美国的铁路系统基本全部由私人出资，并由私人建设。它由私人运营，不需要拿纳税人的钱进行补贴。而且，目前为止它是世界上最大的铁路系统，也是目前为止最便宜的系统（成本为中国铁路系统的二分之一，德国的八分之一）。但真正的关键在这：它基本上完全为货运服务。
As a percentage, far more freight moves in the US by rail (vs. truck) than almost any other country in the world. Europe and Japan are not even close. Specifically, about 40% of US freight moves by rail, vs. just 10% or so in Europe and less than 5% in Japan. As a result, far more of European and Japanese freight jams up the highways in trucks than in the United States. For example, the percentage of freight that hits the roads in Japan is nearly double that of the US.
若以百分比计，在美国，铁路承担的货运量（同汽车运输相比）比世界上几乎其他任何国家都大得多。欧洲和日本完全不在同一档次上。具体来说，美国40%的货运由铁路承担，而欧洲为10%左右，日本则不到5%。结果便是，比起美国，在欧洲和日本，多得多的货物在卡车里堵在了高速公路上。例如，在日本由公路运输的货物的百分比几乎是美国的两倍。
You see, passenger rail is sexy and pretty and visible. You can build grand stations and entertain visiting dignitaries on your high-speed trains. This is why statist governments have invested so much in passenger rail — not to be more efficient, but to awe their citizens and foreign observers.
如你所见，客运铁路性感、招人喜欢，更容易被人看见。你可以修建雄伟的车站并以此取悦前来参观高速铁路的政要。这便是为何国家主义的政府已在客运铁路上投入了如此多的资金——并不是为了更高效，而是为了让他们的市民和外国参观者感到敬畏。
But there is little efficiency improvement in moving passengers by rail vs. other modes. Most of the energy consumed goes into hauling not the passengers themselves, but the weight of increasingly plush rail cars. Trains have to be really, really full all the time to make for a net energy savings for high-speed rail vs. cars or even planes, and they seldom are full. I had a lovely trip on the high speed rail last summer between London and Paris and back through the Chunnel — especially nice because my son and I had the rail car entirely to ourselves both ways.
但是同其他方式相比，用铁路运输旅客并没有什么效率上的提高。大部分的能源被用在制动和运送日益豪华的车厢，而不是运送旅客上。同汽车（甚至飞机）相比，火车必须始终装得非常非常满才能更节省能源，而它们很少是满载的。去年夏天，在往返伦敦和巴黎时，我选择了乘坐穿梭英吉利海峡隧道的火车。那趟旅程可谓惬意——尤其考虑到往返旅程中车厢里都只有我和我儿子时。
The real rail efficiency comes from moving freight. As compared to passenger rail, more of the total energy budget is used moving the actual freight rather than the cars themselves. Freight is far more efficient to move by rail than by road, but only the US moves a substantial amount of its freight by rail. One reason for this is that freight and high-speed passenger traffic have a variety of problems sharing the same rails, so systems that are optimized for one tend to struggle serving the other.
火车的真正效率来自货运。同客运铁路比起来，总能量开销更多被用来运输货物而不是车厢本身。用铁路运输货物要比用公路有效率得多，但只有美国用铁路运输大量货物。原因之一是客货共线存在许多问题，这样，被优化用于一种运输方式的系统会很难为另一种提供服务。
Freight is boring and un-sexy. Its not a government function in the US. So intellectuals tend to ignore it, even though it is the far more important, from and energy and environmental standpoint, portion of transport to put on the rails. ….
货运既无聊又不性感。在美国这不是政府职能之一。所以知识分子倾向于忽视它，尽管从能源和环境角度，货运都是交通极为重要的组成部分。
I would argue that the US has the world’s largest commitment to rail where it really matters. But that is what private actors do, make investments that actually make sense rather than just gain one prestige (anyone know the most recent company Warren Buffet has bought?)
要我说，在它真正能够施展身手的地方，美国才是全世界向铁路交托了最大重任的国家。但那是私人部门所为，他们做有实际意义的投资而不是仅仅买得一个虚名（有谁知道沃伦·巴菲特新近买下的公司吗？）
The greens should be demanding that the world emulate us, rather than the other way around. But the lure of shiny bullet trains and grand passenger concourses will always cause some intellectuals to swoon.
绿党分子们应该要求全世界模仿我们，而不是反过来。但是闪亮的子弹头列车和雄伟的乘客广场总是太诱人，引得一些知识分子意乱情迷。
Which would you rather pounding down the highway, more people on vacation or more big trucks moving freight? Without having made an explicit top-down choice at all, the US has taken the better approach.
在高速公路上，你乐意看到更多出门度假的人还是更多载货的大卡车？全然没有一个清晰的至上而下的选择，美国已然采用了更好的方式。
翻译：Drunkplane(@Drunkplane-zny)
校对：babyface_claire(@许你疯不许你傻)
编辑：辉格@whigzhou