this post was submitted on 08 Mar 2024
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You've moved away from the part which specifies long-haul trucking. To my understanding this is an area where trains are a reasonable solution.
Last mile coverage we also have room for improvement with much smaller vehicles, like bikes.
My point is that long haul is a very small minority of long-distance freight. Anything that can fly, does. Anything else will go on a train if a route exists (this is where rail expansion would help, but there are other problems with that we won't address). The only freight that travels long-distance is truckloads that can't fly (hazardous goods that are dangerous to put on a plane, or stuff like certain foods that could be damaged by the pressure changes in flight) AND doesn't have a good train route to take. My cross-country routes were always stuff like fresh produce or other foods that would be damaged by the pressure. Everything else would travel a few states, but never from one coast to the other.
And you can't put 3 full pallets on a bike, you'll always need trucks to some extent.