this post was submitted on 12 Jul 2023
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Because high speed rail requires costly viaducts that can make the project cost several times the price of a lower speed line.
I think the benefits of going high speed rail now would outweigh the negatives of upgrading at a later point.
It depends on the cost/benefit ratio.
Looking at Nairobi to Mombasa as an example, it looks like Nairobi to Kyumvi and Makindu to Mombasa could be designed and built as high speed rail as the terrain looks relatively flat.
However, there is a set of hills between Kyumvi and Makindu that will make the geometry of the rail a lot trickier. The cost of viaducts and tunneling through those hills could be significantly more costly than the rest of the project combined. For the expensive part of the rail, it may be better to build that part at a lower design speed that can get upgraded later.
China built a great high speed rail system, but a lot of people in China still use the traditional rail system due to ticket cost, and the population in China is wealthier than the average African. You also have the African rail system being designed to operate with freight, which is something that the Chinese high speed rail network wasn't really designed to handle as much of.
The economics don't seem to favor high speed rail now, so it may be better to design the system so that it doesn't preclude high speed rail in the future.
I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that the actual economists in Africa have done the math here.
The summary isn't detailed to go through how the system gets implemented. I also noted in another comment that it is would be wise to design the geometry of some segments to high speed rail standards if the cost increase due to tighter geometry requirements are negligible.
A continental high speed rail network is a great goal, but there are ways to implement the system that can yield faster benefits to Africans than just building the whole system to high speed standards at once.
Again, I have no idea why you're assuming these countries haven't done due diligence before embarking on a megaproject like this. A really weird premise to start from to be honest.
I'm assuming the same due diligence my country puts into these kinds of projects. Hell, there are large parts of the Internet that critique projects like this in general, no matter who builds it.
If I'm willing to critique developed countries in infrastructure projects, why shouldn't do the same for developing countries?
Hell, it isn't like they have to listen to me.
If you wanted to make a serious critique then you should spend the time to actually learn about the project and criticize specifics instead of just making stuff up based on what your country does.
Why so defensive?
And my critique is based on the experience of Chinese High Speed Rail, which I noted in other comment. All you did was ask me by what right I can critique them, and I responded that I will critique any of these types of plans, including plans in my country.
It's a troll move. Make you do hours of work, you post, they do a new low-effort post and expect you to dance all over again.
Because if you won't, you're clearly avoiding the topic.
Flip the script and ask them to post, but sometimes you learn there's another angle than you've been told. Sometimes.
Why are you saying I'm being defensive when I'm simply pointing out that what you're saying is unsubstantiated, and it's not really possible to have a meaningful discussion without knowing the actual details of the plan. If there's something specific you want to criticize then that would be an interesting discussion, but simply claiming high speed rail is a bad idea because reasons is just noise.
This post doesn't have that detail. I'm only critiquing the project based on the information at hand which you provided. If there is noise, it is because the resolution of the plan as detailed is allow you are going to only get noise as part of the discussion. I don't know if the planning has been gotten to my discussion points yet.
You had also said several times asking if I thought the African economists did their jobs competently. It sounds like an appeal to authority to not talk about what is known. I'm looking at this project as being planned by experts and I haven't said anything to suggest otherwise. However, people can still critique experts.
I know the post doesn't have the details, hence it doesn't really much make sense to make extrapolations you're making based on the content of it. The post just says that Africa is building high speed rail, which I think is an interesting development. Whether there are going to be problems or not remains to be seen but to me this is clearly a positive development.
It is a positive development, and it is good that they are looking at it from the continental point of view to ensure compatability between countries. Europe really dropped the ball on compatability.
Nor does it support yours in meaningful ways?
We inhabit many similar fora, we share many interests, but I keep running into you alienating people with uneven logic.
Being called a tankie doesn't help you. Or other causes.
What uneven logic are you accusing me of specifically?
Do the research or you're not actually interested.
It's so adorable that you actually spend your time following me around here. I've unlocked the pet troll achievement.
I'm not following you around.
You're a ubiquitous troll in many of the communities I like. I now question if lemmy is actually for discourse because you're always sitting on it.
You are following me around and making vapid comments that add nothing of substance to the discussion. That's what trolling actually is. You appear to be upset that you're exposed to opinions and views that come outside of the echo chamber you live in. That's entirely a you problem.
I'm not following you. You are a ubiquitous, low effort troll. You are not representing causes in any persuasive way.
Your whole argument is the West and especially the US is bad. I'm sympathetic to many points, but you broad brush people, turn dismissive, condescending and just... mean.
Don't call my stuff vapid when you're posting vomit emoji and othe glib stuff at potential allies.
That's the thing. All you see are enemies. All you make are enemies. You're safe hiding on a server that disallows downvotes but you're pissing people off - because you keep lashing out and trolling.
Groups I'd enjoy, you're killing the vibe and the discussion. We have similar interests but you've never considered it. I was a bad person for being born in the US from the first time we talked.
I'm not the topic, here.
You are following me and making vapid comments that are just personal attacks and contribute absolutely nothing. The fact that I live rent free in your head is kind of adorable, but all you do is just add noise to the conversation. You are noise.
Out of all the federation of Lemmy servers there are literally a handful of trolls, such as yourself, who follow me around and are very mad about my opinions. I have lots interesting and productive discussions with other people. You're not representative of the community. You're just a toxic individual with an agenda who can't stand seeing views you disagree with. Yet, you're not able to make any actual points of your own, so all you do is make personal attacks. It's kind of sad really.
My main concern here is this:
China has a history of offering aggressive upfront costs on loans in exchange for a lot of influence in the region. So I'm guessing China gave the AU a sweetheart deal in exchange for cutting out competitors and potentially allowing China a lot of lenience in future investments (e.g. sweatshops and unsafe mines).
So here's what I see the strategy as:
I don't see this as a real long-term solution. Instead of trying to connect every African country, they should pick favorites at first, with a contract with member countries to eventually expand to everyone. As in, connect the most prosperous areas that will absolutely use the rail network, and expand once that cash flows, and do so without massive loans from countries with an economic interest in exploiting the area.
I just don't see China's interests aligning with the EU. This just seems likely to have heavy corruption where the AU gets short term benefits for a long term sellout of the AU to China.
The initial set of plans looks like a very high level program design, which is appropriate for this stage of planning. It is also going to be up to the constituent member nations to get this built, which is consistent with a continental system that is being planned.
This is a good beginning to a long term solution, but the costs may outweigh the benefits in the short and medium terms.
I hope that the first segments chosen are those that add the most value immediately, then expansions radiate from there so that the incomplete segments are still valuable in their smaller parts. Since they are defining technology now, the different parts should integrate easily into one large system.
My concern with picking China is that Chinese engineers are likely going to go with the expensive option no matter what; they've done it in China a lot and I don't see them changing.