Cousin Amos rides 1,351 miles in just 8.5 hours.

One of our founders, Fritz Plous, received this email from his cousin Amos Gottlieb, of Boulder’s Colorado. Amos was riding a high-speed train from Beijing to Shenzhen, China. For comparison, New York to Miami by highway is roughly 1,300 miles.

This is a common occurrence. Every American who goes to Asia or Europe asks, “Why can’t we have trains like this?” The United States is neither too big nor too small. It’s exactly the right size for high-speed trains.

Please join us if you want trains like this here.

Hi Fritz,

We are on a train from Beijing to Shenzhen (1,351 miles).  The trip will take 8 hours and 30 min with a speed about 350 km/hr (217.5 mph) and six (6) stops.  We are in 2nd class which is quite comfortable – two seats on one side of the aisle and three seats on the other side of the aisle. The ride is fairly quiet and the maximum noise seems to be about 60 to 70 dB.

The ride is very smooth.  We just stopped in the first station.  The stop was very brief.  People off, people on and zip we’re off.

There are two video monitors, one on the right side of the car, and one on the left.  We just saw an ad for a service that takes your luggage from home to the train so you can take a bus or subway to the station without having to lug luggage around or have to use a car/taxi to get to the station.

We’ve just come to our second stop.  It’s near where the Kaifeng Jews lived starting in the Song Dynasty (960 – 1279).

Hope you are well and doing well….

Amos