On CBS This Morning, Amtrak's new director, formally the head of Norfolk Southern, spoke about new equipment for the Northeast Corridor. Acela will be retired and a new high speed train, larger than Acela will take it's place. Nora O'Donnell asked why the speed of trains on the NEC isn't greater. The answer was what you would think, older infrastructure but mostly curves. The solution would be to build an entirely new right of way which would cost in the "Tens of billions", said the director. And he added that a project like that is in the distant future.
So my question is, why buy new trains that can travel faster than current models when they won't be able to stretch their legs to the fullest capacity on the existing trackage ?
