>>1551432Additionally, the length of journeys heavily affects the transport mode chosen.
>Most goods are moved relatively short distances (less than 250 miles), accounting for 50.3 percent of the value, and 66.6 percent of the weight for all shipments within the United States in 2015. Shipments transported more than 250 miles represented 33.4 percent of the tonnage but the vast majority (84.5 percent) of the ton-miles>Modal shares of freight vary by distance. Trucks carry the largest shares by value, tons, and tonmiles for shipments moving 750 or fewer miles, while rail is the dominant mode by tons and tonmiles for shipments moved 750 to 2,000 miles. Air, multiple modes and mail, and other/unknown modes accounted for 54.2 percent of the value of shipments moved more than 2,000 miles.https://www.bts.gov/sites/bts.dot.gov/files/docs/FFF_2017.pdfSo then the guy's figures for ton-miles are thrown off by a minority of the freight. The US freight system is in fact road-dominated. Rail is the dominant mode for the minority of the freight, only it takes that freight very far. In the comparison countries, the high value goods are on trucks and much of the low value goods on ships, going on substantially shorter journeys than in the US. Japan isn't even 2,000 miles from north to south.
So then, there likely is not much cargo that would drop road for rail if only the EU-27/Japan would decrease their passenger rail usage. Conversely, enhancing inter- and intracity rail networks would likely not cause a hemorrhage of traffic off the rails. At which point,
>Because the difference in energy consumption between rail and truck freight is far greater than the difference between passenger rail and cars,kicks in, and the US would save energy by hauling flesh by rail rather than road or where appropriate airplane.
