rails

Ticket to Ride is another solid iPad adaptation of a classic board game, which has the same name, in which you race other players to build railroad routes across a map of the U.S. and southern Canada.

Fans of the board game (and its online version) will find this a satisfying reproduction of the original--but, of course, with the added bonus of not having to fumble with all the little pieces, cards, and bookkeeping. You can play a solo game in about 15 minutes, with no cleanup. If you don't know the game already, it's pretty easy … Read more

High-speed trains running from Paris to Amsterdam will now make part of the trip with the help of solar power.

On Monday, a train successfully made its inaugural run using solar powered systems along the way, said Infrabel, the company that runs Belgium's railroad network. Solar panels were installed atop a 3.4-kilometer length of man-made train tunnel that makes up part of the high-speed rail line running along the E19 highway between Amsterdam and Antwerp, Belgium (see video below).

The solar energy generated by those tunnel panels can now power things like signaling, lighting, and heating for the … Read more

SEDRUN, Switzerland--I'm a kilometer inside one of the Alps and nearly 800 meters below the surface, and it's pitch black. And I'm falling at 14 meters a second.

But this isn't a story of fire and brimstone. It's a story of the construction of the world's longest tunnel, a new 57 kilometer all-flat rail line deep under the Swiss Alps that is planned to open in 2017 and which is hoped to double the capacity of cargo along the crucial Zurich to Milan line. It's also Switzerland's largest-ever ecological project.

This is … Read more

All the money you have spent on cases and juice packs for the iPhone 4, or any smartphone that you have for that matter, only makes it that much harder to move on to a different device. This is what Third Rail Mobility, a new accessory maker for smartphones, intends to change.

The company announced today its very first product, the Third Rail System power solution for the iPhone 4, also known as the Third Rail Slim Case for iPhone 4 with Slide-on Smart Battery, which works not only with the iPhone 4, but also with most, if not all, … Read more

Contemporary high-speed rail seems to have gotten the nod as a plan worthy of pursuit from the makers of the long-awaited film version of "Atlas Shrugged," Ayn Rand's controversial Objectivist novel in which the railroad industry plays a key role.

Production company The Strike released its first trailer for "Atlas Shrugged, Part I" last week. Due out April 15th, the film was directed by Paul Johansson, actor/director of "One Tree Hill" fame.

Dialogue in the trailer signals that the book's ideas promoting the value of capitalism, rational self-interest, the intellectually elite, … Read more

A study released Tuesday by urban planning initiative America 2050 recommends the U.S. Department of Transportation refocus its high-speed rail hopes on "megaregions" in order to be effective.

The term "megaregions" refers to the greater metropolitan areas concentrated throughout the U.S., which happen to consist of roughly 70 percent of the U.S. population and jobs, according to America 2050.

The 56-page study "High-Speed Rail in America" (PDF) claims to generally support the push that has been championed by politicians from both the Republican and Democratic party in certain regions of the … Read more

Citizens concerned with the direction of high-speed rail in their home states have taken to the Internet to voice their opinions on current plans proposed by the U.S. Department of Transportation.

Self-described New Yorkers have started a Facebook campaign in support of high-speed rail service and have inundated the Facebook page of DOT Secretary Ray LaHood with posts imploring him to grant their governor-elect's request for more funding for a high-speed rail project in their state.

"I don't know who started it, but the Facebook campaign sure got my attention!" LaHood wrote in his blog … Read more

The U.S. government awarded $2.4 billion in funding last week to 54 railroad projects across 23 states in the U.S.

This latest round of funding is in addition to the $8 billion that was awarded in January as part of the comprehensive public works project to construct the "first nationwide program of high-speed intercity passenger rail service."

The funds are going toward new railroad lines and stations, as well as efforts to update and refurbish existing ones to coalesce with the high-speed plan announced in January as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

In this round of funding, Florida received $800 million to build a high-speed railroad connecting Tampa and Orlando with train speeds reaching up to 168 mph at some points along the route, making the trip under an hour compared with 90 minutes by car. The state's ultimate plan is to extend the line from Orland down to Miami, according to the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA).

Iowa received $230 million to hook into a new intercity passenger service that would connect Iowa City to Chicago and points in between.

California, known for its heavy traffic congestion, received $901 million, of which $715 million will be spent on a new high-speed railroad across its Central Valley. The state's ultimate goal is to have a high-speed passenger service reaching speeds of 220 mph at some points between San Francisco and Los Angeles that would run 2 hours 40 minutes compared with 6 hours by car, according to FRA statistics.… Read more

Skate It is the handheld version of the popular EA game Skate that most will recognize from console versions. On the iPhone, your control system includes using the accelerometer to turn your skater, a couple of buttons for kicking and grabs, and various swipes of your finger to pull off tricks. Having played the console games quite a bit on the Xbox 360, we were amazed at how many of the original locations are available on the iPhone version. The graphics are predictably not as good as on console versions of Skate, and older 3G iPhones may struggle to keep … Read more