this post was submitted on 12 Aug 2026
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how expensive would putting elevated rail in the median of the freeways even be?
Overpasses
Move the pillars?
I don't know where you live but here the clearance on a standard overpass is 14'. This is well under the 12'8 needed for the highway, plus the height of the track base, plus the clearance for the train. So the train would have to be built 30' in the air. Might as well put it above a road instead.
If you mean "put train on ground in the middle of the highway" we can also do that the hard part is getting to stations not in the middle of a highway.
I vaguely remember something from The Power Broker where an engineer said to Robert Moses with a slight change to the design, at no real cost, they would build the roads so trains could be put in easier at any time in the future. Moses said no. Cars only.
I don't think putting at grade trains on freeways is a good idea, unless they had a reliable way of warning people minutes before a train comes through
Chicago has a system like this. The main problem is the stations in the literal middle of the highway.
Crazy idea, put the stations at the overpasses. Not all of them, obviously, but you can then make covered walk ways, and hopefully have enough land to put parking decks if needed.
You know it might be cool to have an overpass specific for it. Like halfway between to existing ones. Still in the middle of a highway.
Yeah that way everyone has to walk a quarter mile in front of traffic that just got off the high speed highway with NO SHADE!!!