Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) wants to eliminate air travel and fossil fuel-powered vehicles as part of her “Green New Deal.”
Notably, she does not make those demands publicly. However, Ocasio-Cortez includes those goals in a summary of the Green New Deal found online.
For instance, Ocasio-Cortez wants to “build out high-speed rail at a scale where air travel stops becoming necessary.” In addition, she lists a “goal to replace every combustion-engine vehicle.”
Conversely, the congresswoman provides no details for her plans to achieve these goals. Instead, she merely lists them on a document that she distributes to the media.
Will The Green New Deal Truly Eliminate Air Travel?
The Green New Deal is actually a long wish list of projects, policies, goals, and proposals rather than a plan. For example, Ocasio-Cortez’s list contains such disparate goals as eliminating all fossil fuels and guaranteeing a high-paying job for every American.
On the other hand, the Reason Foundation’s Baruch Feigenbaum believes the Green New Deal will indeed eliminate air travel. To elaborate, Feigenbaum thinks that Ocasio-Cortez’s proposal will make commercial air travel obsolete.
Ocasio-Cortez Plans To Eliminate Air Travel
In detail, Ocasio-Cortez thinks people will not need airliners if trains move at several hundred miles an hour. Specifically, she believes bullet trains like the French TGV or the Japanese Shinkansen can replace air travel.
Notwithstanding, high-speed trains require expensive grade-separated tracks to reach speeds of 200 to 300 miles per hour. In fact, they would have to replace every railroad crossing with a bridge or a tunnel in a true high-speed train system.
On the whole, high-speed trains cannot operate on most American rail lines because they consist of surface level crossings. As a result, Ocasio-Cortez wants to rebuild America’s entire railroad system and electrify it.
To explain, high-speed trains run on electricity but most American locomotives are diesel. Additionally, a high-speed rail system requires power plants and electric infrastructure. At the present time, the Northeast Corridor between Boston and Washington, D.C. is the only stretch of electrified track in North America.