alt Hacker NewsMan, I’d love more trains but we can’t act like the infrastructure necessary to support them, if not present, is very challenging to develop.
Even ignoring land acquisition (which is a big thing to ignore in populated areas where a train would most benefit the population), there are simple things like road crossings, other infrastructure crossing, etc.
In this case an airplane may be simply a lower friction solution.
The biggest costs and sources of delays to building high speed rail in the UK are legal challenges from people who don’t want any construction to take place anywhere near them.