Show HN: Luna Rail – Treating night trains as a spatial optimization problem

I love the concept and the renders, but I wonder... is the spatial optimization really what's holding train travel back? If you decrease passenger density in order to increase privacy and comfort, do you then have a corresponding increase in ticket prices?

In places with good train travel, it seems like they already have several cabin classes, from sardine seats (still luxurious compared to air travel) to private cabins (at several multipliers of price). Pod style rooms would presumably be cheaper than that, but still a lot more expensive than a seat?

Then in places without high speed passenger rail, like the US, this wouldn't really be able to address the major problems with train travel (slowness, lower priority than freight, low reliability, etc.).

Under what scenarios would using pods instead of cabins be more economically viable? And could these be retrofitted into existing sleeper cars, or would they have to build entirely new trains?

Clearly different markets have quite different requirements and comparisons to air travel.

For example a "night train" maxes out around 12 hours. A train from 6pm to 6am is functionally equivalent to a 8pm flight, arriving at midnight, checking into a hotel, getting some sleep etc.

How far you can go in that 12 hours (give or take) depends on the speed of the train etc. In Europe you can go to a lot of places in 12 hours. In the US not so much.

Much longer and other factors come into play. You have to balance the time cost of "getting there" to the time benefit of "being there".

But thats OK. This solution doesn't have to work everywhere. It can start where it works well and grows from there.

That is like comparing range in gas cars and EVs. Some do that but there are other major benefits.

The lengths I will go through to avoid air travel is much higher than a 1:1 ratio in comparable time. When I have to get the cattle treatment I prefer cattle cars over cattle cans.

And even with 1:1 remember that layovers are a completely different beast. If Münich was a hub between Northern an southern Europe I would be happy to spend a well rested day before continuing on. Especially in spargel season!

...but only a fool does not fear German railroads. They could really learn from the Austrians.

The reason night trains are not a thing is because there is no real network. Looking for tickets in Europe it is often once or twice a week departures on specific routes. No real good north south interconnected corridor from Scandinavia.

And as a proper geek I have even sought them out but often found them sold out.

They cost optimized themselves to obliteration.

The Snälltåget goes from Stockholm to Berlin almost daily and from Berlin you can take a daily Nightjet to Zurich. Not sure what you are missing.