Good nationalism?

In recent times nationalism seems to have been synonymous with an authoritarian xenophobia but I was looking at flags and wondering if there is also a good side. In wandering central Michigan I see the American flag flown from everywhere from baseball fields to highway-side truck scales. I had previously observed that in the US I more strongly feel a pervasive sense of where I am. One example might be that, rather than having A roads and B roads and whatnot, there are US routes and state routes (named for each state: Ohio, Michigan, whatever), with the location thus being part of the name. It occurred to me that the flags might also relate to that strong sense of locality, whether as cause or effect, and that they may foster a positive sense of community in which those flags remind people that in some sense these sites are all communal assets. The baseball field and whatnot certainly seemed to be in good repair.

American freight trains

Three of the four places in which we lived in Ohio were close to a railway line that routinely carries freight. In visiting central Michigan, the house in which I stayed last summer and the apartment this year are close to each other and also to a railway line that I recently viewed from Meridian Township's excellent interurban pathway system. After my first couple of nights I was again becoming used to the sound of the locomotive's horn blowing even in the early hours of the morning. I got to wondering what fraction of people in such states live within earshot of the railways, perhaps many. It could be that my own experience is unrepresentative.

In Massachusetts the railway line near our apartment also carried passenger rail: I briefly used it to commute to Concord. However, I am more used to the long, slow freight trains. Given their dominance away from the coastal states, I also wondered if a lack of passenger rail is enabling for freight: if fast commuter rail and long freight trains get in each other's way rather.