Every single time I make the trek into Southern Illinois, I’m reminded that Amtrak really does still exist. I never give train travel much thought. Either I just want to drive it myself, or I need to fly the distance due to time, but I’ve never given thought to just paying for the ticket and the rental car for when I get there. Just a quick look of Amtrak’s routes offer up only three possible routes I’d enjoy: Coast Starlight, an L.A. to Seattle run up the Pacific coastline that would be an awesome sightseeing tour; Empire Builder, a 2,257 mile long-haul that connects Chicago with Portland, Oregon; and the 2,728 mile Sunset Limited route that links Chicago with Los Angeles via the Texas Eagle route. So, one sightseeing tour and two long-distance routes that would best be suited for vacations where I’m in no freaking hurry to deal with congestion, interstate construction, fast-food meals, rest stops, or any of that mess.
Wait a minute. When have I ever not been up for a good roadtrip? The biggest reason why I’ve never given a train half a thought is because one, they aren’t any more faster than highway travel, and two, unless you pay for the high-end ride, you’re sitting in an overrated airplane seat anyways. Why would I pay over $600 to have a place to lie down and sleep on a train when I could just catch a flight and find a hotel when I get there? The coach seat wouldn’t cost anywhere near as much but again, you’re in one seat the whole trip, much like an airplane from what I’ve seen on traveler blogs.
Here’s where my mind goes with this: one is straight to going hobo, hopping the rails and hoping that you don’t get busted along the way. The cost is about perfect, but the risk is high in both getting caught and going to jail, thanks to post-9/11 laws and regulations, and in getting injured because you did something stupid on a moving a freight train and got hurt or worse. As romantic as it would be to watch the sun setting in the west while you look out from a grain car, there’s too many problems with that scene. The other would be to look straight to Japan and the Shinkansen trains. The Japanese bullet train system has only been up and going for fifty years, but in that time span they’ve moved over ten billion riders, with no fatalities due to a train accident or a derailment. With speeds of 200 miles per hour achieved easily in a mountainous location where earthquakes, typhoons and the occasional giant radioactive lizard occur, surely a straight-line approach from the corn fields of Illinois to at least the Rocky Mountains could provide for even faster speeds and similarly safety ratings, so long as an American system utilized the designs of the Japanese version.
I’d love nothing more than to board a train in Carbondale, Illinois with a three-day bag of supplies on my back in the evening, get settled into my berth, and wake up refreshed the next morning as the last few miles of the journey are being completed. I might not have the freedom to ditch the highway and go exploring, but I could watch some knockout scenery pass by as I enjoy a beverage.
We have looked into taking some different trips with Amtrak but the price is way too high. Especially when you can fly Southwest for just a fraction of a train ticket and be there in a few hours instead of a day or two.
You need a pretty high population density to make a high speed train make money, which is why right now the only one we have in the States right now is the Acella. Here in Georgia, they’re talking about possibly building high speed lines for Atlanta to Charlotte or Atlanta to Nashville, maybe both. That might work – there’s a lot of decent size cities in the middle where you can stop to pick up and drop off passengers, and still get there faster than driving if you have a 200 mph train. And about the same time as taking a plane once you factor in airport security. That way you can use the same railroad line, and the same train, for what takes the place of a dozen air routes.
But Chicago to LA? You’d have something a lot slower than an airplane trip, with lots of stretches where nobody’s getting off or on the train and just a few routes that are stuck “paying the bill” for the whole track.
The train seats have one HUGE advantage over airplane seats – they have about an extra foot of space between them. But it’s pretty tough to sleep in coach class; you’ve got people always getting on and off the train.
I’ve taken the Amtrak from Kansas City to Chicago. There are two routes, one has very few stops, and it was a nice trip. You don’t need a car in Chicago anyway so it was the way to go. It was very affordable too. I really liked it, wish there were more good routes closer to me.
A great quote from my hero Jimmy Carter. Florida has flirted with building a high speed rail system between Orlando and Tampa since I was in college and it’s always republicans shooting it down because it might benefit the not-rich:
“How many miles of high-speed railroad do we have in this country?” Carter asked. While China has some 18,000 miles of high-speed rail, the U.S. has “wasted, I think, $3 trillion” on military spending.
https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-jimmy-carter-china-war-infrastructure-economy-trade-war-church-1396086
Re. population density, Tampa & Orlando definitely have the density to do this and it’s criminal that we haven’t. The traffic on I4 between our cities is choked. If we freed up some of that congestion I’d be able to blast in the Vette to O-town without wanting to chew on the steering wheel.
Rail is a loser. It’s always subsidized by people who don’t use it. Just look at places in the US that have light rail to see how it dosent pencil out. Portland Oregon has spent billions on the Maxx and it’s losing ridership.
You need a logical hero by the way. One that understands basic economics.
Threedoor: our light rail in Austin TX is a success and quite nice. The light rail in Dallas is also awesome. Your arguments verge on the cliche, being so timeworn.
Also “understands basic economics” – are you high? You think those trillions of $$ were better spent in Iraq and Afghanistan?
Rail won’t work in the U.S. due to the cost and expanse of travel. Not to mention the confiscation of large amounts of private land just to get it built. You would also have to bring the rail into the heart of the cities, thereby destroying more private property and homes just to get a few people off the highway. A support system of travel in the cities would be needed to handle departing passengers. Most wouldn’t do it simply because we already have a decent road system and they prefer the solitude of their car over a bunch of travelers where they can’t pick and choose who to travel with. Sounds selfish but thats the way people are.
As for the cost, look at California’s rail to nowhere, a state thst is dominated by Democrats, and if I recall correctly they had already spent 30 billion and didn’t even have the rail built yet.
Tamps – Orlando is already connected with a clogged interstate. They’d do what they do elsewhere: put the rail system in the center median.
Comparing FL to CA eh? You do realize we don’t have mountains in Florida, mountains that are very expensive for building rail projects over, right?
Re. “solitude of their car” – I’ll choose rail over my Vette every time if it means a 20 minute trip versus 2 hours. You are welcome to sit in your car and gnaw on your steering wheel in frustration sir.
I’ve been on the Euro star. It’s great! You can spend a few bucks more and get really nice seats too. I enjoyed it very much. Could be a great thing here.
HS rail is dependent on infrastructure – Acella etc in the US shares local
freight and passenger corridors .
Any HS system requires dedicated lines w/ no other traffic and no rail level crossings . Otherwise the mix of use and street level crossings prevent
consistent HS speeds
Japan built theirs as France and Germany did w/ post WWII funds
The US paid for theirs but not for any system(s) at home
Did Oakland CA to Chicago as a child w/ parents…sweet liberty, I picked a seat two cars down from them and listened to my music for hours in the evenings. Some amazing views and moments, but I also won’t forget how old that chair was feeling when we were passing the stockyards 48 hours in. A nice lightweight trip was an overnight from north of the S.F. bay area to L.A. down the coast, done alone at age 20 when it was cheap and I just felt like travelling that way, then a few dozen L.A.-to-San Diego commutes later on. Unlike in an airplane you have conversations with people, often small groups, in a train. It can be a lotta fun. I would travel that way now some, but stuff just doesn’t work that way.
I’ve been railroading for going on 17 years, and I won’t ride Amtrak. I know I should support passenger rail as it ads jobs, but It shares freight lines, it’s expensive, and it takes way to long.
The only advantage I could see is in scenic areas where you might get to sit back and enjoy the views instead of focusing on the road.
I travel to China frequently and the high speed rail there is efficient and cost effective. However our slower Amtrak trains have one solid advantage to the car junkie…. you get to see what car finds are in peoples back yards and junk yards that back to the tracks. I’ve also found unexplored sections of old roads to travel on. I wouldn’t take the train every time but you should do it at least once!
Yeah, you get to see all the major cities bowels, abandoned buildings, abandoned cars and garbage. Took Amtrak from PA to FLA. Freaking train stops every 50 miles and after 22 hours you finally get to your destination. Miles and miles of bad track that slows you down to 15 mph. Buy hey, the food was good, expensive as hell but good. Yeah everybody should do it ONCE!
Amtrak needs to be the vacation not the destination, it’s what you see and enjoy in life that counts. We’re in so much of a hurry to get to X that we can’t even enjoy how we got there.
We don’t need no stinkin high speed train. Oh, sure, the go fast but there is a plethora of reasons not to build one. First and foremost, even though private (foreign) entities and greedy politicians are trying to force them on us claiming how much they’re needed and private funds will build them, the truth is given the costs of probable ridership they are money losers and taxpayers will be forced to subsidize them like we are forced to subsidize AMTRAC. Next, the private property seized for these things along with the destruction of rural property owners peace and quality of life is just plain wrong. And why should property be taken under eminent domain by private entities for their own profit? They can’t even claim they’re railroads as the crooks are trying to do in Texas, they don’t have an existing system or infrastructure. No, high speed rail may work in Europe or Asia because they’re government subsidized and/or owned, but I don’t want any of my tax money going for another financial disaster like this.