@@calebholtmeyer1751 Roadways don't show a profit because they were never intended to do so. For the most part they are paid for by the users through fuel, excise, sales, and property taxes, as well as transfers from the federal and state general funds. Unlike railroads, roadways carry a mix of commercial and private users. Trucks and buses make up the bulk of the commercial users. Truckers collect the road taxes imposed on them from their shippers. Bus operators, at least intercity bus operators, collect the taxes from their riders. Most of the nation's roadway users are privately owned cars, trucks, etc. They pay for the roadways through a variety of taxes, i.e., fuel, excise, sales, property, etc., and transfers from the general fund. Also, the nation in recent decades has increase its reliance on tolls to cover the cost of some roadways.
One of the things Amtrak should have did was buy up trackage outside of the Northeast corridor. There were plenty of redundant lines running through many major cities that were abandoned in the tracks pulled up That should have been brought for passenger use in high speed service. You can buy all the new locomotives and rail cars you want, But it doesn't change anything if you're sharing tracks with slow freight trains and the tracks are in poor repair. It's like buying a luxury sports car to drive down a dirt road
With what money? Amtrak barely got enough to keep running thru the year, with occasional cash infusions to start the Acela being the biggest. Yeah they have some money available to them now but not enough to start buying rail lines.
I was stationed in Korea for a year and some change and the one thing I lived about Korea was how amazing their trains were. When I came back to the states it felt like I travelled back in time.
its not really a back in time thing. historically, the us had very comprehensive passenger service, but capatalism led to all of it being killed. if you want a good rail system you need to nationalize it.
@@jsrodman its not capitalism, its what people wanted at the time. nobody wanted to ride around with a bunch of smelly people on a train when they could drive a car. now that sentiment is changing
@@jsrodman It’s that one simple reason huh?? Has nothing to do with cronyism, zoning laws and cultural changes. It is just all of capitalism’s fault. 😂
Yeah I've wanted to take a train before but it costs more than airplane most of the time and it takes longer. If there was an affordable high speed trains like they have in Japan, they would be used more but it won't happen because of big oil :/
I took a 4 hour train ride from Prague to Vienna 2 weeks ago and it cost $38. I then took a 1 hour round trip train from Vienna to Bratislava, Slovakia that cost me $16. This is crazy.
In Europe its cheaper because of competition from low budget airlines like Ryannair, they're forced to make tickets cheaper or they'll fall behind high speed trains that usually take an hour or more but way cheaper than flying, that alone is enough to appeal to many people, in the US there's lobbying going on, so most of the routes planned out by rail experts are automatically lobbied by huge oil and airline industries to shut down those projects, therefore they jack up the prices of airline tickets because you dont have an option other than driving
@@Racko. yeah it’s such a shame how rail travel here is almost a last resort. A trip from DC to New York shouldn’t be costing $400-600. I hope this improves in the near future.
@@Racko. It's not because of competition with Ryanair. It's because the trains don't run in a for profit logic. If anything, airlines had to lower their prices due to trains
@@stefanossmitty3318 Amtrak jacks up the price in order to make profit on that route, most of the ppl taking the NEC take time over money, I understand both sides of the coin but it's a huge blunder for the average joe wanting to take rail in the NEC, the more competition that comes up the cheaper the tickets become, so yes it will improve in the future I hope
@@truedarklander Yah I was talking about airlines running their routes at a cheaper price because of trains and sometimes vice versa, they constantly undercut each other because of it, in France the TGV is more expensive to take than flying from Paris to Lyon which is almost nonexistent now, but in places like UK, you can get a Ryannair flight for the same price as a cup of coffee in some instances
I would love to see a Dallas/Houston/San Antonio high speed rail triangle. Mainly because it would be quicker and those freeways are awful to drive. You want mass transit, even if you don't use it. The more people that take a bus or train, the fewer cars on the road you have to deal with.
They had plans to connect the "Texas Triangle" (Houston − Dallas- San Antonio) with a privately financed high-speed train system. Funding for the project was to come entirely from private sources, since Texas did not allow the use of public money. The original cost was $5.6 billion, but the task of securing the necessary private funds proved difficult. Southwest Airlines, with the help of lobbyists, created legal barriers to prohibit moving forward and the entire project was eventually stopped in 1994, when the State of Texas withdrew the franchise.Several hotel chains like Days Inn, Best Western, and La Quinta Inn, as well as fast food Restaurants like McDonald's and Burger King lobbied against the plan, mainly because many of their locations were along Interstates and in several highway-dependent rural towns.
@user-bu6zg1qk3t I knew of plans for the rail line but didn't know it was all so long ago! My conservative FIL always mentioned the small towns between thought they'd get less business but I could def see that being astroturfed. Ironic of course that it was Southwest in 1994, which apparently was the last time they updated their "computer" systems. Just got stuck in San Antonio tryna come back from a visit down there... 🙃 We flew into Dallas and drove a back way through Cleburne (cute little town!) I'm sure a stop there on a highspeed rail would only help it! Air travel is so "cheap" in $ at the moment, but the cost is to the environment, the airline and airport staff, and government subsidies that could easily go towards efficient rail travel! But also running Amtrak as a for profit company is dumb, as a public service efficient and cheap rail travel is much better than bailling out private airlines so they retain their staff and then them forcing retirements anyway...
@@johnclement5903 that’s why passenger rail has never made it in the US. Conservatives are so afraid of black and brown people being able to make it to their communities that they’d rather deal with traffic or a lack of services to keep out “the others”.
@@ari-jv There's actually a new project going from Houston to Dallas, no spur for San Antonio planned, that got some of the engineers from Japan's Shinkensen rail line working on the project called Texas Central. Last I heard about it was 2020, but it had already crawled its way through a bunch of bureaucratic tape before COVID hit.
Indeed, CA, Midwest, TX and the Southern cities should also connect their major hubs with at least GOOD commuter rail and passenger rail, and put High speed ones for the busiest routes.
@@Rittersport88 Younger Americans are not as interested in getting their drivers license. The culture is slowly changing, but it can be improved by investing properly in rail.
@@rowaystarco Good, more and More North Americans are starting to get interested in Urban planning ideas and that comes with Transit, thank god it's happening, having to drive everywhere was a big advantage back then until it started to become it's own biggest enemy
Over the years (I’m only in my early 30s), I’ve compared prices of train tickets to plane tickets, hoping that traveling long distances by train would be cheaper since it takes longer, but it was always just as expensive or more expensive than air travel. I’d travel by train a lot more, and travel more in general, if trains were a lot cheaper and faster than they are now.
Look into the Rail Pass. If you're traveling multiple times in a month (like a common round trip or a multi-city vacation or work trip), then the total price of $500 for 10 rides is probably significantly cheaper than flying.
I have hated air travel since the delays for security introduced by 9/11. I much prefer train and ship. I use trains in Canada and Europe. But US rail travel is so expensive that I only use rail to go about 35 miles at close to $1 a mile.
@@deekang6244 The food IS better on trains than planes; even in first class, airline "food" doesn't even come close to what Amtrak passengers receive in coach!
Long distance Amtrak routes are basically akin to a national park experience. I greatly enjoyed my trip from Sacramento to Denver, which was only $113, and had great scenery and was so relaxing!
@@Neville60001 We should be able to have both :) build out out highspeed rail corridors in places like California, the PNW, the East Coast, Midwest, etc; all while maintaining the long distance routes. It'll take a long time to fully build out any really-interconnected HSR network anyway :)
@@Neville60001 That's the thing though! The long distance routes aren't transportation at all. They are "experiences". They're extremely expensive and a ton of people are willing to pay for them anyway. These long distance trains, while a major financial drain on Amtrak, are incredible experiences that you have to do at least once in your lifetime. They really shouldn't even be run by Amtrak. We probably need a separate national "excursion" railway that would be run more like a national park, or similar amenity. Amtrak meanwhile needs to focus on the profitable intercity services of which it actually has a ton, surprisingly!
@@TohaBgood2, henceforth why I said that long-distance *_maglev_* routes (New York to Los Angeles, Chicago to Miami, etc) need to be built. I agree with you about the long-distance routes being run by independent companies as tourist railways (somebody said that in a comment at the CityLab website sometime ago.)
You know what else doesn't make money? Highways. The value added is far beyond the operating cost. We need to stop demanding that public transportation be profitable and invest heavily in it.
You realize that alot of transit agencies as well as trucking companies rely on these highways? Don't even get me started on people commuting to work outside a city they live in.
@@hankhill6469 Trains are far more efficient and carry far more loads. Semis/delivery trucks still needed for small, isolated towns. But with more trains, you can reduce large vehicle traffic and reduce road damage while you're at it.
Highways absolutely can be profitable. And if you’re saying the value outweighs its cost you’re necessarily saying it can be profitable. Rail can’t be profitable in most cases simply because it doesn’t offer the benefits proponents claim.
I've taken the Northeast corridor multiples times as I live in DC but my parents live in NJ. The tickets actually aren't too expensive but you have to buy way ahead of time (I'd say around 2 months beforehand). Once you're within a month of a trip it starts to not be worth it.
Brightline's plan to run from LA to Vegas sounds brilliant. I used to drive that route frequently and it is a major PITA. Having the tracks run in the middle of the interstate is clever because it provides free advertising for Brightline. People will be sitting in their cars, hoping they don't die from tailgating trucks, see the train zip past and think: "I will never drive this route again! Get me on that train!"
What about when street thugs😈 start committing crimes at those station stops before passengers get off the train-???. Ever rode the (N.Y.C.) sub way-???🤔
Great plan, but no one is willing to pay for it. No investors because passenger rail loses money for every person they carry. You can already ride the bus or fly for cheaper and faster service.
I've enjoyed several long train trips on AmTrak including the coast starlight, the empire builder, the lake shore limited, and the City of New Orleans, the northeast corridor, and several others. I would travel by train more often IF there were more routes and prices were a little lower.
if it was equal to flying/slightly higher i would take a train. it just seems nicer to me. it really should be much cheaper, but good ol USA has to allow bribing its congress.
I've traveled on the Crescent, the City of New Orleans, Sunset Limited, Texas Eagle, Coast Starlight, California Zephyr, the Wolverine, the NEC, the Capitol Limited, and the Pennsylvanian. I love the train. It is my preferred mode of travel.
@@KB-ke3fi I met an old man on the train that was using it to get to the Cleveland Clinic for his heart treatment because he couldn't fly and driving in the winter wasn't feasible. This was the only transportation available to him in the middle of eastern Montana.
I took the auto train for the first time this summer and it was fantastic. I couldn't afford to spring for a sleeping car but even in coach it was a good experience. The most striking thing for me when I (infrequently) get a chance to ride on Amtrak is how *nice* all the employees are. I really hope we do find a way to increase train travel in this country. It's the best way to travel.
People are nice when you pay them well and treat them with kindness and respect. Happiness exudes Happiness 😃 but if you are underpaid, overworked, stressed out all the time from having no money, worried about your bills, then you'll be angry all the time!!
I love amtrak too. It's so comfortable compared to busses,driving,or planes. Trains by their nature are more efficient once the expensive bit is built. But it's weird how primitive the rail system is in the US compared to other countries. I think if the system were more public or more private it would work better. The demand and the tech are there but the private side has oligarchs trying to raid public funds and the public side has bloated underfunded bueracracies. It's better on the east coast but still clunky,primitive,and expensive.
@@drphosferrous Plus the auto industry has lobbied against decent rail travel in this country for a long, long, time, which has kept it primitive and expensive. We need a long-term, nationwide investment for the betterment of both life quality and the environment.
@@carolinecrane yeah the power of auto companies has screwed a lot of things up. I wish we could have some kind of firewall between money power and government. We need something like citizens united but more robust and far reaching. It would be great for the economy and environment if more people could work without having to buy a car. Seems like anything that hurts the profits of the powerful can't get done though.
We took the north east corridor Amtrack trains during a "rail" trip of the east coast, visiting DC, Philadelphia, New York and Boston. It was so convenient, and one of the best trips of my life!
@@AlaskaErik China built a train station in the middle of nowhere, people made fun of it on the internet and years later there is now a city full of people built around it. This is historically how most towns came to be, the train station came first and the town was then built around it.
I took a twenty hour ride from Baltimore to Florida in December 2022. People thought I was crazy for doing that, but I really wanted to take a solo train ride. It was a cool experience. Although I’d love to travel via train more often, it was indeed very expensive. I could only afford the one way down & ended up flying back. The one way totaled $313. The air flight back was $246.
you could have purchased a Rail Pass for $500 (or $300 on sale) and gotten 10 rides within 30 days. A single ride is staying on a single train or bus. It's a shame this isn't advertised better, because it makes round-trips like yours as cheap or cheaper than flying much of the time.
That is absolutely ridiculous that the train is more expensive than the flight😂😂😂😂 would be better if everyone could use the train for a low price and more people will use it. Job done.
You should have taken the BUS to Florida. I did that, from a futher distance north than Baltimore, and it was a memory of a lifetime. Basically a full day on the bus!
Recently I wanted to take my family (wife and 4 kids) on a weekend getaway to Savannah, GA from Atlanta, GA and thought of all my options. Plane tickets were $2600, Amtrack $1200 and by Enterprise $500. I thought that it was too expensive by train but the fact that i wouldn't have to drive really appealed to me, being a truck driver. The nail in the coffin was the fact that if i left on Friday, ı'd get to Savannah on Sunday, ruining the weekend getaway idea. This got me curious on why that would be the case. So i looked into the schedule, i would have to leave on Friday night, because there's only 1 train per day, arrive to Greensboro, NC 8 hours later, wait about 4 hours to take a train to Raleigh, NC then wait about 7 hours, and take a train overnight to Savannah, arriving Sunday at around noon. Needless to say i chose to drive and rent a car thru Turo that cost me less than $200 for the whole weekend. Also following Atlanta United, there are some games in Charlotte, NC. Thought i could take the train there, but was disappointed to find out that the trains again only run once a day and only overnight. Meaning i would have to spend the night in a train traveling for 5 hours when i could get there in 4 by car. Ticket prices weren't bad though $50 each way which is what my car would take with gas prices nowadays. But that just l3aves me to think what it would be like if we had a staight line to Savannah. Finally i have a couple of recommendations: 1.Faster trains (making the journey faster than by car) is a must. 2. More trains, giving options to riders to not think of departure times would be ideal but I'll settle for 4 times a day. 3. More lines, people want to go to different places for different reasons, think of connecting cities for business but also cities for pleasure. Thank you!
Add another point, train their employees to be more friendly than having an attitude... I haven't met a friendly Amtrak customer service agent at the train station 🚉
What is killing Amtrak is their pricing model. You can't make a trip that isn't planned well in advance unless you have so much money you wouldn't likely consider taking the train anyway.
I just checked what a one way trip from NYP to LAX booked for February 6th (two months in advance) costs $236 for coach or $1375 if you want a room. Keep in mind this is a 67 hour trip, so your $236 ticket might sound cheap, but you're in a chair for about three days straight. For comparison a one way flight from JFK to LAX on the same day (2/6/2022) costs $109 and takes 6 hours. Flying is less than half the price and takes less than one tenth the time. Frankly, this story should be how cheap it is to fly rather than how expensive it is to travel by train.
Not a relevant point. Try buying a cheap plane ticket at the last minute. Air travel is heavily subsidized and has been for decades. Whereas Amtrak and rail infrastructure has been neglected for decades and must travel on freight infrastructure in most regions.
On a train, vs a flight, you have the views, the adventure of traveling. The hassles of flight for me, for now, are too cumbersome, plus, I really can't see much adventure in it. If in a hurry, that is where I would take a flight.
@@sn5806 I just checked, and it turns out that it does include meals. I am thinking about taking a trip to Seattle from Albuquerque in either January or February.
I've used the NE Corridor to get to DC from NJ a few times and enjoyed it a lot. While it is a bit pricey, it's much less of a hassle than having to go through airport security, checking in bags, finding parking &, etc. I've also found that if you book your tickets at least a week or more in advance, you'll typically find affordable tickets. The conductors are always friendly and the food (which isn't free btw) is surprisingly good. This is also just my experience using coach!
I have taken a business class on the same route, and it wasn't quite the bang for my buck that I expected. The coach service was perfectly fine. Acela is also interesting because I find that the time savings often don't make up for the price difference unless you get really lucky with the timing.
@@omarhamza7996 I stick to coach bc my main goal is to save money. Coach is also much more comfortable then i expected so its perfect for me. And quite frankly, the price of a business class ticket on the NE corridor is just as much as an economy airplane ticket from Newark or JFK to Dulles. The Acela is also just a bit overpriced daily. So yh, I wouldn't recommend business class or acela if you're trying to save a buck.
I took the bus to NYC and the regional coach back. The train was around double the price of the bus, but still not a huge amount if booked at least two weeks in advance, and was definitely worth it. About an hour faster and a lot more comfortable.
I really hope these plans to update the fleet/tracks while expanding service around the country pans out. I’ve loved the idea of traveling the country by train for a while now, but the lack of service to certain areas and prices have handicapped me quite a bit.
I love riding trains. It's always baffled me how expensive the tickets are and yet, Amtrak never made money. I did however get a great deal for 3 people going from Portland to Seattle round trip for $130 on the Cascades. I would love to see them update the rolling stock. Most of the passenger cars date back to the 1980s and early 90s. New rolling stock is essential for Amtrak's future success.
They never made money because the ticket price are so high. A train net is a prime example of "use makes it cheaper". You have to pay for the track building and maintenance regardless if you run one train a day or one ever ten minutes. Adding a half-full train actually lowers costs per passenger. And now think what happens if the trains run full...
Maintenance and running costs for trains is very expensive and very time consuming. The only way they would have a chance to make money is having trains that hold a lot more passengers, are much faster and more efficient. They have to charge high ticket prices because they currently don’t hold enough passengers, they are slow and not efficient because they are so old. The only way people would take a train would be if it was half the price of a plane ticket and could get to the destination in a decent amount of time. If plane tickets from ny to Florida is 1000 bucks for a small family takes 4 hours nobody is gonna pay close to 1000 bucks to take a train that’s gonna take 20-30 hours. If I have 1 week for a vacation I would rather pay more for a plane ticket so I don’t waste 2 days on a plane only getting maybe 5 days on vacation. If the train tickets were 600 bucks and took 10 hour then yeah I just might take the train because it’s 400 bucks cheaper and even if ur plane is on time ur gonna waste a good 2 hours getting to the airport early, checking in ur luggage, going through security then waiting for ur luggage when you land so the 4 hour flight will take a good 7 hours out of ur day if ur lucky, when I have taken trains before I have arrived just minutes before they were going to leave and had no problems. When flying half the time there are delays, pilot is late, plane is late. So on this trip if the train is only 6 hours longer, saves 400 bucks I would do it plus it would be cool to look out windows but I would never pay close to the same price to take a slow ass train. The last time I got a price for a train down to Florida I laughed I was like a plane is almost the same price and I could drive my car down there 10 hours faster why would Anyone ever take a train.
@@peanutbutterisfu Trains are only expensive because airplanes and cars externalize so many costs. And that the train system is abysmal in teh US is nothing new. I think it's overkill to have somethign like the maglev, which does the Toyko-Osaka in just 20 minutes more than an airplane, but a 200mph train should be easy for many parts of the US. And as I said in other places, a conventional 160km/h net (the fastest that cheap 200 year old tech can do) would make even New York - Washington something you can take by train in a reasonable time, if you use express trains.
@@peanutbutterisfu Nope. In the 50s and 60s we switched from subsidizing rail to subsidizing highways and airlines. Conventional wisdom at the time was that the railroads got way too powerful. Also decentralized highways and airports were much less vulnerable from a defense standpoint. With sooooo much subsidy for highways and airports and so few subsidies for rail, there is just no way for Amtrak to compete. The government picked its favorite winners and those were cars and airplanes over trains. Most, almost all other countries made the opposite choice and you can see for yourself that we messed up and they guessed correctly.
I loved riding trains in Europe, when I could just buy a month pass for like $200, then ride wherever I wanted. Trains in US are too expensive. A 224 mile trip on a train is $100 or more per person, or I can just drive that for $35 total, and get there in half the time.
The idea for rail is to be faster than driving but cheaper than flying. Of course the infrastructure for efficient rail isn’t there yet but if the investment can build to meet those standards I think rail would blow up in the US. Being someone from Atlanta I would love to take a train from here to Charlotte, Tampa, Nashville or other close by areas. That 400 miles radius idea rings true in my eyes. Having many more Acelas giving a higher frequency of departures would be huge.
YES! I am also an Atlanta area resident who frequently travels to Florida for business, and has family living in Florida. It would be nice to have an Acela option that went to some of the major Florida cities but yet the tickets wouldn't be as expensive as the airlines. Problem for Amtrak (cost aside) is that a flight from Atlanta to Orlando only takes an hour, whereas a train trip would be longer, so for business travel it doesn't make sense. However, when going to visit family in Florida I would welcome not having the task of driving 7 hours and be able to spend that time relaxing on the train, instead of having to worry about dealing with congested holiday traffic on I-75. It would be nice to have another travel option aside from hopping on a plane all the time.
So to solve that problem, you'll buy a train ticket, take a cab to the train station, wait for the train, get on the train and wait at each stop it makes, and then take another cab to where you actually need to be? Is that actually saving you anything over driving your car? No. It's actually making the trip less convenient because then you have no car when you get there....
@@pauld.b7129 Well like the person above mentioned I have a lot of family that is spread out so I would be picked up by them upon arrival. I can understand that point for business though in shorter distances. It’s the same argument for flying though. Still, spending hours working/ relaxing on a train over driving is a big benefit.
@@pauld.b7129 Here you are yet again with a goofy comment. Your same logic could be applied to flying, or does the Airbus A320 drop you off in the driveway of your destination?
We just last week had a terrible airline meltdown, thousands of people stranded, 15,000 flights cancelled. Without good rail transportation we have No backup plan.
Aaand the same thing happened this week, with the "y2k24" Crowdfire meltdown. Planes grounded much of the day across the country. Imagine if our airports had better rail connections (or any, really)
From an European point of view, it is insane that they consider arriving at a train station in the center of a city a "premium". It should be the other way around.
@@EdoTyran Germany. It's illegal here to insult public figures, we have somehthing called "Volksverhetzung" where our government arbitrarilly decides that an opinion is too controversial, we also have a new law where you get a fine for calling "trans" people by their real name. It's pretty bad. And it's not just freedom of speech, European countries (especially Germany) are less free in many other aspects too. For example during Covid our government went into full dictator mode and we still have mask mandates in some places.
@@SincerelyFromStephen We don't. Of course it's not like in China or North Korea, but we do have pretty serious limitations to speech in Germany at least. If you compare both, the US is a lot more free when it comes to freedom of speech (and other things).
@@laurinnintendo that “controversial opinion” that you’re referring to is Holocaust denialism and incitement of violence or hatred. If you choose to live in society, you shouldn’t have the ability to freely call for violence towards groups of people without consequences
In 1990, as a student I went up the east coast via Amtrak from Florida to Boston. Long, slow but good. Other countries have taken train travel to the next level while in the US it has stagnated. It's too pricey for the service offered. For best train travel, go to Japan.
You'd be surprised, but I'd actually say Spain. Japan is great, but somehow isn't as well organized and connected to other modes of transportation as the Spanish system is. Like you get off the subway in Barcelona, in 10 minutes you're on a highspeed train to Madrid, where you get off the train and you're on the subway in 5 minutes.
@@noahking5531 That's not how it works. Nobody expects South Carolina to have the same infrastructure development as Spain. But comparing NY/Illinois/California/Texas/Florida etc to Western European countries is a fair comparison. Yet none of them have anything resembling European country levels of public transportation. The thing is. You can realistically take a train for example in downtown Paris in the morning, be in downtown London in little over two hours. Keep in mind, that train has to literally run under the sea. The distance is similar to that between LA and SF... Same applies to flights, airport connections etc across much of Europe. We're just horrible at infrastructure. We just seem systemically incapable of building or running or maintaining good infrastructure. Even within US cities that do have things like public transportation, like NYC or Chicago, they are absolute trash in quality, reliability, cost and cleanliness when compared to even some of the most notorious European public transportation systems like that of London or Paris and absolutely pale in comparison to some of the better run ones like that of Madrid or Berlin.
@@MikeBenko Still not a fair comparison, as Europe's population density is much higher compared to the US. Spain is about 3/4 the size of Texas, but has a much larger population (47 million vs. 30 million). Europe has a population that is more that twice that of the US (740 million vs. 332 million). People forget that there are large areas of the US with a very low population density. There are far fewer people in the entire state of Wyoming (579k) than there are in the city of San Francisco (815k), which is only 49 square miles. Just compare population density maps of the US and Europe and it's easy to see how much more densely populated Europe is.
@@gunshow7425 This is a long one, bare with me, please. First of all, including the Russian population in that of Europe when discussing things like high speed rail is pointless. What we need to look at is the EU (as it has a unified infrastructure) and the handful of countries that are (sometimes despite their best efforts) fully integrated into it and often co-develop their infrastructure with the EU, namely UK, Switzerland and Norway. They still double the US population, true, but the geographical distribution and geography of the continent is much less favorable than that of the US. Italy and Spain are peninsulas disconnected from the mainland by mountain chains (unlike Florida for example), the UK and Scandinavia are disconnected by rough seas which you have to tunnel under or bridge over. Austria and Switzerland are insanely mountainous. Parts of northwestern Europe are literally under the sea level on extremely swampy ground. Southeastern Europe, like Greece and Romania is again very mountainous, while northeastern Europe has low population densities, the Baltics (these are the European equivalents of our Wyomings and such) and Finland with major urban areas (like Helsinki and Warsaw) quite disconnected from places like Berlin or Vienna. Europe is a mess geographically. But looking at state v country level. A common mistake being made are doing things like bringing Wyoming into the discussion in an attempt to highlight just how low are supposed population density is. Most of the continental United States is empty. The bulk of the population lives either in between Chicago and the Northeast or down along the coast to Houston/Florida. The population west of the Rockies literally lives on a thin line along the coast running for San Diego to Seattle. From a theoretical stand point the US population distribution is absolutely ideal for interstate high speed rail. Almost all our major population centers are distributed along a north-south axis with a handful of east-west outliers which make perfect triangular connecting hubs (Chicago, DC, Columbus). But here's the thing about high speed rail. Nobody is going to take a train in Madrid to go to Rome or London or Berlin. Rail does really well on what's called an intermediate range. 100 to about 450 miles. At those distances high speed rail is typically faster than flying, much faster than driving and more convenient than both. In Europe this like London-Paris, or Madrid-Barcelona-Paris-Barcelona or on extreme Paris-Berlin. In the US we have a whole lot of these perfect connections. ESPECIALLY in the northeast, in Florida, California and TEXAS. Swinging back to the Spain v Texas comparison. If you look at a population distribution map of Spain, you'll notice a very weird population distribution. Something like 40+% of the population lives on the Madrid to Barcelona axis. The rest is fairly evenly distributed in a circle along the coasts, parts of central Spain have the population density of northern Finland (think of Montana), so when Spain builds rail it has to build outwards in every direction from Madrid. Texas on the other hand, has it's population condensed in a relatively small area between Dallas-Houston and San Antonio, Austin falls on the SA to Dallas axis, with a small outlier towards Corpus Christi. Texas would only have to build 4 main highspeed rail lines to service most of its population, in clean little triangle with an extra line from SA to CS. The distance between Dallas and San Antonio? 250 miles. Literally the perfect distance for high speed rail and Austin is on that line. It's also mostly just....flat land. No bends, no tunneling, no Baltic seas and English channels in the way, no Mississippi to bridge over.
Honestly its the best and safest way to travel for me just not the fastest obviously. You get so much room. Frequent stops. You can SEE the whole country instead of flying over it. Its such an adventure.
I keep reading about how "safe" train travel is. The trains do have accidents and people do die or get injured. Considering that a LOT more folks travel by air than train, I would wager the numbers would show air to be safer than rail.
@GilmerJohn Flying is the safest according to crashes per miles traveled. But trains are safer in terms of average number of deaths per crash. Both are very safe actually, driving is what’ll really get you.
This is the issue right here. long distance Amtrak is a tourist attraction. Not transportation. Long distance amtrak cant provide what most travelers want. Efficient and fast transit.
I traveled the Northeast Corridor via Amtrak to go to my parents' house for Christmas. My ticket cost more than a plane ticket would have, but I arrived at my parents' house! Had I taken a plane I would have spent Christmas in the airport!
Has America considered that even a rail way that is 'losing money' might actually be 'making money' for the country as a whole in terms of the economic activity a rail line enables
@@ProfessorPancakes420 yes, america does that, but for roads. US build roads to loose money. everyone else just loose money that makes them more money instead. US would rather offset that cost to the citizens than shoulder for the greater good
I used to live in D.C. as an expat. I wanted to explore a little and being European, I thought it would be convenient to take the train. So I took a traintrip to NYC Penn Station from D.C. Union Station. The tickets aren't as expensive as CNBC is stating in the video, if you plan in advance. Regarding the quality of the service. Let's say I appreciate the train services back home and I'll never complain ever again.
That's the thing though-- planning in advance for the Northeast Corridor means booking at least two months out if you want reasonably priced tickets. That totally takes away any convenience factor. Who is prepared to make any personal trip with that much foresight? I don't even plan vacations that far in advance, let alone visiting family for holidays or weekend getaways, etc.
CNBC usually over-exaggerates everything they report thats US related, the pricing claims were crazy, if you know what you're doing youll find the right price
Waroom? Omdat es Vereenigte Staaten is! DC to NY is probably one of the least scenic stretches in the US. The "Chinatown Busses" have greatly improved in comfort, and I found them very satisfactory for DC-NY. Bedankt.
@@itsnadaaaa Really? In mid October, I booked a round trip from Boston South Station to New York Penn three weeks prior to the trip. It set me back $367.
I love my CA Amtrak :) It was a god-send for visiting home very inexpensively from school. Back in like 2008-2012 the tickets were quite cheap, avg non-holiday ranged from $12-18 and barely went up pre-pandemic years ($22-30). It would've been nearly a full tank of gas to travel that distance by train, it's a great public asset, like the public bus system. Traveling by train is very relaxing and scenic :) I highly recommend taking any Amtrak train that passes near the ocean or through a highly remote area, absolutely amazing. There are some trains running in CA with GREAT viewing cars, and you can walk around on the train. Some viewing cars are 1st come 1st server but have windows that reach all the way to the ceiling :) Great for pics and vids.
That's because Amtrak California is a joint venture between Amtrak and Caltrans! Amtrak California is basically "Amtrak Premium". Newer and better equipped trains, better maintained, cleaner, cheaper, better amenities, nicer staff, etc. Amtrak California is superior in pretty much every way to regular Amtrak. California has been investing a ton of money into Amtrak California and rail transportation in general over the last 20-30 years. And it shows! We now have the most popular rail routes in the country outside of the NEC!
@@correctionguy7632 You may have failed to notice that highways are paid for by taxes on fuel, so the users of highways pay for them when they buy fuel. Rail passengers depend on people who are NOT using rails to pay their way.
I’ve taken the Amtrak St.Paul to Milwaukee route a few times. It usually costs $50-$65 for coach depending on the day. Sometimes it’s cheaper or similar to megabus but more expensive than greyhound. Much more comfortable than both. There’s an option to “bid” for a room or roomette. Last time I took it I got the bid so I paid and extra $75 and got meals are included. I really enjoyed the experience and was something I was happy to get. I definitely would bid again. If you don’t get the bid you don’t have to pay extra so why not!
I use the Amtrak Northeast Regional between New Haven and Penn Station. It’s usually quite a bit cheaper than Acela, less packed, and only slower by about 20 minutes. I personally think the NE Regional is more comfortable too, especially in the first class cabin. Seats are a lot bigger, and the suspension seems smoother. The “quiet car” is enforced well and has very few people in it - I would usually go in there to only find a couple other people, pop in some headphones, and watch a couple episodes of a tv show on my laptop. Unbelievably easy and comfortable compared to driving the Merritt..
May I ask why you take Amtrak over MetroNorth? It’s still only 1 train and the latter isn’t that much slower but it is much less expensive. (Genuine question; I admit to personally missing having that option.)
@@saraleigh5336 it just ends up being much more comfortable and quiet. Boarding is super calm, always has seats open, and Penn Station is low-stress for this route. And I love the NE Regional trains..
I've travelled throughout Poland twice prior to the Covid pandemic. Fast, efficient, affordable and great stations and connections/ timetables. They benefitted a lot from EU money when they joined the Union and they invested wisely in upgrading existing infrastructure and building new ones
@@truedarklander Yeah, "If you change the laws that control Amtrak", that's not changing which is why you need both, to improve Amtrak so they can also make money and not just from tickets, but for future improvements
@@Racko. There is no longer any law requiring Amtrak to be profitable. The Amtrak improvement Act of 1978 reads, “Section 9 amends section 301 of RPSA... to confirm the law to reality, providing that Amtrak shall be ‘operated and managed as’ a for-profit corporation. This amendment recognizes that Amtrak is not a for-profit corporations.” TLDR; since 1978, Congress has not required Amtrak to make a profit.
Last year, I paid $62 going with Amtrak from D.C. to NYC, $19 going from NYC to Philadelphia, and $19 from Philadelphia to D.C. So it is possible finding really affordable tickets along the Northeast corridor. All of the above were the Northeast Regional which is about 30 min slower than the Acela, but often at half or even just a third of the price of the Acela.
I like that they are focusing on linking major cities outside the northeast. I think that’s a good idea. I just wish there were less expensive “scenic route” trains that people could take to see the beauty of the US. This would especially attract international and local tourists.
The problem is that major cities outside teh northeast, except maybe SF, Seattle, Portland (OR) and Vancouver have low density. There are few people in walking distance of the train station in LA, Denver, etc.
This past summer my wife & I took a train from Tampa to West Palm Bech. It was just over 97 bucks for us both, round trip. The train to was over 2 hours late becuase of a car accident on the tracks. The return train was on time. Both trains were extremely comfortable. I was amazed by how wide the coach seats were. There was WiFi but it was spotty. This is my only experience on passeger rail in the US. I wish there were more and higher speed trains as they would be a great option to flying.
As a kid out west, I used to take the Santa Fe train from San Francisco to New Mexico and the Southern Pacific from San Jose to San Louis Obispo. The Santa Fe service was superb and the SP train was OK. Fast forward over 40 years and I took my first AMTRAK service from Albany NY to Canada last summer. It was a good experience. The train was a little run down and dirty like the old SP trains I used to take and a little slow because of freight traffic. But the staff was great - as were a lot of the other passengers - and it was nice to sit in a wide-comfortable seat. Does AMTRAK need updating and other improvements - Yes - but I would take the train again in a heartbeat.
I can drive to a resort location 50 miles away and stay in a 4 Star ⭐⭐⭐⭐ hotel for 3 night's for the price of an Amtrak ticket.. what a rip off. My wife and I looked at a 2 day train tickets " one way" and OMG 😳
It's great for smaller regional trips. I live in Seattle and find it well worth going to Vancouver B.C. or Portland or even Eugene rather than deal with traffic, especially traffic between Seattle to Portland and sure it may take 2 hours longer than a flight from Seattle to Portland but at least on the trains you have somewhat larger bathrooms, a food car, and much bigger leg room, even in coach than you would have on a flight, and a view to match. You also still typically have wifi or cell service on trains as well. They have their niche.
@@denelson83 Awful! You should complain to your local government to return the train! In large part we lost train service in North America because the government thought in the 50s-60s that everyone wants to always drive on a highway. Public pressure is needed to bring those much saner travel options back!
@@TohaBgood2 Unfortunately, it's been said that the E&N Railway is in too poor a condition to run passenger services on anymore, and it is too expensive to repair.
@@denelson83 It's great how no highway is ever too expensive to repair to these people! That they will always find money for! Ugh Well, maybe you all can force them somehow. I know Canadians usually find a way!
Yeah they work because we didn't have to build entirely new trains and tracks to run on it. For high speed rail in the US, it would cost tens of billions, if not trillions. And then nobody would use it anyways. Last time you rode the train, how many people were in it? My guess is not many at all.
the problem is profit... transportation, education and health should be public services, private industry is ok as an alternative but not as the only option.
There are times where privatized companies do a better job than state-funded ones. Take the JR Group of companies that deal with passenger rail service in Japan. They are all for-profit, provide exceptional service, and, yet, are the envy of the world.
@@alqaeda7040 not only are you bad at trolling, You're ignorance is really showing of the world you're not familiar with outside of a surface level grasp
Hate to point it out but... Not just Europe. Most of the developed world and even some third world countries are en route to overtake US passenger traffic.
Amtrak was the first transportation I toke alone at age 15 to visit family and I had an amazing experience. 2022 I traveled with Amtrak over 10 times to New England and every experience was wonderful. I wish the US had more train transportation as in my opinion it is more comfortable and convenient. They also have a lot of discounts for students, military and seniors!
When Switzerland is mentioned when comparing tilting mechanisms the train shown is a Japanese Shinkansen E2 series. A correct train to show would’ve been the SBB RABDe 500.
Sure, they have great trains. The U.S. could have a great national system if it was the size of Switzerland (or Japan, Korea, England, etc.) "Switzerland is nearly the size of Vermont and New Hampshire combined." Nearly the size.
@@Singlesix6I was just talking about the train itself that was shown off in the video. But still the point stands then why don’t the individual states have their own good rail systems? They used to exist but not anymore!
A majority of the tracks that Amtrak and commuter railroads operate on are owned & operated by freight. They have to pay freight companies to use the tracks. Fares included that cost. That freight can cause delays and those tracks aren't designed to go fast.
Yeah.... As opposed to building all new tracks for a service nobody uses. If Amtrak disappeared tommorow, would it actually affect anyone? I doubt it. Most people riding a train are doing it for the novelty, not out of necessity.
The 600$ pricetag may exist but its misleading. A coach one way trip from NY to DC is usually 31$ if booked ~6 weeks out and only 30 minutes longer than the acela.
@@theowainwright7406 yeah some people do so first come first serve for the prices it’s not unlimited seats that’s why it’s expensive just like airplanes there cheap if planned ahead
@@bigpapa2195 That pricing demonstration was for that particular moment the reporter was shopping prices. There are constant pricing fluctuations. There may have been a lot of open available seats on that flight but not many open available seats on that train. Furthermore, to get between city centers (where the train takes you and where most people are actually going) and the outlying airports (where the plane takes you) could range from $50-$100 1 way in the major northeast cities or elsewhere if the airport is quite aways from the city. Double that for the return trip back to the airport. The devil is in the details.
Why can't they connect Detroit to Toledo (directly)?? My gosh they're Right NEXT to each other, and YET right now, you have to take the train West all the way to Chicago First (!), then Back East to Toledo - Makes NO sense(?!?)
Alan Fisher has made many more videos about railways within the U.S. mostly, and what can be done to improve or fix the problem. The big fix he suggests is nationalization.
A """"socialist""" train network? Can you imagine if people (of different races, even) could travel together, comfortably and on an electric vehicle, without paying exorbitant "demand-based" prices? Where is the freedom in THAT?! /s
@@forddon Amtrak is mostly government owned yes, however that does not mean they nationalized the whole nations railway system, those are still mostly owned by the big 4(Who deal with freight), Amtrak is only used for travel. There is no nationalized freight company, there was one in the past but fell apart due to a whole slew of problems. Again Alan Fisher has made multiple videos about trains and railways if you're in the subject.
The government has no right and no constitutional authority to steal public property like that. I also question if nationalization would actually fix problems, or if it could do so without introducing other problems.
I use the train from DC to NYC often- as long as you book your ticket at least 6-8 weeks out, you can get tickets for $30 each way. So it’s not as expensive as the video makes it seem as long as you plan well in-advance.
@@steemlenn8797 The cost of fuel is the basically same whether the train runs empty or full. The cost of gas would be the same if you loaded 1 or 4 passengers to your car. Question is how much you gonna charge each passenger? If you want them to book early to ensure profitability, you can lower the price but have them pay ahead of time and non-refundable. For those that book last minute and presumably with no other transportation options, you can charge those the full fare. Since the train capacity (supply) is limited and inflexible, prices are used as a tool to adjust demand to fit the supply. If supply could be adjusted (by adding more or removing rail cars) that might allow for more consistent pricing, but that would add more variables to operational efficiency and costs.
@@verves2 Yes, the price of fuel is the same, that's why it's stupid to give discounts. While flexible pricing can dsitribute the load somewhat, that's a tiny amount of the total pasengers. Railroads all around the world have figured out how to not send trains out when nobody wants to ride, like 3 a.m., I am sure Amtrak can learn that too.
Acela's new trains tilting technology is actually world standard, developed in Europe and use in UK, Italy, France and Spain's high speed networks. Amtrak needs much more trains like these to thrive
They're made by the help of Bombardier and France, it definitely even tops France's own current TGV series and they wont get the new Acela type cars until the coming years themselves
The track layout and topology on the highest demand line is not ready for it. As someone who travels from Connecticut to NY for work, the Acela almost feels like a waste of money. The difference is not that big relative to regular Amtrak train.
@@tigerrx7 That's a common misconception. The NEC is an old, legacy corridor, sure. But this is a very good corridor nonetheless and it's speeds are not at all unusual for HSR lines in other places. In fact, most HSR services in Europe run on this type of track. The NEC is actually mostly 125+mph, with some sections at up to 150mph. And now Amtrak got the money to upgrade all the 125+mph sections to 160mph for the new TGV-derived Acela trains. Some slower turns around stations will still remain because they can't be removed easily, but that is entirely normal even for the faster French TGV and German ICE trains. If you want to run in city centers then you will have to share slower track with slower local trains. That tradeoff is almost always worth it for the convenience it creates for riders.
@@tigerrx7 The problem with the current Acela fleets is that they're too old and need modernization, that's where the new ones come in with 30 units just sitting waiting to to be used by next year, the Acela is more of an express train that doesnt stop past most stations the regional one does, and it's actually less profitable too, I usually take the New Haven Train line and Acelas past by and they're definitely in need of replacement
There’s always the comparison to European and Japanese service, and it’s asked why those services are do much cheaper. The answer is because they are HEAVILY subsidized by their governments. Why do their trains run on time while Amtrak trains are often late? It’s because their governments mandate that freight operations will not interfere with passenger service.
Also, in certain countries, the station and the land around it is also owned by the railway company, meaning that they can lease or develop the land to provide more lucrative income than just ticket prices.
But it requires station to be popular first. If railway company caters to premium customers, there just isn't enough passengers to justify developing land further, like building shops for passengers to buy stuff on stations.
I'd love to see a direct comparison between Amtrak and Deutsche Bahn in terms of funding, revenue, rolling stock, stations served and passenger numbers as well as distances. That would be very revealing imho.
It would be embarrassing to Americans, more than likely. We don't talk about how much taxpayer money we spend to support automobiles as the primary form of transportation here, but it's an unnecessary burden.
@@meb5205enfe in Spain is excellent. Great service, clean cars, reasonably priced and almost always on time . SBB is definitely the world standard for train service.
A bullet train from Tokyo to Kyoto is about $120, and they run every 30 minutes to an hour. But it’s been a major major government investment since the 1950s, but obviously it’s pain off. And please stop calling 150mph high speed
Yeah, but that's a sardine-can city. Where so many millions of people live within walking distance of the station and it is faster to walk than to drive. Similar rails in Spain are actually costing Madrid money, and in America's wide open spaces they are out of the question. We have airplanes for that.
@Zaydan Naufal I don't care what some people call it, I'm going by the defintion of the international railway union and as per EU directive 96/48/EC which holds 200kph on existing lines and 250kph on new, dedicated lines as the minimum speed when talking about high speed rail.
It's high speed. Idk why you think otherwise, the Standard definition of High Speed from the US and EU rail law put anything over 200km/h as high speed
Before I retired I used to take the Acela between NJ and DC frequently I loved taking the train but honestly I could fly out of Newark to Reagan National for the same price at an Acela ticket.
planning a trip to eastern OR to San Francisco and im stoked. you never hear of train travel in normal conversations but it makes sense to me and quite pleasant once youre rolling in open land. hoping for success for the American passenger train system.
I have taken the Lake Shore Limited from NYS to Chicago and back a few times and these trips are by far the best long-distance travel I've ever done. You get on the train in your city, go to sleep in their train cars with extremely comfortable seats and ample leg room (In coach, too!), and then wake up bang in the middle of downtown Chicago the next morning. I once did the math and it was actually cheaper than driving by a few dollars when factoring in gas and toll roads, plus the added convenience of not needing to find and pay for somewhere to park once I got there or dealing with Chicago traffic. We really need to invest more money into passenger rail in this country, it's so wonderful.
Have you ever travelled on Greyhound and what was your experience like? I've never been to the US but would like to visit someday, I live in the UK.. our country is so small you can cross half of England by train in about 2-3 hours!
@@paullangton-rogers2390 Yes. Europeans consistently underestimate how big the U.S. is. A friend of mine had some German friends stay with him in Manhattan for a couple of weeks, and they thought they'd take a day trip to San Francisco They had trouble believing it is a three-day drive, each way, at autobahn speeds, if you can manage not to be arrested for driving so fast. And, yes, I have traveled by Greyhound. It also takes you from city center to city center, less expensively, without the option to get up and walk around or buy food en route. They stop every few hours at a place that typically has one medium-quality option for food, which of course add to the length of the journey. Plus, of course, they can be stuck in traffic. Though, to be fair, it's not unusual for Amtrak trains to be (illegally) made to wait so freight trains can pass, which helps explain why they are so commonly very late compared with their schedule. The other complaint I've heard about intercity bus travel (not just greyhound, now) is that, since it's less expensive and less nice, it has a "lower class" of clientele, which bothers some people. Personally, I don't mind being the most highly-educated person on the bus, but some people are snobs or bigoted or racist; if you are, you'll probably find a bus much less pleasant, since you can't easily get up to avoid anyone you would rather not be around.
@@paullangton-rogers2390 I think you'll find Greyhound...interesting. Outside the Northeast Corridor, Greyhound is mostly used by poor people. That will be interesting for you to experience, as a foreigner -- but you will also come to understand why the US is a terrible country to be poor in. You'll see a lot of kindness and dignity, and also a lot of social dysfunction. Give it a try! But make sure you check the schedules before you start your trip (they won't be convenient) and be prepared for long delays.
These prices are crazy! I took a high speed train in France last week from Aix to Paris. 471 miles in 3 hours and EUR59. that is USD62.... and for a train that goes twice the speed!!!
I live in Denver and would love to take a train during the winter through the Rockies to California but it’s laughably overpriced. Flying is cheaper than a train. We’ve got it so wrong.
In 2018 I needed to take the rail from Omaha, NE to Chicago, IL and the train that was supposed to pick up the passengers from the day before still had not arrived. Amtrak needs to do better in the Midwest.
It's pathetic when a country doesn't have money for the maintenance of railway infrastructure but has billions of dollars to spend on overseas military bases.
I tried telling somebody about that and how it was wasteful, and they told me that money for the military and money for rail travel improvement was different and shouldn't be compared.
After my parents divorced as a young kid, I took the train between Detroit and Chicago (Amtrak Wolverine) countless times. Probably 15 or more times a year for almost 10 years. And never got sick if it. Love traveling by train
Which yrs??? I ride Heartland Flyer n Texas. I plan 2 visit Sequoia National Park, California 2023. It's the train adventures 4 me. I don't care about the price. I meet people from around the world. Train employees r nice&talk about their favorite hidden stops as oppose 3 airplane employees. U can't see anything from the skies.
I lived in China for a year. In 2017 I bought a round trip maglev train ticket from Shanghai to Beijing. I remember it costing about $45 usd. These trains are super smooth and travel over 200 mph for a lot of the way. I think it was about 4.5 hours each way. Almost as fast as flying if you count security and all the other hooplah, and way way cheaper. I can't believe the Acela trains cost more than a flight, how does that make any sense?
wasn't the maglev... that was a gimmick train between airport and shangers,,, and rarely operates above 70% of the speed it was said to run (supposedly 270mph). You went on a "normal" gaotie... and yes, they make the USA trains look like thomas the Wank engine. USA will never have them, they are too busy suabbling with their highly polarised politics. The Gaotie G trains go 350kph, the D trains 300. Yes easy and relatively cheap to buy tkts using a service on the net. The K services are cheaper,,, but slow as a wet week... ok for overnight if you're a midget Asian... not so good if a 2 metre aussie.
Well, those train lines are effectively run using blank checks from the central government in China and are highly unprofitable as a whole, with heavily corruption-laden management. Plus, the government didn't need to deal with absurdly stringent property rights, as they legally own it all anyway. I agree that their trains are great and the service, too, but Japan and Europe would probably be a better example to look to in terms of sustainable and feasible train systems for the US. edit: Also, $45 isn't a lot for us, but many of the regular people living there make a lot less purchasing power wise. It'd still be quite a bit cheaper than what we have here, but it's worth noting that it's not really just $45 for a lot of the normal people living and working there, and who likely didn't earn as much as you did considering you were a foreigner.
Because the Federal Government nationalized passenger rail. So places where there is high demand for it, where it would otherwise be economical, have to subsidize the vast parts of the network where it is not. Hence the high prices you see. Did you watch the video?
I interviewed at Amtrak. Got the manager of (critical tech infrastructure) position. I found out they had 4 engineers to run the entire (critical) platform. I declined the offer, as they thought this was more than adaquate.
What? My husband works in that field, (critical tech infrastructure) he is an electrical engineer, the details of his work is classified but the area he works in covers one fourth of the railroads in Sweden and they are 48 guys in his office. So, there are almost 50 guys in every office = 192 in total and they work 24/7. As far as I know, the US is a liiiiiiitle bit larger than Sweden.... Unbelievable.
Wow!!! Can u elaborate some more PLZ??? R u an Amtrak rider??? My grandparents&I r México 🇲🇽 Nationals&they would ride from Fort Worth, Tx to California. The adventures of riding trains as a child r priceless. I have plans 2 visit Sequoia National Park, California 2023. I plan 2 ride Amtrak as a way of honouring their memories. I don't care about the price of the train fare.
Getting from where to the airport or train station? Are you assuming the passenger is in the city to begin with or out in the suburbs? The price dynamic changes with the origin. In NYC a resident needs only to take a bus to LGA or a train to JFK, or the subway to Penn station. Very cheap. A Suburb resident has to drive into the city or take the train in to travel outside the area, or attempt to use one of the suburban airports with limited service. In DC the situation is a little different in that DCA and Union station are easy to access in the city but longer range travel is biased in favor of the suburban population because IAD is out in the boonies. Every city is going to be different.
@@starventure most time it is easier to get to the train station without a car, otherwise you need parking. Most times the airports are othside the main metroplitain area. Every city is different like you mentioned.
Yet no one bemoans the hundreds of billions the interstates are in the hole. Ticket sales (ie. tolls) are definitely not keeping up with the costs. Yet we're perfectly comfortable dumping tax money into them, but we expect rail to be 100% passenger funded or we're not doing it.
New trainsets are coming to Acela. Separately, the old cars that make up the single-level coach and business sections (like those also seen on the NEC) are also going to be swapped out in the next couple of years.
I just got done training from SF to South Bend, IN via Chicago. If you have time, it is well worth it. In as much as it was safe, the trains are getting old and definitively need replacement upgrades. Also, internet access is erratic. Amtrak should partner with SpaceX Starlink for satellite broadband internet service. They should keep the long distance routes like the Zephyr. For the most part, the employees of Amtrak have been very professional and caring.
I think the biggest factor is the massive volume some of these countries have. On Shinkansen you rarely look at a timetable because the frequency of service is so high. You just show up, buy a ticket, and go. It's like taking a giant subway.
@@Geotpf taxes on the cars ain't the problem in Japan. It's the tolls to use the highway and parking for inner cities. Tokyo to Osaka about the same distance from NY to DC. you easily pay $200 in highway tolls + 2 tanks of gas and parking. Much easier to take the train or bus for a third of the price.
@@ass4sale2 It was about $50 in tolls in 2011 when I traveled between Washington and NYC, most of which can be bypassed by driving around Baltimore and Philadelphia instead of the direct route. However the cost of gasoline was something like $0.80 a liter. It's about $1.00 now.
People love trains and train travel...just because. I don't think there's any doubt that ridership would greatly increase with many more routes, more frequent trains, and above all low prices.
The car and plane industry would never let train tickets be affordable cause they know it would negatively impact them. Those lobbyists are pretty powerful. Plus the fact that Amtrak is slow, inefficient and severely underfunded.
Exactly JNY. Airline lobby plus Automobile Dealership lobby plus politicians, equals poor train service. Remember, Amtrak train service is controlled by United States government appointees.
And then Chicago to Detroit... and then over to Windsor, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Quebec City. Obviously Canadia's railways would have to get onboard with this too.
There's Chicago to Pittsburgh to Philly and NYC, but the Chicago to Pittsburgh route is only about 2 or 3 times a week. The Pittsburgh to Harrisburg part is only once a day, whereas the Keystone and Pennsylvanian are state supported routes and overlap with the Northeast Corridor. (My grandparents lived in Stahlstown and later Ligonier PA right near the Latrobe pa train station and I went to college in Elizabethtown PA which was on the Harrisburg to Philly to NYC route. (My parents lived in suburban Philadelphia at the time.)
It takes bery high population density to make mass transit profitable, and the US is not that densely populated. That's a big reason why it makes money in Japan and Europe.
Even if they were owned by American freight railroads, I wouldn't say "we" own them, as in the general public. That only happens when a state buys a rail line from those companies, like Virginia or New York has. I think Illinois should absolutely buy the line that the Lincoln Service currently runs on between Chicago and St. Louis since that is a critical link in the future Midwest high speed rail network.
You might want to do a totally different story on how cookies are used to raise prices when searching for transit tickets especially airline. Once you see a good price if you don’t take it right then you will never see it again even hitting the browser back button the software knows what you are looking for and raises the price because it knows the demand is now there you created the demand by the search
If rail in the USA were as omnipresent as it is in the UK I would certainly use it. My kids live near New Orleans, SouthCentral Colorado and San Diego. A circle route that could get me within 200 miles of these would be something I would do a couple of times a year. It would be even better if I could take a smallish motorcycle.z I’ve ridden trains in Japan, the Uk and France. There are plenty of passengers and seats for everyone with way more space than airplanes.
The biggest issue is that even if you could take a train from one American city to another, besides a very select few, most of our cities are built for cars. So once you get there you’ll most likely have to Uber at some point.
The same is true even in Japan. Only the larger cities such as Tokyo, Osaka, etc, have effective local train service. Once you get into smaller cities, you're screwed without using a car service of some kind.
Had this issue when I was living in Central California. The town the station was in just had one of those tiny puttering local buses that only go to the places seniors visit... and we lived 45 miles out of the city. It's a terrible cycle because everyone is poor out there -- not needing a car as much would save them a ton on maintenance and making it easier to go further would make for more opportunity... but because everyone is poor the city never has enough money to afford to put better services together.
@@oldtwinsna8347 And Japan is tiny compared to the U.S. "...making Japan 3.84% the size of the United States. However, only about 33% of Japan's land is habitable due to its mountainous geography and dense forests.""
Heres the thing, you dont need to make it “profitable”, you just need to serve the public. Its the one thing the CEO doesnt understand -lower ticket costs -double train frequency -add more services -electrify state/private corridors -replace and purchase more fleet to increase frequency Thats how you make money
Amtrak's CEO iknows all this but he cannot change the law. The law requiere s Amtrak to be profotable and when they are not profitable they have to rely on congress to cover their losses. Tomdo what you, rightfully, ask for congress needs to change the law and allocate funds to do what you're asking for, just like they do with highways and aviation but they won't.
I agree. As long as Amtrak isn't a serious player, people will only look at travel by train when there are no other options. If it's going to take government investment, then we need to stop nickel and diming the projects, and get it done. The way I see it, airlines aren't so profitable now, so what do we have to lose? And if it's the rails that are keeping the trains from going high speed, and causing delays for freight trains, then maybe we need more rails.
My 6 year old and I took the Texas Eagle to Texas from Milwaukee before Thanksgiving. It was more expensive than 2 coach tickets to east Texas but I wanted to avoid the airlines on a major holiday, lost luggage, and see if it could be fun. It was a nice sleeper car BUT impossible to sleep. Like being in constant turbulence. Meals were good. 6 year old loved the top bunk. Amtrak screwed us over though and a week prior called to say that our return trip had to be cancelled because they were pulling the sleeper car out on the return, had no replacement planned and no coach seats. When I asked how we were supposed to get home, they offered either return on December 1st (Hello! I work!) or nothing. Not even possible to do a longer reroute. So Amtrak decides to service a sleeper care on the BUSIEST weekend of the year. Luckily we got American Airlines to go home, who delayed my bag by a day but at least I got it back. So, that was my one and only Amtrak trip.
USA is doing everything to make the people of Europe live badly! So that the European economy will fall! USA does this in order to rule the people of Europe and send them to war with Russia, so that the people of Europe will fight and die in the war with Russia"""!""! USA in this war will sit across the ocean and sell weapons to Europe and laugh at the Europeans! USA needs a war between Europe and Russia in order to survive itself, as the Anglo-Saxons have always done!
My hubby worked in the railway business many years ago, and the word "service" is code for "broken down, needs to be fixed". But they weren't allowed to say that. So, service it is..... 😡
Asher: I would bet that every person who has ever taken the train in the US has horror story. Mine was SF to Reno (in winter) and back. We took coach seats, gambled all night and planed to take a train back.... hoping to sleep in our seats. NOPE. The train was delayed around Chicago of course. Three hours later than planned we were on the train going home....We had a purser/conductor(?) pointing out stuff THE WHOLE WAY BACK - OVER THE LOUD SPEAKER. Sandwiches we got were awful. And we ( surprise!) didn't win in Reno.
plane ticket prices are not the most accurate, gotta take into commute time to airport, parking or uber, commute from airport to destination city. Amtrak picks you up and drops you off within walking distance of downtowns.
The so-called train and rail system in this country is like the stone age compared to the modern high-speed trains in countries like Japan and especially China.
That's what happens when you keep taking money from oil and airline companies that are lobbying you to prevent rail from improving, rail in the US sucks by design, it's not an accident, no wonder why private companies take matter into their own hands and build actually good rail services like Brightline
Trains should be treated as a public infrastructure instead of a for-profit business. It'll need a lot of spending upfront before it becomes economically viable. But once you've crossed that threshold it's incredibly convenient and cheap. For example: right now train ticket prices are too high because there aren't that many trains. Trains are scarce because people traveling by train are scarce. Train travelers are scarce because train ticket prices are too high.
In 2001 AMTRAK opened a new service from Brunswick, Maine to North Station in Boston. It was hugely popular and was sold out on most days. Much more demand than seats. AMTRAK’s answer to this problem logically would be to add cars to the train or add more trains to the route to accommodate the demand. AMTRAK did none of those. They just raised the price of a ticket and reduced demand.
All trains outside the Northeast Corridor must be supported by state-funds. The States of Maine and New Hampshire fund those trains. Amtrak does not have any say in frequency, food service, consists (cars), etc. All controlled by the states who support the service. :)
My wife and I rode the train from Roseville Ca to Reno NV. It was a fun trip. But it cost us $500 round trip. To drive would have taken us 1.5 hours each way and one tank of gasoline at $75. The train took 4 hours each way. We rode the train as a novelty. Probably wont do it again. It is not economical nor expedient. However it was fun and relaxing.
That was way too much for the fun of riding on the train. The best trip of my life was amtraking from LA to Minneapolis on the Empire Builder route. It was like 20 years ago but it was less than 300 for a 3 day and 2 night journey of a lifetime. To be honest I spent the whole trip in the observation car with the huge windows and the couches and the easy chairs and I felt like a little kid looking at the picture of America passing outside of my window in a far more comfortable seat than everyone else. My eyes were just so glued to the scenery that you could never see from the hwy and it was amazing. As a bonus after it was dark and nothing to see outside there was a big TV on each end of the car that showed a couple of movies. But it got even better as after the 2nd movie was over the car was empty almost as I discovered that people were crashing on the easy chairs and even the couches and the conductor didn't have a problem with it. The things that I saw were amazing and unexpected, but I'll remember it as long as I live. I Challenge you and your wife to take this train from SF to Chicago maybe and then fly home, I'll never forget sitting in the observation car as the sun was rising over Mt Shasta in 10 shades of orange and pink as the train was moving slowly through the s curves following the path of the river. It was just incredibly intense and everyone else was just trying to sleep in the regular seats and didn't have a clue about the once in a lifetime experience that I was looking at from my comfortable chair. As I walked through the cars to get a cup of coffee it was amazing to see how the cars were visibly snaking and curving as they wiggled through the path of the river at a slower speed. Everyone else was sleeping mostly and looked so uncomfortable and it seemed like I had found the magical place in the observation car. Anywho, I came prepared for the journey with plenty of snacks and perhaps even a little something to sip on. I hope that you will try the Empire Builder route and just do what I did and have the time of your lives. Best wishes for the best scenery ever...
That's a rip off even though you had a good time. Read what I wrote below and I hope that you are adventurous enough to ride on the Empire like I did sleeping on a couch after the movies and feeling like I wasn't cheating the system b/c the conductor was OK with it. I just accidently found the right place to be after the observation car was empty and it was amazing and a lot more comfortable than the people that were just trying to sleep in those regular seats as they totally missed the sun rising apon the snow covered Mt Shasta...
I like amtrak, but one of my concerns are the delays. My friend had to deal with delays of over eight hours. I know things happen once in a while, but it can throw a lot of people off schedule
I used to take Amtrak to Los Angeles to catch overseas flights. Too many times the train was delayed too much or cancelled. Unreliable causing me to buy last minute domestic air tickets to make my international connection.
I lucked out taking a round trip on The City of New Orleans last month. Got into Chicago a half hour early, and returned to New Orleans almost an hour early. Depends on freight traffic, plus accidents when vehicles think they can outrun trains.
I wish the DOJ would actually start enforcing Amtrak's priority over freight trains, or we should just nationalize the railroads already like they have in most other developed countries. Would make mainline electification a lot easier too.
They BARELY touched the main reasons why this is: no control of rail outside the NEC and Keystone Corridor and lack of service and hangups due to freight companies. Electrification of the rail and Nationalization is the path to Amtrak's success.
Agreed. I also wish they had harped more on the fact that the whole reason Amtrak has subpar infrastructure is because the federal government has been underfunding Amtrak and rail in general for decades while pouring billions into subsidies for highways and airports.
@@johnyoung5392 Lol, way more of your taxes have gone to constructing massive highways that have to be repaved every 10-15 years. Highway maintenance and construction costs a lot more than rail infrastructure in the long term.
@@jacorp7476 I'm ok with that. Roads have a car over them over 90 percent of their lifetime use whereas a rail would be lucky to have a train over it 1 percent of the time. That's how the market evaluates utility.
This is why Amtrak and all of the tracks in the United States should be nationalized. Honestly I think it was super stupid to try to make Amtrak try to profit. Public transportation is not supposed to profit. It’s supposed to serve the people
Why not have a limited consortium of states that jointly owned the tracks between New York and Washington DC? Don’t involve the rest of the country as they are not going to be served, just have a joint authority between those states to own and run it.
@@starventure They’re already involved in a certain way because it’s somewhat government owned, but still a for-profit company. Under this way they would be better involved
The cost is exactly why people fly and don't take the train. You are also adding the sunk cost of time. Considering as well that PTO is not mandatory in the USA, Americans do not usually have all that much time to take a train either. The views are nice, it's an interesting experience but I have only taken a long distance train in the USA once. It was actually cheaper back then.
Time is only an issue for really long distance travel. For a couple hundred miles, you are usually faster door to door by train, if you include travel to and from airports.
@Tom R I guess if you're going to neighboring cities, like 200 or 300 miles, is that what most people use them for? But I usually just drive short distances like that. More typically, I fly to New York from Missouri. It's like a 2.5 hour flight, perhaps 4-5 hours all in. Train is like 16 hours. Flying to the west coast is way worse. 4 hour flight to Portland, 6 hours all in. Train takes 54 hours.
@@SomePotato " For a couple hundred miles, you are usually faster door to door by train" I agree with 200 mile limit....usually people think it's 400 miles lmao....HSR only goes 200 mph so 200 mile radius. Of course with Amtrak the typical average speed is about 35 which limits the radius to 35 miles. But usually where you're going is farther than 200 miles. For example I plan on going to WonderCon in Anaheim in March, and I live in San Jose, that's 365 miles. We have an HSR project here in California that is a complete failure, and if they ever completed the system, which they can't (long story), it would take three hours to get to Anaheim. The flight is about one hour. Plane wins.
@@neutrino78x The train will pick you up in the city and drop you off in the city. On a 3h train trip, the train wins. Driving to and from the airport, plus security, will easily eat that time.
@@SomePotato "The train will pick you up in the city and drop you off in the city." Argh why do you people cut and paste these arguments? This is true to a greater extent in Europe, or maybe in the NEC. Outside of the NEC, generally speaking the airport is closer to the city itself. For example, in San Francisco, BART gets you to SFO in 28 minutes. You can drive in 20. Security is a five minute thing if you have "CLEAR" and 20 if you don't. None of this makes up for the train taking two hours longer. Now, if the train were under 2 hours, and the plane is one hour, then you have more of an argument. But generally speaking, we're not faced with that in North America and Australia. We have lots of transit here in the Bay Area. It's how I get around; I don't know how to drive. I live in San Jose aka Silicon Valley. If I want to go to SF from SJ, I take Caltrain. If I want to go all the way down to Los Angeles, I take Southwest Airlines. In San Jose, the airport and the train station (the one where HSR would originate, same one where Caltrain stops) are a ten minute drive from each other, 20 minutes on public transit. We have a height limitation on buildings downtown because the airport is so close. Just face the truth: the same solution isn't going to work everywhere in the world.
I’m just old enough to remember rail trips as a kid that were pre-Amtrak. It wasn’t difficult to take a train to most any second and third tier city in the country due to freight railroads offering service to communities along its lines. If Amtrak can dig a little deeper, and put more of those types of communities on its map, its long-distance trains would benefit immediately.
Fantasy world. I rode a pre-Amtrak passenger line. No A/C, open windows only. The snack bar was an ice bucket with candy in it. The seats were padded with straw, many of which were torn. I looked out the window and I could see cars driving faster than us down a 2 lane road. Same route 15 years later, bucket seats with A/C, snack cars, but same wobbly track. Same route today, less wobbly track and way more expensive. So expensive it's not worth the time.
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Maybe we shouldn’t classify a public service as a for profit company, it’s just crazy
For real! Nobody expects the interstates to make a profit. Why Amtrak?
Exactly
Public transport should be called infrastructure like the roads
@@calebholtmeyer1751 Roadways don't show a profit because they were never intended to do so. For the most part they are paid for by the users through fuel, excise, sales, and property taxes, as well as transfers from the federal and state general funds.
Unlike railroads, roadways carry a mix of commercial and private users. Trucks and buses make up the bulk of the commercial users. Truckers collect the road taxes imposed on them from their shippers. Bus operators, at least intercity bus operators, collect the taxes from their riders.
Most of the nation's roadway users are privately owned cars, trucks, etc. They pay for the roadways through a variety of taxes, i.e., fuel, excise, sales, property, etc., and transfers from the general fund. Also, the nation in recent decades has increase its reliance on tolls to cover the cost of some roadways.
Unfortunately a nationalized rail system is considered to be too socialist for most Americans
One of the things Amtrak should have did was buy up trackage outside of the Northeast corridor. There were plenty of redundant lines running through many major cities that were abandoned in the tracks pulled up That should have been brought for passenger use in high speed service.
You can buy all the new locomotives and rail cars you want, But it doesn't change anything if you're sharing tracks with slow freight trains and the tracks are in poor repair. It's like buying a luxury sports car to drive down a dirt road
With what money? Amtrak barely got enough to keep running thru the year, with occasional cash infusions to start the Acela being the biggest. Yeah they have some money available to them now but not enough to start buying rail lines.
My guy you know that costs money right? Like A LOT of money?
Oy, the NE corridor is the only track Amtrak actually owns.
Not true. Amtrak owns a line in MI also.
should have done*
I was stationed in Korea for a year and some change and the one thing I lived about Korea was how amazing their trains were. When I came back to the states it felt like I travelled back in time.
its not really a back in time thing. historically, the us had very comprehensive passenger service, but capatalism led to all of it being killed. if you want a good rail system you need to nationalize it.
@@jsrodman its not capitalism, its what people wanted at the time. nobody wanted to ride around with a bunch of smelly people on a train when they could drive a car. now that sentiment is changing
@@jsrodman It's crazy to blame capitalism in a comparison with South Korea which is objectively one of the most capitalist countries in the world
@@jarumboy1 Hatred of capitalism is a religion. Marx hated religion, but he basically created his own.
@@jsrodman It’s that one simple reason huh?? Has nothing to do with cronyism, zoning laws and cultural changes. It is just all of capitalism’s fault. 😂
I would love to travel by train but the fact the price is usually more than flights just doesn't make sense.
Yeah I've wanted to take a train before but it costs more than airplane most of the time and it takes longer. If there was an affordable high speed trains like they have in Japan, they would be used more but it won't happen because of big oil :/
@@Anna-ny7ks because of big oil? you do know those train also run on oil right?
I took a 4 hour train ride from Prague to Vienna 2 weeks ago and it cost $38. I then took a 1 hour round trip train from Vienna to Bratislava, Slovakia that cost me $16. This is crazy.
In Europe its cheaper because of competition from low budget airlines like Ryannair, they're forced to make tickets cheaper or they'll fall behind high speed trains that usually take an hour or more but way cheaper than flying, that alone is enough to appeal to many people, in the US there's lobbying going on, so most of the routes planned out by rail experts are automatically lobbied by huge oil and airline industries to shut down those projects, therefore they jack up the prices of airline tickets because you dont have an option other than driving
@@Racko. yeah it’s such a shame how rail travel here is almost a last resort. A trip from DC to New York shouldn’t be costing $400-600. I hope this improves in the near future.
@@Racko. It's not because of competition with Ryanair. It's because the trains don't run in a for profit logic. If anything, airlines had to lower their prices due to trains
@@stefanossmitty3318 Amtrak jacks up the price in order to make profit on that route, most of the ppl taking the NEC take time over money, I understand both sides of the coin but it's a huge blunder for the average joe wanting to take rail in the NEC, the more competition that comes up the cheaper the tickets become, so yes it will improve in the future I hope
@@truedarklander Yah I was talking about airlines running their routes at a cheaper price because of trains and sometimes vice versa, they constantly undercut each other because of it, in France the TGV is more expensive to take than flying from Paris to Lyon which is almost nonexistent now, but in places like UK, you can get a Ryannair flight for the same price as a cup of coffee in some instances
I would love to see a Dallas/Houston/San Antonio high speed rail triangle. Mainly because it would be quicker and those freeways are awful to drive. You want mass transit, even if you don't use it. The more people that take a bus or train, the fewer cars on the road you have to deal with.
They had plans to connect the "Texas Triangle" (Houston − Dallas- San Antonio) with a privately financed high-speed train system. Funding for the project was to come entirely from private sources, since Texas did not allow the use of public money. The original cost was $5.6 billion, but the task of securing the necessary private funds proved difficult. Southwest Airlines, with the help of lobbyists, created legal barriers to prohibit moving forward and the entire project was eventually stopped in 1994, when the State of Texas withdrew the franchise.Several hotel chains like Days Inn, Best Western, and La Quinta Inn, as well as fast food Restaurants like McDonald's and Burger King lobbied against the plan, mainly because many of their locations were along Interstates and in several highway-dependent rural towns.
Dont forget a spur line down to El Paso, so the hordes of migrants have a direct route to the heartland
@user-bu6zg1qk3t I knew of plans for the rail line but didn't know it was all so long ago! My conservative FIL always mentioned the small towns between thought they'd get less business but I could def see that being astroturfed.
Ironic of course that it was Southwest in 1994, which apparently was the last time they updated their "computer" systems. Just got stuck in San Antonio tryna come back from a visit down there... 🙃 We flew into Dallas and drove a back way through Cleburne (cute little town!) I'm sure a stop there on a highspeed rail would only help it!
Air travel is so "cheap" in $ at the moment, but the cost is to the environment, the airline and airport staff, and government subsidies that could easily go towards efficient rail travel! But also running Amtrak as a for profit company is dumb, as a public service efficient and cheap rail travel is much better than bailling out private airlines so they retain their staff and then them forcing retirements anyway...
@@johnclement5903 that’s why passenger rail has never made it in the US. Conservatives are so afraid of black and brown people being able to make it to their communities that they’d rather deal with traffic or a lack of services to keep out “the others”.
@@ari-jv There's actually a new project going from Houston to Dallas, no spur for San Antonio planned, that got some of the engineers from Japan's Shinkensen rail line working on the project called Texas Central. Last I heard about it was 2020, but it had already crawled its way through a bunch of bureaucratic tape before COVID hit.
We need to catch up to the rest of the world, and make real high speed rail connecting major cities around the country a priority!
Indeed, CA, Midwest, TX and the Southern cities should also connect their major hubs with at least GOOD commuter rail and passenger rail, and put High speed ones for the busiest routes.
We have the biggest railroad network in the world but the majority is used by freight. Unfortunately America is too car-centric
@@Rittersport88 Younger Americans are not as interested in getting their drivers license. The culture is slowly changing, but it can be improved by investing properly in rail.
@@Rittersport88 hard to compete with "free" roads and subsidized gasoline
@@rowaystarco Good, more and More North Americans are starting to get interested in Urban planning ideas and that comes with Transit, thank god it's happening, having to drive everywhere was a big advantage back then until it started to become it's own biggest enemy
Over the years (I’m only in my early 30s), I’ve compared prices of train tickets to plane tickets, hoping that traveling long distances by train would be cheaper since it takes longer, but it was always just as expensive or more expensive than air travel. I’d travel by train a lot more, and travel more in general, if trains were a lot cheaper and faster than they are now.
Look into the Rail Pass. If you're traveling multiple times in a month (like a common round trip or a multi-city vacation or work trip), then the total price of $500 for 10 rides is probably significantly cheaper than flying.
I sometimes too check the prices and they are way more.
Or if the food were better.
I have hated air travel since the delays for security introduced by 9/11. I much prefer train and ship. I use trains in Canada and Europe. But US rail travel is so expensive that I only use rail to go about 35 miles at close to $1 a mile.
@@deekang6244 The food IS better on trains than planes; even in first class, airline "food" doesn't even come close to what Amtrak passengers receive in coach!
Long distance Amtrak routes are basically akin to a national park experience. I greatly enjoyed my trip from Sacramento to Denver, which was only $113, and had great scenery and was so relaxing!
But people like you are in the minority-everybody else commenting here wants really fast trains (I'm not looking down on your experience, however.)
@@Neville60001 We should be able to have both :) build out out highspeed rail corridors in places like California, the PNW, the East Coast, Midwest, etc; all while maintaining the long distance routes. It'll take a long time to fully build out any really-interconnected HSR network anyway :)
@@Neville60001 That's the thing though! The long distance routes aren't transportation at all. They are "experiences". They're extremely expensive and a ton of people are willing to pay for them anyway. These long distance trains, while a major financial drain on Amtrak, are incredible experiences that you have to do at least once in your lifetime.
They really shouldn't even be run by Amtrak. We probably need a separate national "excursion" railway that would be run more like a national park, or similar amenity. Amtrak meanwhile needs to focus on the profitable intercity services of which it actually has a ton, surprisingly!
@@Neville60001We want what European and Asian countries have.
@@TohaBgood2, henceforth why I said that long-distance *_maglev_* routes (New York to Los Angeles, Chicago to Miami, etc) need to be built. I agree with you about the long-distance routes being run by independent companies as tourist railways (somebody said that in a comment at the CityLab website sometime ago.)
You know what else doesn't make money? Highways. The value added is far beyond the operating cost. We need to stop demanding that public transportation be profitable and invest heavily in it.
You realize that alot of transit agencies as well as trucking companies rely on these highways? Don't even get me started on people commuting to work outside a city they live in.
@@hankhill6469 Trains are far more efficient and carry far more loads. Semis/delivery trucks still needed for small, isolated towns. But with more trains, you can reduce large vehicle traffic and reduce road damage while you're at it.
Highways aren't supposed to make money. They are infrastructure, a public provision.
Highways absolutely can be profitable. And if you’re saying the value outweighs its cost you’re necessarily saying it can be profitable. Rail can’t be profitable in most cases simply because it doesn’t offer the benefits proponents claim.
@@javaman2883 Now you're getting it-- so should be the railroads too.
I've taken the Northeast corridor multiples times as I live in DC but my parents live in NJ. The tickets actually aren't too expensive but you have to buy way ahead of time (I'd say around 2 months beforehand). Once you're within a month of a trip it starts to not be worth it.
Sometimes they charge up to $200 just for a broken seat that barely reclines
It's too inconvenient
Unfortunately so. Also, the same tickets get more expensive every time I view them on my computer. Same tricks as with the airlines.
Sometimes gotta be earlier for holidays like 3-6 months ahead
@@SkyGravity137 I understand that some top Amtrak managers came from the airlines. They brought their "best" practices.
Brightline's plan to run from LA to Vegas sounds brilliant. I used to drive that route frequently and it is a major PITA. Having the tracks run in the middle of the interstate is clever because it provides free advertising for Brightline. People will be sitting in their cars, hoping they don't die from tailgating trucks, see the train zip past and think: "I will never drive this route again! Get me on that train!"
There was a lot of plans but it keeps getting shut down
What about when street thugs😈 start committing crimes at those station stops before passengers get off the train-???. Ever rode the (N.Y.C.) sub way-???🤔
The thing is how you will get from the station to your home or work
Great plan, but no one is willing to pay for it. No investors because passenger rail loses money for every person they carry. You can already ride the bus or fly for cheaper and faster service.
It goes from nowhere california to almost las vegas.
I've enjoyed several long train trips on AmTrak including the coast starlight, the empire builder, the lake shore limited, and the City of New Orleans, the northeast corridor, and several others. I would travel by train more often IF there were more routes and prices were a little lower.
if it was equal to flying/slightly higher i would take a train. it just seems nicer to me. it really should be much cheaper, but good ol USA has to allow bribing its congress.
Enjoins corridor and surferliner are all enjoyable because of the sighting and countryside/landscape indeed
I've traveled on the Crescent, the City of New Orleans, Sunset Limited, Texas Eagle, Coast Starlight, California Zephyr, the Wolverine, the NEC, the Capitol Limited, and the Pennsylvanian. I love the train. It is my preferred mode of travel.
They're only good for vacations...not anything else.
@@KB-ke3fi I met an old man on the train that was using it to get to the Cleveland Clinic for his heart treatment because he couldn't fly and driving in the winter wasn't feasible. This was the only transportation available to him in the middle of eastern Montana.
I took the auto train for the first time this summer and it was fantastic. I couldn't afford to spring for a sleeping car but even in coach it was a good experience. The most striking thing for me when I (infrequently) get a chance to ride on Amtrak is how *nice* all the employees are. I really hope we do find a way to increase train travel in this country. It's the best way to travel.
People are nice when you pay them well and treat them with kindness and respect. Happiness exudes Happiness 😃 but if you are underpaid, overworked, stressed out all the time from having no money, worried about your bills, then you'll be angry all the time!!
I love amtrak too. It's so comfortable compared to busses,driving,or planes. Trains by their nature are more efficient once the expensive bit is built.
But it's weird how primitive the rail system is in the US compared to other countries. I think if the system were more public or more private it would work better. The demand and the tech are there but the private side has oligarchs trying to raid public funds and the public side has bloated underfunded bueracracies. It's better on the east coast but still clunky,primitive,and expensive.
@@drphosferrous Plus the auto industry has lobbied against decent rail travel in this country for a long, long, time, which has kept it primitive and expensive. We need a long-term, nationwide investment for the betterment of both life quality and the environment.
@@carolinecrane yeah the power of auto companies has screwed a lot of things up. I wish we could have some kind of firewall between money power and government. We need something like citizens united but more robust and far reaching. It would be great for the economy and environment if more people could work without having to buy a car. Seems like anything that hurts the profits of the powerful can't get done though.
I’ve heard nothing but nice reviews for the Auto Train and it’s said to be one of Amtrak’s most popular routes outside the Northeast Corridor.
We took the north east corridor Amtrack trains during a "rail" trip of the east coast, visiting DC, Philadelphia, New York and Boston. It was so convenient, and one of the best trips of my life!
Make a rail trip in Europe its way better and cheaper.
@@Ghfvhvfg You can do a rail trip of the east coast of the United States in Europe??? Color me surprised!
It’s Amtrak
The northeast corridor has the population density. The rest of the country doesn't.
@@AlaskaErik China built a train station in the middle of nowhere, people made fun of it on the internet and years later there is now a city full of people built around it. This is historically how most towns came to be, the train station came first and the town was then built around it.
I took a twenty hour ride from Baltimore to Florida in December 2022. People thought I was crazy for doing that, but I really wanted to take a solo train ride. It was a cool experience. Although I’d love to travel via train more often, it was indeed very expensive. I could only afford the one way down & ended up flying back. The one way totaled $313. The air flight back was $246.
you could have purchased a Rail Pass for $500 (or $300 on sale) and gotten 10 rides within 30 days. A single ride is staying on a single train or bus. It's a shame this isn't advertised better, because it makes round-trips like yours as cheap or cheaper than flying much of the time.
That is absolutely ridiculous that the train is more expensive than the flight😂😂😂😂 would be better if everyone could use the train for a low price and more people will use it. Job done.
You should have taken the BUS to Florida. I did that, from a futher distance north than Baltimore, and it was a memory of a lifetime. Basically a full day on the bus!
That’s a massive distance. Where to in Florida?
Riding trains in smaller countries makes sense. Airplanes in larger countries makes much more sense. 😂
Recently I wanted to take my family (wife and 4 kids) on a weekend getaway to Savannah, GA from Atlanta, GA and thought of all my options. Plane tickets were $2600, Amtrack $1200 and by Enterprise $500.
I thought that it was too expensive by train but the fact that i wouldn't have to drive really appealed to me, being a truck driver.
The nail in the coffin was the fact that if i left on Friday, ı'd get to Savannah on Sunday, ruining the weekend getaway idea. This got me curious on why that would be the case.
So i looked into the schedule, i would have to leave on Friday night, because there's only 1 train per day, arrive to Greensboro, NC 8 hours later, wait about 4 hours to take a train to Raleigh, NC then wait about 7 hours, and take a train overnight to Savannah, arriving Sunday at around noon.
Needless to say i chose to drive and rent a car thru Turo that cost me less than $200 for the whole weekend.
Also following Atlanta United, there are some games in Charlotte, NC. Thought i could take the train there, but was disappointed to find out that the trains again only run once a day and only overnight. Meaning i would have to spend the night in a train traveling for 5 hours when i could get there in 4 by car. Ticket prices weren't bad though $50 each way which is what my car would take with gas prices nowadays. But that just l3aves me to think what it would be like if we had a staight line to Savannah.
Finally i have a couple of recommendations:
1.Faster trains (making the journey faster than by car) is a must.
2. More trains, giving options to riders to not think of departure times would be ideal but I'll settle for 4 times a day.
3. More lines, people want to go to different places for different reasons, think of connecting cities for business but also cities for pleasure.
Thank you!
If you own a car, it'd cost less than a hundred bucks. Drive yourself there like everyone else.
@@samsonsoturian6013 you obviously didnt read the whole comment, i ended up driving there because there was no better option.
@@GianniKnowsBest no one did
Add another point, train their employees to be more friendly than having an attitude... I haven't met a friendly Amtrak customer service agent at the train station 🚉
@@___beyondhorizon4664 Shut up, Karen.
What is killing Amtrak is their pricing model. You can't make a trip that isn't planned well in advance unless you have so much money you wouldn't likely consider taking the train anyway.
I just checked what a one way trip from NYP to LAX booked for February 6th (two months in advance) costs $236 for coach or $1375 if you want a room. Keep in mind this is a 67 hour trip, so your $236 ticket might sound cheap, but you're in a chair for about three days straight.
For comparison a one way flight from JFK to LAX on the same day (2/6/2022) costs $109 and takes 6 hours. Flying is less than half the price and takes less than one tenth the time.
Frankly, this story should be how cheap it is to fly rather than how expensive it is to travel by train.
Not a relevant point. Try buying a cheap plane ticket at the last minute. Air travel is heavily subsidized and has been for decades. Whereas Amtrak and rail infrastructure has been neglected for decades and must travel on freight infrastructure in most regions.
On a train, vs a flight, you have the views, the adventure of traveling. The hassles of flight for me, for now, are too cumbersome, plus, I really can't see much adventure in it. If in a hurry, that is where I would take a flight.
@@sn5806 1375, does that include food, I wonder?
@@sn5806 I just checked, and it turns out that it does include meals. I am thinking about taking a trip to Seattle from Albuquerque in either January or February.
I've used the NE Corridor to get to DC from NJ a few times and enjoyed it a lot. While it is a bit pricey, it's much less of a hassle than having to go through airport security, checking in bags, finding parking &, etc. I've also found that if you book your tickets at least a week or more in advance, you'll typically find affordable tickets. The conductors are always friendly and the food (which isn't free btw) is surprisingly good. This is also just my experience using coach!
The food is included on long-distance trains if you buy a sleeper car. Really nice if you're going on a long trip!
I have taken a business class on the same route, and it wasn't quite the bang for my buck that I expected. The coach service was perfectly fine. Acela is also interesting because I find that the time savings often don't make up for the price difference unless you get really lucky with the timing.
@@omarhamza7996 I stick to coach bc my main goal is to save money. Coach is also much more comfortable then i expected so its perfect for me. And quite frankly, the price of a business class ticket on the NE corridor is just as much as an economy airplane ticket from Newark or JFK to Dulles. The Acela is also just a bit overpriced daily. So yh, I wouldn't recommend business class or acela if you're trying to save a buck.
I took the bus to NYC and the regional coach back. The train was around double the price of the bus, but still not a huge amount if booked at least two weeks in advance, and was definitely worth it. About an hour faster and a lot more comfortable.
I honestly don’t care to listen to the opinions of someone who has to travel coach.
I really hope these plans to update the fleet/tracks while expanding service around the country pans out. I’ve loved the idea of traveling the country by train for a while now, but the lack of service to certain areas and prices have handicapped me quite a bit.
US has billions dollar for war but none for infrastructures, PLS MAKE HSR NATIONWIDE A PRIORITY
Wars make💰money!!
I was astounded at how much money we were giving Ukraine when we have so many issues here
@@drewh3224 for the rich, does nothing for the tax payers
@@drewh3224 Yes, for weapons manufacturers.
Trillion not billion
I love riding trains. It's always baffled me how expensive the tickets are and yet, Amtrak never made money. I did however get a great deal for 3 people going from Portland to Seattle round trip for $130 on the Cascades.
I would love to see them update the rolling stock. Most of the passenger cars date back to the 1980s and early 90s. New rolling stock is essential for Amtrak's future success.
They never made money because the ticket price are so high.
A train net is a prime example of "use makes it cheaper". You have to pay for the track building and maintenance regardless if you run one train a day or one ever ten minutes. Adding a half-full train actually lowers costs per passenger. And now think what happens if the trains run full...
Maintenance and running costs for trains is very expensive and very time consuming. The only way they would have a chance to make money is having trains that hold a lot more passengers, are much faster and more efficient. They have to charge high ticket prices because they currently don’t hold enough passengers, they are slow and not efficient because they are so old. The only way people would take a train would be if it was half the price of a plane ticket and could get to the destination in a decent amount of time. If plane tickets from ny to Florida is 1000 bucks for a small family takes 4 hours nobody is gonna pay close to 1000 bucks to take a train that’s gonna take 20-30 hours. If I have 1 week for a vacation I would rather pay more for a plane ticket so I don’t waste 2 days on a plane only getting maybe 5 days on vacation. If the train tickets were 600 bucks and took 10 hour then yeah I just might take the train because it’s 400 bucks cheaper and even if ur plane is on time ur gonna waste a good 2 hours getting to the airport early, checking in ur luggage, going through security then waiting for ur luggage when you land so the 4 hour flight will take a good 7 hours out of ur day if ur lucky, when I have taken trains before I have arrived just minutes before they were going to leave and had no problems. When flying half the time there are delays, pilot is late, plane is late. So on this trip if the train is only 6 hours longer, saves 400 bucks I would do it plus it would be cool to look out windows but I would never pay close to the same price to take a slow ass train. The last time I got a price for a train down to Florida I laughed I was like a plane is almost the same price and I could drive my car down there 10 hours faster why would Anyone ever take a train.
@@peanutbutterisfu Trains are only expensive because airplanes and cars externalize so many costs.
And that the train system is abysmal in teh US is nothing new.
I think it's overkill to have somethign like the maglev, which does the Toyko-Osaka in just 20 minutes more than an airplane, but a 200mph train should be easy for many parts of the US.
And as I said in other places, a conventional 160km/h net (the fastest that cheap 200 year old tech can do) would make even New York - Washington something you can take by train in a reasonable time, if you use express trains.
@@peanutbutterisfu Nope. In the 50s and 60s we switched from subsidizing rail to subsidizing highways and airlines. Conventional wisdom at the time was that the railroads got way too powerful. Also decentralized highways and airports were much less vulnerable from a defense standpoint.
With sooooo much subsidy for highways and airports and so few subsidies for rail, there is just no way for Amtrak to compete. The government picked its favorite winners and those were cars and airplanes over trains. Most, almost all other countries made the opposite choice and you can see for yourself that we messed up and they guessed correctly.
I loved riding trains in Europe, when I could just buy a month pass for like $200, then ride wherever I wanted. Trains in US are too expensive. A 224 mile trip on a train is $100 or more per person, or I can just drive that for $35 total, and get there in half the time.
The idea for rail is to be faster than driving but cheaper than flying. Of course the infrastructure for efficient rail isn’t there yet but if the investment can build to meet those standards I think rail would blow up in the US. Being someone from Atlanta I would love to take a train from here to Charlotte, Tampa, Nashville or other close by areas. That 400 miles radius idea rings true in my eyes. Having many more Acelas giving a higher frequency of departures would be huge.
YES! I am also an Atlanta area resident who frequently travels to Florida for business, and has family living in Florida. It would be nice to have an Acela option that went to some of the major Florida cities but yet the tickets wouldn't be as expensive as the airlines. Problem for Amtrak (cost aside) is that a flight from Atlanta to Orlando only takes an hour, whereas a train trip would be longer, so for business travel it doesn't make sense. However, when going to visit family in Florida I would welcome not having the task of driving 7 hours and be able to spend that time relaxing on the train, instead of having to worry about dealing with congested holiday traffic on I-75. It would be nice to have another travel option aside from hopping on a plane all the time.
So to solve that problem, you'll buy a train ticket, take a cab to the train station, wait for the train, get on the train and wait at each stop it makes, and then take another cab to where you actually need to be? Is that actually saving you anything over driving your car? No. It's actually making the trip less convenient because then you have no car when you get there....
@@pauld.b7129 Well like the person above mentioned I have a lot of family that is spread out so I would be picked up by them upon arrival. I can understand that point for business though in shorter distances. It’s the same argument for flying though. Still, spending hours working/ relaxing on a train over driving is a big benefit.
@@pauld.b7129 Here you are yet again with a goofy comment. Your same logic could be applied to flying, or does the Airbus A320 drop you off in the driveway of your destination?
We have a car culture. This ain't rocket science.
We just last week had a terrible airline meltdown, thousands of people stranded, 15,000 flights cancelled. Without good rail transportation we have No backup plan.
thats because you have an incompetent former mayor running the DOT.
Aaand the same thing happened this week, with the "y2k24" Crowdfire meltdown. Planes grounded much of the day across the country. Imagine if our airports had better rail connections (or any, really)
Vote Chuck Duzzie 2024
Good thing nothing bad ever happens with rail lines.
@@DonkeyHotey-l2e you get a zero on your reading comprehension test
From an European point of view, it is insane that they consider arriving at a train station in the center of a city a "premium". It should be the other way around.
@@laurinnintendo What country are you from to say you don't have freedom of speech?
@@laurinnintendo “we don’t have real freedom of speech” lmaooooo
@@EdoTyran Germany. It's illegal here to insult public figures, we have somehthing called "Volksverhetzung" where our government arbitrarilly decides that an opinion is too controversial, we also have a new law where you get a fine for calling "trans" people by their real name. It's pretty bad.
And it's not just freedom of speech, European countries (especially Germany) are less free in many other aspects too. For example during Covid our government went into full dictator mode and we still have mask mandates in some places.
@@SincerelyFromStephen We don't. Of course it's not like in China or North Korea, but we do have pretty serious limitations to speech in Germany at least. If you compare both, the US is a lot more free when it comes to freedom of speech (and other things).
@@laurinnintendo that “controversial opinion” that you’re referring to is Holocaust denialism and incitement of violence or hatred. If you choose to live in society, you shouldn’t have the ability to freely call for violence towards groups of people without consequences
In 1990, as a student I went up the east coast via Amtrak from Florida to Boston. Long, slow but good. Other countries have taken train travel to the next level while in the US it has stagnated. It's too pricey for the service offered. For best train travel, go to Japan.
You'd be surprised, but I'd actually say Spain. Japan is great, but somehow isn't as well organized and connected to other modes of transportation as the Spanish system is. Like you get off the subway in Barcelona, in 10 minutes you're on a highspeed train to Madrid, where you get off the train and you're on the subway in 5 minutes.
@@MikeBenko Spain is simply not a fair comparison. The US has 16 times the area.
@@noahking5531 That's not how it works. Nobody expects South Carolina to have the same infrastructure development as Spain. But comparing NY/Illinois/California/Texas/Florida etc to Western European countries is a fair comparison. Yet none of them have anything resembling European country levels of public transportation.
The thing is. You can realistically take a train for example in downtown Paris in the morning, be in downtown London in little over two hours. Keep in mind, that train has to literally run under the sea. The distance is similar to that between LA and SF...
Same applies to flights, airport connections etc across much of Europe. We're just horrible at infrastructure. We just seem systemically incapable of building or running or maintaining good infrastructure.
Even within US cities that do have things like public transportation, like NYC or Chicago, they are absolute trash in quality, reliability, cost and cleanliness when compared to even some of the most notorious European public transportation systems like that of London or Paris and absolutely pale in comparison to some of the better run ones like that of Madrid or Berlin.
@@MikeBenko Still not a fair comparison, as Europe's population density is much higher compared to the US. Spain is about 3/4 the size of Texas, but has a much larger population (47 million vs. 30 million). Europe has a population that is more that twice that of the US (740 million vs. 332 million). People forget that there are large areas of the US with a very low population density. There are far fewer people in the entire state of Wyoming (579k) than there are in the city of San Francisco (815k), which is only 49 square miles. Just compare population density maps of the US and Europe and it's easy to see how much more densely populated Europe is.
@@gunshow7425 This is a long one, bare with me, please. First of all, including the Russian population in that of Europe when discussing things like high speed rail is pointless. What we need to look at is the EU (as it has a unified infrastructure) and the handful of countries that are (sometimes despite their best efforts) fully integrated into it and often co-develop their infrastructure with the EU, namely UK, Switzerland and Norway.
They still double the US population, true, but the geographical distribution and geography of the continent is much less favorable than that of the US.
Italy and Spain are peninsulas disconnected from the mainland by mountain chains (unlike Florida for example), the UK and Scandinavia are disconnected by rough seas which you have to tunnel under or bridge over. Austria and Switzerland are insanely mountainous. Parts of northwestern Europe are literally under the sea level on extremely swampy ground. Southeastern Europe, like Greece and Romania is again very mountainous, while northeastern Europe has low population densities, the Baltics (these are the European equivalents of our Wyomings and such) and Finland with major urban areas (like Helsinki and Warsaw) quite disconnected from places like Berlin or Vienna. Europe is a mess geographically.
But looking at state v country level. A common mistake being made are doing things like bringing Wyoming into the discussion in an attempt to highlight just how low are supposed population density is.
Most of the continental United States is empty. The bulk of the population lives either in between Chicago and the Northeast or down along the coast to Houston/Florida. The population west of the Rockies literally lives on a thin line along the coast running for San Diego to Seattle.
From a theoretical stand point the US population distribution is absolutely ideal for interstate high speed rail. Almost all our major population centers are distributed along a north-south axis with a handful of east-west outliers which make perfect triangular connecting hubs (Chicago, DC, Columbus).
But here's the thing about high speed rail. Nobody is going to take a train in Madrid to go to Rome or London or Berlin. Rail does really well on what's called an intermediate range. 100 to about 450 miles. At those distances high speed rail is typically faster than flying, much faster than driving and more convenient than both. In Europe this like London-Paris, or Madrid-Barcelona-Paris-Barcelona or on extreme Paris-Berlin.
In the US we have a whole lot of these perfect connections. ESPECIALLY in the northeast, in Florida, California and TEXAS.
Swinging back to the Spain v Texas comparison. If you look at a population distribution map of Spain, you'll notice a very weird population distribution. Something like 40+% of the population lives on the Madrid to Barcelona axis. The rest is fairly evenly distributed in a circle along the coasts, parts of central Spain have the population density of northern Finland (think of Montana), so when Spain builds rail it has to build outwards in every direction from Madrid.
Texas on the other hand, has it's population condensed in a relatively small area between Dallas-Houston and San Antonio, Austin falls on the SA to Dallas axis, with a small outlier towards Corpus Christi.
Texas would only have to build 4 main highspeed rail lines to service most of its population, in clean little triangle with an extra line from SA to CS. The distance between Dallas and San Antonio? 250 miles. Literally the perfect distance for high speed rail and Austin is on that line. It's also mostly just....flat land. No bends, no tunneling, no Baltic seas and English channels in the way, no Mississippi to bridge over.
Honestly its the best and safest way to travel for me just not the fastest obviously. You get so much room. Frequent stops. You can SEE the whole country instead of flying over it. Its such an adventure.
I keep reading about how "safe" train travel is. The trains do have accidents and people do die or get injured. Considering that a LOT more folks travel by air than train, I would wager the numbers would show air to be safer than rail.
@GilmerJohn
Flying is the safest according to crashes per miles traveled. But trains are safer in terms of average number of deaths per crash. Both are very safe actually, driving is what’ll really get you.
@@peregrino9154 scared to fly?? LOL
I'll drive to spend less money and have more convenience.
This is the issue right here. long distance Amtrak is a tourist attraction. Not transportation. Long distance amtrak cant provide what most travelers want. Efficient and fast transit.
I traveled the Northeast Corridor via Amtrak to go to my parents' house for Christmas. My ticket cost more than a plane ticket would have, but I arrived at my parents' house! Had I taken a plane I would have spent Christmas in the airport!
Your parents' house is right next to the train station?
@@trwent your parents house is on the airport runaway?
@kubotite9168 YOU are the one who said, "I arrived at my parents (sic) house".
@@trwentYou Are A Semantic Troll.
Has America considered that even a rail way that is 'losing money' might actually be 'making money' for the country as a whole in terms of the economic activity a rail line enables
No. #Capitalism
Yes,that’s Asian countries now is doing.
@@ProfessorPancakes420 yes, america does that, but for roads.
US build roads to loose money. everyone else just loose money that makes them more money instead. US would rather offset that cost to the citizens than shoulder for the greater good
@@acasccseea4434, loose money? Dude, it’s lose money. Grammar is fundamental. Try it sometime.
We lose money on every ticket, but we make it up in volume 😂
I used to live in D.C. as an expat. I wanted to explore a little and being European, I thought it would be convenient to take the train. So I took a traintrip to NYC Penn Station from D.C. Union Station.
The tickets aren't as expensive as CNBC is stating in the video, if you plan in advance. Regarding the quality of the service. Let's say I appreciate the train services back home and I'll never complain ever again.
That's the thing though-- planning in advance for the Northeast Corridor means booking at least two months out if you want reasonably priced tickets. That totally takes away any convenience factor. Who is prepared to make any personal trip with that much foresight? I don't even plan vacations that far in advance, let alone visiting family for holidays or weekend getaways, etc.
CNBC usually over-exaggerates everything they report thats US related, the pricing claims were crazy, if you know what you're doing youll find the right price
Waroom? Omdat es Vereenigte Staaten is! DC to NY is probably one of the least scenic stretches in the US. The "Chinatown Busses" have greatly improved in comfort, and I found them very satisfactory for DC-NY. Bedankt.
@@ProfessorPancakes420 I've booked only about a week or two before and saw decent surprises for the NE corridor.
@@itsnadaaaa Really? In mid October, I booked a round trip from Boston South Station to New York Penn three weeks prior to the trip. It set me back $367.
I love my CA Amtrak :)
It was a god-send for visiting home very inexpensively from school.
Back in like 2008-2012 the tickets were quite cheap, avg non-holiday ranged from $12-18 and barely went up pre-pandemic years ($22-30). It would've been nearly a full tank of gas to travel that distance by train, it's a great public asset, like the public bus system.
Traveling by train is very relaxing and scenic :)
I highly recommend taking any Amtrak train that passes near the ocean or through a highly remote area, absolutely amazing. There are some trains running in CA with GREAT viewing cars, and you can walk around on the train. Some viewing cars are 1st come 1st server but have windows that reach all the way to the ceiling :) Great for pics and vids.
That's because Amtrak California is a joint venture between Amtrak and Caltrans! Amtrak California is basically "Amtrak Premium". Newer and better equipped trains, better maintained, cleaner, cheaper, better amenities, nicer staff, etc. Amtrak California is superior in pretty much every way to regular Amtrak. California has been investing a ton of money into Amtrak California and rail transportation in general over the last 20-30 years. And it shows! We now have the most popular rail routes in the country outside of the NEC!
it is not a public asset. It is a public drain. It costs more to operate than passengers are willing to pay. Without government subsidies, it dies.
@@DonkeyHotey-l2e So just like interstate highways in other words
@@correctionguy7632 You may have failed to notice that highways are paid for by taxes on fuel, so the users of highways pay for them when they buy fuel. Rail passengers depend on people who are NOT using rails to pay their way.
I’ve taken the Amtrak St.Paul to Milwaukee route a few times. It usually costs $50-$65 for coach depending on the day. Sometimes it’s cheaper or similar to megabus but more expensive than greyhound. Much more comfortable than both. There’s an option to “bid” for a room or roomette. Last time I took it I got the bid so I paid and extra $75 and got meals are included. I really enjoyed the experience and was something I was happy to get. I definitely would bid again. If you don’t get the bid you don’t have to pay extra so why not!
I use the Amtrak Northeast Regional between New Haven and Penn Station. It’s usually quite a bit cheaper than Acela, less packed, and only slower by about 20 minutes. I personally think the NE Regional is more comfortable too, especially in the first class cabin. Seats are a lot bigger, and the suspension seems smoother. The “quiet car” is enforced well and has very few people in it - I would usually go in there to only find a couple other people, pop in some headphones, and watch a couple episodes of a tv show on my laptop. Unbelievably easy and comfortable compared to driving the Merritt..
From New Haven? Couldn't you take Metro-North? It would be a tad slower, but cheaper.
@@robertlunderwood Definitely. But it compromises heavily on comfort.
Ah yes
The Merritt Parkway
Mankind's most deplorable abomination.
May I ask why you take Amtrak over MetroNorth? It’s still only 1 train and the latter isn’t that much slower but it is much less expensive. (Genuine question; I admit to personally missing having that option.)
@@saraleigh5336 it just ends up being much more comfortable and quiet. Boarding is super calm, always has seats open, and Penn Station is low-stress for this route. And I love the NE Regional trains..
I've travelled throughout Poland twice prior to the Covid pandemic. Fast, efficient, affordable and great stations and connections/ timetables. They benefitted a lot from EU money when they joined the Union and they invested wisely in upgrading existing infrastructure and building new ones
A friend of mine just visited Poland and he said the same thing.
What the heck does your comment have to do with the video?
@@sweynforkbeardtraindude as a comparison to how railways can be operated in other countries, I guess.
@@sweynforkbeardtraindude are you slow in the brain department!
@@sweynforkbeardtraindude Typical European condescension. These comments are quite ubiquitous on any train video involving the U.S.
We need amtrak's priority to be providing a good service, not making profit
you kind of need both, that what the video is about
Right, but of course our government instead wants to spend hundreds of billions on subsidies to the auto and aviation industries instead.
@@LuisPJ you don't need both if you change the bylaws and laws that govern Amtrak.
@@truedarklander Yeah, "If you change the laws that control Amtrak", that's not changing which is why you need both, to improve Amtrak so they can also make money and not just from tickets, but for future improvements
@@Racko. There is no longer any law requiring Amtrak to be profitable. The Amtrak improvement Act of 1978 reads, “Section 9 amends section 301 of RPSA... to confirm the law to reality, providing that Amtrak shall be ‘operated and managed as’ a for-profit corporation. This amendment recognizes that Amtrak is not a for-profit corporations.”
TLDR; since 1978, Congress has not required Amtrak to make a profit.
Last year, I paid $62 going with Amtrak from D.C. to NYC, $19 going from NYC to Philadelphia, and $19 from Philadelphia to D.C. So it is possible finding really affordable tickets along the Northeast corridor. All of the above were the Northeast Regional which is about 30 min slower than the Acela, but often at half or even just a third of the price of the Acela.
I like that they are focusing on linking major cities outside the northeast. I think that’s a good idea. I just wish there were less expensive “scenic route” trains that people could take to see the beauty of the US. This would especially attract international and local tourists.
The problem is that major cities outside teh northeast, except maybe SF, Seattle, Portland (OR) and Vancouver have low density. There are few people in walking distance of the train station in LA, Denver, etc.
This past summer my wife & I took a train from Tampa to West Palm Bech. It was just over 97 bucks for us both, round trip. The train to was over 2 hours late becuase of a car accident on the tracks. The return train was on time. Both trains were extremely comfortable. I was amazed by how wide the coach seats were. There was WiFi but it was spotty. This is my only experience on passeger rail in the US. I wish there were more and higher speed trains as they would be a great option to flying.
As a kid out west, I used to take the Santa Fe train from San Francisco to New Mexico and the Southern Pacific from San Jose to San Louis Obispo. The Santa Fe service was superb and the SP train was OK. Fast forward over 40 years and I took my first AMTRAK service from Albany NY to Canada last summer. It was a good experience. The train was a little run down and dirty like the old SP trains I used to take and a little slow because of freight traffic. But the staff was great - as were a lot of the other passengers - and it was nice to sit in a wide-comfortable seat. Does AMTRAK need updating and other improvements - Yes - but I would take the train again in a heartbeat.
I love train travel 🧳 and to my knowledge they don’t cancel the train 🚊 the way they do with flights !! ✈️
I can drive to a resort location 50 miles away and stay in a 4 Star ⭐⭐⭐⭐ hotel for 3 night's for the price of an Amtrak ticket.. what a rip off.
My wife and I looked at a 2 day train tickets " one way" and OMG 😳
It's great for smaller regional trips. I live in Seattle and find it well worth going to Vancouver B.C. or Portland or even Eugene rather than deal with traffic, especially traffic between Seattle to Portland and sure it may take 2 hours longer than a flight from Seattle to Portland but at least on the trains you have somewhat larger bathrooms, a food car, and much bigger leg room, even in coach than you would have on a flight, and a view to match. You also still typically have wifi or cell service on trains as well. They have their niche.
And I live on Vancouver Island and we do not have passenger train service at all anymore. EVERYONE on this island who wants to travel has to drive.
@@denelson83 Awful! You should complain to your local government to return the train! In large part we lost train service in North America because the government thought in the 50s-60s that everyone wants to always drive on a highway. Public pressure is needed to bring those much saner travel options back!
@@TohaBgood2 Unfortunately, it's been said that the E&N Railway is in too poor a condition to run passenger services on anymore, and it is too expensive to repair.
@@denelson83 It's great how no highway is ever too expensive to repair to these people! That they will always find money for! Ugh
Well, maybe you all can force them somehow. I know Canadians usually find a way!
Yeah they work because we didn't have to build entirely new trains and tracks to run on it. For high speed rail in the US, it would cost tens of billions, if not trillions. And then nobody would use it anyways. Last time you rode the train, how many people were in it? My guess is not many at all.
the problem is profit... transportation, education and health should be public services, private industry is ok as an alternative but not as the only option.
Yup. It's not like the millions of street lights and all sorts of public services make much money.
Exactly
Exactly
There are times where privatized companies do a better job than state-funded ones. Take the JR Group of companies that deal with passenger rail service in Japan. They are all for-profit, provide exceptional service, and, yet, are the envy of the world.
We need more rail - I hate seeing Europe beat us at trains.
@sourav jaiswal sitting on train roof? Nah no thx. US train definitely better than super pooper 2020
@@alqaeda7040 not only are you bad at trolling, You're ignorance is really showing of the world you're not familiar with outside of a surface level grasp
@@alqaeda7040 Stop watching videos from the 1990s. PS:I am not going to take someone who names himself after a terrorist organisation seriously.
Hate to point it out but... Not just Europe. Most of the developed world and even some third world countries are en route to overtake US passenger traffic.
China😀
Amtrak was the first transportation I toke alone at age 15 to visit family and I had an amazing experience. 2022 I traveled with Amtrak over 10 times to New England and every experience was wonderful. I wish the US had more train transportation as in my opinion it is more comfortable and convenient. They also have a lot of discounts for students, military and seniors!
When Switzerland is mentioned when comparing tilting mechanisms the train shown is a Japanese Shinkansen E2 series. A correct train to show would’ve been the SBB RABDe 500.
Sure, they have great trains. The U.S. could have a great national system if it was the size of Switzerland (or Japan, Korea, England, etc.)
"Switzerland is nearly the size of Vermont and New Hampshire combined."
Nearly the size.
@@Singlesix6I was just talking about the train itself that was shown off in the video. But still the point stands then why don’t the individual states have their own good rail systems? They used to exist but not anymore!
@@Singlesix6 then why do neither of those states have extensive railways?
A majority of the tracks that Amtrak and commuter railroads operate on are owned & operated by freight. They have to pay freight companies to use the tracks. Fares included that cost. That freight can cause delays and those tracks aren't designed to go fast.
Yeah.... As opposed to building all new tracks for a service nobody uses. If Amtrak disappeared tommorow, would it actually affect anyone? I doubt it. Most people riding a train are doing it for the novelty, not out of necessity.
Guess you never been on a transcon line..90 mph amtrak...
@@pauld.b7129maybe in some parts of the country, but in the NE, Amtrak is about function, not novelty.
The 600$ pricetag may exist but its misleading. A coach one way trip from NY to DC is usually 31$ if booked ~6 weeks out and only 30 minutes longer than the acela.
Some of us don’t have 6 weeks to wait to make a trip
@@theowainwright7406 yeah some people do so first come first serve for the prices it’s not unlimited seats that’s why it’s expensive just like airplanes there cheap if planned ahead
@@zedmaster2178 then how come the airplanes can come out cheaper your argument doesnt work you must not be that smart
@@bigpapa2195 That pricing demonstration was for that particular moment the reporter was shopping prices. There are constant pricing fluctuations. There may have been a lot of open available seats on that flight but not many open available seats on that train.
Furthermore, to get between city centers (where the train takes you and where most people are actually going) and the outlying airports (where the plane takes you) could range from $50-$100 1 way in the major northeast cities or elsewhere if the airport is quite aways from the city. Double that for the return trip back to the airport. The devil is in the details.
@@theowainwright7406 you pay then
Why can't they connect Detroit to Toledo (directly)?? My gosh they're Right NEXT to each other, and YET right now, you have to take the train West all the way to Chicago First (!), then Back East to Toledo - Makes NO sense(?!?)
Alan Fisher has made many more videos about railways within the U.S. mostly, and what can be done to improve or fix the problem. The big fix he suggests is nationalization.
A """"socialist""" train network? Can you imagine if people (of different races, even) could travel together, comfortably and on an electric vehicle, without paying exorbitant "demand-based" prices? Where is the freedom in THAT?! /s
They did nationalize, it'd called Amtrak
@@forddon Amtrak is mostly government owned yes, however that does not mean they nationalized the whole nations railway system, those are still mostly owned by the big 4(Who deal with freight), Amtrak is only used for travel. There is no nationalized freight company, there was one in the past but fell apart due to a whole slew of problems.
Again Alan Fisher has made multiple videos about trains and railways if you're in the subject.
The government has no right and no constitutional authority to steal public property like that. I also question if nationalization would actually fix problems, or if it could do so without introducing other problems.
@@tootime576 it's not public property it's owned by private companies
I use the train from DC to NYC often- as long as you book your ticket at least 6-8 weeks out, you can get tickets for $30 each way. So it’s not as expensive as the video makes it seem as long as you plan well in-advance.
Yeah. Obviously holiday pricing will not be the same as typical pricing.
And that is stupid. If you plan long enough for your car trip, do you get a 50% discount for the fuel?
@@steemlenn8797 The cost of fuel is the basically same whether the train runs empty or full. The cost of gas would be the same if you loaded 1 or 4 passengers to your car. Question is how much you gonna charge each passenger? If you want them to book early to ensure profitability, you can lower the price but have them pay ahead of time and non-refundable. For those that book last minute and presumably with no other transportation options, you can charge those the full fare. Since the train capacity (supply) is limited and inflexible, prices are used as a tool to adjust demand to fit the supply. If supply could be adjusted (by adding more or removing rail cars) that might allow for more consistent pricing, but that would add more variables to operational efficiency and costs.
Coachbus fares make this not worth the bother, much of the time, even with I-95 traffic delays
@@verves2 Yes, the price of fuel is the same, that's why it's stupid to give discounts.
While flexible pricing can dsitribute the load somewhat, that's a tiny amount of the total pasengers.
Railroads all around the world have figured out how to not send trains out when nobody wants to ride, like 3 a.m., I am sure Amtrak can learn that too.
Acela's new trains tilting technology is actually world standard, developed in Europe and use in UK, Italy, France and Spain's high speed networks. Amtrak needs much more trains like these to thrive
They're made by the help of Bombardier and France, it definitely even tops France's own current TGV series and they wont get the new Acela type cars until the coming years themselves
The track layout and topology on the highest demand line is not ready for it. As someone who travels from Connecticut to NY for work, the Acela almost feels like a waste of money. The difference is not that big relative to regular Amtrak train.
@@tigerrx7, so what do you propose or what to build that would be better?
@@tigerrx7 That's a common misconception. The NEC is an old, legacy corridor, sure. But this is a very good corridor nonetheless and it's speeds are not at all unusual for HSR lines in other places. In fact, most HSR services in Europe run on this type of track. The NEC is actually mostly 125+mph, with some sections at up to 150mph. And now Amtrak got the money to upgrade all the 125+mph sections to 160mph for the new TGV-derived Acela trains. Some slower turns around stations will still remain because they can't be removed easily, but that is entirely normal even for the faster French TGV and German ICE trains. If you want to run in city centers then you will have to share slower track with slower local trains. That tradeoff is almost always worth it for the convenience it creates for riders.
@@tigerrx7 The problem with the current Acela fleets is that they're too old and need modernization, that's where the new ones come in with 30 units just sitting waiting to to be used by next year, the Acela is more of an express train that doesnt stop past most stations the regional one does, and it's actually less profitable too, I usually take the New Haven Train line and Acelas past by and they're definitely in need of replacement
There’s always the comparison to European and Japanese service, and it’s asked why those services are do much cheaper. The answer is because they are HEAVILY subsidized by their governments. Why do their trains run on time while Amtrak trains are often late? It’s because their governments mandate that freight operations will not interfere with passenger service.
Also, in certain countries, the station and the land around it is also owned by the railway company, meaning that they can lease or develop the land to provide more lucrative income than just ticket prices.
But it requires station to be popular first. If railway company caters to premium customers, there just isn't enough passengers to justify developing land further, like building shops for passengers to buy stuff on stations.
I'd love to see a direct comparison between Amtrak and Deutsche Bahn in terms of funding, revenue, rolling stock, stations served and passenger numbers as well as distances. That would be very revealing imho.
It would be embarrassing to Americans, more than likely. We don't talk about how much taxpayer money we spend to support automobiles as the primary form of transportation here, but it's an unnecessary burden.
DB is absolutely horrendous. If Americans want to do it right, by all means, do NOT look at DB. OBB (Austria) or SBB (Switzerland) are the way to go.
@@meb5205 Oh come on, they're not THAT bad. Long distance maybe, but the regional connections are steady, cheap, reliable and comfortable.
@@meb5205enfe in Spain is excellent. Great service, clean cars, reasonably priced and almost always on time .
SBB is definitely the world standard for train service.
@@meb5205 Compared to Amtrak, DB is great
A bullet train from Tokyo to Kyoto is about $120, and they run every 30 minutes to an hour. But it’s been a major major government investment since the 1950s, but obviously it’s pain off. And please stop calling 150mph high speed
150 Mph would qualify as high speed in most countries. In Europe, a high speed train is any train that can drive above 200kph.
Yeah, but that's a sardine-can city. Where so many millions of people live within walking distance of the station and it is faster to walk than to drive. Similar rails in Spain are actually costing Madrid money, and in America's wide open spaces they are out of the question. We have airplanes for that.
@Zaydan Naufal I don't care what some people call it, I'm going by the defintion of the international railway union and as per EU directive 96/48/EC which holds 200kph on existing lines and 250kph on new, dedicated lines as the minimum speed when talking about high speed rail.
It's high speed. Idk why you think otherwise, the Standard definition of High Speed from the US and EU rail law put anything over 200km/h as high speed
@@Hans-gb4mv If we convert it, 200kph is around 125mph and 250 is around 155 mph 🤷♀️
Before I retired I used to take the Acela between NJ and DC frequently I loved taking the train but honestly I could fly out of Newark to Reagan National for the same price at an Acela ticket.
planning a trip to eastern OR to San Francisco and im stoked. you never hear of train travel in normal conversations but it makes sense to me and quite pleasant once youre rolling in open land. hoping for success for the American passenger train system.
I have taken the Lake Shore Limited from NYS to Chicago and back a few times and these trips are by far the best long-distance travel I've ever done. You get on the train in your city, go to sleep in their train cars with extremely comfortable seats and ample leg room (In coach, too!), and then wake up bang in the middle of downtown Chicago the next morning. I once did the math and it was actually cheaper than driving by a few dollars when factoring in gas and toll roads, plus the added convenience of not needing to find and pay for somewhere to park once I got there or dealing with Chicago traffic. We really need to invest more money into passenger rail in this country, it's so wonderful.
Have you ever travelled on Greyhound and what was your experience like? I've never been to the US but would like to visit someday, I live in the UK.. our country is so small you can cross half of England by train in about 2-3 hours!
@@paullangton-rogers2390 Yes. Europeans consistently underestimate how big the U.S. is. A friend of mine had some German friends stay with him in Manhattan for a couple of weeks, and they thought they'd take a day trip to San Francisco They had trouble believing it is a three-day drive, each way, at autobahn speeds, if you can manage not to be arrested for driving so fast.
And, yes, I have traveled by Greyhound. It also takes you from city center to city center, less expensively, without the option to get up and walk around or buy food en route. They stop every few hours at a place that typically has one medium-quality option for food, which of course add to the length of the journey. Plus, of course, they can be stuck in traffic. Though, to be fair, it's not unusual for Amtrak trains to be (illegally) made to wait so freight trains can pass, which helps explain why they are so commonly very late compared with their schedule. The other complaint I've heard about intercity bus travel (not just greyhound, now) is that, since it's less expensive and less nice, it has a "lower class" of clientele, which bothers some people. Personally, I don't mind being the most highly-educated person on the bus, but some people are snobs or bigoted or racist; if you are, you'll probably find a bus much less pleasant, since you can't easily get up to avoid anyone you would rather not be around.
@@paullangton-rogers2390 I think you'll find Greyhound...interesting. Outside the Northeast Corridor, Greyhound is mostly used by poor people. That will be interesting for you to experience, as a foreigner -- but you will also come to understand why the US is a terrible country to be poor in. You'll see a lot of kindness and dignity, and also a lot of social dysfunction. Give it a try! But make sure you check the schedules before you start your trip (they won't be convenient) and be prepared for long delays.
These prices are crazy! I took a high speed train in France last week from Aix to Paris. 471 miles in 3 hours and EUR59. that is USD62.... and for a train that goes twice the speed!!!
That's what happens when government gets their nose in something. This country was built on railroads WITHOUT 1 cent from taxpayers.
I live in Denver and would love to take a train during the winter through the Rockies to California but it’s laughably overpriced. Flying is cheaper than a train. We’ve got it so wrong.
In 2018 I needed to take the rail from Omaha, NE to Chicago, IL and the train that was supposed to pick up the passengers from the day before still had not arrived. Amtrak needs to do better in the Midwest.
It's pathetic when a country doesn't have money for the maintenance of railway infrastructure but has billions of dollars to spend on overseas military bases.
The money is there, just not the will
@@Racko. where’s the demand?
@@Dog.soldier1950 Also there, MidWest, South East, West Coast and Houston-Dallas
Amtrak's budget in one year is like the same as how much we spend on defence in a day and a half
I tried telling somebody about that and how it was wasteful, and they told me that money for the military and money for rail travel improvement was different and shouldn't be compared.
After my parents divorced as a young kid, I took the train between Detroit and Chicago (Amtrak Wolverine) countless times. Probably 15 or more times a year for almost 10 years. And never got sick if it. Love traveling by train
AMÉN AMÉN AMÉN!!!!!!
Which yrs??? I ride Heartland Flyer n Texas. I plan 2 visit Sequoia National Park, California 2023. It's the train adventures 4 me. I don't care about the price. I meet people from around the world. Train employees r nice&talk about their favorite hidden stops as oppose 3 airplane employees. U can't see anything from the skies.
@@jaimealvarez8896 late 80s and 90s.
Absolutely! Couldn't agree more 😉👍
Somebody has to pay for the massive "boondogle" known as Amtrak. Should've been privatized decades ago!
I lived in China for a year. In 2017 I bought a round trip maglev train ticket from Shanghai to Beijing. I remember it costing about $45 usd. These trains are super smooth and travel over 200 mph for a lot of the way. I think it was about 4.5 hours each way. Almost as fast as flying if you count security and all the other hooplah, and way way cheaper. I can't believe the Acela trains cost more than a flight, how does that make any sense?
exactly .... why does EVERY other country do it better ....? that just means we are doing it wrong.
wasn't the maglev... that was a gimmick train between airport and shangers,,, and rarely operates above 70% of the speed it was said to run (supposedly 270mph). You went on a "normal" gaotie... and yes, they make the USA trains look like thomas the Wank engine. USA will never have them, they are too busy suabbling with their highly polarised politics. The Gaotie G trains go 350kph, the D trains 300. Yes easy and relatively cheap to buy tkts using a service on the net. The K services are cheaper,,, but slow as a wet week... ok for overnight if you're a midget Asian... not so good if a 2 metre aussie.
Well, those train lines are effectively run using blank checks from the central government in China and are highly unprofitable as a whole, with heavily corruption-laden management. Plus, the government didn't need to deal with absurdly stringent property rights, as they legally own it all anyway. I agree that their trains are great and the service, too, but Japan and Europe would probably be a better example to look to in terms of sustainable and feasible train systems for the US.
edit: Also, $45 isn't a lot for us, but many of the regular people living there make a lot less purchasing power wise. It'd still be quite a bit cheaper than what we have here, but it's worth noting that it's not really just $45 for a lot of the normal people living and working there, and who likely didn't earn as much as you did considering you were a foreigner.
Because the Federal Government nationalized passenger rail. So places where there is high demand for it, where it would otherwise be economical, have to subsidize the vast parts of the network where it is not. Hence the high prices you see. Did you watch the video?
Time to charge more for the carriers to use the airport
I interviewed at Amtrak. Got the manager of (critical tech infrastructure) position. I found out they had 4 engineers to run the entire (critical) platform. I declined the offer, as they thought this was more than adaquate.
Just like you, no doubt, think that your grammar is "adaquate".
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@@raypitts4880 literally no one cares
What?
My husband works in that field, (critical tech infrastructure) he is an electrical engineer, the details of his work is classified but the area he works in covers one fourth of the railroads in Sweden and they are 48 guys in his office. So, there are almost 50 guys in every office = 192 in total and they work 24/7. As far as I know, the US is a liiiiiiitle bit larger than Sweden.... Unbelievable.
Wow!!! Can u elaborate some more PLZ??? R u an Amtrak rider??? My grandparents&I r México 🇲🇽 Nationals&they would ride from Fort Worth, Tx to California. The adventures of riding trains as a child r priceless. I have plans 2 visit Sequoia National Park, California 2023. I plan 2 ride Amtrak as a way of honouring their memories. I don't care about the price of the train fare.
For the comparison ny to Washington, the cost getting to and away from the airport should be also included.
Getting from where to the airport or train station? Are you assuming the passenger is in the city to begin with or out in the suburbs? The price dynamic changes with the origin. In NYC a resident needs only to take a bus to LGA or a train to JFK, or the subway to Penn station. Very cheap. A Suburb resident has to drive into the city or take the train in to travel outside the area, or attempt to use one of the suburban airports with limited service. In DC the situation is a little different in that DCA and Union station are easy to access in the city but longer range travel is biased in favor of the suburban population because IAD is out in the boonies. Every city is going to be different.
@@starventure most time it is easier to get to the train station without a car, otherwise you need parking. Most times the airports are othside the main metroplitain area. Every city is different like you mentioned.
Yet no one bemoans the hundreds of billions the interstates are in the hole. Ticket sales (ie. tolls) are definitely not keeping up with the costs. Yet we're perfectly comfortable dumping tax money into them, but we expect rail to be 100% passenger funded or we're not doing it.
I rode the Acela from DC to NY. I was shocked how the seats were old and dirty. Everything needed a massive overhaul.
New trainsets are coming to Acela. Separately, the old cars that make up the single-level coach and business sections (like those also seen on the NEC) are also going to be swapped out in the next couple of years.
@@aresef Old is one thing; dirty is not acceptable.
I just got done training from SF to South Bend, IN via Chicago. If you have time, it is well worth it. In as much as it was safe, the trains are getting old and definitively need replacement upgrades. Also, internet access is erratic. Amtrak should partner with SpaceX Starlink for satellite broadband internet service. They should keep the long distance routes like the Zephyr. For the most part, the employees of Amtrak have been very professional and caring.
I think the biggest factor is the massive volume some of these countries have. On Shinkansen you rarely look at a timetable because the frequency of service is so high. You just show up, buy a ticket, and go. It's like taking a giant subway.
There's still of lot of potential volume in private vehicles to be shifted.
Taxes on cars in Japan are very high. This makes demand for things like rail travel much higher.
@@Geotpf taxes on the cars ain't the problem in Japan. It's the tolls to use the highway and parking for inner cities. Tokyo to Osaka about the same distance from NY to DC. you easily pay $200 in highway tolls + 2 tanks of gas and parking. Much easier to take the train or bus for a third of the price.
You get volume when you offer a decent service.
@@ass4sale2 It was about $50 in tolls in 2011 when I traveled between Washington and NYC, most of which can be bypassed by driving around Baltimore and Philadelphia instead of the direct route. However the cost of gasoline was something like $0.80 a liter. It's about $1.00 now.
People love trains and train travel...just because. I don't think there's any doubt that ridership would greatly increase with many more routes, more frequent trains, and above all low prices.
The car and plane industry would never let train tickets be affordable cause they know it would negatively impact them. Those lobbyists are pretty powerful. Plus the fact that Amtrak is slow, inefficient and severely underfunded.
Exactly JNY. Airline lobby plus Automobile Dealership lobby plus politicians, equals poor train service. Remember, Amtrak train service is controlled by United States government appointees.
They need to link up Pittsburgh and Chicago to the northeast corridor in an expedited manner
And then Chicago to Detroit... and then over to Windsor, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Quebec City. Obviously Canadia's railways would have to get onboard with this too.
There's Chicago to Pittsburgh to Philly and NYC, but the Chicago to Pittsburgh route is only about 2 or 3 times a week. The Pittsburgh to Harrisburg part is only once a day, whereas the Keystone and Pennsylvanian are state supported routes and overlap with the Northeast Corridor. (My grandparents lived in Stahlstown and later Ligonier PA right near the Latrobe pa train station and I went to college in Elizabethtown PA which was on the Harrisburg to Philly to NYC route. (My parents lived in suburban Philadelphia at the time.)
I don’t know why, but anytime somebody mentions Chicago and trains I think of this movie scene. th-cam.com/video/S8avj5d8G6s/w-d-xo.html
Looked at taking a train from Austin, Texas to Whitefish, Montana for a family of 4... More than 2 days travel time and $8k one way. We flew.
That's not how our rail service is set up.
@@timf2279 obviously. It's a shame.
It takes bery high population density to make mass transit profitable, and the US is not that densely populated. That's a big reason why it makes money in Japan and Europe.
Here in Illinois, what gets me is that we don't even own the railways. They're owned by Canadian National.
Its time to boycott these business that is not owned by Americans.
Canadian National's biggest shareholder is Bill Gates.
@@marktrinidad7650 not sure how you're going to boycott a freight company, but go off ig
@@marktrinidad7650 I mean you have plenty of tracks in Canada owned by Americans , mainly CN tracks
Even if they were owned by American freight railroads, I wouldn't say "we" own them, as in the general public. That only happens when a state buys a rail line from those companies, like Virginia or New York has. I think Illinois should absolutely buy the line that the Lincoln Service currently runs on between Chicago and St. Louis since that is a critical link in the future Midwest high speed rail network.
You might want to do a totally different story on how cookies are used to raise prices when searching for transit tickets especially airline. Once you see a good price if you don’t take it right then you will never see it again even hitting the browser back button the software knows what you are looking for and raises the price because it knows the demand is now there you created the demand by the search
If rail in the USA were as omnipresent as it is in the UK I would certainly use it.
My kids live near New Orleans, SouthCentral Colorado and San Diego. A circle route that could get me within 200 miles of these would be something I would do a couple of times a year.
It would be even better if I could take a smallish motorcycle.z
I’ve ridden trains in Japan, the Uk and France. There are plenty of passengers and seats for everyone with way more space than airplanes.
The UK has pretty terrible rail coverage by European standards with few but expensive lines.
The biggest issue is that even if you could take a train from one American city to another, besides a very select few, most of our cities are built for cars. So once you get there you’ll most likely have to Uber at some point.
The same is true even in Japan. Only the larger cities such as Tokyo, Osaka, etc, have effective local train service. Once you get into smaller cities, you're screwed without using a car service of some kind.
Had this issue when I was living in Central California. The town the station was in just had one of those tiny puttering local buses that only go to the places seniors visit... and we lived 45 miles out of the city. It's a terrible cycle because everyone is poor out there -- not needing a car as much would save them a ton on maintenance and making it easier to go further would make for more opportunity... but because everyone is poor the city never has enough money to afford to put better services together.
@@oldtwinsna8347 And Japan is tiny compared to the U.S. "...making Japan 3.84% the size of the United States. However, only about 33% of Japan's land is habitable due to its mountainous geography and dense forests.""
If only the trains was faster… I still love Amtrak though… lol
You mean speed rails from China?
@@drewh3224 Or Japan and France
Heres the thing, you dont need to make it “profitable”, you just need to serve the public. Its the one thing the CEO doesnt understand
-lower ticket costs
-double train frequency
-add more services
-electrify state/private corridors
-replace and purchase more fleet to increase frequency
Thats how you make money
Amtrak's CEO iknows all this but he cannot change the law. The law requiere s Amtrak to be profotable and when they are not profitable they have to rely on congress to cover their losses. Tomdo what you, rightfully, ask for congress needs to change the law and allocate funds to do what you're asking for, just like they do with highways and aviation but they won't.
I agree. As long as Amtrak isn't a serious player, people will only look at travel by train when there are no other options. If it's going to take government investment, then we need to stop nickel and diming the projects, and get it done. The way I see it, airlines aren't so profitable now, so what do we have to lose?
And if it's the rails that are keeping the trains from going high speed, and causing delays for freight trains, then maybe we need more rails.
My 6 year old and I took the Texas Eagle to Texas from Milwaukee before Thanksgiving. It was more expensive than 2 coach tickets to east Texas but I wanted to avoid the airlines on a major holiday, lost luggage, and see if it could be fun. It was a nice sleeper car BUT impossible to sleep. Like being in constant turbulence. Meals were good. 6 year old loved the top bunk. Amtrak screwed us over though and a week prior called to say that our return trip had to be cancelled because they were pulling the sleeper car out on the return, had no replacement planned and no coach seats. When I asked how we were supposed to get home, they offered either return on December 1st (Hello! I work!) or nothing. Not even possible to do a longer reroute. So Amtrak decides to service a sleeper care on the BUSIEST weekend of the year. Luckily we got American Airlines to go home, who delayed my bag by a day but at least I got it back. So, that was my one and only Amtrak trip.
USA is doing everything to make the people of Europe live badly! So that the European economy will fall! USA does this in order to rule the people of Europe and send them to war with Russia, so that the people of Europe will fight and die in the war with Russia"""!""! USA in this war will sit across the ocean and sell weapons to Europe and laugh at the Europeans! USA needs a war between Europe and Russia in order to survive itself, as the Anglo-Saxons have always done!
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My hubby worked in the railway business many years ago, and the word "service" is code for "broken down, needs to be fixed". But they weren't allowed to say that. So, service it is..... 😡
Asher: I would bet that every person who has ever taken the train in the US has horror story. Mine was SF to Reno (in winter) and back. We took coach seats, gambled all night and planed to take a train back.... hoping to sleep in our seats. NOPE. The train was delayed around Chicago of course. Three hours later than planned we were on the train going home....We had a purser/conductor(?) pointing out stuff THE WHOLE WAY BACK - OVER THE LOUD SPEAKER. Sandwiches we got were awful. And we ( surprise!) didn't win in Reno.
Honestly this is a bunch of whining
plane ticket prices are not the most accurate, gotta take into commute time to airport, parking or uber, commute from airport to destination city. Amtrak picks you up and drops you off within walking distance of downtowns.
20 years ago, I looked at booking from New Orleans to Canada - the prices quoted by Amtrack were twice what the airlines quoted.
Atlanta is one of the most populated cities in the country, and there is no passenger rail service there.
Surprised Elon's not tried to flog Hyperloop to the city council yet, promising big but ending up with a tunnel full of Teslas and gamer lights.
The so-called train and rail system in this country is like the stone age compared to the modern high-speed trains in countries like Japan and especially China.
Japan has better rail than China though
@@akgupta94 Debatable.
That's what happens when you keep taking money from oil and airline companies that are lobbying you to prevent rail from improving, rail in the US sucks by design, it's not an accident, no wonder why private companies take matter into their own hands and build actually good rail services like Brightline
@@akgupta94 Salty anti-Chinese Indian spotted. Does India have one? Then argue about others.
@@truedarklander rail transport in general, including computer trains, definitely Japan. High speed rail, China
Trains should be treated as a public infrastructure instead of a for-profit business. It'll need a lot of spending upfront before it becomes economically viable. But once you've crossed that threshold it's incredibly convenient and cheap.
For example: right now train ticket prices are too high because there aren't that many trains. Trains are scarce because people traveling by train are scarce. Train travelers are scarce because train ticket prices are too high.
In 2001 AMTRAK opened a new service from Brunswick, Maine to North Station in Boston. It was hugely popular and was sold out on most days. Much more demand than seats. AMTRAK’s answer to this problem logically would be to add cars to the train or add more trains to the route to accommodate the demand. AMTRAK did none of those. They just raised the price of a ticket and reduced demand.
All trains outside the Northeast Corridor must be supported by state-funds. The States of Maine and New Hampshire fund those trains. Amtrak does not have any say in frequency, food service, consists (cars), etc. All controlled by the states who support the service. :)
My wife and I rode the train from Roseville Ca to Reno NV. It was a fun trip. But it cost us $500 round trip. To drive would have taken us 1.5 hours each way and one tank of gasoline at $75. The train took 4 hours each way. We rode the train as a novelty. Probably wont do it again. It is not economical nor expedient. However it was fun and relaxing.
That was way too much for the fun of riding on the train. The best trip of my life was amtraking from LA to Minneapolis on the Empire Builder route. It was like 20 years ago but it was less than 300 for a 3 day and 2 night journey of a lifetime. To be honest I spent the whole trip in the observation car with the huge windows and the couches and the easy chairs and I felt like a little kid looking at the picture of America passing outside of my window in a far more comfortable seat than everyone else. My eyes were just so glued to the scenery that you could never see from the hwy and it was amazing. As a bonus after it was dark and nothing to see outside there was a big TV on each end of the car that showed a couple of movies. But it got even better as after the 2nd movie was over the car was empty almost as I discovered that people were crashing on the easy chairs and even the couches and the conductor didn't have a problem with it. The things that I saw were amazing and unexpected, but I'll remember it as long as I live. I Challenge you and your wife to take this train from SF to Chicago maybe and then fly home, I'll never forget sitting in the observation car as the sun was rising over Mt Shasta in 10 shades of orange and pink as the train was moving slowly through the s curves following the path of the river. It was just incredibly intense and everyone else was just trying to sleep in the regular seats and didn't have a clue about the once in a lifetime experience that I was looking at from my comfortable chair. As I walked through the cars to get a cup of coffee it was amazing to see how the cars were visibly snaking and curving as they wiggled through the path of the river at a slower speed. Everyone else was sleeping mostly and looked so uncomfortable and it seemed like I had found the magical place in the observation car. Anywho, I came prepared for the journey with plenty of snacks and perhaps even a little something to sip on. I hope that you will try the Empire Builder route and just do what I did and have the time of your lives. Best wishes for the best scenery ever...
That's a rip off even though you had a good time. Read what I wrote below and I hope that you are adventurous enough to ride on the Empire like I did sleeping on a couch after the movies and feeling like I wasn't cheating the system b/c the conductor was OK with it. I just accidently found the right place to be after the observation car was empty and it was amazing and a lot more comfortable than the people that were just trying to sleep in those regular seats as they totally missed the sun rising apon the snow covered Mt Shasta...
I like amtrak, but one of my concerns are the delays. My friend had to deal with delays of over eight hours. I know things happen once in a while, but it can throw a lot of people off schedule
I used to take Amtrak to Los Angeles to catch overseas flights. Too many times the train was delayed too much or cancelled. Unreliable causing me to buy last minute domestic air tickets to make my international connection.
I lucked out taking a round trip on The City of New Orleans last month. Got into Chicago a half hour early, and returned to New Orleans almost an hour early. Depends on freight traffic, plus accidents when vehicles think they can outrun trains.
I wish the DOJ would actually start enforcing Amtrak's priority over freight trains, or we should just nationalize the railroads already like they have in most other developed countries. Would make mainline electification a lot easier too.
Took a train from Sacramento to Baltimore first time I saw the country I had a blast.
They BARELY touched the main reasons why this is: no control of rail outside the NEC and Keystone Corridor and lack of service and hangups due to freight companies. Electrification of the rail and Nationalization is the path to Amtrak's success.
This.
Agreed. I also wish they had harped more on the fact that the whole reason Amtrak has subpar infrastructure is because the federal government has been underfunding Amtrak and rail in general for decades while pouring billions into subsidies for highways and airports.
@@jacorp7476 So more taxes instead of high ticket prices for inefficient service. OK
@@johnyoung5392 Lol, way more of your taxes have gone to constructing massive highways that have to be repaved every 10-15 years. Highway maintenance and construction costs a lot more than rail infrastructure in the long term.
@@jacorp7476 I'm ok with that. Roads have a car over them over 90 percent of their lifetime use whereas a rail would be lucky to have a train over it 1 percent of the time. That's how the market evaluates utility.
This is why Amtrak and all of the tracks in the United States should be nationalized. Honestly I think it was super stupid to try to make Amtrak try to profit. Public transportation is not supposed to profit. It’s supposed to serve the people
Exactly. No one should have to pay nearly 200$ to 300$ just to go from NYC to Washington DC
Why not have a limited consortium of states that jointly owned the tracks between New York and Washington DC? Don’t involve the rest of the country as they are not going to be served, just have a joint authority between those states to own and run it.
@@starventure It would be a mix of federal and state owned. Also plenty of more places in plenty of states to get more service
@@transitcaptain I believe that keeping the feds out of it would make it more efficient and get more done.
@@starventure They’re already involved in a certain way because it’s somewhat government owned, but still a for-profit company. Under this way they would be better involved
The cost is exactly why people fly and don't take the train. You are also adding the sunk cost of time. Considering as well that PTO is not mandatory in the USA, Americans do not usually have all that much time to take a train either. The views are nice, it's an interesting experience but I have only taken a long distance train in the USA once. It was actually cheaper back then.
Time is only an issue for really long distance travel. For a couple hundred miles, you are usually faster door to door by train, if you include travel to and from airports.
@Tom R I guess if you're going to neighboring cities, like 200 or 300 miles, is that what most people use them for? But I usually just drive short distances like that. More typically, I fly to New York from Missouri. It's like a 2.5 hour flight, perhaps 4-5 hours all in. Train is like 16 hours. Flying to the west coast is way worse. 4 hour flight to Portland, 6 hours all in. Train takes 54 hours.
@@SomePotato
" For a couple hundred miles, you are usually faster door to door by train"
I agree with 200 mile limit....usually people think it's 400 miles lmao....HSR only goes 200 mph so 200 mile radius. Of course with Amtrak the typical average speed is about 35 which limits the radius to 35 miles.
But usually where you're going is farther than 200 miles. For example I plan on going to WonderCon in Anaheim in March, and I live in San Jose, that's 365 miles. We have an HSR project here in California that is a complete failure, and if they ever completed the system, which they can't (long story), it would take three hours to get to Anaheim.
The flight is about one hour. Plane wins.
@@neutrino78x The train will pick you up in the city and drop you off in the city. On a 3h train trip, the train wins. Driving to and from the airport, plus security, will easily eat that time.
@@SomePotato
"The train will pick you up in the city and drop you off in the city."
Argh why do you people cut and paste these arguments?
This is true to a greater extent in Europe, or maybe in the NEC. Outside of the NEC, generally speaking the airport is closer to the city itself. For example, in San Francisco, BART gets you to SFO in 28 minutes. You can drive in 20. Security is a five minute thing if you have "CLEAR" and 20 if you don't.
None of this makes up for the train taking two hours longer.
Now, if the train were under 2 hours, and the plane is one hour, then you have more of an argument. But generally speaking, we're not faced with that in North America and Australia.
We have lots of transit here in the Bay Area. It's how I get around; I don't know how to drive. I live in San Jose aka Silicon Valley. If I want to go to SF from SJ, I take Caltrain. If I want to go all the way down to Los Angeles, I take Southwest Airlines. In San Jose, the airport and the train station (the one where HSR would originate, same one where Caltrain stops) are a ten minute drive from each other, 20 minutes on public transit. We have a height limitation on buildings downtown because the airport is so close.
Just face the truth: the same solution isn't going to work everywhere in the world.
Problem with AMTRAKis that the rail lines ARE NOT IN A STRAIGHT LINE. Amtrak uses ancient tracks from the 20 an 30 's that zig-zag thru towns.
We need a better passenger train system!
And more lines going directly to big warehouses
I’m just old enough to remember rail trips as a kid that were pre-Amtrak. It wasn’t difficult to take a train to most any second and third tier city in the country due to freight railroads offering service to communities along its lines. If Amtrak can dig a little deeper, and put more of those types of communities on its map, its long-distance trains would benefit immediately.
they turned those routes into bicycle path, sorry. sold the steel to China. the day is coming
Fantasy world. I rode a pre-Amtrak passenger line. No A/C, open windows only. The snack bar was an ice bucket with candy in it. The seats were padded with straw, many of which were torn. I looked out the window and I could see cars driving faster than us down a 2 lane road. Same route 15 years later, bucket seats with A/C, snack cars, but same wobbly track. Same route today, less wobbly track and way more expensive. So expensive it's not worth the time.
The train system in this country is just sad
In Europe their automobile fuel is taxed to subsidize rail transportation. We need to do that.