Too expensive, too slow, too remote.
Thanks to Washington DC.
Even freight trains hauled by steam locos used to be faster than the freights running today.
I really want to spend three days on a train from SF to PHL at three times the price of a 4 hour air flight. Makes perfect sense to me.
Talk about DUH!!
True...and I also prefer to take the chopper to avoid ground-level traffic. Let’s face it: you have a much better chance of finding a helipad near your destination than a train station.
“Too expensive, too slow, too remote.”
You forgot it doesn’t go where you want to go.
Exactly!
I rode trains as a 14 year old kid going to and from boarding school. They used to wind through the back woods of our nation, a path where you would see things you couldn’t from other vantage points. Talk about a lovely trip from Joplin, Missouri to Siloam Springs, Arkansas. It was about as beautful as you would ever want to see.
I’ve ridden them to Kansas City a few times.
If you have the shekels and the time, it’s a romantic way to travel.
Other than that, no thanks.
Some commuter trains are doing pretty good here in Los Angeles. I’m not sure they’re turning a profit, but it sure gives the local politicos something to brag about.
BTW, the cost of the California Super-Train just went up again. I know, I know, who could have believed it would? /s
Judy Garland - On the Atchison Topeka and the Santa Fe
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S87evkiu4iA
I have liked riding trains since I was a little kid. I have always thought that Amtrak should be parted out to individual railroads and the Fed Gov should contract with them to provide passenger service. Private rail is more efficient
Ramsey County leaders joined their peers from St. Paul and the state Wednesday to welcome Amtrak to their meticulously restored depot. The first train, the westbound Empire Builder from Chicago, arrived at 11:13 p.m. -- 70 minutes late -- en route to Seattle and Portland, Ore.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3153993/posts
Price!
I’d love to travel by train, especially when my kids were young. But it cost four times more than a flight and, what would take half a days travel by air, takes days of travel by rail.
Hubby and I always dreamed of taking a train tour of the US in our retirement. A cruise to Mexico is cheaper and more pleasant.
And don’t forget, too unreliable and too union.
true, but some areas — specifically in the north-east and california it would make sense. As one of the commenters pointed out: the California High-speed is badly designed (of course it is — govt did it) with the first line between two places that won’t see any real business. Better to target two close cities first rather than build castles in the air.