From the comments section
If I take a train from Dublin to Galway, I have within 20 minutes' walk of either terminus hundreds of bars, restaurants, offices, and other attractions at my disposal. If I take a train from say, Orange County to Phoenix, I have within 20 minutes' walk about 5 freeway overpasses and lots of parking lots.and
Most of the US is a suburban hellscape, with anything worth doing at least 20 minutes' drive away. This is largely the result of ridiculous parking minimums (forcing business owners to subsidize private automobile storage) and NIMBYs fighting denser development because of parking concerns (forcing the government - i.e. all of us, to subsidize private automobile storage). The true irony of this is that it doesn't even ease traffic; people spend most of their time driving not through interesting things but.. automobile infrastructure (after all about 70% of LA's surface area is pavement or buildings dedicated to automobiles).
Most American cities are laid out differently than in Europe (other than older cities in the NE corridor). They are sprawling and spread out. Suburban areas have houses with huge lots. Stores are massive, like Walmart, and have huge parking lots. This makes mass transport within cities impractical. Mass transport only works in places with high population density. Therefore, people might we willing to take a train between nearby cities, like Dallas and Houston or LA and SF, but once they get to their destination, they'd have no way to get anywhere without a car. Alternatives could be taxi (expensive if you have more than a few limited destinations), shared ride van (slow), and car rental (again, rather expensive). Plus the train station itself may be far from your true destination within the city (driving across LA can take hours).
This is why trains are not practical in most US cities for most travelers.
Why don’t “Progressives” think for themselves?
Why do Marxists constantly strive to limit our freedoms and choices?
What business is it to anyone else what damned transportation I choose?
bkmk
Love of personal freedom and independence of travel. In a motor vehicle you leave when you want and distance/speed limitations allowing, arrive when you desire.
brilliant analysis
I lived in England for 3 years and was really impressed with their public transportation system. It actually worked!
Why?
Each (and every) stop had covered areas to wait for the train or bus.
Each station for the trains was clean and well run.
Each bus stop had maps on the walls along with different colors for different routes...clearly showing what bus to take and where it was going.
All public transportation was very efficient in being on time.
Now, take the American transportation system:
First, you have to have a photographic memory to memorize the routes, times and where they go since NONE of that is posted on the walls of the pick-up points. As a matter of fact most pick-up points are simply a post with a “bus stop” sign on it....nothing else. You have to be born with a complete schedule and city route map in your brain to even suspect where our public transportation will take you...and when!
Second, nothing is ever on time. Our system is 100% unreliable.
Compare England and Europe’s transportation systems and our American system rates a score of F.
A few years ago, I looked at AMTRAK from Baltimore to Detroit. For comparison, it was about 2 hours by plane and 9 by car. AMTRAK was 17 hours and the same cost as a plane ticket.
The reason people here don’t ride trains is that they are not profitable. If they were, there would be passenger tracks next to the freight tracks. The Interstate system shut down most passenger trains. Trains only go on the rails, and not where people want to go.
I had a coworker who went to pick his son up in San Diego after he finished his military training. Took him over three days each way. He had to go through St Louis from Texas to get there. He later said “I wish I’d have driven to get him”.
My son won the county geography bee when he was in middle school. The prize was a free Amtrak trip to the state finals in Chapel Hill. To get there from our Western NC county via Amtrak required driving to Greenville, SC, catching the train to Washington DC, changing trains and then heading back south to Durham, NC.
Amtrak is geared to benefit the NE Corridor and residents thereof who want to get to south Florida. I suppose the LA to SF and NE Corridor to Chicago get a bit of traffic. Amtrak is useless to Flyover country and too expensive.
Put good high speed buses on an express lane on the Interstates with terminals at major shopping malls and they would dominate the less than 200-250 mile intercity travel. At least until the TSA screwed things up.
Because it is cheaper to go some other way. I have checked into train travel a time or two. It has always been even more expensive then going by air. And since, unlike many of the countries mentioned, we own personal cars it is also easier to drive.
Well...cause we have had FREEDOM?
Yes!
And our trains no longer go to most towns, as they once did.
The trains themselves are far slower than they once were because, for one thing, the tracks are no longer banked around curves because they are maximized for freight. The infrastructure for passenger rail is gone ... the gov-subsidized hi-speed passenger rail of Europe doesn't run at 200 mph on wooden sleepers!
AMTRAK? As you point out it leaves you high and dry miles short of the destination ... and is damned expensive. Yes, we need our cars. However, the Socialists have determined that the auto is not good for us and see no reason to keep the price of fuel within reason, while they strive to limit production.
because trains are inefficient to a society of liberty and private property. (property of ones person, thoughts, mobility)
Trains are pork and crony projects. trains DON NOT reduce congestion or reduce traffic. This article seems a false flag effort to push the US to herd its citizens like cattle into corruption crime.
Trains are about worker drones. This keeps in track with new company starts DROPPING and more companies closing.
The governments that control the trains want only big company employees NOT individuals.
Trains control where you can travel. They limit mobility choice. (property of ones thought and travel)
Actually if you combine regional train travel with local bus service, you can get within a 20 minute walk to just about anywhere within any US city with a population of over 100,000.
What killed the railroads? The interstate highway system. Whose idea was that?
For short travel/commutes, trains only work in densely populated areas. That way it is financially feasible to have many stops and available, inexpensive transport to get to a final destination.
Any regular that would have additional expensive transportation to get to a final destination makes it an unlikely choice.
Long distance travel on trains is ruined by the time to get from one large city to another. I considered a trip to Florida a year ago on train, and it was almost a 2 day affair. By plane, it’s a few hours. By my own vehicle, it’s a day and a half and I have my transportation with me.
Cost and convenience seem the bottom line to me.
Because Americans are selfish and only care about themselves, which is why we need government to make prices "necessarily skyrocket" so they can be forced onto trains!
I'm right, aren't I?