I agree with the sentiment, but notice the article is about his first impressions and not what happens after the train starts moving. Amtrak spends most of its time going less than 30 miles an hour. If a freight train needs to go through, you wait. If the freight railway they lease the trackage rights from doesn't feel like maintaining the tracks or signals, you spend 3 hours going 5 miles per hour.

And finally, for longer trips, it's fucking expensive. I really wanted to take Amtrak from Chicago to Portland, but it was like $1400. Flying was much cheaper.

I really want Amtrak to work, but as long as it's continually ignored by people with money to pour into it, it's going to suck. The sad part is that it would actually make money if it were reliable, unlike the airlines which are just creating billions and billions of dollars of debt that they'll never pay.

(BTW, my experience with Amtrak is mostly St. Louis to Chicago, and Chicago to Grand Rapids. The CHI/STL route has gotten a lot of money, and is decent now. They call it high speed, but it's not really. CHI/GRR is a short distance, so it doesn't matter that the train never gets above 50mph. It would be so much nicer if it got up to 90mph and stayed there until the train got to GRR.

Oh well... at least those routes are reasonably priced; about $50 round-trip.)

Trains work well for short distances. The commuter rail from Baltimore to DC for $7, and 45 minutes is great. But if you're traveling 3+ hours, it's probably cheaper to fly.

I recently rediscovered another underappreciated mode of transportation: the bike.

Amtrak is a pleasant, viable alternative to flying as long as you are traveling between Washington, Philadelphia, New York and Boston. The Cascades services between Seattle and Vancouver has some nice scenery as well.

If anyone reading this has about $10MM to invest in a capital intensive but relatively stable venture in the building intermodal train/truck yards let me know. The venture requires a $6MM land purchase.