I would rather pay double than almost die on Amtrak. I speak from experience.
But in Canada where I live, the train is much nicer, reliable, and doesn't try to screw you.

My boss never flies. He and his family take a train down to Florida several times a year. They'll plan ahead if they're going out to California (from PA, it's a 2+ day trip). And they love traveling that way. Another benefit to traveling by train, you can take your car with you.

It seems like every day, there is a new reason to not fly. The furthest I've taken Amtrak is 4.5 hours from Philly to Richmond. Overall, they've been pleasant experiences from the Amtrak side. Dealing with other travelers is always frustrating.

not plummeting 20,000 feet to your death is a nice benefit. At least for those of us who think about that, alot, during the entire flight, on the white tube rocketing through the sky.

i'm taking the train from portland, ore to vancouver BC. Only $42 each way, woo-hoo

Let me start by saying I love train travel and up until a few years ago when I had to conquer my fear of flying for a conference in spain I only traveled by train (including a marathon 50 hour trip from Albany to New Orleans). Having said that, there are some flaws in the OP's love letter to trains. First is, not all Amtrak trains are the same. In terms of electrical outlets, while you might have them on the trains leaving Chicago to Detroit, good luck finding any outside of the cafe car on the return trip. Also I'd like to find the mythical sub-$5 danish he waxes nostaligic about. The food on the Amtrak cafe car is the same quality and price of airline food, in fact I think they more or less use the same vendor. The $6 microwaved pepperoni pizza is particularly horrific. Also while coach is roomier it might be a benefit for a 5-6 hour trip; however don't dare to try a 12-20 hour trip in coach as the comfort level dramatically decreases around the 8 hour mark and you are now in a tube listening and smelling all the other passengers who pay $18 to travel 20 hours.

I love taking the train. Nowadays, it's my favorite way to travel.

philadelphia to orlando overnite (~20 hrs). once we got past d.c., it was really nice (the train stops in everyone's backyard in the NE corridor), but word to the wise: fork over the extra bucks for a cabin. sleeping in coach sucks what with people dropping luggage on your head as they try to get it in the overhead bin & all.

even with the constant wake-ups, i was still much more refreshed when we made it to orlando than i would've been with the trip by car (or even by plane - that circus certainly drains your energy).

I am an overnight manager at a luxury hotel in a city Amtrak services. People have checked in with me, utterly exhausted, eight, ten, and twelve hours after they were due to arrive! I've travelled many times in Southern California and the Pacific Northwest on Amtrak, and have been delayed almost every single time. Not even the worst airlines have that kind of record.

Passenger trains are the lowest priority on the track. If a freight or cargo train needs to use a track, the passenger train just gets to wait it out. Not even the worst airlines have that kind of record.

I wish trains looked like it in economy ;)

Here in Canada, they are pretty comfortable (more than a bus). If you go on a long trip, you can even get a room with shower. Pretty cool, and you can stretch your legs anytime. Also, since they are a wagon or two for ''cafeteria'' (basically bring your own lunch), if you have kids, it can pass time quicker, with the tv and games.

I've done the Pittsburgh to NYC trip 2x on Amtrak. And I'd do it again in a second. Relaxing, scenic, spacious, and a slight feeling of adventure.

Also, it was nice and cheap.

@DeepFriar: How often are there plane crashes? I mean, its pretty safe.

Also I don't know how helpful seat belts are in a train wreck or a plane wreck. Really you're screwed either way. Luckily, it's very unlikely to happen.

Last time I rode on a train was from London to Paris. Bonuses? Much easier to sleep without constant flight attendant announcements, and an amazing salmon dinner with unlimited wine that supplemented the already-cheap ride.

Yea, that article is written when he JUST got on the plane.

Taking the train from Halifax to Montreal, normally a 4 or so hour flight, was supposed to take 24 hours, instead took 28. We were in a sleeper car but people came in and out at all hours of the night, boarding and departing at their stops. The train was so loud that I couldn't sleep, so 28 hours without sleep. A sandwich was four dollars and there was not enough room to put all my stuff in and only ONE plug for the entire train, which had to be fought over and camped out at.

However, when I went from Halifax to Moncton, a 4 or 5 hour train ride. It was lovely, got to see lots of beautiful things and it was really enjoyable. I would never do it again for anything longer that maybe 6 hours.

The big plus is that with via rail,if your train is delayed by two hours, they give you a 50% voucher for your next trip.

The longest train ride I'd ever had was the F train from Kings Highway, Brooklyn to 169 Street in Jamaica, Queens. That was one heck of a long ride.

As much as I want to ride Amtrak and go long distance, it's still fairly expensive for me. Flying was cheaper, though with recent unfolding of events, that may not be the case anymore.

The only problem with train travel in the U.S. is that Amtrak is at the mercy of the host railroad (the exception is the Northeast Corridor which are the only tracks that are owned & operated by Amtrak).

The host railroads do not like Amtrak since trains hauling freight makes way more money for them. So what they do is assign Amtrak trains a low priority status which in-turn makes them eternally late to their destinations.

In order for passenger train travel in the U.S. to be competitive with air travel is to changes the rules in regards to Amtrak trains or pay more to the host railroads for on-time delivery of Amtrak Trains. Until something like this happens, Amtrak will never be able to compete.

I took a high-speed train from Madrid to Algeciras last summer (4-5 hours or so). The train was silent, we had enough leg room to not only stretch out, but to place our bags in front of us, and seeing the countryside up close was a beautiful.

I dream of the day when the US has some sort of infrastructure like they have in europe.

I read in my local paper yesterday that the trip from Utica, New York, to Boston before World War Two might have taken six hours. Now, since Amtrak has to share track with CSX (who has priority), the same trip is scheduled at almost nine hours. All the schedules are padded like this for this reason. People had no idea how fast the trains USED TO BE.

I take Amtrak for any trip that will take (on train) less than six hours. Yeah, it might only be a two-hour flight -- but once you factor in getting to the airport, the security line, the all-but-inevitable flight delay, then getting your baggage at the end and getting from the airport to your actual destination, there's actually not much time difference at all. Not all cabins are as nice as the ones above, but I have found the trains just as clean and infinitely more comfortable than planes. Sometimes there are train delays, but in my experience they tend to be more of the "20 minutes late" variety than the "5 hours of hell" the airports love to dish out. Not all cabins have laptop outlets, but many do, and the quiet car is actually quiet. You can get up and walk around if need be, and when you get where you're going, you already have all your bags, and most train stations are located right in the heart of the cities/towns they service -- boom, you're there.

More than six hours, the plane actually does save time, and the costs don't tend to be much different, so I usually suck up the inconvenience and go. But I'd rather take a train trip than a plane trip any day.

My only gripe is that about one out of every five Amtrak cars is air conditioned to the point of insanity -- like, it must be about 60 degrees in there. But I've learned to carry a blanket.

MetroNorth in the NYC area is an interesting trade-off with regards to rail travel. Fares are reasonable, schedules are accurate, but the trains are dirty as hell and always smell like an overused chemical toilet.

@mgy: Unfortunately, the last time we spent that kind of dough on infrastructure, we got the Interstate Highway System. Good for cars and trucks; not so good for anything else.

Still, you would think the rights of way for these highways can be widened a bit for intercity rail.

@azntg

The F train is a mistake to put it simply.

A train FTW!!!.... too bad I take it from the rockaways into Manhattan everyday.... Hour and a half each way just to get down town... :-(

I just scheduled yet another Philly-NYC run on Acela. One thing that seemed new - the phone system had a recorded message stating that passengers were limited to two pieces of luggage, not counting purses/laptops, etc. Is this in fact new? Is it just for ACELA? Are the trains trying to lighten their loads as well now?

The real fun was a few years ago, the Saturday before Thanksgiving, when I was trying to get out of Carbondale, IL, along with all the other students. There was a train derailment between there and Chicago. What should have left at 4 PM via train and arrived in Homewood, IL sometime around 9 PM left at like 11 PM via bus and got to Homewood like 10 AM.
That said. there's not really any viable alternative to Amtrak for getting from Chicago to Carbondale without driving, and the other 15 or so times I've taken the train between Chicago and Carbondale it's been reasonably hassle-free.

Too bad about the 3-5x the cost, 10-15x the travel duration...(speaking for the trans-continental routes I've looked at). It takes a lot of qualititatives to make up for those quantitatives.

trains are stupid expensive. it's usually at least $100 each way boston-NYC on amtrak, at least for those of us who always end up getting tickets at the last minute. i'd rather risk my life with fung wah for $15.

We doubt that all the Amtrak cars are as nice as the Silverliner pictured above

I used to take the Hiawatha service from Chicago to Milwaukee for work a few times a week, this line uses regular coach cars. The seats were easily 33% wider, more likely 50% wider than coach seats on any major airline. The seat pitch was unbelievable ... if you wanted to rest / sleep on the trip, you could. Plenty of legroom for the tallest person and room to recline without impacting your neighbors. These are the cheapest seats that Amtrak offers, and they blow airline seats away by a longshot.

I would say that the only downside is, you should come on board prepared for weather conditions, especially in the winter. Twice on my trip, the train broke down and they had to bring in another engine. Which left us sitting in southern Wisconsin in the middle of winter with no engine running to heat the train. Keep a parka handy if you travel in the winter.

Trains are better than planes because you can stand between the cars with one foot on either side of the joint, watch the two sides move up and down independently of each other, and feel as though you're doing something extremely dangerous.

I was about 8 the last time I rode an Amtrak, is it obvious? Simple pleasures, people.

My first time on the Amtrak was even worse than any poor experience on a plane. Five hour delay because they thought they hit someone on the tracks in Ann Arbor.

But at least the train was nearly empty and outlets were plentiful. Those can often be well worth the quality of a trip, compared to a plane.

Amtrack is HORRIBLE. They're way overpriced, all of their cars have been used as the "smoking car" at one point or another, and there's no such thing as assigned seats, even if the ticket tells you there is.

Avoid, avoid, avoid.

Amtrak is the ONLY way to travel in the Northeast. New York to DC is heavenly compared to the drive or flight.

I count a train trip from Chicago to Flagstaff as one of my favorite all-time travel memories. We had a sleeper, which obviously made it a lot better, and I was 10 and not 6-foot-4 as I am now, so I don't know how roomy that sleeper would seem today. Planes are definitely the way to go for business/weekend trips, but I definitely will look into it for my next vacation.

I'm flying from London to Amsterdam on BA for about 58 pounds, and the flight takes around an hour and 20 minutes. Or, for nearly 200 pounds, I could have taken the train which would have taken 5.5 to 6.5 hours.

I like the train. Despite how bad Amtrak is, it's a great deal better than flying.

I plan on taking the train next month to an anime convention and maybe another one next year. When I can grab the train for $17 each way why drive in all that crap? My car gets 34 mpg and at $4 a gallon I can get approximately 150 miles for the price of that ticket which is approximately the same BUT I don't have to pay parking (which is $40 a day at some hotels in the big city!)

I'm not much for going green but having the ability to stand up once in a while, read a book, go on my laptop, draw, go use the john etc. instead of being stuck on cruise control and getting tired.

I suppose trains make less sense the more people you have, but that may change as gas goes up or if the government decides to invest in better passenger trains which I doubt. Too bad they won't privatize it. Get us some high speed trains so we can go from Chicago to NYC in 5 hours.

My only train experience was two rides on the Amtrak train that ran from Dallas down to San Antonio (or did it go farther south?). Here's what I learned on those rides:

*The train ride took an extra 4 hours than if we did it by car.
*Both times the train was hours late in leaving the station to head back north.
*Food is expensive and crappy unless it is the inaugural run.
*Heading one way is fine, the extra time on the train can be fun and part of the vacation.
*The return trip is hell because all you can think about is how late it is and that you have to work the next day.

In the end train travel for much of the US is a joke. Yes, the seats are comfortable and you can move about easily during the trip. But train travel misses on too many important points for it to be feasible for the general public.

I take the train from Portland to Seattle all the time, although I wouldn't fly if I wasn't, I'd drive. It takes a little longer then driving, the tracks take a less direct route along the bottom of Puget Sound, but its much less stressful and I can sleep, read, whatever. The dining car isn't much, but they serve Ivar's Clam Chowder so if nothing else that's usually good. The only problem is that I often take the train after sporting events (the Seattle train station is right next to the baseball and football stadiums) and the train is usually full of people who've had quite a bit too much to drink at the ballpark and keep drinking on the train.

Amtrak has done a nice job of increasing demand on its Illinois-wide routes (Chicago to St. Louis, Chicago to Carbondale, Chicago to Quad Cities). One of the best parts, IMO, is that you can bring food and drink right on the train. I have been on several that involved consumption of adult beverages and other things that would NEVER make it on a plane.

Yes, they really do need to do something about Amtrak sharing the rails with freight lines. IIRC that was implemented in the 70's when they were ripping up rail lines all over the US. That ranks right up there with all of the 70's urban renewal that gutted cities of buildings that would today be considered treasures and the trendy part of many cities.

It is 3.5 hours to the nearest rail terminal for us but we are still considering Amtrak for any of our long trips. We can usually take the train for 1/4 the cost of plane tickets.

The real incentive is room, freedom and avoiding the security theater that is the airlines. Airline seats are way too small and I am only 5'7". I have to get up and move around every so often or I literally will not be able to stand up after a while. I would also rather be stuck on a train for double or more the supposed air travel time to avoid psycho flight attendants, being stuck on the tarmak for 5+ hours or the chance of having your flight canceled and left stranded in some airport.

As for $4 sandwiches, that is pretty much the norm anywhere that has even a semi captive audience.

The longest I ever went by train was, I think, Moscow to St. Peterburg. (I might have been on longer-distance trains in Western Europe, but they were shorter-time trips if so.) Sleeper car, and it was relatively awesome. I slept really well, personally, with the swaying and the clacking lulling me to sleep. It was also really old-fashioned, with porters and everything, and a toilet that opened right down onto the tracks (which freaked me out a little).

There was -- I am not making this up -- a mafia killing on the next car in the night. We all slept through it, but our tour group leader was a catastrophic wreck from sitting up all night terrified we were going to get killed next. We still got into St. Pete on time, though. This was in 1994ish; things were pretty disorganized and law was more of a nice idea than an actual fact. (But the trains ran on time!)

@FatLynn: Cross your fingers we get Amtrak in Peoria! They're telling us 2010!

For those of you bitching about the food, you usually can buy or bring your own and not lose it to the security theater people. Most train stations even have restaurants and fast food joints RIGHT INSIDE THEM!

I took a pretty long Amtrak journey last year from Temple, TX to Charlottesville, VA via Chicago. All told it took 50 hours but I actually enjoyed it, for the most part.

The Texas to Chicago part was easily the best leg as it used the double deck trains and there weren't that many passengers so I had the double seat to myself. I got to see parts of the country I'll almost certainly never see again.

Chicago to Charlottesville was not so great on the older single deck train. It was packed and went through more major cities so a seat-mate was pretty much guaranteed all journey. Worse, the part of the journey descending the mountains in WV was so rocky I thought the train would derail.

So plus points were it was much cheaper than any alternative, I had plenty of leg room and could get up and walk at any time.

Negatives were the aforementioned shared tracks. We had to wait 40 minutes outside Chicago while a slew of freight trains went ahead. The food was pretty bad, but it didn't pretend to be something it isn't (how many ways can airlines dress up shite chicken?)

Unfortunately, there's no money in passenger rail to make it very profitable for the big freight railroads to get back into that business. They're quite content with the freight traffic they have now. So privatizing Amtrak won't work.

As for those who say Amtrak is more expensive than flying, that may be true for those of you living next to a major hub airport. But even with the Greyhound bus ticket to catch the train at Albuquerque (Albuquerque's bus station is also the amtrak station), Amtrak coach is HALF the price of flying Southwest Airlines from Amarillo TX. If I spend the same amount on the train as I would to fly I can get a nice private room on the train.

10. It's always fun when that 4 hour car trip, scheduled to take 8 hours by train, leaves 3 hours late and takes 12 hours, instead. (See: Amtrak, D.C. to Durham, N.C.)

i take amtrak frequently from NYC to Albany and back again over weekends. it's way more comfortable and relaxing than driving, but there are some disadvantages. For one thing, they really do overheat in the winter and over- air condition in the summer. also- sometime in the last few years they took out the snack car from most NYC-albany trains (only those that continue on to niagra falls and canada still have food service).

my real problem is this though- for a state subsidized agency from which they've been cutting service recently (like those snack cars), amatrak still isn't really competitive on price. An acela ticket isn't much less than a shuttle flight between NYC, DC, or Boston, and even worse is the comparison with driving. Look at these numbers:

NYC-albany distance = 160 miles
car gas mileage= 25mpg
gallons needed for round-trip=12.8
gas price= $4.50 per gallon
cost of gas for round trip= $57.6
Cost of peak fare 1-way ticket from NYC-Albany= $59

Basically, gas would have to go up to about $9/gallon before amtrak represented a cost advantage over driving, at least on this particular route. Of course, that could happen by summer of 2010, so who knows. Maybe sooner if israel pulls the trigger on iran.

I've taken several trips via Amtrak and have generally had a pretty good experience. As far as price I've almost always managed to get a better deal than a plane ticket due to specials they were running or searching for coupon codes. If one doesn't bother to look through these then you'll often pay more than you need to. I also take on a soft-sided cooler with snacks & little bottles of wine or liquor. Makes for a nice trip. :D

Train travel is ideal in the northeast. Outside of that it's absurd. It would cost me significantly more to take a train from St. Louis to San Diego than it would to fly non-stop on American. And it would take THREE DAYS instead of three hours. Since I don't want to spend 6 days of my one week vacation on the train and spend substantially more money to do it, not really a viable option.

I'd love to take the train, but they seem to make sure it's as hard as possible to do.

Seattle (Where I live) to Las Vegas 2 adults and my 4 year old:
Amtrak (3 Days) = Over $1200 dollars that does not include a sleeper cabin.
Southwest Airlines = $985.50

Acela from Boston to Philly last week was very pleasant. I needed a one-way plane ticket in the afternoon and the best airfare was $460...the train was $179. Comfortable seat, super sandwich that I picked up before I left, lots of legroom, good sized and reasonably clean bathrooms, and internet service the entire way. Door-to-door in about four hours which is not that much longer than it would have been to fly without the TSA and weather hassle.