Slow Amtrak

[Amstruck]

In my recent visit to California I tried Amtrak train operated by Caltrans. It's not impressive at all. In fact, train travel in the US is worse than in many of third world countries. It's not difficult to see that they design it that way intentionally. It's slow and almost always late! Their excuse? They claim they have lower priority over freight trains, which own the track. And the intense dirty politics have virtually stop the progress of high speed rail construction. What a shame!

 

[CCC1007]

In my recent visit to California I tried Amtrak train operated by Caltrans. It's not impressive at all. In fact, train travel in the US is worse than in many of third world countries. It's not difficult to see that they design it that way intentionally. It's slow and almost always late! Their excuse? They claim they have lower priority over freight trains, which own the track. And the intense dirty politics have virtually stop the progress of high speed rail construction. What a shame!

do you have a question?

 

[Ryan]

Thanks for your valuable contribution to the forums.

 

[afigg]

And the intense dirty politics have virtually stop the progress of high speed rail construction. What a shame!

That would come as a surprise to the CA HSR program which is building a starter high speed rail line in the Central Valley. And thanks to Governor Brown and the state legislature will get 25% of the revenue from the CA Cap & Trade auction for CO2 pollution that could net the CA HSR project $1 billion or more a year towards construction and bond debt service. Yes, the CA HSR project has run into intense and very vocal opposition, but the political support in the state has been enough to keep the LA to SF HSR program moving ahead.
As for the three current CA corridor services, yes, none of them are all that fast, but they do get pretty good ridership numbers. There are also a number of HSIPR and state funded track and station projects either underway or in the near term plans to improve the reliability and trip times of the current services. It is a long slog to incrementally improve the conventional corridor services, but California has been doing so in bits and pieces for the past 20 years.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Amtrak is absolutely worse than most first world developed countries but I'm not aware of any third world undeveloped countries which have objectively superior service to Amtrak. Can you name some examples?

 

[jis]

If you suggest what criteria are important I can attempt to provide some informed comments. Absent that I think I shall refrain

 

[TylerP42]

So if you don't have any questions... and all you wanted to do was rant. You know ranting is something you should do to a friend? Not to a bunch of people on a forum who have real questions to answer?

 

[Alice]

Well, he did put this in trip reports, and he did make a report (sparse as it is and void of details), and I wouldn't expect questions here in trip reports. Now I'm not saying it is a well-written trip report, but geez, just ignore it! The guy has been a member for a day-and-a-half and pretty nearly all his posts are negative.

 

[CCC1007]

Do we have a new DA?

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Do we have a new DA?

Being "DA" involves more than just adhering to devout cynicism. You have to be able to articulate your complaints with specific concerns and preferably some examples. Otherwise you'd be no better than the blindly apologetic cheerleaders who helped create a vacuum for DA to fill in the first place. Most of my complaints about Amtrak come from my experiences elsewhere in the world, but claiming Amtrak is worse than third world countries doesn't hold any water, at least in my experience.

 

[Ryan]

Yeah, comparing the OP and DA are like apples and rocks. For all your negativity, you are grounded in reality without resorting to unsupportable, hyperbolic crap like the OP.