Deutsche Bahn’s once-admired service has descended into chaos. Whether decades of poor investment or the company’s unusual structure is to blame, it’s a huge headache for a coalition trying to meet climate goals
Frequent delays. Poor frequency. Weird routes. Slow average speeds that can barely compete with a bus. Always getting bogged down by track-sharing with freight.
The Northeast corridor is the only section of the entire system that is even remotely decent and is basically subsidizing the crappy lines that they are congressionally mandated to run so it’s not even that cost competitive with other modes.
To be fair, most of this isn’t Amtrak’s fault but just a reflection of the fact that America doesn’t care about passenger rail.
My cousin visited Texas from Germany and took a train from Dallas to Austin. The track sharing with freight was insane, the trip took 9 hours due to freight having right-of-way on the tracks. It’s only about a 3.5 hour drive. He was not impressed at all.
If Amtrak is the best we can do we should all be embarassed.
what’s wrong with amtrak?
Frequent delays. Poor frequency. Weird routes. Slow average speeds that can barely compete with a bus. Always getting bogged down by track-sharing with freight.
The Northeast corridor is the only section of the entire system that is even remotely decent and is basically subsidizing the crappy lines that they are congressionally mandated to run so it’s not even that cost competitive with other modes.
To be fair, most of this isn’t Amtrak’s fault but just a reflection of the fact that America doesn’t care about passenger rail.
My cousin visited Texas from Germany and took a train from Dallas to Austin. The track sharing with freight was insane, the trip took 9 hours due to freight having right-of-way on the tracks. It’s only about a 3.5 hour drive. He was not impressed at all.