Is Amtrak worth saving?

It’s a damned shame that it’s not a bigger part of our transpo system.

Amtrak is an awesome alternative transportation method that I use regularly to travel from San Francisco to Sacramento. Many people commute to work daily via Amtrak. But yeah, far too many people use and rely on Amtrak to ever loose it and I hope even more turn to using it instead of filling the roads full of ‘driver only’ cars.

And besides, I’ve sworn to never ride Greyhound again for the rest of my life, enough is enough.

Amtrak could be great – it is very much worth it to Americans to do everything they can to save, revitalize, and support rail systems over highways.

I took a trip on Amtrak from Emeryville to CT! It was really fun except we were two hours behind schedule quickly into the mountains of Utah, they ran out of snacks late the second day, the porters were rude and impersonal, and the bathrooms flowed to capacity with stench around that same time. I met a lot of genuinely nice people and there were many retired people traveling to see their grandkids. (The only way they could afford it was the usual story.) We had a whole train car full of Amish. I don’t think I could bring myself to get on a Greyhound bus from the stories I’ve heard. Amtrak was inexpensive and wearing but improvements should continue especially for those of us without personal transportation. I would never take an over-nighter again without my own private car. Too many smokers getting up and down and a lot of loud snoring as well.

I’ve taken a couple big Amtrak trips – Philly to Minneapolis, Seattle to San Jose – they were both great. The problem is, I don’t think a twice-in-a-lifetime iconic train experience is necessarily enough to justify Amtrak’s existence. Anyone who has spent any time at all in Europe probably suffers from serious train envy, like I do – if only we had a system like that! I would never own a car again.