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Comment by ghaff | Hacker News Reader

I hate driving into Manhattan.

I'd much rather take rail relative to the alternatives even if it takes longer and maybe costs more (especially leaving aside parking). And many others do as well even if it would be faster to drive.

And generally Manhattan is pretty walkable once you're there.

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Boston to NY is 215m, it should take at most 90 minutes by modern train, 2 hours by century old lines.

York to London is 215m and 2 hours, along a line that’s nearly 200 years old. Paris ti Lyon is 290 miles and takes 2 hours on a 40 year old track.

If we could just get rid of that pesky Connecticut in the way

That is interstate commerence, amtrak as a federal agency could win any fight if they tried. But that needs leadership that cares (congress)

What is the typical charge for those? I remember traveling around Italy by rail pretty cheaply.

SNCF prices vary a lot of when you book. You can see [1] that prices in the next week vary from 29 to 85 euros (I think you can get even cheaper booking further in advance)

[1] https://www.sncf-connect.com/app/en-en/home/shop/results/out...

You're missing the fine print. It's like $200 for a ticket if you want to take it at any reasonably competitive time, like a Friday at 5pm. It's basically a system for the 1% of wealthy super commuters.

Yeah, I feel like nobody talks about the price of Amtrak enough. For some reason the conversation is almost always on its speed or that we don't have enough lines.

Those things are true, but like, jeez, the price. I for one don't even mind Amtrak's slow speed on its own, but not when it's more expensive than faster options!

I agree with you; but that is a low bar for qualifying Acela as a decent system.

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