People care deeply about a lot of things, just not this. And why should they? When you have every business decision made either by private equity or public companies with a focus only on the next 90 days it turns out everything goes to shit. Wages are stagnant. Wealth inequality is massive. Our society is sick. Issues like this will only increase. Our rail ecosystem is experiencing the same issues for the same reason.
$1000 for a first class ticket from DC to BOS. 6.5 hours.
Same flight first class with Delta this week is $850. Also 6 hours with layover.
Blows my mind first class rail travel is as much as first class air travel.
In my experience, in the UK, taking a train is more expensive than taking a flight (or driving, for that matter).
The train cost more, but you enter the train in the city centre, sit down and relax, go to the restaurant car and eat a nice dinner, relax som more and you arrive in the destination city.
This works better in continental Europe, where you have shorter distances and high speed trains between the capitols, often making the train faster from city centre to city centre than air travel. Traveling from Chicago to SF by train is pleasant, but take a couple days, not a couple of hours.
I took the Amtrak a couple times from DC through WVA and have had several delays trying to get from VA to KY due to priority being given to the freight trains. I remember one trip having a one or two hour delay in the middle of no where while we were side tracked.
It is much, much more comfortable than a plane though.
Also IME Amtrak's prices are surprisingly reasonable. More like a place around the corner than like an airport food court.
I haven't ridden Amtrak in a long time, but I would be absolutely shocked if the first class experience on the Acella is as nice, much less worth a premium compared to flying. Regardless, there's pretty much nothing they could offer to make it worth the price premium.
I guess it has to do with planes replacing plane, hence plane must be better, hence more expensive.
But the reality is that the plane won because of two things: speed and cost. Air is free. Miles of miles of railroad is very expensive to build and maintain.
Trains are a bit cheaper than planes. But they travel slowly. So cost per mile per passenger is lower for a plane.
Even when subsidized, the cost of rail travel is often more expensive per mile than air travel.
So when Europe and Asia now are building a lot of high speed rail, it's not to make it cheaper, but to lower carbon footprint and to make a more pleasant experience.