Honest question: What's the difference? Mitigating the negative aspects involves making others aware of the negative aspects, but many people see that as ranting and railing. What does a productive conversation look like?
The size of the country has almost no bearing on the way we develop our towns and cities, subsidize car production, assume/require car ownership in public policy, etc.
It's also quite the stretch to claim the UK as the best country in the EU and even more to claim that it doesn't also have a car culture. And it's not just "America's worst state", the vast majority of US town and cities are car dependent.
1. The stock is divided into two sets: single decker trains that are falling apart but are still better than new stock because they were designed during an era where there was actual consideration given to comfort. They are old and run down but more comfy.
The new double decker trains are a design by committee nightmare: they have uncomfortable molded chairs made mostly out of plastic, super cold, noisier due to the terrible shifting whine of the electric motors, and now poorly maintained (god help you if you have to use their rest rooms).
2. They are constantly stopping due to priority given to amtrak and commercial rail. In the best case scenario the train takes ~45 mins to get from central NJ to NYC with stops. For about ~20 miles of track distance, that averages out to ~29-31mph. If Amtrack stops you that time is extended.
3. Very slow speeds due to old track technology.
4. Rising ticket costs for the same lousy service. (~$21 round trip from central NJ to NYC) I guess being able to have a digital ticket helps? (It probably helps them more than it helps you)
5. Pure depression because outside the main routes going into NYC and Hoboken, the dregs of society are the only ones riding these trains. This really grates on you if you take the train for years like I did.
6. Recently, they couldn't even provide working windows so people can see the 'beauty' of NJ. ( To be fair after all the TikTok meme videos called them out on this they finally got embarrassed enough to start replacing them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-a3r6i4hiQ )
It all priorities. People in the US just dont want mass rail over other priorities. The people who do are internet keyboard warriors.
(Possibly you mean by some other metric, but I'm struggling to think of _any_ metric by which the UK could be said to be the best country in Europe. Sitcoms, possibly. It does a good sitcom. Even outside London!)
This is the polar opposite of Europe. I've taken even the run down ugly german trains that they still run on irregular routes and even though the trains are antiquated, they make sense and get the job done. People are respectful even if the train is packed. I wouldn't want to go back to trains in America other than for sparse occasional trips.
I often look at maps like this and think maybe that would be amazing: https://i.imgur.com/srMhE1X.png
But then i'd probably just take an airplane for most trips because 1-2 hrs of leg cramps with a typically quiet passenger crew is better then a misbehaved train carriage.
Fixing the trains is not fixing the society. The trains are probably broken because the society is broken.
An example: I live roughly 200m from the Costco in the center of town, but there's a major 4 lane road between us. Walking would be so convenient, but it's so much safer to drive. A footbridge would address this without impacting drivers. I have no intentions of giving up my car, but this particular activity would be so much nicer without it!