• @AA5B
    link
    12 days ago

    Passenger rail was faillling across the country. Pretty much every private rail company was going out of business.

    Amtrak was the rescue plan. Sounds good right? Amtrak took ownership of a bunch of money losing routes across the US and were required to keep the nationwide service. No track (except northeast), no reliable government funding. Can’t decrease service. Can’t raise fares much. No way back to profitability.

    The additional funding signed by Biden was the way back. Currently Amtrak is profitable on the Northeast Corridor only, and that funds the rest of the system. Even that has several choke points that are over 100 years old. They desperately need upgraded infrastructure in order to function. That funding also included increased service in a few places, to try to make it useful to someone. All too much of Amtrak is useless stuff like one train per day. Of course they’re not selling any tickets