Maybe this was a mistake.
The United States has always had a love hate relationship
when it comes to train travel.
The country was literally built on the backs of the railroads
and the US used to have the biggest
and the most well-funded rail network in the world.
But if you ask anybody that's taken the Amtrak...
they'll tell you that that's not exactly the case anymore.
The US has fallen woefully behind the rest of the world
when it comes to train travel.
So what the heck happened?
How did the United States get so far behind?
And does it have any chance of catching up?
To find out the answer to that, I'm going to take the Amtrak
from here in Los Angeles all the way to New York City.
And I'm going to have plenty of time to think about it
since it's a... 70-hour journey.
I guess I better get started.
The entire length of my journey
from Los Angeles to New York is about four days long...
and for the first leg of my journey
there weren't any sleeper cars available.
So, this is what my living space
looks like for the next two days
which as somebody that's [BEEP] years old
should be really good for my back.
The journey I'm taking is pretty different
than it would have been about a hundred years ago.
To see the differences, let's take a look at this US map.
The year is 1916 and there's about 254,000 miles of railroads
the highest number there's ever been in this country.
The Pennsylvania railroad, or the Pennsy, as it was referred to...
I feel like that nickname
could have probably used a little more work.
Nevertheless, it was the largest corporation
in the world at the time.
It's difficult to illustrate how influential these companies were...
and how much railroads
were into woven into the fabric of American life.
They were responsible for the temples of their time...
like Penn and Grand Central stations.
Also, you would not believe how amazing
train travel could be back then.
Sure, they had basic boring train cars like the one I’m riding.
But the upscale trains featured
chandeliers, barber shops...
pianos and food service
that would make the Four Seasons look like Boston Market.
One menu featured oysters, consommé...
and celery fed duck.
The bad news is my train
didn't have ducks that were fed anything.
I ate the Thai Red Curry Street noodles
which, although I'm pretty sure they were just a microwave frozen package
were actually pretty good.
And although the accommodations were a far cry from crystal chandeliers
they were comfortable enough.
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.
This is the conductor speaking.
It has now been 5 hours and 15 minutes
which is the time it takes to fly from LAX to Newark Airport.
And we are still in California.
It's only 9:00
but it already got dark outside
so there's nothing to look at through the window...
and there's no Wi-Fi, apparently.
So, I guess I'm just going to go to sleep.
They leave the overhead lights on all night
but luckily I brought my trusty eye mask.
I also brought some earplugs, which should come in handy
because I'm sitting right in front of some iPad kids
who are watching movies at full volume with no headphones.
So, that's fun.
All right.
I'll see you in the morning.
Did I sleep well last night? Hmm?
I'm going to say no.
I'll spare you the details
but imagine getting literally kicked in the head
by the woman in the seat next to you.
I wound up retreating to the observation car to sleep...
which was less than ideal.
Like an astronaut in space.
I'm trying to move around as much as I can
so that my muscles don't deteriorate during my journey.
So let's talk about how American trains
went from gilded pleasure palaces to...
This.
Part of the reason why railroads
became so wildly successful in the first place...
is because they were run by
what were affectionately termed “robber barons”.
Men like Cornelius Vanderbilt...
Jay Gould, James Fisk, and J.P. Morgan.
These guys were ruthless, anti-labor, and really corrupt...
which was great when it came to building
an expansive kingdom of highly profitable rail companies...
but bad when it came to... just about everything else.
As a result, the train companies became pretty universally hated
by the general public.
As seen in what passed for scathing satire at the time.
“Now then, Jim.”
“No jockeying, you know.”
“Let em rip, Commodore.”
“Don't stop to water or you'll be beat.”
The federal government
saw the kind of crap these guys were pulling and was like
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, you can't do that.”
So they instituted a bunch of regulations...
which, among other things...
set fixed rates for the railroad companies.
And also prevented them
from raising their fares or changing their service
without the government's permission.
This didn't seem like that big of a deal at the time...
because as historian Robert Selph Henry said...
“The problem , to some minds at least
was how to keep railroads from making too much money.”
After all, railroads were still by far
the most efficient and the best way for most people to travel.
This all obviously changed when affordable automobiles
and later air travel came into the picture.
So much so that by 1956
only 4% of passenger travel was on trains.
When you take into account that 40 years earlier
that number was 98%
you can see how much the US’s priorities
had shifted when it came to travel.
The train companies were far from a monopoly anymore...
but they were still being regulated as if they were...
which was killing them.
Okay, so, right now we are being held on the tracks
to let a freight train pass.
And this is actually the perfect time to talk about something.
Private commercial passenger trains
have never been very profitable.
The lifeblood of the industry
has always been these: Freight trains.
But rail companies were always forced to provide
passengers service as a benefit to the public.
So when the rail companies began to suffer
and then eventually fold, the government had the idea
to take the responsibility for passenger service
off the plates of the rail companies
who could then focus on the profitable freight side of the business.
They took all the passenger service
and combined it into one company.
Which is how in 1971 we got Amtrak.
Which stands for the American Train Track.
Again, what is up with these nicknames?
“Amtrak makes it easy come, easy go
to more than 450 cities in the USA.”
But here is the thing.
Amtrak was designed to fail from the beginning.
That may sound ridiculous, but let me explain.
First of all
the government created Amtrak as a for profit corporation
despite the fact that virtually no passenger service
anywhere has been profitable.
After all, the government broke off all the passenger trains
from the rail companies because they weren't making money.
When the government formed Amtrak
they tasked it with employing innovative operating and marketing concepts
to develop the potential of modern rail service.
And how much did Congress give them to do that in their
first year of operation?
Just $40 million.
Their budget has gone up a lot since then.
Their budget for the year 2022 was $2.3 billion...
which sounds like a lot, doesn't it?
But when you take into account that the federal highway budget
for the same year was $64.3 billion
you begin to see the inequity.
To put it even more into perspective...
the sum total of all the subsidies that the US
has allocated to Amtrak in its entire history...
is less than one year's funding for the interstate highway system.
This right here shows where America's
priorities lie when it comes to travel...
and why Amtrak has failed to majorly expand or innovate.
Okay, so we just got to Chicago.
I got off the Amtrak about 45 hours after I left Los Angeles.
And needless to say...
I do not smell very good.
I have about a 7 hour layover here in Chicago.
And right now I'm in Union Station...
which is actually kind of amazing.
As you see
I got a chance to put on some clean clothes
which feels amazing.
And now I'm just here in Millennium Park...
rolling around with my suitcase like a dang tourist.
And I'm just trying to enjoy...
not being on a train as much as possible
before I get on the second leg.
The second and final leg of my journey.
I've achieved the Holy Grail...
of my own private room.
I want to show you my favorite feature of the entire room.
You're going to like this.
Hidden sink.
This train is a little bit more...
dynamic, shall we say, than the last one.
But I'm hoping that all the movements...
will just help rock me to sleep.
When I woke up, we had reached Ohio...
about 2600 miles through my journey
and 50 something hours.
There are a lot of reasons
why people still want to take the train.
A big one is the environment.
According to a study by the University of Pennsylvania...
a long distance train trip produces
37% less emissions than taking a flight.
Trains are also much safer than cars.
You're 17 times more likely to die
while driving than taking a train.
Flying and driving can be faster
and sometimes even cheaper than taking the Amtrak.
But they're both often miserable experiences.
Going through TSA
dealing with flight delays or being stuck in traffic
and not being able to do anything
because you need to be driving the car.
While I've been on Amtrak
I've been able to just stare out the window
and see the country go by...
or read a book or take a nap or whatever.
I've been able to wander around the train
whenever I want and stretch my legs.
And I've had the enjoyment of having my own private little room.
And this is with Amtrak being perpetually
and profoundly underfunded.
Imagine what it would be like if this were evened out.
So, I made it.
All total, took me about 72 hours and 17 minutes...
which granted it would have taken me between
5 and 6 hours to fly that distance.
I don't actually know the distance off the top of my head
but I'm going to add it in post right here.
But here's the thing.
I had a good time.
It was actually really fun.
Aside from a couple of hiccups at the very beginning.
It was a really pleasant, memorable experience.
I got to see parts of the country that I had never seen before.
And overall, dare I say, it was a pleasant experience.
Right now, Amtrak covers
roughly 21,000 miles of passenger rail in the US.
But when you look at the map, you can see it's sparse coverage
routes that don't connect...
And sorry, Wyoming and South Dakota
you don't get any trains.
If the United States took Amtrak off life support...
it would revolutionize the way people travel around the US.
When he was retiring
former Amtrak President Graham Claytor said...
“When I came to Amtrak I was convinced I could save it...”
But finally came to the conclusion
that only the American public can save it...
“...when they say they want it.”
Now, if you'll excuse me
I'm going to go take a much needed shower
and go to sleep in a real bed.
I got to rest up for my flight back to California tomorrow.
For me, one of the best parts of riding
the Amtrak is just throwing on some Phoebe Bridgers
and wistfully staring out the window for hours on end.