It's a similar distance as Penzance-Exeter in the UK which has 22 trains in each direction on a weekday
Do city streets make a profit? How about sewers?
The value of those resources is immeasurable - they enable trillions of dollars of economic benefit in the US alone.
Instead of trying to nail on rail to cities it should be part of comprehensive travel planning that includes roads, etc. But selling it alone gets things like the California High Speed rail which hasn't sped anywhere, and dampens further similar projects.
Amtrak is a state owned enterprise. It is for profit, but it’s understood that it’s an economic multiplier.
We demand that public transit be self-sufficient, while subsidizing private personal transportation. The market is a great "figure out the most efficient solution" mechanism, but not if you skew it in favor of one particular solution as we're doing now.
If only there were some other way to collect funds for roads. One idea could be that governments require some kind of annual "license" that they charge you for. Alternatively, since private automobiles involve a large capital purchase, maybe we could levy some kind of fee or tax on the purchase to cover annual road maintenance.
https://www.businessinsider.com/history-of-amtrak-train-rail...
This idea that services shouldn't turn a profit is a massive problem.
