A major problem with Amtrak today is that they don't own most of their own track, and thus are at scheduling and upgrade mercy of other companies (freight railways...us commercial freight railways are world class). This was also a big problem in the uk after privatization.

Step one may make sense without step two. Rails for freight, get trucks off the highways, and cars, buses, and planes for passengers between cities, with dedicated high speed rail for certain areas, and metro subway and light rail systems in the densest cities.

So the government owns the Amtrak trains but not the track ? What were they thinking ? That's exactly the opposite of what makes sense and what is already done with road and air transport.

Basically, rail travel suffered when jet aircraft became commercialized, and when the personal automobile and interstate highway system became widespread. This happened in Europe to a lesser degree (although there higher density sort of saves the rails, as well as a less-degregulated air industry until recently -- however in the 1990s and 2000s, they ended up in the same situation as the US with respect to trains).

In the 1960s and 1970s, freight lines were losing money on passenger service, and shutting it down. There were a variety of political problems with shutting it down entirely (certain constituencies, especially people in small towns with major trains running through them, religious or cultural groups who liked trains, etc.) strongly supported rail travel.

Amtrak was a political solution to let the freight lines discontinue offering passenger service (and thus be more profitable), while keeping service for political reasons. It would have taken a much larger (20x? 100x?) investment to really create a viable passenger rail service, and it still would have suffered for fundamental technological reasons. If Amtrak were not political, it would have just ended service entirely across most of the country, focusing service on specific markets where rail makes sense (Northeast corridor, essentially, and maybe some commuter services not run by states).

There are some new factors which make rail maybe more suitable today than it was 40 years ago (1. congestion at airports -- we're unwilling to build new/big ones in most cities, 2. the carbon intensive nature of air travel 3. a greater population and general increase in density due to people moving to cities and near suburbs of the biggest cities), so maybe rail makes sense for certain routes now where it didn't before.

Passenger rail, no matter what, makes absolutely no sense for genuinely long distance travel between endpoints separated by nothingness, which characterizes most long distance trips in the US.