I think everyone has heard this claim from Amtrak. Anyone who has actually caught Amtrak has seen the gigantic inefficiency’s (the ridiculous boarding process, ancient trains). I’ve been stuck behind freight traffic on Amtrak, but only after we were already running late and had stopped for random “signaling” issues.

If Amtrak want to prove it’s the freight traffic causing the slowness they should quantify how many otherwise ontime routes are delayed by freight.

I have ridden a fairly large amount of Amtrak. I have never seen the boarding process cause a delay. I find the boarding process to be much preferable to airplanes.

"Signaling issues" usually means traffic and sometimes means under-invested infrastructure. There is no question that the slowness of Amtrak is directly related to underinvestment.

>I have ridden a fairly large amount of Amtrak. I have never seen the boarding process cause a delay. I find the boarding process to be much preferable to airplanes.

Same here. I frequently ride between Boston and New York. In New York, I've seen over 200+ people leave the train and another 200+ board the train, especially on Sunday evenings. The whole process takes < 15 minutes.

Boarding is heaven compared to flying. No security theater, no ridiculous parking issues. I used to ride from Rhode Island to DC, and I could literally arrive 10 minutes before my departure time, grab my bags, lock my car, walk 100 feet to the platform, and still make the train. The trip took most of the day, but now that cell service is no longer an issue, it's possible to spend the entire ride relaxing or getting work done.

And I can't believe no one has talked about how much better the seating is than any other form of long distance travel in the US.

I recently traveled from BOS<->NYC for business. I left my office an hour before scheduled departure and walked 30 minutes to Penn Station. A slightly different experience than getting to Newark/La Guardia/JFK. As a bonus, I was returning on short notice, so I was able to easily change to an earlier train 10 minutes before it departed, with no extra fee.

At the end of the return trip, I overheard a group of four other travelers saying that they got so much work done, they should just ride the train back and forth every day.

Seat and ride comfort are totally different as well. To me, it's well worth trading in some time for a much better travel experience. I've had a year where I logged close to 50k air miles in coach and over 10k train miles in coach, so I've seen the good and bad of both modes of travel (on and off the NEC for the trains).

For the long distance trains, I consider the time it takes to travel one of the benefits. In today's highly connected, highly active world, I find having 24 hours to simply look out the window and be alone with my thoughts to be incredibly rejuvenating.

Signals on the lines are also owned and maintained by freight railroads, because outside the NEC literally the only thing Amtrak owns is the trains themselves.

I think the various state departments of transportation that Amtrak serves own quite a bit of the equipment as well.

> the ridiculous boarding process

What's the boarding process over there? In Europe you just .. enter the train.

Same as the US.

Wait in a central waiting hall until the train arrives, at which time a big screen shows what platform the train is on. Then you and everyone else rush to be first to get to the single escalator going down to the platform. A conductor checks your ticket at the top of the escalator. That's how it works in NY. It's also approximately how it works in China, unfortunately (though their stations put Penn Station to shame in almost every other way).

That’s because there isn’t room on the platforms under Penn Station. And it’s very common in Europe not to announce the platform until 10 minutes or so before. What Amtrak could do though is have actual reserved seats on their all reserved trains.

It depends on where you are in Europe. In Germany and Switzerland, the platform is announced up to a year in advance, and you can go and wait there for your train. Sometimes you can even buy a coffee directly on the platform while you're waiting.

Furthermore, most tickets have assigned seating so there's no race. Also tickets are inspected when the train is moving, not on the platforms.

the trips I take between Seattle and Vancouver are regularly 1h+ late due to sitting for 30min a few times waiting for freight

I also arrive and get onto the train in ~5min. getting off in Canada is slow though

49 U.S. Code § 24308 says "Amtrak has preference over freight transportation in using a rail line, junction, or crossing unless the Board orders otherwise under this subsection" [0]

In practicality, I agree with you that freight lines abuse this without consequence.

[0]: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/49/24308

Ha, I never knew! Thank you for the citation. I have taken hundreds if train rides from Portland to Seattle, and sat waiting for freight trains to pass, or for a passenger train that was late due to freight traffic, nearly as many times.