Hello guys,

Could you please enlighten a non-American? I know that trains aren’t very common in the US, and most people have never ridden one. I’m wondering if there’re any reasons for that. And if there are some passenger trains, are they in every state or only in some states, and who (and why) uses them?

Thank you very much!

UPD: Thank you very much guys for explaining this. You are wonderful people! So sorry I confused so many of you, by ‘trains’ I meant long distance passenger trains, not subway or freight trains. Thank you for being kind, understanding and patient, though!

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45 comments

  2. Some states are too large and sparsely populated for trains to make sense

  3. There are many cargo trains and very few passenger trains that people use. In some major cities there are subway trains that plenty use. It’s not like Europe. We drive or fly.

  4. Amtrak has a passenger travel train system that goes all over, but isn’t comparable to other countries. Various cities and regions have commuter train systems.

  5. They are most common in the Northeast corridor from southern Maine down to DC.

    Outside of that passenger rail is rare outside of big cities that have local/regional rail transit. Interstate train service for passengers just isn’t profitable and cargo rail is much more profitable/common for long hauls.

  7. Yes, we usually use them for cargo, but AMTRAK has passenger trains. I road them before, but it is slower than flying and you will likely need a car at your destination anyway.

  8. [There are trains everywhere in the US](https://www.google.com/search?q=us+map+of+railroads&hl=en&sxsrf=ALiCzsbas24WTCLOvNzJ7QVYmn5_jLZTLA:1651508533942&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjm94jcnMH3AhX0Ap0JHZLmC8IQ_AUoAnoECAEQBA&biw=1920&bih=975&dpr=1). But its mostly freight traffic.

    >and most people have never ridden one.

    This is probably true. Unless you live in one of the metro areas with a rail network of some sort, it isn’t a common experience. I was into my teenage years before I first set foot on any type of rail transport, and that was in Paris.

    >I’m wondering if there’re any reasons for that.

    Most streetcar lines transitioned to buses, and regional lines that connected cities converted over to freight or just out right abandoned.

  9. We have Amtrak which is passenger trains, but the majority of trains are used for hauling freight.

  11. There are trains here, though they aren’t super common. I can tell you first hand that Salt Lake City has some train infrastructure, and it in fact has the historic Intercontinental Railroad running through it, and the rail infrastructure seems to mostly be used for freight but there is one running passenger line I’m aware of. But it’s not super representative of most Americans cities.

  12. Freight trains are extremely common, to the point that the US is a world leader in freight rail. However, due to the low density of population and affordability of cars among other reasons, are passenger system is more limited, though only three states, (Wyoming, South Dakota, and Hawaii) lack passenger rail.

  13. Yes. There’s a company called Amtrak that runs lines between major cities.

  14. All over the place, we have some of the most extensive rail lines in the world. And though their purpose is mostly hauling freight, there are still cross country passenger trains.

  15. [This is Amtrak’s system map](https://i.imgur.com/UUxjsap.jpg). Note that that is only longer-distance routes, it doesn’t include regional commuter rail like Chicago’s Metra or the Metro-North Railroad in New York. Nor does it include private ventures like Brightline in Florida. It also doesn’t include local metros and light rail systems which many cities have.

    Here’s the [freight rail network](https://i.imgur.com/jAZdUJo.jpg), which is actually what Amtrak operates on — Amtrak only owns rail in the Northeast corridor.

  18. The United States have an extensive railroad network, the central hub of which is the city of Chicago. The majority of this network is privately-owned, and used for shipping freight all across the country.

    Since 1971, intercity passenger service has been provided by Amtrak, which is a privately-owned corporation, but with the majority of its shares owned by the U.S. government. **edit:** I forgot, there are also some private-sector attempts to operate high(er)-speed intercity rail, such as the Brightline service in Florida.

    Suburban passenger service is typically funded/operated/subsidized by state and municipal agencies. Certain cities also operate light-rail, metro and/or tram services.

  19. I get stuck by a train any week day morning if I leave even 2 minutes late. Freaking BNSF.

  20. There’s Amtrak, which covers a lot of places (including cross-country… if you’re not in a hurry). It’s most convenient on the northeast corridor, not so much in the midwest or wherever.

    Most large cities have some sort of local passenger rail system. In my area there are three separate passenger train systems. SEPTA (Southeast Pennsylvania Transit Authority), which does regional rail and subways in Philadelphia (as well as busses, trams, etc), as the name suggests they’re basically just on the Pennsylvania side of the river. There’s NJTransit, which does light rail (like a tram sorta) and rail into New York City, Atlantic City, and Philadelphia and all the smaller cities along the way like Trenton, Newark, etc in New JErsey. There’s also PATCO, which goes from a few southern New Jersey suburbs into center city Philadelphia and is pretty much focused on commuters (though it does run 24 hours a day).

    As far as who uses them: the people I know who use the commuter rail are, well… commuters. They work in center city and live in the suburbs, and their workplace doesn’t provide reserved parking for them, so they take the train.

    The reason why: they’re simply not that efficient for non-cities, and a lot of people don’t live in cities. Population density is pretty low in most areas outside cities, and most people don’t want to waste time waiting around for public transit, having to deal with other people, etc. It makes way more sense to just have a personal vehicle. I like to go wherever I want, whenever I want, so… there we are. Driving is usually still faster than going by train and then you can stop wherever you want, do side-trips, make your own route, etc. Driving is also usually drastically cheaper for families… train tickets usually break even with driving for one person, but if you have 5 people (not uncommon for a family) the cost is virtually the same for driving, but you need five train tickets.

    Also due to the sheer size of the country, if you’re going coast to coast or a major distance then flying is dramatically faster than going by rail. The only people I know who take rail for going more than a couple major cities away are people who can’t fly (due to phobia or medical conditions) and for some reason can’t or don’t want to drive.

    Freight rail is much more used here than in Europe and most of the railroads are owned by freight rail companies.

  22. Most people in Chicago have ridden commuter trains. Many commute on them daily. It’s less common to ride a train for an overnight trip, but a lot of people ride the train from Chicago to the state capital in Springfield.

    And there are people who cross the country on trains. There’s also a high speed train from Boston to Washington on the East Coast, and another under construction in California.

    Note that freight trains are *extremely* common in the United States. As passenger trains became less common, freight took over. The freight share of the railroad market is the highest for any rich country.

  23. Anecdotal story

    Had a buddy travel from Raleigh, North Carolina to Gainesville, GA via Amtrak. you can make
    the drive via car in about 5 or so hours. Ride a bus in 7-8 hours. He took the train. I picked him up nearly 23 hours later. The train ride was supposed to take 6 hours.

    The problem with Amtrak is that there are not very many dedicated passenger lines. Most Passenger trains lose priority to commercial freight trains as that is the primary reason for most of these rail lines existing. I would take a plane or bus after his experience. Local city transit systems can vary. Marta in Atlanta isn’t bad but it isn’t great either.

    I have been to Japan and nothing in the US compares to their rail system. The ease of use, cost, and efficiency are unmatched when it comes to American Transit lines.

  24. We actually have the world’s largest rail network, roughly twice China’s. It is also true that most of the rail network is used for freight, however. There are regional passenger-rail authorities, state systems, and then the national system that’s called Amtrak.

    2017 seems to be the last year we have Googleable figures for, but about 4.7 million people rode trains in the US in that year. (I imagine that Covid and other factors cut that down massively, I just don’t have the numbers.)

    The coastal systems (esp. the Boston-NYC-Washington regionals) are the most profitable, IIRC, and the transcontinental ones are more for vacationing than, say business travellers. (Planes are just faster).

    Then, of course, there’s light rail and commuter rail systems, used mainly to get people into and out of large metropolises.

  25. In most parts of the country, even if rail exists as an option it’s usually not the best option.

    For me to get a train ticket from San Diego to San Francisco, tickets start at $86 and it will take about 14 hours and there’s a few hours in the middle that I’d be on a bus getting me from
    one train line to the other.

    I can drive there in a little over 8 hours (highly traffic dependent, could be 12 hours if I hit rush hour wrong). In a car that gets 20 miles to the gallon and a gas price of $6 per gallon, that’s $150 in gas.

    It’s pretty easy to find a flight to San Francisco for around $60 each way. The flight time is less than 2 hours.

    If I’m with a group of people and in no hurry to get to San Francisco, driving is probably the best way to get there. If I want to make a quick trip there or am by myself, flying is the best way to get there. There’s almost no case where taking the train would be the superior option.

  26. Amtrak has routes all over the country, but it isn’t particularly fast or cheap. Flying is faster and often cheaper.

  27. I’ve ridden on many passenger trains along the East Coast, and I know they are common throughout the country. In my area, many people commute by train to avoid traffic.

  28. trains are mostly for moving freight. transportation trains are uncommon.

  29. We have Amtrak but its not high speed or anything. For context there’s a train that runs from Chicago to San Francisco and it takes a very speedy 52 hours to complete the journey

  30. Amtrak is our national passenger rail public-private corporation.

    It runs all over the country and to most major cities.

    The Northeast Corridor is the most efficient and frequent route in the country between New York and DC. There are a fewer number of trains on this route that continue farther north of NYC and south to four different places in Virginia. If you wanted to do an American Revolution tour that included Boston, NYC, Philadelphia, and Williamsburg/Yorktown, you could easily do so via Amtrak’s North East Corridor.

    You can take trips across the country, but these are more frequently delayed by freight companies that own the rails. They’re also a huge time commitment, upwards of 24 hours in many cases.

    DC to Chicago, for example, is an overnight 17 hour haul train ride. But a flight is a 3.5 hour airport experience (2 hour flight and roughly 90 minutes of navigating to/from airport before).

    I don’t include the pre/post time for trains because you can arrive at the train station 5 minutes before boarding, there’s no security line to anticipate, and train stations are consistently in the middle of the destination, and you don’t have a sprawling terminals to navigate to exit.

    New York Penn Station, Philadelphia 30th St Station, and DC’s Union Station are the most trafficked (specifically Amtrak Stations) in the country and it’s five-ten minutes from exiting the train to being across from Madison Square Garden in Manhattan, on the Schuylkill River Front In Philadelphia, or a block away from the United States Capitol Building in DC.

  31. There is an extensive freight rail network.

    There is Amtrak, which is a long distance trail network, that has route across the country. For most trips, given distance/time and cost of train ticket, it’s not worth taking for efficient travel (other than the experience). People tend to drive shorter distances. Amtrak is most successful between New York and DC.

    We do have some commuter rail lines bringing people from suburban towns into downtown business districts. I know New York, Chicago, San Francisco have such lines.

    There have been proposals for regional high speed rail connecting cities within a region, like Chicago to Milwaukee, Detroit, Indianapolis, Cleveland, St. Louis but the freight carriers own the current tracks and get rights of way, which makes high speed travel difficult and laying new tracks is costly and will lead to all sorts of litigation over taking land.

  32. Have most people never rode one? Not judging, that just surprised me. The reason is USA population density is nothing compared to Europe, like 5x less than Western European countries. Where I live in Montana it makes absolutely zero sense to have passenger trains, but we have freight trains run right through town quite often. The northeast has a lot of them, so that’s cool.

  33. I live in Minneapolis where we have a city wide “light rail” system but I suppose it’s more like an above ground subway. But you can take an actual train to Chicago or out west towards Seattle but it will be slow.

  36. As others have said, there are trains. But also, are you including commuter trains, like subways and such. Several cities have that.

  37. We have passenger trains. They’re far less convenient and run less frequently than trains in places like Europe, but they exist and basically do the same thing, only slower and less efficient.

  39. There’s a a passenger train in my old hometown in San Diego. It rides on weekends. I never rode it but it always went by my backyard so I’d go walk along the tracks with my cat for exercise and say hi.

    During the week it takes rocks and coal and stuff from what I’m assuming is the nearby mines.

  40. The United States has the largest and most expansive freight train network in the world.

    For passenger rail, I’ve taken it across the country. So it does exist and some paths go through some extraordinarily beautiful places. But it’s not very useful since most US Cities are car-dependent once you arrive – and flying is usually cheaper and faster.

    The Northeast Corridor does make sense, and we have a high speed network called ‘Acela’ (though it’s not super fast compared to European and Asian systems). Since a lot of Northeastern Cities *do* have reliable public transit, its a convenient way to travel between Boston, NYC, Philly, Washington DC.

    And again, a lot of America does have subway, trolley, tram and commuter rail systems. New York’s MTA carries nearly 9 million people every single day. The system also more miles of track than any other in the world. Keep in mind that 1 in 15 Americans live in the NYC Metropolitan Area.

    Virtually everyone here in Boston uses our public transit system with nearly 1.5 million rides a day (though this includes buses). Other busy systems include Washington Metro, Chicago L, Bay Area Rapid Transit, SEPTA (Philly), MARTA (Atlanta), etc.

    So to answer your question.. yes we’re full of trains. Some people use trains everyday, other people might never use a train *ever*. But *everyone* benefits from Freight trains.

  41. Trains are still very common in the US, most trains that aren’t city transportation are for cargo only as it’s the best way to ship a load of cargo on land. With how massive the US is transportation by train isn’t very practical for people trying to travel across the country, so non city transport trains are rare.

  42. My home town has a separate rail system with small 2-4 car commuter trains. Other than that there are freight trains everywhere and the amtrack shares the rails with the freight trains.

  43. Inter-city trains exist, sort of. They aren’t used much because they are slower and more expensive than planes and don’t allow you to bring your car like driving does. We have a great, robust freight rail system. Only a few cities have trains within the city. Hopefully this changes quickly.

    I personally love traveling by train.

  44. There are a lot of trains but passenger train travel isn’t really convenient or economical for most travel. The only people I know that have traveled by train in the States in recent years did it to have the experience.

  45. Passenger trains? Never seen one. Freight trains? All over, I hear them day and nights.

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