is the USA Rail Pass worth it?

14 comments

1. Does it go the places you want to go?

2. Depends. Are there places you want to go that are served via rail? If the answer is yes, then sure.

3. Probably not…but there is no way to know for sure without knowing your itinerary.

4. What’s a USA Rail Pass?

5. Probably is, for your use case. Amtrak is generally designed for tourists, young people, and old people: people who are willing to go a bit more slowly when travelling long distances (and are thus open to non-flight options) and want to see pretty landscapes with much nicer accommodations than one can get on a bus. I would heavily recommend Amtrak for tourists rather than driving around long distances.

6. What services does it cover? Does it include municipal transportation, including buses?

   Just so you’re aware, the only parts of the US that have decent and frequent intercity rail connections are the major cities of the Northeast and New England. Amtrak connects them, and many of the cities have their own commuter light rail networks. Basically, this runs from Washington DC (and its suburbs, if you include the Metro) north through Baltimore, Philadelphia, NYC, Boston up to Portland Maine (with many smaller cities having stops along the way).

   Outside of this region, commuter rail connections between cities are infrequent and inconvenient, or even completely non-existent.

7. If you’re planning to visit the North East and plan on visiting a lot of cities, sounds like a decent deal.

   Otherwise you’ll probably won’t take full advantage of it.

8. Plan out your trip. Rail travel between cities isn’t great except for the north east.

   If you were trying to do Wash DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia, NYC, Boston or any other combination of those cities then it might be reasonable. DC, NYC, and Boston are also locations where it’s easier to not have a car anyway. You would also want to look at tickets individually between those areas to see which deal is better.

9. People have already said it, but I’ll repeat it – for the Boston-Washington corridor, yes. If your goal is to travel the Southwest, no.

10. I’ve used Amtrak a few times, including one long haul route Southwest Chief. And I’m doing the Empire Builder later this year.

    You have to think of Amtrak routes as the thing you want to do rather than just transit. It provides a unique way to see the country. The views on the Western routes between Chicago and the West Coast are spectacular.

    That said the long routes of 2-3 days in a train in coach is tough for me. Maybe if I was younger, but I’m not.

    r/Amtrak and search for First Time posts to get an idea of what to expect

11. If you have a plan to use the tickets, absolutely.

    Our rail system is limited, but is quite useful in the North East and on the west coast.

    Might be good to hop around from Boston to NYC to DC and then fly out to San Diego to go up the coast.

    It will not be useful day-to-day for getting around.

12. Things to keep in mind:

    1. Many Amtrak services only operate once per day, and the trains are 12+ hours long. You can take the train from Buffalo to Chicago, but there is only 1 per day and it leaves at midnight.
    2. There are functionally only a handful of north-south routes. The entire route network is centered around Chicago and NYC.
    3. The trains are frequently delayed.
    4. Many US cities aren’t served by Amtrak (e.g. Phoenix), although they have connecting buses in some places.
    5. Most US cities have poor public transportation and aren’t walkable outside of a very small downtown portion.

13. There’s a usa rail pass ?

14. Depends where you’re going. The US has a ton of rail but the vast majority of it is only used for freight not passenger travel.