this post was submitted on 11 Apr 2025
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The problem in the US is that there aren’t separate tracks for passenger rail, and that the freight trains are owned by the same company that owns the tracks so they can tell Amtrak to wait.
Also those companies have been making trains longer and longer, so long they don’t fit in the sidetracks. So even if they wanted to be nice to Amtrak they can’t.
The solution would be to build a passenger rail network but then you run into regulations and eminent domain and NIMBYism.
They don't just cause problems for Amtrak either. Sometimes trains are so long that, when parked, there's no where to put them except right through the middle of a town, blocking roads
Where passenger rail makes the most sense Amtrak owns their own tracks (with a couple exceptions) and they still can't figure out how to run great service.
Maybe it’s just because Americans are idiots who can’t do things right, then.
Americans are humans. We are not smarter or dumber than any other human. We might be stupid in different ways from you, but those are subtitle variations and mostly about people (everyone) ignoring how they are stupid.
I am, unfortunately, an American. Though not by choice.
And compared to other countries we are far stupider.