The OP is operating in a peacetime mentality. Oil's killer app is war: Can a fleet of fighter planes run on electricity, currently? No. Has the Army committed

The OP is operating in a peacetime mentality. Oil's killer app is war: Can a fleet of fighter planes run on electricity, currently? No. Has the Army committed to having 100% of their fleet of tanks running on electricity by 2025? No. Can you run a supply chain to the front lines of a ground war with electricity? Technically yes, but it's only a matter of time until your wire infra gets cut/bombed. So I completely agree with the OP, assuming a general absence of armed, land-based conflict in the next 20 years. That said, think about why the US even _has_ a highway system and domestic airlines. There are two main weaknesses of building transportation infrastructure on rail, from a central-planning perspective: 1. You can shut down an entire country's economy by bombing the rail infrastructure (c.f. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherman%27s_March_to_the_Sea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherman%27s_March_to_the_Sea, viewing the seceded South as a "country" here...), less so with airfields and asphalt highways. 2. There is no consistent demand for continued production of railroad infrastructure, once it is built, which makes mobilizing production in times of great need (e.g. war) slow and difficult. How this relates to the OP's argument re: electric cars: 1. While battery technology will continue to improve, the main means of transporting electricity is still the power plant + electric lines, which is relatively fragile compared to oil barges/tanks on trucks + highways. You would need to destroy every oil tanker and truck in America to shut down the energy distribution system -- a much harder task than bombing every power plant -- power plants can't move. 2. With gas-powered cars (and planes, though to a lesser extent), you can keep the production running all the time making civilian vehicles. Turning all those Ford F150s and 737s into tanks and bombers is difficult, but it is way easier to do so if you don't have to build the factories FIRST.