Amtrak is a bit of a special beast. It's a Frankenstein's monster that the government assembled from the corpses of the many independent rail companies that wer

Amtrak is a bit of a special beast. It's a Frankenstein's monster that the government assembled from the corpses of the many independent rail companies that were failing in the mid 20th century. As for why Amtrak's service is so poor, my personal sense is that Amtrak made a bunch of bad decisions that maximized their bottom line, such as using excessively cushy (and heavy, and low-capacity) rolling stock for the kinds of routes that would be covered by something more like IC service in Europe. In essence, they made a gamble that what rail travelers want is luxury, which translated into 250lb seats with half an acre of leg room and 3" of foam padding, when what they really want is frequent, regular service. Commuter train systems like Chicago's Metra are much better, but they're unable to extend themselves out to full-fledged intercity service, no matter how successful they might be at it, because Amtrak enjoys a statutory monopoly.