I don't think that is true. Small bits of the Northeast corridor were opened in 1834 but the whole thing wasn't complete until 1880 or something like that. I th

I don't think that is true. Small bits of the Northeast corridor were opened in 1834 but the whole thing wasn't complete until 1880 or something like that. I think a lot of Europe's infrastructure is as old or older. Especially in the UK where trains were invented and first commercially operated at scale. If you compare to a route of similar length in the UK, on average the ~400miles of line between London and Edinburgh/Glasgow is probably about 20-30 years older. Trains were racing to Scotland from London up the West and East coasts from the 1860's onwards and there was a lot of competition between the two routes to be the fastest. The time over the 400 mile route was down to about 8hrs by 1880 and about 7hrs in the 1930's. These days trains operate on the two main routes at up to 140mph now and it's possible to get a train that does it in about 4h30m with a few intermediate stops. This is not so hot compared to TGV Paris-Bordeaux at 2h10 on a dedicated HSR route but it does compare favourably to Acela's 6h30 over a similar distance also on a legacy route. This is because the alignment has been worked on continuously over the years to improve speed, it's not the same alignment as it was in the 1850's when it was first completed and both East and West routes pass through quite a few cities and towns on the way.