Sure, but so are airports and so are roads. And all forms of infrastructure are sometimes prestige projects, and all are sometimes subject to political choices

Sure, but so are airports and so are roads. And all forms of infrastructure are sometimes prestige projects, and all are sometimes subject to political choices that while legitimate, in retrospect turn out to have been questionable. It's possible that despite all that rail has higher costs - but it's also quite possible that the dominating factor is the unreasonably subsidized airline fuel. The tax-exempt status is absurd, especially given other fuel and power duties - not to mention that a reasonable accounting should be taxing fuel high enough to cover the costs of the climate-change externalities, which would result in an even higher price (as it happens, due to cloud formation, air travel causes even more warming than ground based fossil fuel consumption, though I'm unaware of whether that's a significant difference). If indeed an honest accounting were to reveal that flight is still cheaper: great! But I seriously doubt it; and in any case it's certainly time to stop subsidizing air travel like this. Let the sector succeed or fail on its own merits, not by virtue of tax shenanigans.