Nuanced thought is to be commended. As a moderate conservative, I am not opposed to nationalizing the rails. Certain shared infrastructure is impractical when p

Nuanced thought is to be commended. As a moderate conservative, I am not opposed to nationalizing the rails. Certain shared infrastructure is impractical when privately owned, primarily when (as parent points out) private ownership creates misaligned incentives. As a fiscal conservative, my views are that we should reduce government waste. As long as Amtrak continues to be worthless, the money we spend on it is wasted. When unprofitable rail lines are torn out, the money we spent building those rail lines may have been wasted. If we genuinely want eco-friendly transportation, one option to explore is to centralize our rail infrastructure with the goal of it becoming useful to all. I don't know if it is the best option, but I think we should explore it and see what the benefits would be.