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Random aside: I looked up an Acela ticket this morning. $1000 for a first class ticket from DC to BOS. 6.5 hours. Same flight first class with Delta this week

Random aside: I looked up an Acela ticket this morning. $1000 for a first class ticket from DC to BOS. 6.5 hours. Same flight first class with Delta this week is $850. Also 6 hours with layover. Blows my mind first class rail travel is as much as first class air travel.

CaptainMarvel 3y ago
Do you mean that the train is _as cheap_ as taking a plane? In my experience, in the UK, taking a train is more expensive than taking a flight (or driving, for that matter).
- fulladder 3y ago
  Why do people pay more for slower transportation?
  - Max-q 3y ago
    Train travel tend to be much more comfortable than bus, car or plane. Especially if the plane takes as long time due to airports being located outside the city, security hazel, lots of stress at the airport and so on. The train cost more, but you enter the train in the city centre, sit down and relax, go to the restaurant car and eat a nice dinner, relax som more and you arrive in the destination city. This works better in continental Europe, where you have shorter distances and high speed trains between the capitols, often making the train faster from city centre to city centre than air travel. Traveling from Chicago to SF by train is pleasant, but take a couple days, not a couple of hours.
  - plagiarist 3y ago
    I'd pay extra to take the train for shorter trips. The entire experience is better, from not passing through a security theater production to the larger seats. I've never had a train sitting on the tarmac for hours, either, my plane trips frequently involve waits and delays.
    - leetrout 3y ago
      > had a train sitting on the tarmac for hours I took the Amtrak a couple times from DC through WVA and have had several delays trying to get from VA to KY due to priority being given to the freight trains. I remember one trip having a one or two hour delay in the middle of no where while we were side tracked. It is much, much more comfortable than a plane though.
      - plagiarist 3y ago
        I kinda knew I'd get called out on that, but, yeah, definitely more comfortable. You can even get up instead of, "everyone has to stay seated because any minute now we will be ready." Some trains have a food car. It's great.
        euroderf 3y ago
        > Some trains have a food car. It's great. Also IME Amtrak's prices are surprisingly reasonable. More like a place around the corner than like an airport food court.
- 0xffff2 3y ago
  Not OP, but as a simple physics exercise, the fact that it's cheaper to put a metal tube flying in the air instead of hurling it down a pair of low-friction steel rails firmly attached to the ground to get from the same point A to the same point B is mind-boggling. It becomes even more so when you consider that I was easily able to find a ~$500 first class flight for the same route that is non-stop for just 1.5 hours of flight time, so flying is going to be a much shorter door to door time for half the price and probably a better experience to boot. I haven't ridden Amtrak in a long time, but I would be absolutely shocked if the first class experience on the Acella is as nice, much less worth a premium compared to flying. Regardless, there's pretty much nothing they could offer to make it worth the price premium.
datadrivenangel 3y ago
DC to BOS should be a 90 minute flight...?
- 0xffff2 3y ago
  Presumably the "with layover" is something crazy like a Delta flight that goes via Atlanta. You can get some pretty crazy routing sometimes if you pick the wrong combination of airports and carrier. United has a non-stop with weekday first class tickets for ~$500, so I think the point stands.
the_third_wave 3y ago
Those prices are extreme, I regularly travel 1st class by train from Göteborg/Sweden to Amsterdam/the Netherlands at about €85 for a single with ICE/EC/IC, a ~15 hour trip.
Max-q 3y ago
What is the reason behind this thought? I know that most people think like this. Train should be cheaper than air. I guess it has to do with planes replacing plane, hence plane must be better, hence more expensive. But the reality is that the plane won because of two things: speed and cost. Air is free. Miles of miles of railroad is very expensive to build and maintain. Trains are a bit cheaper than planes. But they travel slowly. So cost per mile per passenger is lower for a plane. Even when subsidized, the cost of rail travel is often more expensive per mile than air travel. So when Europe and Asia now are building a lot of high speed rail, it's not to make it cheaper, but to lower carbon footprint and to make a more pleasant experience.
mehlmao 3y ago
Amtrak and plane tickets are priced differently. For each class of ticket, Amtrak has X seats at price A, Y seats at price B > A, Z seats at price C > B, etc. When you check prices or buy a ticket, it will offer you the cheapest remaining ticket in that class. If you book Amtrak early, you'll find it is significantly cheaper than a plane ticket. Wait until a week until departure, and usually the airplane will cost less.
deleted 3y ago
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midasuni 3y ago
I’d expect rail to cost far more

CaptainMarvel 3y ago

Do you mean that the train is _as cheap_ as taking a plane? In my experience, in the UK, taking a train is more expensive than taking a flight (or driving, for that matter).

fulladder 3y ago
Why do people pay more for slower transportation?
- Max-q 3y ago
  Train travel tend to be much more comfortable than bus, car or plane. Especially if the plane takes as long time due to airports being located outside the city, security hazel, lots of stress at the airport and so on. The train cost more, but you enter the train in the city centre, sit down and relax, go to the restaurant car and eat a nice dinner, relax som more and you arrive in the destination city. This works better in continental Europe, where you have shorter distances and high speed trains between the capitols, often making the train faster from city centre to city centre than air travel. Traveling from Chicago to SF by train is pleasant, but take a couple days, not a couple of hours.
- plagiarist 3y ago
  I'd pay extra to take the train for shorter trips. The entire experience is better, from not passing through a security theater production to the larger seats. I've never had a train sitting on the tarmac for hours, either, my plane trips frequently involve waits and delays.
  - leetrout 3y ago
    > had a train sitting on the tarmac for hours I took the Amtrak a couple times from DC through WVA and have had several delays trying to get from VA to KY due to priority being given to the freight trains. I remember one trip having a one or two hour delay in the middle of no where while we were side tracked. It is much, much more comfortable than a plane though.
    - plagiarist 3y ago
      I kinda knew I'd get called out on that, but, yeah, definitely more comfortable. You can even get up instead of, "everyone has to stay seated because any minute now we will be ready." Some trains have a food car. It's great.
      - euroderf 3y ago
        > Some trains have a food car. It's great. Also IME Amtrak's prices are surprisingly reasonable. More like a place around the corner than like an airport food court.
0xffff2 3y ago
Not OP, but as a simple physics exercise, the fact that it's cheaper to put a metal tube flying in the air instead of hurling it down a pair of low-friction steel rails firmly attached to the ground to get from the same point A to the same point B is mind-boggling. It becomes even more so when you consider that I was easily able to find a ~$500 first class flight for the same route that is non-stop for just 1.5 hours of flight time, so flying is going to be a much shorter door to door time for half the price and probably a better experience to boot. I haven't ridden Amtrak in a long time, but I would be absolutely shocked if the first class experience on the Acella is as nice, much less worth a premium compared to flying. Regardless, there's pretty much nothing they could offer to make it worth the price premium.

datadrivenangel 3y ago

DC to BOS should be a 90 minute flight...?

0xffff2 3y ago
Presumably the "with layover" is something crazy like a Delta flight that goes via Atlanta. You can get some pretty crazy routing sometimes if you pick the wrong combination of airports and carrier. United has a non-stop with weekday first class tickets for ~$500, so I think the point stands.

the_third_wave 3y ago

Those prices are extreme, I regularly travel 1st class by train from Göteborg/Sweden to Amsterdam/the Netherlands at about €85 for a single with ICE/EC/IC, a ~15 hour trip.

Max-q 3y ago

What is the reason behind this thought? I know that most people think like this. Train should be cheaper than air. I guess it has to do with planes replacing plane, hence plane must be better, hence more expensive. But the reality is that the plane won because of two things: speed and cost. Air is free. Miles of miles of railroad is very expensive to build and maintain. Trains are a bit cheaper than planes. But they travel slowly. So cost per mile per passenger is lower for a plane. Even when subsidized, the cost of rail travel is often more expensive per mile than air travel. So when Europe and Asia now are building a lot of high speed rail, it's not to make it cheaper, but to lower carbon footprint and to make a more pleasant experience.

mehlmao 3y ago

Amtrak and plane tickets are priced differently. For each class of ticket, Amtrak has X seats at price A, Y seats at price B > A, Z seats at price C > B, etc. When you check prices or buy a ticket, it will offer you the cheapest remaining ticket in that class. If you book Amtrak early, you'll find it is significantly cheaper than a plane ticket. Wait until a week until departure, and usually the airplane will cost less.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

midasuni 3y ago

I’d expect rail to cost far more