After my last horrible domestic flight experience, several trips to Japan, and watching an ungodly amount of Miles in Transit videos, I actually considered just

After my last horrible domestic flight experience, several trips to Japan, and watching an ungodly amount of Miles in Transit videos, I actually considered just doing 100% Amtrak for an upcoming trip. Problem is, I live in Utah. The daily California Zephyr pulls into Salt Lake Central at 3AM, way after all the connecting public transit has shut down for the night. So just getting to the train will probably involve a night Uber at what I assume is extraordinary expense. Not to mention it's in the run-down industrialized car park part of downtown, not the nice part with the mall and LDS temple. Additionally, Utah's class 1 railway is Union Pacific, a dogshit hedge fund running a decrepit railroad that clogs up downtown with shittons of long, slow freight trains[0]. Which means the California Zephyr is one of the most frequently delayed Amtrak services, even with Amtrak levels of padding. So that 3AM train could easily wind up being delayed several hours, and any connections through Chicago are almost certain to get missed. Not to mention it's a three day ride, which is a lot of time to spend on a train without access to a shower[1]. So Amtrak here is the worst combination of inconvenient and slow. I've heard the scenery on the Zephyr is absolutely amazing, though. I ultimately wound up booking SLC - JFK and a connecting Amtrak from Penn Station to Pittsburgh, which turns out to be about the same time as SLC - JFK - PIT by air. In fact, the air layover is so long JetBlue won't sell you a connecting ticket. However, I'm now afraid that itinerary is going to get wrecked by this stupid government shutdown, and if that happens I'm pretty sure I'm just out the money for both the plane, train, and hotel. With infrastructure like this, why would anyone want to vacation in this awful country? [0] To the point where pedestrians often ignore grade crossing warnings, expecting a slow freight train they can outrun, only to be turned into a fine red mist by a FrontRunner train going 80mph. Also, if you're reading this and live in Utah, please tell your local representatives to support the Rio Grande Plan: https://riograndeplansaltlakecity.org/ https://riograndeplansaltlakecity.org/ [1] Please correct me if it turns out there are public showers for coach passengers.