THE WEAKNESS OF AMTRAK'S NATIONAL NETWORK.

Passenger Rail travel guru Jim Loomis cautions travellers not to rely on even the guaranteed train connections between long distance trains, when such are available, primarily at Chicago, but to an extent at Emeryville or Washington.

Stay overnight and continue your journey the next day, even if Amtrak tells you it’s a “guaranteed connection”. Get off the first train at your scheduled destination, go to a hotel, get a good night’s sleep, then resume your journey on the next day’s train. That’s my best advice and—believe me!—I learned the hard way.

Yes, I put in a pad between trains at Washington and between train and cruise ship at Fort Lauderdale, and enjoyed every minute of the two recreational days thus obtained, and would do it that way again, despite all the inbound western trains making their connections to the remaining eastern trains at Chicago, and the Capitol and Silver Meteor running to time or close to time.

As long as passengers understand that overnight in a major city is peace of mind, plus an opportunity to play tourist, rather than an additional expense, that works.  We have the lack of connections problem, though, in part because much of the national network relies on one, overpurposed, long distance train per route, with plenty of opportunities to run afoul of weather or freight train troubles.  The added time and expense to tourists, in planning and budgeting for those big-city layovers likely contributes to potential train riders opting to drive, or fly, instead.