THE SURPRISE ANSWER TO "ARE YOU DRIVING OR FLYING?"

Sometimes, the air carriers themselves will sell you a seat on a train.  "Replacing short-haul flights with trains frees up landing and departure slots at busy airports that can be used for more lucrative long-haul services."  Those train seats, even in standard class, are roomier.

The long Thanksgiving weekend is one of Amtrak's busiest, and the carrier demonstrated that it could keep moving despite the immoderate weather.

Once again, the nation’s TV viewers were treated to a steady diet of reporters doing obligatory stand-ups during the Thanksgiving holiday that bemoaned cancelled flights and snow-clogged highways from Denver through the upper Midwest to New York and New England.

In fact, the big story that most outlets missed is that many Amtrak trains were sold out in advance on the busy travel days and generally survived otherwise paralyzing storms with modest delays but no cancellations.

In the model railroad world, the carrier also got travelers to their destinations.

The Sunday after Thanksgiving, I helped operate a model railroad that features the south concourse of Chicago's Union Station.  I was working the coach yard that assembles the regional trains.  The locomotive at right is gathering cars for a strengthened formation that will include a couple of the dinette cars for the table seating (collegians use those to study.)  The person who will work this yard at the next operating session is going to have some interesting rakes to break down.  The Budd Cars at center are protecting the Chicago to Dubuque service, in the model railroad world we can represent current Amtrak trains, including the twice-daily Quincy or Carbondale service, as well as trains past including the Black Hawk and the Prairie Marksman.