AMTRAK AT FIFTY?

There's a lengthy article on the prospects for Amtrak at Railway Age.

The author is longtime Passenger Rail advocate D. P. Alan.

There's still too much uncertainty about the shape of the tourism industry, let alone business travel, in the immediate future.

Let's concentrate, for a few moments, though, on the Amtrak map in the beginning of 1978.

National Association of Railroad Passengers map retrieved from Railway Age.

Not much has changed in the intervening forty years.  The Southern Crescent is now an Amtrak train, the Empire Builder the sole service across the northern tier, the Pioneer through Idaho is long gone, and the National Limited through Columbus and Indianapolis is not even possible any more.

Whether there will be any additions to the map, or increases in frequencies, any time soon, remains to be seen.