Infrequent service, long wait times, needless lines instead of boarding on arrival, and more uttter nonsense.... Sound familiar....? Amtrak....? These are the "Basics" we fail at....

As the actual numbers tell us from California's rail passenger corridor experiment (LOSSAN, San Joaquin, Capitols...)of the last forty five years should have taught us, frequency is more important than speed, in attracting riders. Can I go when I need to go... Speed competitive with at least better than auto times sure helps, but the most super high speed is not always necessary.... Now, imagine if we did spend what we are wasting right now, on much more capacity to increase "frequency" capacity and schedule reliability on these successful California corridors, to attract these much higher volumes of short and mid distance auto trips, as Brightline's business case is doing?

Maybe it's just me again who's noticed this, probably from having ridden too many SW shuttles in the last 30 years, which I often compare unfavorably to deadheading on Greyhound, when I was a hoghead. So, instead of hiring CEO's from the airline industry, who only seem to know cost management strategies, from their MBA programs, maybe Amtrak and Via should try hiring European rail system CEO's? As these European rail CEO's seem to understand much better, from my own experiences in Europe, that these basics in customer service are actually important.

This latest bunch of airline "Amtrak" CEO's all seem to have mostly "made" their careers, by making today's air travel experience an utterly depressing, or even traumatic experience. Maybe, we have lines for Amtrak boarding, because Airline executives can't imagine not making the passengers have to line up for the sub standard Amtrak travel experience they seem to want to create for us?

This video also raises great questions about what kind of rail investments we should be making in the proposed infrastructure act. Should we be funding "cost is no consideration" "speed at any cost" investments, like a $25 billion Pacheco alignment? Or, should we be considering spending only a billion, on seperate 110 capable passenger rail tracks over Beaumont, which would allow for 24 trains a day service levels, of "fast-frequent-reliable" rail service, and carry enough passengers to save us from needing to spend 2 or 3 billion dollars to provide that same added passenger/vehicle mile capacity widening the I-10 (again and again...), or since this is Altamont Press, on Altamont?