In reply to Eric Ecklund.

Wouldn’t the fact that Amtrak gets shoved into sidings lead a reasonable person to conclude that freight railroads’ traffic is indeed beyond capacity? Please notice how much recovery time has been added to Amtrak schedules lately, and even with that, they still can’t manage to run on time. In fact, one of the famous “name trains” of the past was specifically named “The 400” for being able to travel the 400 miles from the Twin Cities to Chicago in 400 minutes. Amtrak’s “fluff for the freight railroads” schedules now allot 508 minutes to travel the same distance. (It could be worse! A connecting bus takes 560 minutes.).
How would you like to run a business on privately-owned, fully-taxed right of way and then have the government construct a competing mode parallel to yours, on tax-exempt land, with massive subsidies for its constant maintenance and upgrading? It’s a wonder there are any railroads left in the US at all.
Politicians who drink the Cato Kool-Aid and complain how Amtrak requires subsidies just don’t get it. Airlines were largely deregulated in the 1980s and will only run profitable routes. So-termed Essential Air Services and intercity buses are trimmed back more and more every year, leaving only Amtrak in certain corridors. Like the USPS, Amtrak is a service to the country. The corporation is not the one reaping the benefits of the service, it is the areas served by it. It is also worthwhile to note that the air and highway modes’ use of land and emissions of pollutants are given a free pass in this country. The same politicians who harp about menial subsidies for Amtrak are more than eager to sweep the ill effects of auto and truck pollution under the proverbial rug.
What Amtrak calls “flexible dining service” deserves to be called out for what it really is: a thinly-veiled program to eliminate union jobs in the kitchen and make passengers miserable, in order to push down ridership, in order to justify cutting or discontinuing trains which run overnight. If you have personally experienced this onslaught of saturated fat, sodium, sugar and chem-lab ingredients, give your feedback to Amtrak, because they are listening and tracking customer response trends. You may need to wait on hold for a few minutes, or fill out a contact form on their website. For $600-900 a day after being stuck onboard for two days, passengers deserve better. Better food exists, but their upper-level management has decided not to pursue it.
Also keep in mind that Amtrak employees, 1,950 of whom were pink-slipped this morning, are not the ones who decided on these changes. These changes are made by politically-appointed board members and airline loyalists who have their own interests in mind. The front-line workers at Amtrak are among the most professional and safety-conscious workers I have met. Upper management, well, not so much.