Track speeds and freight companies are the biggest thing keeping us from having night trains between major cities so you can go to sleep at 8 in Chicago and wake up the next morning in Austin, New Orleans or New York
For example, The City of New Orleans comes close to being a Night Train but it runs a full 19 hours, meaning if you leave Chicago at 8 pm, you would still arrive at 3 pm in New Orleans the next day. If the train were sped up to last about 10-14 hours it could easily become a real alternative to flying. Luckily with this example, There should be some infrastructure improvements as grade separation projects happen and the already funded New Orleans to Baton Rouge train increases speeds in that area, as there is a bridge that moves at literally 10 mph over a lake in Louisiana. Nothing to lower speeds by 5 hours but it is a start
@man-and-atom Yeah, if we were able, securing funds for additional express routes between major cities would also be a massive way to increase ridership for amtrak as the new time could easily help encourage people to choose Rail over Driving. For example with the Texas Eagle an express service could be just Chicago-STL-Little Rock-Dallas-Austin-San Antonio with no intermediate stops
I know that High-speed Rail should be the goal, but I think pursuing general speed improvements like grade separation, Higher Speed Rail like the 110 mph between Chicago and STL, and replacement of bridges to make Express Routes and Night Trains practical on more Amtrak lines could also be a great way to increase Amtrak Ridership and improve Rails transit mode share
For the example of the City of New Orleans, these blue sections are the sections of Rail that really should have significant speed increases in the 90-120 mph range, Memphis to Greenwood would require rerouting the train to be straighter, but it is such an empty portion that it really would be one of the best spots for a project like this. Additional speed increases can be made by redoing the rail bridge over lake Pontchartrain to have higher speeds
