Cities that should be connected by train
 

Boise Idaho and Bend Oregon

Medford Oregon and Redding California

Every decent sized (50,000+) city to every other decent sized city in America. Ideally, even more connectivity to smaller cities.

Calgary and Edmonton.

Phoenix, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas.

Phoenix in general. Nearest Amtrak is in the town of Maricopa, almost 30 miles from downtown Phoenix.

Another I would like to see would be Fargo - Sioux Falls - Omaha (with a spur to Lincoln) - Kansas City.

Gothenburg - Borås - Ulricehamn - Jönköping.
It's an obvious line that should have been built over a hundred years ago IMO. But it never was. Would be great for both passenger service and freight.
There's been plans for HSR there (as part of the Stockholm-Gothenburg line), but that seems to be downgraded to a 250 km/h plan for ALL hsr in Sweden now :(

I mean, the entire US other than the NE corridor, California, and 1 or 2 lines out of Chicago. Besides that small handful, the Amtrak service that's there now sucks so much it may as well not exist.

But in the spirit of OP's question, I guess we should assume any existing rail connection counts as "already connected." So let's look at the Amtrak system map and see where there are holes:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...em_Map.svg.png
chumwa on wikipedia

Obvious holes:

• New York-Scranton-Binghampton
• Clevaland-Columbus-Dayton-Cincinnati-Louisville
• Jacksonville-Atlanta-Chattanooga-Nashville-Saint Louis
• Atlanta-Chattanooga-Knoxville-Kingsport-Roanoke-DC
• Richmond-Roanoke OR Richmond-Charlottesville
• Tampa-Sarasota-Naples
• Dallas-Houston
• Oklahoma City-Tulsa-Kansas City
• Milwaukee-Madison
• Detroit-Flint-Lansing-Grand Rapids
• Quincy-Saint Louis
• Atlanta-Tuscaloosa-Jackson-Dallas
• Denver-Colorado Springs-Albuquerque-El Paso
• Los Angeles-Las Vegas
• Los Angeles-Bakersfield

Count Seattle-Portland as another that doesn't suck. Maybe Seattle-Vancouver. The former even gets fair business ridership including people traveling between my company's two offices, each a mile from the station.

Boise to Bend sounds like an odd pairing. Too small and far apart.

LA-Vegas-SLC? SD-Phoenix?

-Columbus, OH to anywhere. (The Ohio 3C Route could have solved this, but Kasich sent the funds back to DC)
-Louisville, KY to anywhere.
-Nashville, TN to anywhere.
-Fort Wayne, IN to anywhere.
-Madison, WI to Milwaukee (Scott Walker handed $810 million back to the feds that would have done this.)
-Toledo to Detroit (Which would also permit trains from the east to connect with Detroit)
-Re-establish the National Limited - Kansas City-St. Louis-Terre Haute-Indianapolis-Dayton-Columbus-Pittsburgh-Philadelphia-New York. (Lots of abandoned/missing track)
-Looking at an Illinois route that the state could start - Moline-Galesburg-Peoria-Bloomington/Normal-Champaign/Urbana-Danville. But only after they get Chicago-Moline and Chicago-Rockford going first.

Plus there are city pairs that are served, just not very well. Chicago-Cincinnati connects only three times a week. Cities served by the Sunset Limited get only 3 round trips a week as well. Plus the segment from New Orleans to Orlando was never re-established after Hurricane Katrina.

Cleveland gets the Capitol Limited and the Lake Shore Limited daily, but they both hit town in the middle of the night. Same goes for Cincinnati and the thrice-a-week Cardinal.

I don't know, Oregon is not connected to any other states except to Washington. It's kinda weird. If at least Medford and bend were connected by trsins that were faster then cars

I think this might still be relevant:
http://www.lightrailnow.org/images02...-2050_PRWG.jpg
http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...=142002&page=2

That is from 2008, almost a decade ago. It is interesting to see how much of this is actually progressing. The Portland-Seattle corridor is receiving upgrades and higher frequencies. California's HSR is under construction. Colorado is considering an Amtrak-run commuter train along the front range. Dallas and Huston may be connected by the Texas Central private HSR project. There has been some motion on restoring the Gulf Coast Amtrak route under a different operating scheme than the Sunset Limited. Brightline is being built in Florida despite the politics there. The Heartford line in Connecticut will raise speeds and add capacity on that line. And Amtrak is buying new trainsets to replace the old Acela trains, and speeds on the NEC will be raised.

So progress hasn't stopped, though it certainly didn't achieve what we all wanted in 10 years.

I linked this map because I think the green long-distance line between LA-LV-SLC-Boise-Portland-Seattle could be a very plausible new Amtrak route. It would get Amtrak service closer to Bend, OR - but as far as a Bend-Boise service, there is no direct railroad track between the two cities. That would make rail travel between the two rather difficult, I think.

That's a cool line but that would go up into the Rocky Mountains, I guess there's a chance it could get built. Sucks Salt Lake City wasn't down between the two mountain ranges, then it would be a no brainer

As both of these potential routes are less than 750 miles, passenger rail service to those towns would have to be established, and paid for, by the states being served.

Oh so Oregon sorta got screwed over. It's a lovely place, but it's sorta like cali too many trailer trash areas

Let's change that 50,000 metro population numbers to 5,000,000 - then run at least a daily train from Houston to Dallas. Before worrying about cities as small as 50,000 - let's connect cities of 500,000 and 5,000,000 first! :notacrook:

Not sure how Oregon gets screwed over, really.

Look at Michigan, which has three routes that they support themselves (Wolverine, Pere Marquette, and Blue Water). There isn't a single Amtrak long distance route that visits any town in Michigan. If not for their own initiative, they'd have no rail service at all.

Yet long distance routes cover many states in the union that would rather sink untold sums into more asphalt than commit a dime to rail.

Unless and until Congress determines to fund rail to the extent that it funds roads and air service, the only real growth in rail will probably come from the states. As threadbare as the national system is, Amtrak probably does as much as can be expected with the funds currently available.

Yes and yes, though geography might force the SD-Phoenix line to route through Temecula and the Coachella valley. Also, Phoenix-Tucson is a short, logical extension that adds 1 million people.

Amtrak Introduces New Era of Modernization, Customer Comfort with Interior Overhaul of Northeast, Midwest Trains

Refresh happening in phases through summer 2018

Read More: https://media.amtrak.com/2017/09/amt...idwest-trains/

https://media.amtrak.com/wp-content/...17-600x400.jpg

https://media.amtrak.com/wp-content/...17-600x400.jpg

https://media.amtrak.com/wp-content/...17-600x400.jpg

https://media.amtrak.com/wp-content/...17-600x400.jpg

Hopefully the greyhound busses get upgraded too. Those are so uncomfortable

The trains I've ridden were fine. Maybe the trains over there are older?

a big plus one to that. i was working up a trip out there to both cities and lake louise and wondering about renting a car as i noticed there is no rail service between the two. they do have nice, regular bus service though thankfully. when we go i'll probably do the bus and just rent a car for a couple days to head to lake louise or wherever. :cheers:


and yeah kasich shooting down the three 3Cs plan in ohio was just asinine. unfortunately, the state government in ohio tends to cater to "i got mine" suburbanites who elected trump and screws over the rural areas, cities and anything like public transit. i believe florida has that money now for their rail projects.