view the rest of the comments
Ask Lemmy
A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions
Please don't post about US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world
Rules: (interactive)
1) Be nice and; have fun
Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them
2) All posts must end with a '?'
This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?
3) No spam
Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.
4) NSFW is okay, within reason
Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com.
NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].
5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions.
If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.
Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.
Partnered Communities:
Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu
Not east-west, but I’ve done north-south, ORL to NYP (24 hrs), as well as CHS-NYP, on the Silver Star and Silver Meteor. Since it’s not really in the vein of this question, I won’t go into detail, but it’s been between good and okay for me; doing coach and coach-premium-or-whatever-it’s-called. AMA I suppose?
Share away! It's hard to come up with questions about an experience I've never had. What stuck out to you? What was different between your expectations and experiences? What do you think most people don't understand about AmTrak travel?
So, the difference between air and train is immense. There’s like 3-4x more leg room, free 2x carryons, 2x checked, and 2x personal items (you could probably get away with more if you wanted). The seats are newer pleather that look nicer, though don’t feel too great, especially for long durations. Getting up and walking down the aisles and spending time in the café car is a great way to spend time, and you don’t really have to worry about leaving items at your seat.
Not much, if I had to say, I’d guess speed. It can get going pretty fast, and it’s nice to see you speeding past cars on the highway in the VA area. But also, speed… getting deprioritized against freight traffic is more than a little annoying. Was once stuck for a couple of hours because a tree had fallen across the track in a storm earlier in the day.
Not having to deal with TSA makes the experience 100x better in speed and convenience. Taxes and several dozen bags included in the ticket price make it cheaper than air travel in a lot of situations. Seeing the countryside go by at grade-level is so beautiful. Interaction with other passengers and train attendants is very… touching, I guess? People in general are much, much more friendly and happy to be there than in an airplane.
Here’s hoping that you get a chance to experience AmTrak! Even if it’s just for a couple of hours, it’s a very unique experience. I really want to do a roomette cross-country at some point, but it does get pretty expensive, and I feel that some of the charm may be lost by having a totally private space versus coach seating.