It is not fare to include automobiles as a percentage of Intercity travel for Amtrak and Greyhound.

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

Private Transportation as opposed to Public For Hire transportation is a entirly different matter. Those opposed to Public Subsidy of Amtrak and other Public Transit should leave the private automobile out. Now you might want to incude rent a car or maybe not. Amtrak carrys 21,000,000 million people G

AMTRAK/AIRLINE RIDERSHIP - MAY 1997
AIRLINE…AMTRAK…Amtrak’s percentage of the airline

Air Wisconsin - 151,228…1,730,000…1,144 percent

ValuJet - 247,787…1,730,000…698 percent

Atlantic Southeast - 336,913…1,730,000…513 percent

Frontier Airlines - 549,000…1,730,000…315 percent

Alaska Air - 1,010,400…1,730,000…171 percent

America West - 1,532,650…1,730,000…113 percent

Southwest Airlines - 4,361,121…1,730,000…40 percent

American Airlines - 6,862,301…1,730,000…25 percent

United Airlines - 6,998,000…1,730,000…25 percent

Delta Airlines - 8,826,824…1,730,000…20 percent

2

I’m confused. Are the airlines charging too much or did they play rough on the playground?

3

May I respectfully disagree? One of the prime purposes of subsidizing public transportation today is to avoid the need of expensive and sometimes distructive highway expansion in order to correct congestion and sometimes terrific traffic jams at choke points. In some cases busses can to the job, in other cases rail can do the job better, and in other cases only rail can do the job.

When looking at the subsidies appropriate for rail and bus for a given corridor, all modes should be considered, even air and water if used!

4

The chart shows that you can do anything with statistics if you want. Air Wisconsin and Atlantic Southeast are both regional carriers and only the last four could reasonably be considered national carriers. Consider the last four as a unit and compare that figure against Amtrak. Keep in mind that a lot of other sizable air carriers would not be included in that figure.

5

Good points, plus I can’t recall the last ime I took Amtrak to Hawaii, Puerto Rico or Key West.

6

I agree plus I can’t remember the last time I took Amtrak to Alaska, or to London[:)]