Actually the fees paid by highway users subsidize passenger rail.
There is a long history of subsidizing rail infrastructure in the US. I mentioned the CP-UP transcontinental link in the post that started this thread. The power of eminent domain could also be considered a subsidy (although not a direct monetary one) Many communities put up taxpayer money to to start shortline railroads or later sreetcar and interurban lines. “Air Line” railroads have more curves than the Snake River because the went through the communities that gave them the best deal. I read somewhere that at least one State built a railroad.
Again, I posed an alternative to Amtrak, but it may be even more expensive to the taxpayer. That is massive tax incentives to the railroads to run decent passenger services and put it on a passenger-mile or some similar basis so railroads not only compete for the fares but for the tax rebates as well. What the formula should be would be best left up to real experts that understand the costs and operations throughly, and I’d have to do a lot of studying to come up with the right formulas.
But until them Antrak is the best we have now and David Gunn has proven to be its most efficient manager so far, so he should get the money he is asking for.
As for shutting down Amtrak in the hopes something better will be provided in the future, that seems to me to be sheer foolishness. It took 40 years just to replace the tracks on Canal Street, New Orleand which everyone agrees should not have been removed in the first place. Do my typical Rhode Island elderly couple have to have a transcontinental Canada trip to see the Rockies and the Pacific Coast because of Mineta and President Bush? I hope not.
Except for this tax incentive plan, I think overall that a really good study would show that the present Amtrak system is the most economical way for the tax paper to subsidize a National Passenger Railroad System. And I think it should be subsidized. Fair is Fair. These people, for whom the subsidy is essential if they are to be fully citizens, may be a minority, a tiny minority percentwise, but they are still a lot of people, and it is unfair of the majority car culture to deprive them of a right they did have at one time, to see and enjoy the entire country.