The United States is a nation built on mobility and grand infrastructure projects – from the transcontinental railroad in the 19th century to the interstate highway system in the 20th. Yet in the 21st century, as countries across Europe and Asia race ahead with high-speed rail networks, the U.S. remains conspicuously stuck in the slow lane. America, a wealthy and geographically vast country, still has no true national high-speed rail system. This investigative report examines the complex web of historical, economic, political, and cultural factors that have kept American passenger trains crawling at 20th-century speeds while nations like China, France, and Japan zoom into the future on 200+ mph “bullet trains.” The story involves the mid-20th century decline of U.S. passenger rail, the outsized influence of car, oil, and airline lobbying on transportation policy, America’s love affair with the automobile and suburban sprawl, cautionary tales of costly high-speed rail attempts in states like California and Texas, and a funding landscape that has long favored highways and airports over railroads. We also compare America’s rail trajectory with the high-speed success stories abroad – from China’s vast network to Europe’s famed TGV, ICE, and Shinkansen – to see what lessons can be learned. Throughout, the tone is factual and investigative, avoiding bias or propaganda, and grounded in verifiable information. The goal: to understand why, despite its wealth and size, the United States still lacks the high-speed trains that much of the developed world takes for granted.
The Rise and Fall of American Passenger Trains
In the first half of the 20th century, railroads were the backbone of American travel. Sleek trains like the Twentieth Century Limited and the Super Chief whisked passengers across the country, and nearly every city and small town was connected by passenger rail. By mid-century, however, this golden age of rail travel was coming off the tracks. After World War II, the automobile and the airplane emerged as favored modes of transport. The statistics tell a stark story: **between 1945 and 1964, intercity rail passenger travel in the U.S. plummeted by 84%**. What had been a “railroad country” swiftly became an automobile country as every American who could afford a car climbed into one, relishing the independence of the open road.
This seismic shift in travel habits coincided with profound changes in how and where Americans lived. The post-war boom brought explosive growth of suburbs – not the “railroad suburbs” of earlier eras that clustered around train stations and streetcar lines, but sprawling automobile suburbs spread across miles of highway. New tract housing developments like Levittown sprouted on cheap land outside cities, “scattered, sprawling, without definable downtowns, and not negotiable on foot”. Shopping centers and office parks were built with plentiful parking rather than rail access. In these new suburbs, having a car wasn’t just a convenience – it was a necessity. The car became deeply embedded in American culture as a symbol of freedom, status, and modernity.
Meanwhile, government policy in the mid-20th century further accelerated the decline of passenger rail. The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 poured federal money into constructing the Interstate Highway System – an unprecedented $25 billion program to lay 41,000 miles of freeways, funded by a federal gas tax. Political leadership at the time was closely entwined with automotive interests: President Eisenhower’s Defense Secretary was the former president of General Motors, Charles Wilson, who championed highways as essential to national security. Likewise, a key federal highways administrator in the 1950s was Francis DuPont – from the family that owned a major share of GM – who helped push through the interstate funding. As billions of public dollars built new roads, Americans increasingly chose driving for intercity travel.
By contrast, the railroads received little help and in some cases were actively hindered. Rail companies were still private and for-profit, and they faced heavy property taxes on tracks and stations even as ridership collapsed. Many railroads were desperate to drop money-losing passenger trains and focus on freight. Throughout the 1950s and 60s, railroads petitioned the Interstate Commerce Commission to discontinue famous train routes that had once been their pride – and most got permission to do so. One by one, storied passenger trains like the Pennsylvania Railroad’s Broadway Limited and New York Central’s Twentieth Century Limited were terminated. Branch-line and then even mainline passenger services disappeared en masse, leaving a “skeletal framework” of intercity trains by the late 1960s.
The situation grew so dire that by 1970, the largest railroad (Penn Central) was bankrupt and private railroads were on the verge of exiting the passenger business entirely. In response, Congress stepped in to create the National Railroad Passenger Corporation – better known as Amtrak – in 1971. Amtrak was to be a government-backed entity taking over the remaining passenger routes from the freight railroads, which were all too eager to shed the financial burden. This move preserved a national passenger rail network, but only barely. Amtrak inherited a threadbare system of just a few dozen routes, mostly operating on freight-owned tracks at speeds well below what was common in Europe or Japan. Crucially, Amtrak was conceived as a for-profit company (albeit one that has never actually turned a profit) and it has lived a precarious existence, dependent on annual congressional appropriations and frequent political assaults. The lack of a secure, dedicated funding source meant Amtrak could not invest heavily in modernization or expansion. Indeed, from the 1970s onward, U.S. passenger rail entered a vicious cycle: low investment led to slow, infrequent service, which kept ridership low – in turn inviting more cuts. For example, in 1995 Amtrak suffered severe budget cuts that forced service reductions nationwide. Many routes went from daily to thrice-weekly, and some towns lost train service entirely, further undermining rail’s usefulness.
By the end of the 20th century, the American passenger rail network was a shadow of its former self. A pair of stark maps tells the story: in 1962, a dense web of passenger trains crisscrossed the U.S., but by 2005 that network had been reduced to a few sparse lines. Outside of a handful of busy corridors – notably the Boston-to-Washington Northeast Corridor – taking the train was no longer a practical option for most travelers. This historical decline set the stage for why true high-speed rail never gained a foothold: the country first had to stop the bleeding of its basic passenger rail services before it could contemplate bullet trains. Even today, Amtrak’s top speeds (150 mph on a short stretch of the Northeast Corridor for the Acela) fall far short of the 186–220 mph common on high-speed lines abroad, and those higher speeds are only possible on a small fraction of Amtrak-owned track. To understand how we got here, we must examine not only the modes Americans embraced – cars and planes – but also the powerful interests that nudged the nation down that path.
The Lobbying Machine: Cars, Oil, Airlines and the Death of Transit
The decline of American passenger rail was not only a natural result of consumer choice or post-war affluence. It was hastened and sealed by deliberate actions of industries that stood to gain from rail’s downfall – namely, the automobile, oil, and airline industries. These interests expended enormous effort to influence public policy and infrastructure investment in their favor throughout the 20th century, often at the direct expense of rail and mass transit.
A notorious chapter in this story is the so-called “General Motors streetcar conspiracy.” In the 1930s and 40s, as many U.S. cities still relied on electric streetcar networks for urban transportation, a group of companies tied to the automotive sector embarked on a campaign to buy up and dismantle those streetcar systems. National City Lines (NCL), a private holding company funded by GM, Firestone Tire, Standard Oil of California, Phillips Petroleum, and Mack Trucks, methodically purchased transit companies in cities from Los Angeles to Baltimore. Once NCL controlled a city’s streetcars, it would rip up the electric rail lines and replace them with GM-built buses. Internal memos revealed that GM officials, like President Alfred P. Sloan, understood buses would be a far less appealing mode of transit – and that riders, frustrated by slow, inconvenient bus service, would likely switch to automobiles, “buying cars in huge numbers” as a result. The plan was insidious but effective: by 1947, National City Lines and its affiliates had acquired and dieselized transit systems in over 100 cities. In 1949, GM and others were convicted in federal court of conspiring to monopolize the sale of buses and supplies to their captive transit companies, though they infamously received only token fines (GM paid just $5,000 – hardly a deterrent given the scope of the offense). To this day, debate rages over how much this “conspiracy” versus other factors contributed to the demise of streetcars. But it’s clear that major corporate players actively worked to eliminate rail-based transit options, thereby boosting dependence on cars and buses that ran on their products (tires, gasoline, internal combustion engines).
Beyond the streetcar saga, Detroit’s auto executives were instrumental in creating the modern highway lobby – one of the most powerful political lobbies in U.S. history. In 1932, Alfred Sloan helped organize the National Highway Users Conference, an umbrella group uniting oil companies, car and truck makers, tire manufacturers, and other motor vehicle interests into a cohesive force. This coalition’s explicit goal was to secure lavish public spending on road construction. Over subsequent decades, the highway lobby became extraordinarily effective at shaping legislation and public opinion. It pushed the narrative – still common in American political dialogue – that roads “pay for themselves” through fuel taxes, whereas trains are subsidy-dependent. This narrative was (and is) misleading: in reality, all transport modes are subsidized, and dedicated gas taxes have only ever covered a fraction of road costs. But the highway lobby’s prowess ensured that policymakers looked kindly on funding highways and gave comparatively paltry sums to rail or mass transit. As one analysis by the Regional Plan Association noted, “in the last 100 years the amount of government money spent on railroads has been paltry compared with what is spent on roads and air travel” – government funding built a multi-lane car and air system while the intercity rail network withered to skeletal form.
The commercial aviation industry likewise had incentives to discourage passenger rail, especially as jet travel took off in the 1950s–60s. By the 1970s, airlines dominated long-distance intercity travel in the U.S., and short-haul flights between nearby cities became routine as well. If high-speed rail had been proposed to connect, say, Los Angeles and San Francisco or Dallas and Houston, airlines would have viewed it as a direct competitive threat to lucrative shuttle flight routes. Indeed, there is a telling example from Texas in the 1990s: a consortium backed by European and Japanese companies had put forward an ambitious plan known as the Texas TGV to build a high-speed line linking Dallas, Houston, Austin, and San Antonio. Southwest Airlines, a dominant short-haul carrier in Texas, launched an all-out lobbying campaign to kill the project. According to reports from that time, Southwest aggressively opposed any public funding or bond guarantees for high-speed rail, persuaded Texas legislators to forbid state support, and even got political heavyweights – Governor Ann Richards and Senator Lloyd Bentsen – to withhold enthusiasm. Southwest’s CEO Herb Kelleher feared (correctly) that a bullet train siphoning off travelers could force the airline to cut routes and raise fares. An analysis predicted the proposed 200-mph train would grab as much as 60% of air travelers on the Dallas–Houston route, a market Southwest relied on. The airline publicly insisted its concern was only that the rail project be privately funded, not taxpayer-subsidized. But the outcome was that the Texas TGV plan collapsed by 1994 – unable to meet a financing deadline and starved of political support, in no small part due to Southwest’s interference. This episode illustrates how U.S. airlines have not hesitated to use their political muscle to thwart potential high-speed rail competition on key city-pair routes.
The oil industry’s role in shaping American transportation is somewhat more diffuse but just as crucial. Oil companies benefited immensely from a car-centric society and the decline of electrified transit. In the early 20th century, groups like Standard Oil were involved in the bus-push schemes (as investors in National City Lines). More broadly, for decades the petroleum lobby fought against higher fuel efficiency standards and fuel taxes that could make driving more expensive, fearing it would reduce gasoline consumption. Cheap gasoline – often kept that way with the help of tax subsidies for oil production – has been a pillar of U.S. transportation policy, encouraging more driving and suburban growth at the expense of transit and rail. One striking anecdote: in 1953, the same year President Eisenhower appointed GM’s Charles Wilson to his cabinet, the federal government also appointed DuPont family scion (and GM stakeholder) Francis DuPont to lead the Bureau of Public Roads. These appointments entrenched a “auto-first” mindset in federal policy, ensuring that when the pivotal moment came – the interstate highway plan – there was virtually no dissent at high levels of government about focusing on roads rather than rails.
By the late 20th century, the combined effect of these lobbying efforts was plain to see. The United States had built a world-class interstate highway network and a ubiquitous system of airports, heavily subsidized by public funds, while its passenger rail system dwindled and decayed. Highways and air travel received far more government money than railroads did in the 20th century, effectively engineering America’s transport mono-culture of cars and planes. For generations, many Americans internalized the belief that driving was “free” (or at least fully paid by drivers) and that trains were money-losers kept afloat only by government handouts. This belief persisted despite evidence to the contrary, in part because admitting the reality – that cars too are heavily subsidized – would undercut the car’s image as a symbol of individual freedom unencumbered by government support.
All of these historical factors set the stage for why high-speed rail has struggled to gain a foothold. By the time the concept of 200-mph trains was even technologically feasible and proven elsewhere (the first such service appeared in Japan in 1964), the U.S. had already made decades of choices that entrenched automobile and airline dominance. The railroads had been relegated to moving freight, and the very idea of passenger trains was seen as anachronistic by many. Yet in other parts of the world, a very different story was unfolding – one that makes for a sharp contrast with the American experience.
Car Culture, Suburban Sprawl, and the American Mindset
Beyond lobbying and policy, another powerful force in America’s transportation saga is culture – specifically, the country’s attachment to automobiles and the lifestyle that grew up around them. The U.S. isn’t unique in loving cars, but it arguably took this affection to an extreme. Car ownership per capita in the United States has long been among the highest in the world. The post-WWII “American Dream” was often symbolized by a house in the suburbs and one or two cars in the driveway. As noted, the design of post-war suburbs virtually required car ownership; cul-de-sac subdivisions and shopping malls surrounded by parking lots were not accessible by rail or often even by foot. Over time, this built environment created a self-perpetuating dependency: people drove because destinations were far apart and not reachable otherwise, and destinations continued to be built in dispersed, car-oriented patterns because it was assumed everyone would drive.
This suburban sprawl had profound implications for mass transit and intercity rail alike. In Europe or Japan, high-speed trains typically link dense city centers, where passengers at both ends can connect to extensive local public transportation (metros, trams, buses) or walk to final destinations. In much of the U.S., however, the cities became decentralized and “de-densified.” Downtowns emptied out as jobs and residents moved to the suburbs. Many American cities dismantled their urban rail systems (e.g. streetcars, as described earlier), meaning that even if one took an intercity train to a city, the onward mobility in the region often required a car. This reduced the appeal of trains compared to flying into an airport and renting a car, or just driving directly to one’s destination. It’s telling that when the auto companies and highway lobby crippled urban streetcar networks, they not only removed a competitor to cars in the city, but also severed a critical feeder for longer-distance trains – once you couldn’t take a streetcar to the train station, you were more likely to drive all the way for intercity trips too.
Culturally, the car came to embody freedom in the American psyche. From novels and Hollywood films to advertising campaigns, the message was that mobility equals car ownership. The idea of driving cross-country on the open Interstate with the radio on and “the top down” became a romanticized notion of independence, even though this mobility was in fact enabled by massive government spending on roads. Trains, by contrast, were increasingly seen as old-fashioned or restrictive – they run on fixed schedules and routes, which clashed with the American ethos of individualism and flexibility (never mind that airlines also run on fixed schedules, the perception differed). By the 1980s and 90s, Amtrak often had to market its long-distance trains as nostalgic experiences rather than time-competitive transportation.
Another aspect of American culture affecting rail is the political culture around public transit. In many circles, public transportation (including trains) became stigmatized as something for people who “have no other choice” – the urban poor, students, or elderly – whereas the car was for the mainstream middle-class. This was not universally true (the Northeast Corridor’s busy trains mostly carry professionals), but it was a common perception elsewhere. This translated into weak political support for rail investment. If lawmakers and voters view train travel as a niche or even a quasi-charitable service rather than critical infrastructure, they are less likely to pour big money into it. High-speed rail in particular might have seemed exotic – something relevant for dense European or Asian countries but not a priority for the sprawling U.S.
It’s worth noting that America’s car-centric trajectory was not preordained. In the early 20th century, American cities were fairly transit-oriented and intercity rail was how most people traveled between cities. The dominance of cars emerged from specific policy choices and economic conditions, as we’ve explored. Cultural attitudes followed infrastructure to a large extent. Some historians argue that if the U.S. government had invested in modern high-speed rail from the 1960s onward with the same zeal it put into highways, Americans might well have embraced trains for their efficiency and speed. After all, during World War II, train travel in the U.S. surged and was popular – ridership peaked because gasoline was rationed and trains were reliable. But the opposite happened after the war: cheap gas, new highways, and the momentum of car culture overwhelmed any nascent interest in fast trains.
Today, this cultural landscape is slowly evolving – younger generations show more interest in public transit and environmental sustainability is prompting some rethinking of car dependence. But the legacy of the past is deeply ingrained. The U.S. has spent over half a century building cities and habits around the automobile. Any attempt to introduce high-speed rail nationally must contend not only with physical infrastructure hurdles but with these long-standing cultural preferences. In effect, high-speed rail asks Americans to rediscover train travel in a country that has largely forgotten what it’s like to zoom between cities on rails. For a skeptical public, seeing is believing – which is why the examples from overseas are instructive. It’s to those international high-speed rail systems that we now turn, to understand what the U.S. is missing and why those countries succeeded where America has not.
On the Fast Track Abroad: High-Speed Rail Success Stories
If one needs proof that high-speed rail can transform travel, boost economies, and capture the public’s imagination, look no further than the experiences of Asia and Europe. In the past few decades, countries around the world have built extensive high-speed rail (HSR) networks that have revolutionized how people move. These systems offer a telling contrast to the American stagnation. Here, we spotlight a few leading examples – China, Japan, France, Germany, and Spain – each a wealthy nation that chose to invest heavily in fast trains, albeit in different contexts. Their accomplishments underscore that the barriers holding back HSR in the U.S. are not technological or due to lack of resources, but rather matters of priorities and politics.
China’s High-Speed Rail: From Zero to 48,000 km in 15 Years – No country has bet bigger on high-speed rail in recent years than China, and the results have been astounding. As recently as the early 2000s, China had virtually no high-speed rail. Its rail network was large but slow, based on mid-20th-century technology. Then, around 2004, the Chinese government made HSR a national strategic priority, seeing it as essential for economic development and intercity mobility in their vast country. Construction began in earnest in the mid-2000s, and within a decade China was routinely opening new high-speed lines at a pace and scale never seen before. By the end of 2024, China’s high-speed railway network reached approximately 48,000 kilometers (30,000 miles) of track – by far the longest in the world. To put that in perspective, 48,000 km is more than two-thirds of the entire U.S. rail network (freight and passenger combined), and China achieved this just since the late 2000s. Trains on these lines operate at speeds of 300 km/h (186 mph) or more, connecting all of China’s major cities and many smaller ones. The busiest routes, like the Beijing–Shanghai corridor, now move hundreds of millions of passengers a year in as little as 4.5 hours end-to-end (a 1,300 km journey). The impact on Chinese travel habits has been transformational – many routes that were formerly a 3-hour flight or an overnight slow train have been supplanted by 5- or 6-hour high-speed rail trips city center to city center, with frequencies as high as one train every 10 minutes on peak corridors.
How did China manage this, and what contrasts with the U.S. stand out? For one, China’s political system enabled rapid decision-making and massive state-directed investment. The government treated HSR as a national infrastructure project akin to America’s Apollo moon program – something to achieve quickly and at scale. There was relatively little local veto power (e.g. fewer legal challenges or “not in my backyard” hurdles that often bog down projects in democratic systems). Financing was largely done through state-owned banks and entities, meaning funding was not the persistent question mark it tends to be in U.S. projects. Costs in China were also lower – both labor and land acquisition costs are generally less than in the U.S., and there was a concerted effort to indigenize the technology. China initially imported high-speed train designs from Japan, Germany, and France, but through technology transfer agreements, it developed its own manufacturing capacity. Today, China’s rail industry produces its own trains (the “CRH” and “Fuxing” trainsets) and exports rail equipment globally. The government also prioritized network breadth over immediate profitability; many lines in less-populated regions were built for long-term development reasons and might not have been justified by short-term ridership alone. The payoff is now becoming evident: by 2025, China aims to extend the HSR network to 50,000+ km and to 60,000 km by 2030, reaching virtually every city of half a million people or more. In effect, China leapfrogged from having antiquated trains to having an advanced high-speed network blanketing the country in the span of a generation.
Japan’s Shinkansen: Pioneering the Bullet Train – Japan is where high-speed rail was born. In 1964, as the world watched the Tokyo Olympics, Japan unveiled the Shinkansen, the first-ever high-speed railway, linking Tokyo and Osaka at speeds of 210 km/h (130 mph). This bold project was driven by necessity: by the late 1950s, Japan’s conventional rail lines were utterly saturated with trains and could not handle the booming travel demand of a rapidly growing economy. The solution was revolutionary – build an entirely new standard-gauge line dedicated to passenger trains, bypassing the old slow network. The Tōkaidō Shinkansen opened on time in ’64 and was an immediate success, carrying millions with unprecedented speed and frequency. In the ensuing decades, Japan expanded the Shinkansen system across the country. By its 50th anniversary in 2014, the network had grown from the initial 515 km to 2,388 km of high-speed lines (and it has continued to grow since, now over 3,000 km). The Shinkansen not only slashed travel times – Tokyo to Osaka went from nearly 7 hours pre-1964 to about 2 hours 25 minutes on modern trains – it also developed a reputation for extraordinary safety and punctuality. In 50+ years of operation, Japan’s high-speed trains have carried over 10 billion passengers without a single passenger fatality due to accidents – a safety record unmatched by any other major mode of transport. The trains routinely run on schedule to within seconds of precision (average delays under one minute). This level of reliability and safety helped ingrain train travel as a preferred choice for Japanese travelers. Even with the advent of low-cost airlines, the Shinkansen remains highly competitive on routes up to ~500 miles, offering hassle-free downtown-to-downtown service.
Japan’s success holds lessons for the U.S. For one, it showed that population density is an important but not exclusive factor. Japan is densely populated in corridors like Tokyo-Nagoya-Osaka (the megalopolis where the Shinkansen runs), which clearly helps rail demand. Parts of the U.S., like the Northeast Corridor or Southern California, have comparable population densities where high-speed rail could thrive. But Japan also built lines into less dense regions (e.g. the northern Tohoku Shinkansen) with the understanding that fast rail can spur economic integration and growth in those areas. Another lesson is that centralized planning and consistent funding were key – Japan’s national railway (JNR, later JR groups) had government backing to invest heavily and was not constantly whipsawed by politics after the initial go-ahead. Compare that to America, where even after a high-speed rail project is launched (say, in California), it can face recurring threats of cancellation or funding cuts whenever political winds shift.
France’s TGV and Europe’s High-Speed Network – France was an early European adopter of high-speed rail, launching the TGV (Train à Grande Vitesse) in 1981 on the Paris–Lyon line. The French approach was to build dedicated high-speed lines (LGV – lignes à grande vitesse) for the trunk of a route and then allow trains to fan out on conventional tracks to serve various cities. The formula proved hugely successful: the bright orange TGV trains set a world speed record (which France still holds at 574.8 km/h in a test run) and more importantly slashed travel times. Paris and Lyon, two major economic centers ~270 miles apart, were suddenly just 2 hours apart by train, city-center to city-center. Travelers flocked to the convenience, and TGV lines soon spread out across France – south to Marseille and the Mediterranean, north to Lille and the English Channel (with a connection via the Channel Tunnel to London), west to Brittany, and east toward Strasbourg. By 2021, France had about 2,800 km of dedicated high-speed lines, and today slightly more as new segments have opened. The network ties into neighboring countries: French TGVs can continue into Germany, Switzerland, Spain, Belgium, etc., and reciprocally those countries’ trains (like Germany’s ICE or Spain’s AVE) can run on French high-speed tracks if compatible. The result is a fairly seamless high-speed rail web across Western Europe. For example, one can travel from Paris to Barcelona (over 600 miles) in about 6.5 hours by a direct TGV/AVE, or Paris to Frankfurt in about 4 hours, avoiding the need for short flights.
Germany’s InterCity Express (ICE) trains, starting in 1991, similarly created fast links between cities like Frankfurt, Hamburg, Cologne, and Berlin. Germany has built new high-speed lines in sections (approximately 1,650 km of lines built for 250–300 km/h speeds), while also upgrading existing routes. An ICE sprinting at 300 km/h across the German countryside is now a common sight, and like France, Germany interlinks with neighbors (ICE trains run into France, Belgium, the Netherlands, etc.). Spain, interestingly, leapfrogged many peers – starting later but then constructing one of the largest high-speed networks in Europe. The first Spanish high-speed line (Madrid–Seville) opened in 1992. Since then, Spain has laid about 3,700–4,000 km of HSR lines, connecting Madrid with Barcelona, Valencia, Málaga, Galicia, and more. As of 2025, Spain actually boasts the longest high-speed rail network in Europe (nearly 4,000 km) and the second longest in the world after China. Despite Spain’s somewhat lower population density and economic challenges in the 2010s, the country prioritized rail to unite far-flung regions and modernize transport – aided by European Union infrastructure funds. Spain’s system (the AVE) has dramatically reduced travel times across the Iberian Peninsula (Madrid to Barcelona is 2.5 hours by train instead of 6+ by car).
The European high-speed rail experience demonstrates a few important points: First, these systems require sustained public investment and political commitment over decades. France’s TGV, for example, was heavily funded by the French government (and the state-owned SNCF railway), justified by the broader economic benefits it would bring – which it did, by tying regional economies closer to Paris and spurring development around stations. European Union nations also coordinated to ensure interoperability across borders, something the U.S. doesn’t have to worry about (since it’s one country) but which shows the level of planning involved. Second, high-speed rail in Europe competes with short-haul flights and often wins on convenience. As environmental awareness grows, there’s increasing pressure in Europe to shift from air to rail for sub-3 or 4-hour trips. Governments there see HSR not just as a transport mode but also as a tool for reducing carbon emissions, since electrified trains produce far less CO2 per passenger than jet aircraft or cars. In the U.S., transportation is the largest source of greenhouse gases, and much of that comes from cars and planes. Yet U.S. climate policy has so far focused more on electric cars than on trains, again reflecting the ingrained car-first mentality. Europe, by contrast, is explicitly encouraging rail travel as part of climate action (e.g. France even moved to ban some short domestic flights where a train alternative under 2.5 hours exists).
Another takeaway from abroad is how passenger-centric priorities can coexist with busy economies. Japan’s and Europe’s freight rail systems are not as dominant as America’s; instead, trucks handle more freight there. The U.S. made a different trade-off long ago: favoring freight on rails and passengers on roads/air. In Europe and Japan, it’s almost the inverse for certain corridors – the best rail infrastructure is allocated to passengers, and freight sometimes takes longer routes or operates at off-peak times. We will delve more into the U.S. freight-vs-passenger dynamic later, but it’s clear that if a nation wants high-speed passenger trains, it has to be willing to give them prime real estate (rail corridors designed for passenger needs).
In summary, other wealthy countries have shown that high-speed rail can be nation-transforming. From the smooth 320 km/h rides of a French TGV to the standing-room-only holiday crowds on China’s bullet trains, these systems have become victims of their own success in a sense – they are often crowded because so many people want to use them. They boost connectivity, shrink travel times, and provide an alternative to the delays and hassles of short flights or highway congestion. When Americans visiting abroad ride these trains, they often wonder, “Why don’t we have this back home?” The answers lie in the unique challenges and missteps of attempts to bring high-speed rail to U.S. soil, which we explore next.
Big Plans, Bigger Problems: U.S. High-Speed Rail Projects in Peril
If the lack of high-speed rail in America were due simply to lack of ideas or proposals, the story would be straightforward. But in fact, numerous high-speed rail projects have been proposed in the U.S. – some even got underway – only to face delays, cost overruns, political opposition, or outright cancellation. Three of the most prominent attempts in recent years are California’s statewide high-speed rail, the Texas Central project, and Florida’s Brightline (the nation’s first new private intercity train in decades). Each illustrates different obstacles on the bumpy road to HSR.
California: The Bullet Train that Slowed to a Crawl
California, with nearly 40 million people and notorious highway and airport congestion, seemed like fertile ground for America’s first true high-speed rail line. In 2008, California voters approved a $9.95 billion bond measure to kickstart construction of a high-speed rail system connecting Los Angeles and San Francisco (with extensions to San Diego and Sacramento in later phases). The vision was bold: electric trains traveling at up to 220 mph would whisk passengers between LA and the Bay Area in about 2 hours 40 minutes, meaning downtown-to-downtown trips competitive with flying and far faster than driving. The project broke ground in 2015 in the state’s Central Valley. A 171-mile Initial Operating Segment (IOS) from Merced to Bakersfield – roughly the middle portion of the line – is now under construction. But what was once touted to open by 2020 is still years from completion, and the entire endeavor has become mired in challenges.
The California High-Speed Rail project (CAHSR) is a case study in cost inflation and schedule delays. Initial estimates pegged the cost of Phase 1 (San Francisco to Los Angeles/Anaheim, ~520 miles) at around $33 billion in 2008, with completion by early 2020s. Those figures proved wildly optimistic. As of the latest official update, the full Phase 1 system is now projected to cost $89–$128 billion depending on final alignment and scope, and the state has nowhere near that funding in hand. The current focus is on finishing the 171-mile Central Valley segment first. That stretch alone carries an estimated price tag of about $28–$38.5 billion and is expected to start service around 2031–2033 if all goes well. In other words, just one-third of the SF–LA route will cost as much or more than the entire system was supposed to. What happened?
Several factors contributed to the ballooning costs and timeline:
- Engineering and Geographic Complexities: The California route must cross two major mountain ranges – the Tehachapi Mountains north of Los Angeles and the Diablo Range (Pacheco Pass) to reach the Bay Area. Tunneling through these mountains is both expensive and slow. Initial planning may have underestimated the difficulty. As of 2025, no tunneling has begun; the sections under construction are in the flat Central Valley. The hard (and costly) part is yet to come, and there is a funding shortfall for those segments.
- Route Selection and Local Opposition: The chosen route goes through various communities that have raised concerns or lawsuits over the rail line’s impacts. Aligning the high-speed tracks often meant threading a needle to avoid dense cities, environmental sensitive areas, and seismic fault zones. Litigation from NIMBY (“not in my backyard”) groups and suburbs, especially in parts of Southern California and the Bay Area, delayed environmental clearances. Every alignment tweak or mitigation added costs.
- Piecemeal Funding and Political Uncertainty: Unlike the interstate highways which had a huge upfront federal commitment, CAHSR has been funded in fits and starts. The federal government supplied about $3.5 billion during the Obama administration (as stimulus grants), and California has allocated some state funds (including cap-and-trade carbon auction revenue). But the project never got a consistent yearly appropriation. This stop-go funding meant the rail authority couldn’t tender large design-build contracts for the entire line at once – they had to break it into smaller segments that could be afforded with the money on hand, which is inefficient and drives up costs. It also meant the project was vulnerable to politics: when California’s governorship or the White House changed hands, support could weaken. For instance, the Trump administration canceled a nearly $1 billion grant for the project in 2019 (later restored by the Biden administration), injecting more uncertainty.
- Management and Oversight Issues: Reports by state auditors and others have pointed to poor contract management and optimistic scheduling by the California High-Speed Rail Authority. Land acquisition for right-of-way lagged, utility relocations took longer than expected, and contractor change orders piled up, adding hundreds of millions in overruns. In essence, a project of this magnitude strained the capacity of existing institutions – California was building the first high-speed railroad in America, so every procedure (from safety regulations to workforce training) had to be developed on the fly.
The result of these challenges is that, fifteen years after voters approved it, California’s high-speed rail is still years away from carrying its first passenger – and even then, it will only operate on a partially isolated segment. Political support has wavered; some state legislators now question whether the Los Angeles to San Francisco vision will ever be realized. Opponents brand it a “boondoggle,” while supporters argue that California must persevere, noting that once completed, the 220 mph trains on the Merced–Bakersfield segment would be the fastest in the Americas and that abandoning the project now would waste the billions already spent. As of mid-2025, the state is pressing on with construction in the Central Valley, and has finished major viaducts and guideway on over 119 miles of that segment. However, without tens of billions more secured, it’s unclear how or when the track will extend to the major coastal cities. California’s effort shows that building high-speed rail in the U.S. is not just a technical endeavor but a profoundly political one, requiring long-term commitment that outlasts election cycles.
Texas: A Private Bullet Train Meets Public Skepticism
In contrast to California’s publicly funded approach, Texas Central was conceived as a fully private venture to build a high-speed rail line roughly 240 miles long between Houston and Dallas – two giant metros with a combined population of around 15 million. This route is flat, with no mountains to tunnel, and the city pairs are among the largest in the country without direct rail service. Travel demand is high – currently over 16 million trips by car or air occur annually between the Houston and North Texas regions, according to project estimates. The idea was to offer a 90-minute train trip as an alternative to a 4-hour drive or a short flight. The technology of choice: Japanese Shinkansen trains (the N700S series), known for their safety record. In fact, the Japanese government and companies like JR Central were early partners, seeing an opportunity to export Shinkansen technology to America.
Texas Central made significant strides in the 2010s. It secured agreements with JR Central, did extensive engineering studies, and by 2020 it had obtained key federal approvals – the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) issued a safety rule framework and environmental clearance for the Dallas-Houston high-speed line. The company lined up a proposed route mostly along existing utility corridors or rights of way to minimize the impact on landowners. As of 2025, Texas Central claims to have acquired around 500 parcels of land along the route and even all the planned station sites in Dallas, the Brazos Valley, and Houston. The project is often touted as “shovel-ready.” In April 2024, it even got a diplomatic nod when the U.S. and Japan issued a joint statement supporting the Texas high-speed rail project as part of a bilateral meeting.
Yet, for all that progress on paper, Texas Central has struggled to secure the one thing a private infrastructure megaproject absolutely needs: money. The estimated construction cost is on the order of $30 billion+ for the line. Raising that amount privately (through investors or loans) for an unproven market is a tall order. The company initially hoped to finance through a mix of equity and debt, possibly tapping federal loans or private activity bonds, but concrete funding has been elusive. By 2022, the project’s CEO had stepped down and there were reports Texas Central had reduced staff, fueling rumors it was moribund. Then came a twist: in 2023–24, Amtrak entered into an agreement with Texas Central to essentially take over planning and potentially help seek federal grants for the line. Amtrak’s involvement signaled that the federal government might assist this as a kind of public-private partnership. Indeed, in August 2024, a $64 million federal grant was awarded for further planning. However, politics intervened again – after the 2024 election, the incoming administration rescinded that planning grant in April 2025, causing Amtrak to suspend its involvement. The uncertainty of federal support has left the project’s future in limbo.
Additionally, Texas Central faced vehement opposition from some rural landowners and Texas politicians. The line would pass through rural counties between the metro areas, and many landowners objected to a private company using eminent domain to acquire strips of their land for the rail right-of-way. There were lawsuits challenging Texas Central’s legal status as a railroad (and hence its eminent domain authority). In 2022, the Texas Supreme Court did affirm that the company qualified as a railroad and could use eminent domain, which was a victory for the project. But opposition remains. A state legislator representing rural constituents has railed against the project and promises to keep fighting it. In Texas’s political climate, skepticism of rail projects runs high; some see it as a boondoggle or an imposition on private property rights.
Despite these headwinds, Texas Central’s lead investor, John Kleinheinz, insists the project is not dead. In August 2025, he testified that the project is “shovel-ready” – it has its federal permits, much of the land, and even specific train technology chosen. According to Kleinheinz, 70% of the route would run in the median of power transmission lines (utility corridors), meaning relatively few homes or farms are disrupted. He argues that Houston to Dallas is perhaps the best possible corridor in the U.S. for high-speed rail: it’s a huge travel market, the geography is ideal (straight and flat), and there’s no viable rail service today. He also tantalizingly claimed that the Texas line, with its planned top speed around 205 mph, could become the fastest train in the world because the flat terrain allows sustained high speeds. (This is a bit of hyperbole – a few trains abroad run slightly faster, up to 217 mph, and even faster speeds have been tested – but the point is Texas would have world-class speed capability). To move forward, what Texas Central needs is financing. Kleinheinz indicated they are seeking to assemble a package involving federal loans, private investment, and possibly state support. Whether that materializes may depend on political winds and investors’ risk appetite.
Texas Central’s saga highlights a fundamental challenge: the U.S. lacks a robust mechanism to finance high-speed rail, especially when projects are not strictly government-run. In other countries, HSR infrastructure is usually funded or underwritten by the government because of the high upfront costs and the broader public benefits. In the U.S., there has been an expectation (especially in some states) that if bullet trains are worth doing, the private sector should foot the bill. Texas tried that route, but investors see the risk – construction costs can overrun, and ridership, while potentially high, is not guaranteed. Without public investment or guarantees, the capital markets alone have been reluctant to commit tens of billions to unbuilt rail lines. Thus, Texas Central remains in a holding pattern: shovel-ready on paper, but shovels still largely idle on the ground as of 2025.
Brightline: A Brighter Spot – Higher-Speed Rail in Florida (and Beyond?)
Amid the disappointments, Brightline stands out as a somewhat different and more hopeful story. Brightline is a privately operated passenger train service in Florida that began in 2018, running on a 70-mile corridor between Miami and West Palm Beach. It is not “high-speed rail” by the international definition (its top speed was 79 mph initially, now 125 mph on newer segments), but it represents the first new private intercity passenger rail service in the U.S. in over 100 years, and an effort to prove that modern trains can attract riders even in America’s car capitals.
Brightline’s first phase was built by Florida East Coast Industries, a private company that owns the Florida East Coast Railway corridor. By leveraging an existing rail line and upgrading it, Brightline avoided the astronomical costs of brand-new right-of-way. The company’s strategy was real estate-driven: they developed station complexes in Miami and other cities with shops and housing, aiming to generate ancillary revenue. The service, with sleek trainsets and a higher-end, hospitality-like experience, did start to gain ridership momentum (before a pandemic dip in 2020). In late 2023, Brightline achieved a major milestone: it opened its extension from West Palm Beach to Orlando, creating a 235-mile Miami–Orlando route. The trains now travel up to 125 mph in the new segment inland, making it the fastest train service in the U.S. outside the Northeast Corridor. A trip from downtown Miami to Orlando (near the airport) takes about 3.5 hours. While not as fast as a hypothetical 200 mph high-speed train (which could do that distance in perhaps ~2 hours), it’s competitive with driving when one considers Florida’s often congested highways, and it offers a comfortable, productive travel environment.
Brightline’s Florida expansion hasn’t been without challenges – it faced community opposition in some areas (concerns over safety at grade crossings after some accidents, since the train speeds are high for a line that still has road crossings). It also endured construction delays and cost escalations for the Orlando extension. But the service is operational and planning further growth. The state of Florida did not subsidize Brightline, but it did facilitate some aspects like allowing the use of highway right-of-way for future expansions.
Importantly, Brightline has set its sights on another major corridor: Las Vegas to Southern California. Under the name Brightline West, the company is advancing a plan to build a true high-speed line (speeds up to 180 mph) from Las Vegas to a desert town in California’s Victor Valley, and eventually to Rancho Cucamonga in the Los Angeles suburbs – where it would connect to commuter rail into LA Union Station. This project repurposes an old idea (there have been proposals for a Vegas train for decades) and seems to be gaining traction. Brightline West commenced initial construction work in early 2024 and anticipates a roughly four-year build, aiming to open by around 2028. The 218-mile line will largely run in the median of Interstate 15, minimizing new land acquisition issues. Financing is still being finalized, involving private capital and likely federal loans or bonds, but the fact that ground has been broken indicates a level of confidence. If completed, the Vegas line would be the first true high-speed rail operation in the U.S. (Brightline’s Florida service is often termed “higher-speed rail” since it’s not 150+ mph).
Brightline’s emergence demonstrates that under specific conditions – a favorable corridor, available right-of-way, and private investment aligned with real estate or tourism goals – train projects can advance in the U.S. However, these are still exceptions rather than the rule. Florida’s case was unique (private ownership of a rail corridor through a dense region is rare). And even Brightline has leveraged government help, such as tax-free bonds and cooperation with state agencies, albeit not direct subsidies. The Las Vegas line likewise will hinge on some public financing tools. In general, the U.S. has not seen a purely private high-speed rail project succeed yet (Texas is still uncertain). It suggests that for widespread HSR, government leadership and funding are likely indispensable – just as they were for the interstate highways and for high-speed rail in every other country.
In this section, we’ve seen that American high-speed rail efforts face a gauntlet of obstacles: complex geography (in California’s case), fragmented funding and political shifts, entrenched opposition from those wary of land takings or skeptical of trains, and the sheer scale of investment required. Each setback in projects like these can sour public perception, making politicians even more hesitant next time. It can become a vicious cycle: no successful examples to point to, so nobody wants to take the risk to create one. That’s why Brightline’s modest success is important – it shows Americans will ride modern trains if given the opportunity, and it breaks the psychological barrier that new passenger rail is impossible here.
Still, without a national commitment, these isolated projects will remain just that – isolated. Which brings us to one of the most decisive factors in the fate of high-speed rail: where the money goes. The U.S. has always heavily subsidized transportation; the question is which modes get the goldmine and which get the shaft. The next section delves into the dollars and cents.
Follow the Money: Subsidies, Incentives, and the Transportation Tilt
To understand why America doesn’t have high-speed rail, one must examine how America spends its transportation dollars. It is often said that “Americans chose the car.” In reality, Americans were presented with a heavily subsidized auto-highway system and a largely neglected rail alternative, so the choice was nudged, if not made, by policy design. Over the past century, the U.S. government – at federal, state, and local levels – poured vast sums into roads, highways, and aviation, while investing comparatively little in passenger rail. The result is a classic case of “you get what you pay for.” High-speed rail thrives in places where governments have consistently funded intercity rail infrastructure; the U.S. prioritized other modes instead.
Consider the Interstate Highway System: since its inception in 1956, the federal government has authorized well over half a trillion dollars (in today’s money) on highways. The Highway Trust Fund, funded by federal gas taxes, covers a large portion, but not all – in recent years, gas tax revenues haven’t kept up with spending, so tens of billions from general Treasury funds (i.e. unrelated to user fees) have been injected to prop up highway funding. State and local governments also spend heavily on road building and maintenance (often from property taxes or general funds). Meanwhile, Amtrak’s federal support since 1971 has typically been in the range of $1–2 billion per year, a rounding error in the federal budget. For perspective, the U.S. Department of Transportation’s budget for 2022 included around $60 billion for highways and only about $2 billion for Amtrak grants. In the landmark Bipartisan Infrastructure Law of 2021, the disparity narrowed but was still evident: the law provided $110 billion for roads and bridges and $66 billion for rail (mostly passenger rail) over five years – hailed as the largest U.S. rail investment in decades, yet still less than what highways received. It’s true that the infrastructure law also gave a big boost to transit ($39 billion) and some funding to improve airports. But the overarching takeaway is that for every dollar the U.S. spends on trains, it historically has spent many more on roads and aviation.
Aviation subsidies are often less obvious to the public because airlines are private companies and air travel seems to operate on a ticket-purchase model like a free market. But airports and air traffic control are largely publicly funded. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and airport grants are funded by a mix of ticket taxes and general funds. Many large airports are owned by city or county authorities and have received massive government-backed bonds for expansion. During the 2020 COVID crisis, U.S. airlines received billions in federal bailout grants to stay afloat. So the air travel system is hardly a purely private enterprise; it’s underpinned by public investment too.
On the flip side, passenger rail’s low funding was often tied to a political demand that it “pay for itself”. Amtrak, unlike highways or airports, is repeatedly held to a profitability or break-even expectation that highways (as a whole system) are not. As Transportation for America noted, it’s a “failure in government funding” that Amtrak was tasked with maintaining a national network while being starved of funds and then criticized for not turning a profit. That dynamic led to a spiral of inadequate service. It’s telling that when Amtrak did receive extra funding – for example, the late 2000s stimulus or the recent 2021 infrastructure law – it resulted in significant improvements, such as buying new trains, refurbishing tracks, and planning new corridors. But those infusions have been too little, too late to build something as ambitious as high-speed rail from scratch.
Additionally, consider the indirect subsidies to cars and oil: government policies have long subsidized driving by not internalizing external costs. Fuel taxes in the U.S. are very low by global standards (only 18.4 cents federal per gallon, unchanged since 1993), which doesn’t fully pay for road wear-and-tear, let alone environmental costs. In many urban areas, roads and parking are provided for free or cheaply – effectively a subsidy to driving paid by general taxpayers or by hidden costs (e.g. the cost of “free” parking is baked into the price of goods and services). Zoning policies mandated ample parking and low-density development, which are non-monetary policy choices that nevertheless incentivize car use. Meanwhile, incentives for rail use – such as tax benefits for rail commuters or funding for rail R&D – were comparatively meager.
Fossil fuel subsidies in the energy sector also indirectly bolstered car culture. For decades, the U.S. provided various tax breaks and incentives for oil extraction and fuel production, making gasoline cheaper. While not a direct transportation policy, the effect was to reinforce the gasoline-based transportation system. In contrast, electrified rail, which could run on any energy source including renewables, didn’t enjoy a similar boost.
From an accounting perspective, a true apples-to-apples comparison of mode subsidies is complex, but studies have attempted it. The Regional Plan Association report cited earlier noted that tolls and gas taxes cover only a small portion of the road system’s costs, despite popular belief to the contrary. If one adds the military expenditure historically involved in securing oil supply lines globally, one could argue car transport has had huge hidden costs. Trains have costs too and require subsidies, but nowhere has passenger rail (especially high-speed rail) been built without substantial government investment. The difference is that those countries made a policy decision to allocate funds that way, seeing a return in mobility, economic development, and environmental benefits. The U.S. largely did not, except in the Northeast Corridor to a limited degree.
However, the tide may be shifting, ever so slightly. The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (2021) and subsequent federal initiatives under the Biden administration signaled a renewed interest in rail. As mentioned, $66 billion was earmarked for rail – the largest federal rail investment since Amtrak’s creation. This money is being used to fix aging infrastructure (e.g. the Northeast Corridor’s century-old bridges and tunnels), to expand some corridors, and to fund new intercity services in places like North Carolina, Georgia, Ohio, etc. Additionally, the federal government launched programs to identify and develop new “corridor” routes for passenger rail. There’s also funding for “Amtrak Connects US,” a vision map for expanded service to dozens of cities that currently lack train service. None of these alone equate to true high-speed rail, but they create a foundation. The government’s rhetoric is that this is a down payment, and more will follow if these projects show success.
Meanwhile, state and private initiatives are also re-emerging, buoyed by the possibility of matching federal grants. For example, several states in the Southeast are cooperating on a plan for faster rail from Atlanta to Charlotte (possibly a future high-speed line). In the Midwest, proposals for a high-speed Chicago–St. Louis or Chicago–Detroit line periodically get attention. The difference now is that there’s some federal money to compete for, which acts as a carrot for states to dust off old plans.
Still, even the optimistic scenario in the U.S. has funding levels far below what countries like China spend on rail annually. The financial tilt toward cars and planes is deeply entrenched and even a $66 billion rail program (spread over five years and 50 states) is modest. Los Angeles alone is spending more than that on its local transit build-out over coming decades. A single new highway interchange can cost hundreds of millions; by comparison, getting a few billion for a rail line involves Herculean effort.
In summary, money talks. For decades, U.S. policymakers spoke loudly with highway budgets and only whispered about rail. High-speed rail was never going to materialize without tens of billions in sustained funding, which simply wasn’t there. The lack of dedicated, protected funding for passenger rail (like the Highway Trust Fund provides for roads) left rail projects high and dry whenever budgets got tight or politics shifted. The scales might be inching toward balance now, but the gap remains large. If the U.S. truly wants a national high-speed rail system, it would require a paradigm shift in spending – akin to treating rail the way we treated the interstates – plus new approaches to land acquisition and project delivery. That leads to another distinct American quirk: the dominance of freight railroads, who literally own the tracks and can make or break passenger ambitions.
Freight Rail: America’s Double-Edged Sword
One often overlooked reason the U.S. does not have a national high-speed passenger rail system is that it instead built a highly effective freight rail system – and the two have historically been at odds. Unlike many countries where the national rail infrastructure is government-owned and allocated between passenger and freight usage, in the U.S. most rail lines are privately owned by freight companies. These companies – names like BNSF, Union Pacific, CSX, and Norfolk Southern – inherited the railroad network of old and today prioritize moving goods, not people. The American freight railroads are the busiest in the Western world, hauling enormous tonnages of coal, grain, containers, and other goods with efficiency. However, this success has come instead of robust passenger service, rather than alongside it.
How does freight rail’s primacy impact high-speed rail prospects? For one, high-speed trains need their own dedicated tracks (or at least tracks that are largely free of slower traffic). You cannot realistically run a 200 mph train on the same line as 60 mph freight trains – the differences in speed and braking distance would make scheduling and safety unworkable. In Europe and Japan, the solution was to build separate high-speed lines for passenger trains, while often maintaining parallel slower lines for freight. In the dense Northeastern U.S., something similar was done in the 1930s-60s era: the Pennsylvania Railroad quadruple-tracked some mainlines to segregate fast passenger expresses from freight. But elsewhere in the U.S., as passenger service dwindled, freight consolidated onto fewer tracks.
Today, Amtrak owns relatively little track outside the Northeast Corridor (which it does own from Washington D.C. to Boston). On the nearly 22,000 miles of routes that Amtrak runs nationwide, 97% of the track is owned by freight railroads. Amtrak trains have legal rights to operate there, and by law (the Rail Passenger Service Act) they are supposed to get priority dispatching over freight. In practice, however, freight railroads often delay Amtrak trains, intentionally or not, by making them wait for freight traffic. Enforcement of Amtrak’s priority is weak – disputes go to the Surface Transportation Board or courts and can drag on for years. Freight companies have been fined occasionally, but generally they face little penalty for keeping a passenger train stuck behind a slow freight. The result is that Amtrak’s on-time performance, especially on long-distance routes that travel over freight lines, is poor, which in turn makes train travel less attractive to customers. The passenger trains often must also run at freight-train speeds on those tracks (typically 79 mph, maybe up to 90), because the track is maintained to standards suitable for heavy freight loads, not 150+ mph passenger service. In short, sharing track with freight constrains speed and reliability.
Freight railroads also have been wary of any initiatives that might encroach on their operations or corridors. For example, proposals to build new passenger routes often seek to use or run adjacent to existing railroad rights-of-way (since acquiring entirely new corridors is expensive). Freight companies can be reluctant to sell access or may demand capacity improvements at the passenger operator’s expense. In some cases, they have cooperated – as with some state-supported Amtrak routes where the state paid for additional tracks or signaling upgrades that also benefited freight. But true high-speed rail, which needs completely grade-separated, fenced, and straight alignments, usually cannot just use an old winding 19th-century freight route. It needs new corridors that sometimes parallel freight lines but often diverge for optimal geometry. That again means acquiring land and building from scratch, which in the U.S. context triggers all the challenges we discussed (permits, environmental reviews, NIMBY lawsuits, etc.).
There are also physical differences: American freight trains are heavier and longer than those in most countries. Our tracks are built to carry these 2-mile-long, 20,000-ton coal drags and double-stacked containers. Heavy freight causes wear and tear; the tracks (rails, ties, ballast) deteriorate under such tonnage and need maintenance, which can conflict with the precision scheduling high-speed passenger service demands. Conversely, high-speed trains require very tight tolerances in track geometry for safe travel at speed. Mixing the two on the same infrastructure is problematic. Europe solved this by having separate classes of lines: for instance, in France, the high-speed TGV lines carry almost no freight (they’re mostly passenger-only), while freight continues on older lines at night or on less time-sensitive routes. The U.S., however, let much of its duplicate trackage go out of service during the mid-20th century decline (many rail corridors were abandoned or single-tracked to cut costs). So there is often not an easy alternate route to offload freight if one wanted to dedicate a line to passenger.
A real-world consequence of the freight-vs-passenger tug-of-war was seen in the Gulf Coast example: After Hurricane Katrina in 2005, Amtrak’s Gulf Coast passenger train (the Sunset Limited east of New Orleans) was suspended due to track damage. For years, the states and Amtrak wanted to restore service between New Orleans and Mobile, Alabama. But the freight railroads (CSX and Norfolk Southern) resisted, throwing up technical objections and delaying negotiations for over a decade. It took until 2022 for the Surface Transportation Board to intervene and mandate that Amtrak be allowed to restart that service (which is now finally beginning in 2023–2025, 18 years after Katrina). This drawn-out battle showed that even for a modest-speed train running 2-4 times a day, freight companies can stall progress extensively. Now imagine trying to carve a path for dozens of high-speed trains a day – without strong federal mandates or incentives, the freight companies have little reason to prioritize it.
On the positive side, America’s strong freight rail network is an asset that other countries envy for moving goods efficiently and with lower carbon emissions than trucking. Any future where the U.S. has high-speed passenger rail will likely involve building new tracks for those passenger trains while leaving the freight network to do what it does best. But that requires the political will and funding to invest in new rail corridors, not just piggyback on existing ones. It may also require cooperation from freight companies, perhaps through land swaps or shared infrastructure deals (e.g. if the government builds a new line that freight also can use at night or builds extra freight capacity elsewhere in exchange for a passenger route).
Interestingly, one reason often cited by high-speed rail skeptics in the U.S. is that we’re too spread out and don’t have the population densities of Europe or Asia. While this is partly true in the aggregate, the relevant metric is corridor density, not national average. The U.S. has plenty of dense city-pairs within 200–400 miles (the sweet spot for high-speed rail) – think the Northeast megalopolis, California’s corridors, Texas’s triangle, Florida’s corridor, the Chicago-centric Midwest, etc. These corridors collectively have tens of millions of people. The real challenge hasn’t been lack of people – it’s been the pre-existence of a robust car/air system and freight rail dominance that undercut the need and feasibility for passenger rail. In China, despite lower average density, the government built HSR because they were forward-looking about growth and they lacked the ubiquitous aviation network the U.S. already had. The U.S. is playing catch-up, and doing so in a landscape where highways and airports already handle the bulk of intercity travel.
To sum up, the structure of U.S. railroads – private freight companies owning the corridors – is a major institutional difference from countries with nationalized or state-controlled rail infrastructure. It’s not a coincidence that Amtrak’s only “quasi-high-speed” service, the Acela, runs mostly on the Northeast Corridor tracks that Amtrak owns itself; it doesn’t have to ask a freight railroad’s permission there and can dispatch its trains with passenger priority. If the U.S. is to create new high-speed rail lines, it will likely have to acquire or build dedicated lines independent of the freight carriers. That is feasible (Brightline in Florida did it by purchasing a right-of-way; California is doing it through public acquisition), but it costs money and requires political will.
Can the U.S. Get on Track?
Investigating why the United States lacks a national high-speed rail system reveals no single smoking gun, but rather a constellation of interrelated factors. Historically, the mid-20th century saw passenger rail wither due to competition from cars and planes – a decline abetted by lobbying and policy choices that heavily favored highways and aviation. Culturally, Americans grew up in suburbs built for cars, shaping preferences and political attitudes that relegated trains to afterthought status. Economically, the government consistently bankrolled road and air infrastructure while starving rail of investment, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy of mediocrity in passenger train service. Politically, attempts to launch high-speed rail have been fragmented among states, thwarted by partisan shifts, local opposition, and the lack of a unified national commitment. And structurally, the dominance of private freight railroads has made sharing or repurposing tracks for high-speed passenger use a difficult proposition, necessitating expensive new corridors.
Comparisons with other advanced nations drive home the point that America’s high-speed rail deficit is not due to geography or technology. Countries with challenging geographies (mountainous Japan, sprawling China) or competitive transport markets (aviation-heavy Europe) still chose to invest in fast trains – and have reaped the benefits in mobility, economic connectivity, and lower-carbon travel. Those countries treated rail infrastructure as a public good worthy of government support, similar to how the U.S. treats highways. In contrast, the U.S. mostly left passenger rail to fend for itself or be a political football. The results speak for themselves: while China built 20,000 miles of HSR in a decade, the U.S. struggles to build even a few hundred miles in that time. While France or Japan zips travelers across regions in hours, Americans face either long drives or airport hassles for equivalent distances.
Yet, it’s not all gloom. There are embryonic signs of change. Recent federal policies like the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act mark the beginning of overdue investment in rail – fixing bottlenecks, buying new equipment, and perhaps funding some new routes. Amtrak’s future plans envision expanding service to more cities, which could build public support for rail generally. Private initiatives like Brightline show that, at least in certain corridors, Americans will embrace trains if they’re done well. Public opinion is also shifting as younger generations are less car-centric and more climate-conscious; they are open to trains as a modern, efficient alternative. And the sheer reality of congestion – both highways and airports are reaching saturation in places – means doing nothing could impose great costs in lost productivity and environmental damage. High-speed rail, while not cheap, offers a capacity boost and sustainable option that in the long term can pay economic dividends.
However, turning a corner will require learning from past mistakes. That means developing a national strategy for high-speed rail rather than piecemeal state projects that start and stall. It means securing dedicated funding – perhaps a rail trust fund – so that planning isn’t upended every election. It might involve reforming regulations to streamline permitting without sacrificing environmental standards (other countries manage to build faster without endless lawsuits, indicating a balance can be struck). It could also mean fostering partnerships with freight railroads to mutually benefit – e.g. building new freight bypasses in exchange for passenger corridors, a win-win if done right.
Crucially, a successful high-speed rail project on U.S. soil would be a game-changer psychologically. If California can finally get trains running on even part of its high-speed line, and people experience 200 mph travel in America, it may shift perceptions dramatically. The same goes if Texas or the Northeast eventually build a segment. Success can breed success: once the value is demonstrated, it becomes easier to rally support for extensions and new lines. Right now, skeptics can point to cost overruns and delays and say “I told you so.” Completing a project that people can actually ride would refute the notion that “it can’t be done here.”
In the end, the American high-speed rail gap is a story of priorities. For decades, the priority was expanding highways and runways; rail was an afterthought. Changing that priority is possible – recall that in the early 1800s, canals were the priority until railroads emerged, or that mass highway-building only started in earnest after World War II when the priority shifted. The future isn’t written in stone. If reducing carbon emissions, providing travel choice, and boosting urban connectivity become higher priorities, high-speed rail has a clear role to play. But it will require sustained vision beyond the election-cycle horizon and a willingness to invest upfront for long-term gains – traits that America has shown in the past during its great infrastructure builds, but must rekindle for this endeavor.
For now, the U.S. remains in the slow lane, watching trains abroad race by. Getting up to speed will be challenging, costly, and at times contentious. But as this investigation has shown, the reasons America lacks high-speed rail are rooted in human decisions – and that means they can be changed by human decisions. The tracks ahead are difficult, but the destination of a faster, more connected America may yet be attainable if the nation chooses to lay the rail.