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[quote]QUOTE: Originally posted by ohlemeier [quote]QUOTE: Originally posted by futuremodal Speaking for the 99.7% of Americans who either don't use or can't use Amtrak, [/quote] Please tell us how you derived that inaccurate figure. You're a transportation expert who's surveyed America's traveling habits? Nearly 100% of Americans haven't ridden or can't ride Amtrak? That's fiction, pal. 25 million Americans rode Amtrak last year. If the country has 280 people, how does that translate to not even 1%? So about 10% of the public has ridden Amtrak. That's 10x as much as your lowball figure. . Amtrak also serves about 85% of this country's metropolitan statistical areas, so the claim that 100% of people don't have Amtrak service is groundless as well. The train may not serve every city at the best of hours, but that's not Amtrak's fault. Amtrak serves 500 cities. The most any single airline serves is 150, if I recall correctly. I'd therefore say Americans have more access, in general, to rail travel than air. I respectfully suggest you do some research before making sweeping generalizations. [/quote] Easy there, Big Fella! Where do you get your numbers? Is that 25 million discrete people, or trips? It is probably trips. My wife took two trips on Amtrak this year, and so did I. Were we counted as two specific people or four trips? Probably four trips. NYC has about 8 million but I doubt many of them ride Amtrak. A lot ride the subway, Metro North, and NJT. MN has an annual ridership of approx. 62 million. And that is trips. So obviously there aren't a lot of New Yorkers riding Amtrak in comparison to Metro North. NEC ridership is about 11 million. In the case of MN and the NEC I suspect that a lot of these trips are repeat business so 11 million different people are not riding Amtrak in the NEC. On MN I would imagine most people are commuters making 10 trips a week so the number of individuals would be about 120,000. Yes, 120,000 because they do it five days a week, 52 weeks a year, and MN says their ridership is 240,000 trips per day. Applying that same analysis to the Amtrak number of 25 million and assuming they are all 5 day a week commuters that would be about 1.7% of the people ride Amtrak. Since we know that isn't a valid assumption, because my wife and I do not commute on Amtrak, the true number is probably greater but far less than the 10% that you claim because Amtrak is counting trips, not individuals. Also, serving, or being available doesn't mean people will ride it. New York City proves that. A population of 8 million, more if you incude everything on the Bos-Wash corridor, and only 11 million riders in a year? To quote you, "I respectfully suggest you do some research before making sweeping generalizations."
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