Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Want airline food? Take Amtrak

railwayage.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–225 of 225 posts

Re: Want airline food? Take Amtrak

#221

Post by xvedejas »

tehlike wrote: post #193
xvedejas wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just about the distance that I prefer to take Amtrak over driving or flying (mostly I travel SF Fresno). I can get work done, unlike when driving, and I don't have to deal with all the pains of getting to the airport early and going through security.

Unsolicited advice: get yourself global entry.

I already have global entry / TSA precheck. My preference is still for Amtrak for certain journeys. Consider that flying SF to Fresno costs hundreds of dollars each way. Amtrak costs $30.

Re: Want airline food? Take Amtrak

#222

Post by tehlike »

xvedejas wrote: post #221
tehlike wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unsolicited advice: get yourself global entry.

I already have global entry / TSA precheck. My preference is still for Amtrak for certain journeys. Consider that flying SF to Fresno costs hundreds of dollars each way. Amtrak costs $30.

Sure i get that. But most cases global entry is a real time and stress saver.

Re: Want airline food? Take Amtrak

#223

Post by db48x »

lobster_johnson wrote: post #199
db48x wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not obviously insane compared to driving. It's a 4200 mile trip, basically the length of Europe and back. That's a minimum of 6 days of driving, ~$400 in gas, 5 nights in hotels during the trip (at least another $500), plus meals (three fast-food meals per day could be ~$200). Obviously you can economize on any of these at some cost to your comfort and sanity. But because you can read a book on the train, or pla…

Driving is not the alternative for me. Flying is. Chicago to Portland is a 2.5 hour flight for $180-200 round trip, make it 4 if you factor in transportation and security. That's why it's insane. Trains should be competing with flying. Given the choice between a stressful, polluting airplane and an environmentally friendly electric bullet train with meals, legroom and cheap overnight cabins, I would choose the latter…

I was extremely bored this evening, so I went looking for similar trips on European trains. I found a trip in May from Lisbon to Warsaw. Like the Chicago to Portland route on Amtrak, it's about 2000 miles and 42 hours. It has 6 transfers, including a 4 hour transfer from 10pm to 2am (ouch), and a few hours later a two hour transfer from 3am to 5am (very ouch). Only one of the trains has actual sleeping compartments. To match Amtrak I choose a private 2-bunk compartment on that train. I picked 1st class fully-refundable tickets on all 6 trains, again to match Amtrak. I've no idea if any of these trains have a dining car; I did see a photo of some vending machines. On the other hand, a ticket in a sleeper on Amtrak includes three meals a day.

The resulting price was $1067 for a one-way trip (the site couldn't find any return tickets). So even the high-priced $2000 ticket you saw doesn't seem that bad; that's the same cost as a trip of similar length in Europe.

Re: Want airline food? Take Amtrak

#224

Post by lobster_johnson »

db48x wrote: post #223
lobster_johnson wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Driving is not the alternative for me. Flying is. Chicago to Portland is a 2.5 hour flight for $180-200 round trip, make it 4 if you factor in transportation and security. That's why it's insane. Trains should be competing with flying. Given the choice between a stressful, polluting airplane and an environmentally friendly electric bullet train with meals, legroom and cheap overnight cabins, I would choose the latter…

I was extremely bored this evening, so I went looking for similar trips on European trains. I found a trip in May from Lisbon to Warsaw. Like the Chicago to Portland route on Amtrak, it's about 2000 miles and 42 hours. It has 6 transfers, including a 4 hour transfer from 10pm to 2am (ouch), and a few hours later a two hour transfer from 3am to 5am (very ouch). Only one of the trains has actual sleeping compartments.…

For multi-country trips, you want a European rail pass, e.g. from this site [1].

A 5-day ticket for the entirety of Europe is about $480, though you get a 15% discount for two people. If you're only doing 4 countries, it's about $360. For $968 you get unlimited travel for a whole month.

As for sleeper cabins, prices vary depending on the route, but it's often somewhere around $20-50 per night per person [2] for a private, multi-bed "couchette".

Comparing US states to Europe is a bit like apples and oranges, though.

[1] https://www.eurail.com/en/eurail-passes/global-pass

[2] https://www.eurail.com/en/plan-your-trip/about-reservations/...

Post reply on HN