WHY does Amtrak, America's government-subsidised passenger railroad, require so much taxpayer money to survive? Is it the $9.50 cheeseburgers? What about labour costs, or competition with cars and planes? Actually, Amtrak's problems are mostly explained by the map above, which was created last year by Michael Hicks, a Minnesota transportation blogger.
On the map, every Amtrak station in America's 48 contiguous states is displayed as a blue circle. Bigger circles represent more riders—and as anyone can see, the bulk of Amtrak's customers are concentrated in the northeast, California, and Illinois. As Vox's Matt Yglesias notes, just three northeastern cities—New York, Washington, and Philadelphia—account for nearly a third of all Amtrak boardings.
As Gulliver has argued before, Amtrak's long-haul routes (you can see them on the map as the tiny blue dots stretching across most of the country) are money pits. But America's bizarre constitutional structure, which gives outsized influence to states with small populations, creates an incentive for Amtrak to maintain unprofitable services that keep influential senators happy.
If its long-haul trains were cancelled, Amtrak would serve just 23 states, down from the current 46. That would make it more profitable, allowing it to improve services in areas where it actually has riders—Mr Hicks suggests increasing train frequency between major midwestern cities. But an Amtrak that served just 23 states would likely be politically unsustainable—and that's exactly the problem.
