Higher speed rail service between Chicago and St. Louis begins

It's not really losing to the car. The article says the train will now also be less than five hours, so the time difference is honestly not that much. There are also four trips daily which is sadly quite good nowadays in America. You can leave from St. Louis at 4:30 AM, 6:35 AM, 2:55 PM, and 5:40 PM. You can leave Chicago at 7:15 AM, 9:50 AM, 5:20 PM, and 7:10 PM. Coach costs like $25-$31, while the car trip would cost you around $68. Instead of focusing on driving for 4.5 hours, you can relax or do work for five hours. Compared to less frequent routes (Pennsylvanian 😒) you also have several options for departure and don't need to arrive at the station before the sun even rises. Someone who knows more about planes can tell me a flight would make any sense.

As someone who goes between Philly and Pittsburgh a couple times a year, if the shitty Pennsylvanian service was upgraded to be like the new Lincoln Service, I'd be really happy!

Oh, and for price that ends up $7 million per mile. Not sure how that compares.

Yeah I'd really hope that the upgrades pave the way for even higher potential speeds, like if the limiting factor is now old Amtrak trainsets instead of the rail itself. Or if a new line means less delays. 20 minutes out of 5 hours is really not much.