Are there lessons from Texas’ passenger rail revival?

Texas’ rail revival may feel improbable in a state built around highways, but the demand is there—even if the service isn’t, Bloomberg writes. 

A trip that should take four hours between Dallas and Houston can stretch to 23 hours on Amtrak, thanks to zig-zagging routes, freight delays and decades of cutbacks that left the nation’s second-largest state with only three surviving passenger lines. Yet ridership is hitting records, federal grants are flowing, and private investors are again pushing high-speed rail proposals that could shrink the journey to 90 minutes.

Aboard the Texas Eagle, the slow pace reveals something deeper: Texans are still riding — young travelers seeking community, retirees logging cross-country miles and rail advocates trying to rebuild a network that once carried 30 million passengers a year. The question now is whether political resistance, funding gaps and rural land fights will stall momentum, or if Texas is finally ready to modernize its rail future.

In August, Amtrak launched its new Gulf Coast passenger rail route running from New Orleans to Mobile, Alabama. The twice-daily route, called the Amtrak Mardi Gras Service, features four Mississippi stops between New Orleans and Mobile: Bay St. Louis, Biloxi, Gulfport and Pascagoula.

For years, community leaders have advocated for a passenger rail line connecting Baton Rouge and New Orleans, with stops located downtown at the intersection of Government and 14th streets, and another would likely be located in the Baton Rouge Health District to facilitate medically necessary evacuations in the event of a major storm.

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