So I took a consulting job in a small town in Illinois called Quincy. I couldn't fly there without connecting in St. Louis, but I could take the train from Chicago. It was billed at 6 hours.

It absolutely left on time but had to wait for three freight trains on the way. 9 hours later we got to the "station". One of the other passengers said that their previous trip was cancelled and Amtrak bought everyone bus tickets.

In the Midwest, there are no guarantees with trains other than you'll get there. Eventually.

A couple of the lines I ride in California have decent on-time rates (mostly I ride the line formerly known as the San Joaquins)

> a 14.5 hr train journey can easily be delayed by several hours

It can easily be delayed a lot longer than that. The last time I took Amtrak I was delayed over 24 hours.

Delays? What if you can’t buy tickets at all.

I was looking at Tucson to Seattle trip on a relatively short notice - all sleeping tickets were sold out multiple weeks in advance. And due to the length of the trip it’s not practical with non-sleeping seat.

Haha hours. There is no upper bound. The average Amtrak delay on Norfolk Southern is 19 minutes per 100 miles. And the worst cases are all horror stories. A freight operator sidetracks Amtrak while a miles-long coal train rolls through at a jogging pace. The coal train breaks down. The Amtrak crew can't legally operate any more because of federal time limits. You are 1000 miles from a city in the middle of nowhere and by the time they dispatch another crew to your train you've been surviving on Fritos for days.

I believe Brightline in Florida has ownership of its tracks from Cocoa to Orlando.