I don't get Amtrak?

[NotUrsula]

Obviously you're more of a train enthusiast than I am, but am I not correct in thinking that there are many many places in the US where suitable (correct gauge) track has been abandoned and the trains re-routed? Even pulled out and paved over, in many cases? It seems to me that we once had enough active track and enough long sidings for both uses, and now we don't seem to.

I live right down the street from a major railyard, and there are 3 lines of track leading out of it. Two of them have had a string of freight cars permanently parked on them for at least 10 years now; there are trees growing through them. Even though the yard is busy every day, the railroad has cut itself down to one track in and out, and is not maintaining the other two.

 

[CandyMandy]

Obviously you're more of a train enthusiast than I am, but am I not correct in thinking that there are many many places in the US where suitable (correct gauge) track has been abandoned and the trains re-routed?

Yes, the total amount of route mileage of U.S. railroads has actually been shrinking - but that's been going on for almost a century (it peaked in 1918).

If you dig into this subject, the overwhelming majority of tracks that have been removed or are inoperative are old branch lines, not main transcontinental routes and those serving major urban metros. The branch lines that are "gone" shrunk or disappeared because the industries they supported either left or died, or other forms of transporting product (particularly heavy natural resources, such as pipelines for oil) replaced trains.