Tips for rail travel

Before airplanes and automobiles exploded onto the scene, rail travel was virtually the only way to travel cross-country. This is evident in Jules Verne's Around the World in 80 Days where Phileas Fogg makes extensive use of rail travel to make his way around the world. A train was also the setting of Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express.

In some parts of the world, such as Europe and much of Asia, it's still one of the standard modes of city-to-city travel, and in others (e.g. North America) it remains as a fairly popular alternative. With no traffic, rail travel has the advantage of always being in motion. It lacks the speed of air travel on longer distances and often the density of coverage of the road network, but compensates with space to move around while someone else does all the driving. It's also more comfortable than air travel, especially in terms of legroom and to those who don't like the thought of being suspended 30,000 feet above the ground.

For distances between about 100 and 800 km rail may be the fastest method of travel, especially if you need to go from city center to city center. A rough first estimate is that a train is faster than a competing air-service if it takes three and a half to four hours or less, as getting on a train usually doesn't require being at the station more than some fifteen minutes prior to departure. For longer distances it takes longer than travelling by air, but provides you with a ground-level view of the territory you're visiting, and allows you to stop on the way. Prices range from cheaper than even a full car – in some countries that highly subsidize public transport – to comparable to (or even higher than) cheap airline-tickets in other countries that want their railways to generate revenue or have privatized them. In some cases both at the same time, depending on the level of service and the time you book.