ABOVE: Passengers wait on the platform to board Amtrak’s Empire Builder at Whitefish Station (2019 ridership: 55,642) in Whitefish, Montana (pop. 7,751). The station building is owned by the local Stumptown Historical Society, and offers passengers a waiting room, rental car kiosk, and connections to Greyhound intercity lines.

In hundreds of rural and small-to-midsize municipalities around the country, passenger rail provides residents with a vital option for getting around. Rail has long served as a key connector between larger urban and smaller rural areas; however, when passenger rail began declining in the second half of the 1900’s, thousands of train stations were closed, largely in these smaller municipalities, depriving residents of an extremely convenient means of travel. This was very much the case here in Michigan, where we lost nearly all of our preexisting passenger rail lines, except for Amtrak’s Blue Water, Pere Marquette, and Wolverine. The line we are working to restore would connect several smaller communities—Durand, Owosso, Alma, Mt. Pleasant, Clare, Cadillac, Kalkaska, Petoskey—along existing tracks from Detroit to Traverse City and Petoskey.

What exactly makes passenger rail so important in these smaller, more rural communities? Primarily, it’s the fact that the train takes people where they need to go safely, conveniently, and at relatively low costs. Driving in rural America is disproportionately dangerous compared to in the rest of the country. Not only do residents of rural areas typically have to drive farther than their urban counterparts to access the same services, but they often do so on roads that want for maintenance, due to a mix of low population densities and exorbitant amounts of roadway that need to be maintained. These factors, combined with streets characterized by high speed limits, limited lighting, long stretches without stop signs or traffic lights, and realities such as longer response times due to the remoteness of emergency services and hospitals, lead to rural areas accounting for 41 percent of America’s 42,514 car crash fatalities in 2022, despite being home to just 20 percent of the population.¹ Comparatively, from 2000–2023, there were 143 fatalities on passenger trains nationwide.² Over that time period, Amtrak transported more than 500 million passengers over more than 100 billion passenger miles.

Then, there’s convenience; trains offer vast space for luggage, room to get up and walk, wifi, food and beverage options, accessible bathrooms, and massive windows that regularly provide phenomenal views. You also have the ability to work, nap, relax, or do any number of tasks more comfortably aboard a train than as a passenger in a car; tasks you wouldn’t be able to accomplish at all driving yourself. Trains can provide residents of rural areas with an excellent passenger experience—which goes a long way toward ensuring equitable access to transportation—for everyone, but especially for low-income individuals, people with disabilities, and seniors.

There’s no other travel experience quite like relaxing in your seat as a train carries you safely and comfortably to your destination.

Affordability also deepens the utility of passenger rail. Amtrak’s pricing, and the availability of passes play a significant role in providing transportation to passengers who otherwise couldn’t afford travel to their destination. There is a price to both the individual and society when cost is a barrier to travel. Educational trips that don’t happen could reduce a person’s future earnings potential; just as fewer shopping or tourism trips mean less money is spent in the community; canceled business trips could result in lower economic output; and lost family and leisure trips could reduce an individual’s quality of life. And even for those with the budget to utilize a more expensive mode for their trip, lower transportation costs often lead to increased spending at their destination. 
 
Given its convenience and advantages, residents of rural areas have various transportation needs that passenger rail provides solutions for. These include accessing education, work, medical travel, visiting family members and/or friends, and leisure. Passenger rail provides a great option for students getting to their college or university, as many prohibit some underclassmen from keeping a car or sell expensive parking passes. Plus, fewer young adults are getting driver’s licenses every year. Since many college towns are walkable and have transit operations, trains make it easy for a student to get to and from campus without necessitating a 2+ hour road trip by their parents or the kind soul willing to make the drive. Graduate students stand to benefit, too—even outside of a parking pass, owning a car is expensive.

At University of New Hampshire in Durham, Amtrak’s Downeaster service stops right in the middle of campus, providing easy access to dorms, classes and athletic facilities.

When it comes to work, accessing conferences, meetings, events, and myriad other travel-dependent activities becomes simple with passenger rail. This simplicity, and the ability to get work done or relax during your trip contrast starkly to dealing with a potentially long and exhausting drive. Someone who is less stressed, well-rested, and able to get tasks out of the way during what otherwise would be downtime will likely be a happier and more productive employee. Further, the convenient travel passenger rail offers can effectively extend a city’s job market to rural areas, making it possible for rural residents to access the massive concentrations of jobs in metropolitan areas. Passenger rail service can also boost a rural community’s job market, particularly by attracting regional investment and corporate satellite offices.

Someone who is less stressed, well-rested, and able to get tasks out of the way during what otherwise would be downtime will likely be a happier and more productive employee.

Medical travel is another significant need in many rural communities, driven by closures of rural healthcare facilities and the increased centralization of specialists and advanced equipment in cities and suburbs. Accessing healthcare resources is a challenge for those who are unable to drive due to their age or condition; in many cases, patients are forced to schedule appointments and procedures around the availability of a family member or friend who can provide a ride. This can lead to delays in obtaining critical medical care, which can result in negative health outcomes. Simultaneously, rural areas are aging faster than the rest of the country; from 2000 to 2023, the percentage of rural Americans aged 65 and over increased from 12.8% to more than 22%.³ This percentage is expected to increase as members of Gen X begin to retire and life expectancies continue rising. The Northeast’s Amtrak Downeaster service, which connects some of Maine and New Hampshire’s smaller municipalities, provides an excellent model for incorporating rail into a healthcare transportation strategy; for more than 16 years it has partnered with the American Cancer Society to offer discounted fares for passengers traveling to medical appointments.

Visiting friends and/or family is the travel rationale of many rural rail passengers. Over the last few decades, young adults have increasingly taken residence and start families in suburban areas and cities, while older generations have increasingly made their homes in rural areas. As a result, many families are geographically isolated from one another; without passenger rail service, visiting each other often requires long road trips, which many find untenable as they age. When surveyed, the vast majority of seniors indicate that they’d like to age in place.⁴ Passenger rail helps aging in place become more palatable for many who wish to easily visit their siblings, kids, grandkids, cousins, and friends in other communities. A 2015 Denver Post article illustrates this point through a conversation with Bernice Carlock, a then-86-year-old resident of La Junta, CO (pop. 6,881) and Amtrak Southwest Chief passenger. For Bernice, the Southwest Chief serves as the primary connection to her daughter in Topeka, and the then-proposed removal of the line made her consider moving to ensure she could continue seeing her family at her pleasure.

Whether you’re traveling across the state or around the country, passenger rail is a reliable way to get to your destination.

And of course, there are numerous benefits that rural residents see when vacationing. Suddenly, accessing some of the greatest recreational areas in the country for hiking, fishing, hunting, skiing, backpacking—you name it—becomes possible without a car. So too does getting to many major cities within one’s state and around the country, for sightseeing, sporting events, shopping, and the other assorted pleasures they offer. That means traveling to your destination without adding hundreds (or thousands) of miles to your odometer, paying to park at a downtown hotel, worrying about making it through TSA or any other number of transportation stressors. Rather, the train often drops you off near the city center, from where you can take public transit, call a taxi/Uber, walk, or use micromobility options to travel your last few miles.

Amtrak’s seasonally-open East Glacier Park Station in Glacier National Park serves as the entryway to the park for many visitors.

Here in Michigan, our existing Amtrak services increase travel activity and reduce the number of cars on the road. As part of the most recent report on Amtrak’s economic contributions to our state, passengers were surveyed on their travel mode of choice if Amtrak was unavailable. 66% would drive, 12% would fly, 10% would take the bus, and 12% wouldn’t have traveled.⁵ That year, Michigan’s Amtrak stations had a combined ridership of 372,228, suggesting Amtrak took as many as 665 cars off our roads every day (depending on average vehicle occupancy) and made it possible for more than 44,600 people to take a trip they otherwise wouldn’t have. Those are 44,600 trips to school, to spend time with family, business meetings, vacations with friends, doctors appointments, surgeries, among other wants and necessities of daily life that wouldn’t have occurred without access to passenger rail, in a single year.

Passenger rail also provides the benefit of making tourism in rural areas less of a burden for year-round residents. Passengers who take the train are less likely to contribute to traffic, as options are provided for the last mile of their journey. While some will rent a car, many will have a friend or family member pick them up, use local public transit, walk/bike to their destination, use a rideshare app, or catch a hotel/resort shuttle, each of which would take pressure off of local streets. Fewer cars on the road also means fewer parking spaces taken up, and overall, reducing the stressors associated with driving can have significant mental and physical health benefits.

Vermont’s new Ferrisburgh-Vergennes Station, served by the Ethan Allen Express, opened in 2022 and serves as a key transfer point for local transit operator Tri-Valley Transit.

On top of the benefits residents see as riders and externally from reduced traffic, the train station itself provides smaller municipalities with a gateway to eloquently welcome visitors and returning residents. A station also often becomes the local area’s hub for multimodal transportation, serving as a major node in local transit operations, and sometimes offering connections to long-distance bus services. In addition to providing the utility of a transit center, stations can host a wide array of community amenities, such as a cafe or restaurant, farmers market, museum or cultural institution, housing, office space, meeting spaces, a visitor welcome center—the possibilities are endless. The surrounding area can also be improved, with public parks, trails, bike lanes, streetlights, etc.—elements that make being a pedestrian safer, simpler, and more enticing.

In Culpeper, Virginia, the potential demolition of the historic depot spurred the town’s governance and civic leadership into action, leading to a station revitalization project that would result in the opening of new shops, restaurants and residential spaces.

Rural America benefits tremendously from access to passenger rail. Things have changed a lot since the train rolled into rural communities for the first time over 100 years ago, but so much has remained the same. Our urban and rural centers still rely upon one another, our residents crave walkable areas with accessible amenities, and our environment requires delicate care as we develop our communities. Expanding and improving upon passenger service in rural and smaller municipalities stands to not only heighten quality of life for residents, but to strengthen our connections as a nation. 
 
Over the coming weeks, we’ll be publishing a series of vignettes highlighting how rural communities around the country benefit from Amtrak service today. Stay tuned for some more fascinating stories.

1. Figures taken from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s 2022 Traffic Safety Facts ↩︎
2. According to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics’ Railroad Passenger Safety Data ↩︎
3. Figures taken from the American Community Survey’s Older Population in Rural America: 2012-2016 report, USDA’s 2024 Rural America At A Glance ↩︎
4. From AARP: “Despite Pandemic, Percentage of Older Adults Who Want to Age in Place Stays Steady” ↩︎
5. From Amtrak’s 2016 Economic Contributions to Michigan report ↩︎

Michael Goldman Brown Jr. is Groundwork’s Transportation Specialist.
michael.goldmanbrown@groundworkcenter.org