The Personality Of An Amtrak Train

There is an entire genre of photography dedicated to documenting the peculiarities of Amtrak trains. When I returned from my recent train trip, I was surprised by the number of people who asked what the inside of the train looked like.

Since most people have never traveled cross-country on Amtrak, it seems appropriate to document the special characteristics of U.S. passenger trains.

These images depict machinery that is thirty years or older (we still travel on cars that should have been retired long ago), reminding me of a past in which passengers stayed until the early hours of the morning to talk and drink.

The train still offers spaces designed only for passenger interactions. It is these spaces that make trains special. After all, in what other form of terrestrial or aerial transportation can one find a lounge, an observatory, a dinning hall, a dressing room, and sometimes an arcade and movie theater, all in the same place?