riding the rails

I've been working on this in stages for most of a week. I know it's long.

For months, I've been considering attending the US Olympic Marathon trials
https://lauradi7dw.dreamwidth.org/584618.html
Regular readers will know that if I consider a self-indulgence, I often follow through, and it was true in this case. I extended the visit to my parents by a couple of days (the extra time was used - I got my mother to early voting, dropped off the documents to their tax preparer, and went to ringing practice at Christ Church Raleigh).
I fly a lot, and I worry about the carbon footprint of that, so I try to be careful in my lifestyle aside from all the flying. From my parents’ house to Peachtree Street in Atlanta by car (nonstop) would take about six hours, and then I’d have to do something with the rental car. Greyhound would take eight, due to stops. Megabus on that route gets terrible reviews. The time spent actually riding around on a train is about nine hours, but the route requires a five hour layover in Greensboro, NC before connecting to the main route after midnight, so my second travel night with almost no sleep within two weeks. What the heck. Late Friday afternoon the 28th, I packed an easy reading detective novel and a lot of snacks, and headed to train station number one.
Durham station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durham_station_(North_Carolina)
I’ve used that station before, to or from DC, on the once a day route that takes seven hours for what would be a five hour drive, due to the fact that it has ten stops. When I was a kid, the train station was at the other end of town, and I only rode it twice, each time mostly to have the experience of riding on a train. The first depot was in 1849. I don’t know exactly where it was.
There has been a train station in Greensboro for a long time, and it was heavily used during the Civil War. Those tracks were destroyed by Sherman’s troops. The Greensboro station now is fairly new, but has been done really well, to be a modern station with elevators and such that still looks like one of the classic ones inside, incorporating bits taken from the previous station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Douglas_Galyon_Depot
The current route (the one that I took, called the Crescent because it terminates in New Oreans) is the same as the one as on the Southern Railway (a consolidation of small regional routes) on this map from 1895, although the Amtrak route has fewer stops. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Railway_(U.S.)#/media/File:1895_SOU.png
We did stop in Salisbury, though. My grandfather grew up in Eastern North Carolina, but finished high school in Salisbury, two hundred miles west, because his rural school didn’t go to 12th grade, and his older sister lived in Salisbury, a much bigger area. He lived with her for the high school years. What I don’t know is how Aunt Mary ended up marrying someone so far from home, but I’m pretty sure he was connected to railroad work. By the time we got to Salisbury, I think I had asked to be re-seated. My seatmate had rushed to the restroom four times in an hour, and I didn’t want whatever she had. Passing the 48 hour incubation period for norovirus was a big relief. Maybe she had food poisoning. It must have been a miserable trip for her, longer than mine. She was already on the train when I boarded, and her destination was Birmingham, a couple of hours after I got off. The person sitting next to me had a phone with a text noise that went off very frequently. After an hour or two, the woman in front of us asked him to turn it off. He said he couldn’t. Hours later, when he received a phone call, it was making the noise even as he conversed. Time to get some apple genius to figure it out.
Somewhere in Northern Georgia, we had what may be a quintessential US train journey experience – pulling onto a siding so that a freight train could pass us. Explaining the slowness and lack of passenger service to British or European friends always involves dealing with the fact that freight has priority on most of the rails. Along with many others, I crave high speed rail in the US, but it would presumably involve all new tracks (on a different right of way). I can’t imagine the political will required. And not stopping at all the little stations would leave out many people. Amtrak already leaves whole states uncovered, and the high speed networks that have been proposed would be even more negligent.
The only station in Atlanta now was not the Civil War one (so vividly destroyed in Gone With The Wind), or a subsequent one, but the much revamped Southern Railway station, too small, with too little parking. It’s a mile to the nearest subway station, but there is a local bus. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peachtree_station
Still, it has some of the old-style long bench seats, and so did the other two stations. I remember Penn Station in NYC having those in the 1970s, but I don’t think that there are any still there. Not sure – I tend to take the bus to New York, rather than a train. The other thing I don’t remember about the Boston – New York corridor is the color of the passengers. On trains in the South, I am in an extreme minority, skin-wise. I’m not a sociologist, and could only guess why this is true. The hoard of 20-somethings that got on in Greensboro seemed to be students at NC A&T, a HBCU. I guessed (but didn’t ask anybody) that they were heading out for spring break. The Crescent Route (and others) often largely sells out. I was lucky to be able to move to a different seat, because there really weren’t many empty. I know why *I* take trains – mostly carbon guilt, some sentiment about living in the past (although I was glad to have wifi), sometimes hoping to see somewhere new. Why do other people, and why the racial proportions? It can’t be based on money, really. Planes are often somewhat cheaper (although one has to allow for getting to and from an airport, which can be quite expensive by itself). To go the whole NYC to NOLA Crescent route takes 30 hours and and costs $174 up. Air between those two places can be as cheap as $100 (booked a month in advance), and takes under four hours. I presume there is a cultural explanation that I don’t get. I don’t remember anything about my fellow passengers from the train trip from Portland OR to Emeryville CA.
Watching the Olympic trials marathon was fun. I flew home from Atlanta. I left my iPad at the TSA area (I was tired, but don’t feel that I have much of an excuse). Will probably never see it again, and I am sad about that. The airport lost and found form is very specific, and I don’t see how they didn’t find it, but so it goes. I hope the new owner enjoys it. I hope it did not get accidentally trashed.
Seeing the Doraville destination on the MARTA (specifically subway) map brought this song from the 1970s to mind, for the rest of the day.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vi32yFeIBww