Why is it that the U.S. never had a big push to implement a train system? I would have thought that with trains being used so widely in Europe some founding father would have said "Damn, we got to get some of those." But now all we have are city subways but very little in the way of large distance railway systems.
The US has the largest and most complex train system in the world. It's 2.5 times the size of the next largest (China) and carries more freight in a day than most people realize. The issue you are seeing is that we don't move PEOPLE with trains, we move FREIGHT. Millions of tons of freight. We decided decades ago as a country that we would use our rail system for freight. And now, that's what we have is a hugely efficient system for moving freight.
You can read more about it Here. Our rail system should be a HUGE source of pride for us, but because it's not carrying people it's not.
And now, by the time you build a rail system for people (because the rails are privately owned by the freight companies) it'll be cheaper just to fly or drive.