Buses Beat Rail

The New York Times Washington Post asked a reporter to ride the bus between New York and Washington for a month to see why intercity buses are suddenly so popular. Andrea Sachs found that most bus riders were motivated by “price, location and times.”

The buses are far less expensive than Amtrak (typically $15 to $20 vs. $49 to $99) and take people to more locations (for example, not just Penn Station in New York). With at least a dozen different companies offering 150 to 180 departures per day (depending on the day of the week), buses also beat out Amtrak’s 24 departures per day (half of which are Acela trains that cost a minimum of $99).

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