I didnt read all of that, but trains are indoubtedly faster than cars. The reason while thats not necessarily true in US is that train network in the US sucks because the whole infrastructure (and ideology) is leaning heavily towards cars and now you have serious people who claim "why whould I adjust my schedule when I am FREE with my car and its faster" as a counter argument to "we should improve public transport network". Living in Europe with functioning train networks, I can confirm train is much more comfortable than car. Adjusting to a fixed schedule is worth the cost of being much faster and having the time to do something else on the train and be it just relaxation to arrive without exhaustion at the destination.
A lot of these discussions devolve because of a lack of shared context. I live out in farm country. No trains are coming out here for a plethora of reasons.
Using public transportation - for me - and a lot of America where population density is LOW in such a case is a waste of time for all of the reasons I listed.
Right but the ability of you and many Americans to live in such low-density areas is fully supported by the massive amount of resources directed towards car-centric infrastructure. The problem you refer to- that public transit cannot service low density- is one which creates itself. Moreover, low-density means low tax revenue and infra is EXPENSIVE; more expensive in many cases than the low-density tax base can support. The net result is that revenue to build infra is generated in high-density areas and then spent on low-density ones, which weakens the public transit offerings in high-density areas and encourages more driving, which encourages more low-density living, and the cycle continues. This is not sustainable, and something will give eventually.
