November 24, 2025 - TRA Newswire - 

Ridership increased aboard Amtrak's three Texas train routes in 2025, even as capacity constraints resulted in fewer available coaches and sleepers for part of the year. 

The daily Texas Eagle, tri-weekly Sunset Limited and the single daily round-trip Oklahoma-Texas partnered Heartland Flyer all showed ridership gains in Amtrak's fiscal year-end 2025 report, through September 30.

Overall, Amtrak's national ridership broke a record with 34.5 million people aboard trains. The national passenger railroad service collected a record ticket revenue of some $2.7 billion.

The passenger railroad picked up 14.3% more passengers on the Texas Eagle, which runs from San Antonio and Austin, through Dallas-Fort Worth and east Texas, to Little Rock, St. Louis, and Chicago daily. Ridership jumped from 325,709 to 372,135 on the daily train despite some days only running with two coaches and one sleeping car through Texas. One of the most popular short-runs in the state was between the Dallas-Fort Worth stations to Austin and San Antonio, showing the need for more trains in the I-35 travel corridor.

While a popular sightseer lounge car was added on to the Texas Eagle in 2025, the train still only runs with a limited cross-country cafe car and does not offer full-service dining as on all other Amtrak long distance trains west of the Mississippi River. 

The Texas Department of Transportation has a study underway to determine what it would take for additional service between greater Austin and San Antonio with multiple intercity trains each day. That report is due to be completed by May 2026. 

The tri-weekly Sunset Limited, which runs from New Orleans to Los Angeles in the I-10 travel corridor, jumped 18.9% in ridership, again despite a lack of equipment. The Sunset stops in Beaumont, Houston, San Antonio, Del Rio, Sanderson, Alpine and El Paso on its three times a week route. Ridership went  from 76,937 in 2024 to 91,493 in 2025, again showing the need to make this a daily service with additional coaches and sleepers sorely needed in this growing south corridor.

The Texas Department of Transportation received a $500,000 federal Corridor Identification and Development Program (CID) grant to determine how to add additional service in the Houston to San Antonio corridor. That study is still in progress.  

The states of Texas and Oklahoma share expenses to run the daily Heartland Flyer, a popular daily train since 1999, that originates in Fort Worth and Oklahoma City with stops in Gainesville, Texas and towns in Oklahoma along the I-35 travel corridor. The Flyer carried 80,876 passengers in 2025, compared to 80,371 in 2024, up 1% despite only having two coach cars on many days. A study to add a second round-trip and greatly increase the ability to attract more business and tourist travellers had been proposed years ago, but no action was taken by either state. 

Funding for the Texas share of support for the Heartland Flyer was eliminated by the Texas Senate Finance Committee earlier this year, despite the train's year over year increased revenue and ridership. The train was targeted for elimination by fall 2025. The North Central Texas Council of Governments worked with the Texas Transportation Commission during the summer to restore funding through mid-2026, while lawmakers consider how to keep the popular service operating in the future. 

Amtrak President Roger Harris said the company is using a dynamic pricing model for ticketing, similar to how airlines price fares. A surge in ridership occured during the government shutdown when travellers, faced with flight delays and cancellations, chose to ride trains.

Photo credit: Amtrak station Austin Texas / Texas Rail Advocates