By James E. Casto, Daily Mail West Virginia; July 30, 2020
You don’t have to board a tourist train to be treated to a view of some spectacular West Virginia scenery by rail. Amtrak bills the route of its Cardinal as one of the most scenic in its system.
The three-day-a-week Cardinal travels between New York City and Chicago via a 1,146-mile route, with a key portion of its route stretching across West Virginia. It’s a successor to the New York Central’s (later Penn Central) James Whitcomb Riley and the Chesapeake & Ohio’s iconic George Washington regional trains.