In Europe, flying is cheaper than taking the train.
It's an embarrassment, and a major problem: we have to stop flying for silly short distances. Realise that the overheads of flying (reaching the airport, awaiting 2 hours, the flight, the unloading, reaching the destination) largely cancel out any time gains of flying. And the carbon costs are utterly untenable. Not to speak of the modern, dire conditions of the whole flying "experience".
Another embarrassment is that train connections can't be guaranteed when across countries or companies. They aren't even coordinated. As if those who commission and set the schedules didn't travel by train themselves, at least not internationally. In considering how tiny most European countries are, it's frankly bizarre.
There are so many destinations one could travel by train to, yet in practice, it's not sensible. A disgrace.
I feel like being much smaller countries, plus the atrocities of the two world wars playing out in Europe (destroying major infrastructure), "help(ed)" in providing a ground framework for rail as it is in Europe.