Public transit has intrinsic value to the public it serves and deserves to be sustained and subsidized at whatever level is necessary to provide comfortable and adequate service to the community. Every civilized nation realizes that. Only in the US do we threaten to close down transit whenever there is a budget crunch.
That goes for trolleys, cable cars and, surprise, AMTRAK - the every eight years budget balancing tool. It never ceases to amaze me that we can spend 14.8 billion dollars annually on airports, not to mention how much both Democratic and Republican administrations have poured into the private sector airlines in the form of bailout loans, and still think we can "balance the budget" with AMTRAK's stinking $2.8 billion. But any president worth his salts, regardless of affiliation, has used AMTRAK as a budget whipping boy every time it has come up for renewal since 1971.
I think we'll have cable cars in San Francisco long after the long haul passenger trains are gone.