dguruswamy:

Thanks for clarifying.

I checked and found that a First class Acela ticket costs $444 RT and that a business class acela ticket costs roughly $300 for a trip between NY Penn station and Washington DC. Not a bad price for a quick train ride.

I rode an Acela train about 2 years ago when they were first introducing them on the NYC-BOS route and it was pretty good. They only had business class seats, so I don't know what difference first class offers.