It is the point. People in Europe very much do consider train vs. plane. I encountered this first hand in personal considerations, family vacation planning and in a policy handout in a big corporation.
Quite a few of my friends in Europe prefer not to fly for environmental reasons as well, which I don't see really discussed a lot here. Oftentimes flight is seen as a last resort mode of transportation.
Not in Eastern Europe and the Balkans where trains and rail infra are crap. If I were going from Austria to the Czech Republic, sure. Hungary to Greece? No way.
