Yes, compared to many places in Europe (and even parts of Asia), UK's rail system is pretty bad. But it is still a practical way to get from city to city in the UK. In the US, except for the Washington-NYC-Boston corridor (and maybe the San Diego-Los Angeles route) it isn't really anymore. You can technically take a train from NYC to Chicago, but it will take you longer than the same train trip took 100 years ago! And insane house prices are very much a problem in the US as well.
I wouldn't call it very practical. Unless you want to go to London you're better off driving from a time, cost and reliability perspective. It's bizarre to me that it's much cheaper to fly to Edinburgh or Nice than to take trains...
The ratio of hourly wage to meter of housing is from 2x to 10x worse in the UK than the USS.
