Okay, I have a feel-good Amtrak story, but it will just reinforce your experience with lousy telephone agents.
In '89 my wife and I were at the end of a month-long tour. We were near Seattle and didn't feel like riding down the coast to home in CA because we had been away from work for so long we were worried that the folks we worked with would realize how unimportant we were to the whole operation. Anyway, we called Amtrak and asked specifically about taking a tandem bike on the Coast Starlight. We were assured there wouldn't be a problem, so we bought our tickets and headed to town.
Well, on the appointed morning, we showed up at the station and were told by the ticket clerk that Amtrak does not take tandems. We begged and pleaded and he finally told us that the conductor has total authority to allow us to bring it on or not. When we met the conductor, about ten minutes before the train would depart, he was super excited about our bike. He not only let us bring it on, he didn't make us deal with a box (good thing, no time) and said he would come down to the car it was in at every stop to make sure no one tried to take it. We just leaned it against a wall and set the parking brake (which the conductor also loved).
Of course, back then no one at Amtrak was annoyed by bikes since there were so few of them being brought on any trains.