Posted on 01/22/2019 6:48:06 AM PST by Kaslin
PITTSBURGH -- For nearly a quarter of a century, Amtrak's Capitol Limited route has taken me from my beloved hometown to Washington, D.C. Sometimes for fun, almost always for work, the experience is never the same.
And if you are a rail lover, it is always about the experience.
There is only one train that leaves the Pittsburgh station every day, and that is at 5:20 a.m. (which means your alarm goes off at 3:30 a.m.). Thanks to sharing the line with freight, that almost always means a 20- to 90-minute departure delay. Then there's the nearly eight-hour trip, twice what it takes me to drive there. Flying would only take an hour.
So why ride the rails? For starters, there's the joy of looking out your window to swaths of the countryside you'd never see if you were flying over them or cruising along the Pennsylvania Turnpike.
There are miles of old industrial sites in places like Braddock and McKeesport, Pennsylvania, some filled with ghosts of the past. If you are curious enough, you look up what they were as you pass them by and learn something new about the cities and towns that built this country, as well as the people who built it.
You also see a remarkable amount of them being reused or repurposed as new companies chase the ghosts away. Rebirth among the ashes is the story of America.
The post office in Meyersdale, Pennsylvania, is charming. The decay of the old brewery in Smithton, Pennsylvania, is hauntingly beautiful. The rapids of the Youghiogheny in Ohiopyle, Pennsylvania, are breathtaking. So are the sleepy little towns like Hyndman, Pennsylvania, and Paw Paw, West Virginia, where the long-long-short-long warning whistle of the train at each crossing echoes off the mountains that surround these valley towns.
What happens inside the train matters as well. One of the true charming parts of the ride is the dining car experience. It isn't just the warm, buttery grits and the crisp bacon. It is the people you meet because of the communal dining.
It was there on the Friday before former President Barack Obama's first inauguration where I met African-Americans traveling from as far as California by train to attend his inauguration. From veterans of the civil rights movement to young people caught up in his aspirational rhetoric, we were all sitting, conversing, sharing stories and experiences.
Last Monday, when I boarded the train for the first time this winter, I discovered the warm, buttery grits were no longer an option, replaced by a tub of yogurt and granola -- in a box. Dinner now came in a box. So did lunch. Gone were the crisp white tablecloths, and gone were the people who always cheerfully made whatever meal you wanted.
My first reaction was: If I were to want to be treated the way I am on an airline, I would take one. I took to Twitter and Facebook to express my disappointment in my best mom tone.
A call to Amtrak at first met deflection. As is the norm with spokesmen these days, they declined to talk and tried to insist I put my questions in email.
However, persistence, done courteously, sometimes does prevail. Apparently, I wasn't the only objector. Amtrak returned to hot meals by this past Wednesday.
The crisp, white tablecloths and the jobs have not returned. In fact, a month ago, employees held a small rally in D.C. to protest the dining service changes and the threat of outsourcing some 1,700 union food and beverage jobs.
Change is inevitable. Change is important. But it is often spurred by erroneous assumptions.
As Peggy Noonan commented on Twitter: "Amtrak's new management thinks trains are planes. A lot of us are on the train because we don't want to be on the plane."
Notably, Amtrak's new president, Richard Anderson, is the former chief executive of Delta Air Lines. There are a lot of things about rail service that can and should be modernized. But there are also some that shouldn't.
Anderson's next course of action should be a trip around the country by rail to listen to his devoted customers and learn who they are and why they ride. He and his team might realize what shouldn't be changed.
What’s the main reasons do not make money?
They are almost always full.
They sell ya $2 of food for $8.
There’s no dining car on the Amtrak between Los Angeles and San Diego but you should go anyway. The train goes right by the ocean, and the stations at both ends are pretty.
What’s the main reasons TRAINS do not make money?
They are almost always full.
They sell ya $2 of food for $8.
The airlines have forced the government to produce slow service. Even the big train companies which now love the Amtrak fees they receive to let their trains ride their tracks are pro-Amtrak. But they are against the trains receiving any type of priority. The reality is that Amtrak’s service is so bad that even people like me who would take it if it were even twice as long as flying, can’t do it. Its not dependable, for no good reason. Its not cheap for no good reason. And its unbelievably slow, for no good reason. So there is no good reason for the service at all. Other countries around the world do a much better job.
Cut them off 100% from any form of funding or Federal guarantees. If they can’t make their slow-assed choo-choo train profitable, eff ‘em.
My wife and I took the Autotrain to Florida last Summer. The sit down dining was surprizingly good, better than many resturants with good reputations. The whole experience, the sleeper car, the service, and the lounge car with huge windows, was impressive.
Privatize it.
I always wanted to go on a nice long train ride to see the countryside eat good food and drink good booze.
I wonder if there are any privately operated tourist trains here in the Boston area..
A long ride through the Midwest would be both sad and interesting going through once prosperous but now decimated towns due to the leftists, unions and globalists.
One of the reasons that Amtrak is slow is because they do not own the rails; they are owned by private freight lines, such as Norfolk Southern or CSX. Prior to Amtrak, when both passenger and freight service were provided by the same railroad, the passenger trains had priority over freight. Now, however, Amtrak’s passenger trains have to give right-of-way to the freight trains run by the railroads that own the tracks.
“””-Its a 10 trip from Charlotte to DC.. Can drive it at 6hrs.
But I can’t read, nap, and eat my take along Deli made ham and cheese sandwiches and a Beer !!!-”””
But you have 4 hours to rest after you get there if you drive, and a few more $$ still in your pocket.
If rail travel were twice as fast as driving, nearly as cheap, and devoid of all the negatives that come with being around tons of unknown people (screaming babies, liberals, transmission of colds, etc.), then it would be a very viable alternative.
Question - can you even conceal-carry on an Amtrak train?
“”” - One of the reasons that Amtrak is slow is because they do not own the rails; they are owned by private freight lines, such as Norfolk Southern or CSX. Prior to Amtrak, when both passenger and freight service were provided by the same railroad, the passenger trains had priority over freight. Now, however, Amtrak’s passenger trains have to give right-of-way to the freight trains run by the railroads that own the tracks. - “””
They prioritize all the trains pretty much. On the N&S tracks near me, they will clear a path for the daily (or more) UPS train. It is a high priority that, I’m sure, UPS pays for, but other trains get onto the second track where available to let that one through.
I’m sure that in some instances, Amtrak has priority over certain freight trains, but I bet UPS has priority over Amtrak in most cases. So, maybe it is better to ship yourself to your destination. :)
As long as AMTRAK needs subsidies to exist, it is definitely NOT reasonable to have 1,700 federal employees occasionally making grits.
Planes, SkyDancer wrote: The Empire Builder (route 7/8) from Seattle to Chicago is a great trip provided you go first class (sleeper). It’s a forty-five hour trip through great country scenes.
Use it from where I’m at to get to Chicago and it’s always late. Sometimes as much as 8 hours due to freight traffic out of the western states. AMTRACK could set up a local run using an interburban (commuter style) train originating from where they have a contract with a bus company in Winona MN which they use to pick up those passengers on the stops between Winona and Milwaukee when that happens. But I suspect because of union problems AMTRAK can’t.
The author is lamenting the end of an age gone by. Imagine how the article would read if the train tickets were priced at what it really cost to offer the service they’d come to romanticize!
Face it, Amtrak is already subsidized (i.e. - direct revenues do not cover direct expenses). It is also not as fast as flying or driving. I’d venture to guess that the trains use as much (if not more) energy than a plane connecting the same 2 points.
The measure of its worth should be whether people would be willing to pay the real cost or not. The taxpayer should not be subsidizing antiquated modes of transportation just because some are nostalgic for them.
It’s late also due to winter storms and spring floods but then if you’re using the train then time is unimportant.
A bucket list goal of mine has been to experience the Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint train scenes from North by Northwest. Is that possible in 2019?
I would think your presumption of equal fuel use is way off.
Any aircraft will use more fuel per pound moved than any land transport simply because lifting something uses energy, in addition to moving it horizontally.
Trains (steel wheels on steel rails) are extraordinarily efficient: a typical train uses ONE gallon of diesel to move one TON of freight around 300 MILES.
Your average jetliner uses more fuel than that taxiing to the runway.
National Geographic has a (semi) scientific answer to that: HERE.
Not as cut-and-dried as one might think. Seems to depend on distance traveled, and whether measuring on an absolute basis vs. per-passenger.
There should be a Waffle House Car on every Train.
+1
5.56mm
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