# LSL: Beginning and ending a 1 zone in TOL



## TimePeace (Jan 11, 2013)

Who has experience with this? I am interested to know about early or late occupancy of the roomette - that is, does it ever happen that Westbound, you can go into the roomette earlier than TOL, and coming back East, do you ever get to stay in the roomette past TOL?


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## Ryan (Jan 11, 2013)

When I did this (well, on the Cardinal at CIN), I just paid for the room WAS-CIN. Wasn't too expensive and didn't have to worry about depending on the kindness of the conductor.

Maybe you can pick a station in West NY that would put you into the room around bedtime to reduce the cost some and ensure that you get a room for the night?


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## Railroad Bill (Jan 11, 2013)

Maine Rider said:


> Who has experience with this? I am interested to know about early or late occupancy of the roomette - that is, does it ever happen that Westbound, you can go into the roomette earlier than TOL, and coming back East, do you ever get to stay in the roomette past TOL?


Boarding in Cleveland, we always do our zone award westbound starting with TOL. We have yet to be allowed in the sleeper early, partly because the stop in CLE is usually rushed--the sleeper attendant in that particular car was taking his break-etc. The conductor did allow us to sit in the LL seats on the Capitol so as to make a quick exchange to the sleepers at the front of the train in TOL.

Eastbound, we have been more fortunate, especially when traveling in bedrooms. A couple of times we have been able to stay in the sleeper from TOL to CLE as long as we had purchased a coach ticket TOL-CLE, which we always do. We agree not to use the upper bunk (since we disembark in CLE at 1am its not a big deal--which makes the car attendant happy that we didnt mess up his bed  A generous tip is always included.

One of the reasons for this is that conductors change in Toledo and it causes some problem if the new conductors do not know where you are.

I would doubt you would be permitted to change to your bedroom/roommette before TOL in most cases going westbound


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## TimePeace (Jan 11, 2013)

Railroad Bill said:


> Maine Rider said:
> 
> 
> > Who has experience with this? I am interested to know about early or late occupancy of the roomette - that is, does it ever happen that Westbound, you can go into the roomette earlier than TOL, and coming back East, do you ever get to stay in the roomette past TOL?
> ...


Thanks for that info. A big help.

I was wondering where the crew changes are - you say it's in TOL - is that both Eastbound and Westbound?


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## Railroad Bill (Jan 11, 2013)

Maine Rider said:


> Railroad Bill said:
> 
> 
> > Maine Rider said:
> ...


 Yes, the conductors change in TOL in both directions on the Capitol Ltd. and I believe that is true for the Lake Shore as well


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## Ryan (Jan 11, 2013)

Since it's 18 hours from BOS to TOL, there's at least 1 more crew change in there as well. Albany?


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## SubwayNut (Jan 11, 2013)

The Lakeshore Limited conductors crew change (I'm basing this on this map from May 2006) in Toledo, Buffalo, and Albany. There is an engineer only change (that also applies to the Maple Leaf and extended Empire Service trains) in Syracuse.


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## Ryan (Jan 12, 2013)

Wow, that's a great map. Thanks for sharing it.


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## Guest (Jan 12, 2013)

These rooms are often sold for the part of the trip that you haven't booked, so it is not up to someone "being nice" to break the rules just for you.


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## TimePeace (Jan 12, 2013)

Guest said:


> These rooms are often sold for the part of the trip that you haven't booked, so it is not up to someone "being nice" to break the rules just for you.


Well that's kind of a negative way of looking at it. Of course I am aware that rooms are not always empty when I am not in them.

And I am not asking for a rules violation. Unless there is rule that says this cannot be done, at either the conductor's or car attendant's discretion. I am not aware of one but perhaps you are.

And there's nothing wrong with being nice... is there?


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## Railroad Bill (Jan 12, 2013)

Obviously, if the room is reserved, we would have to move. This has to be approved by the conductor, who is consulted by the car attendant at TOL. There are few people willing to pay for a bedroom to ride from TOL to WAS, but in most cases if we were in a roommette, our room has been reserved and we had to move.

We had a really nice conductor on the Lake Shore westbound from Buffalo one evening who had us sit in the lounge with them when we had to move out of our room in Erie, Pa. That was one of the best early morning rides as we talked about Amtrak, their career as a conductor, etc.

Most people we have encountered on Amtrak have a common sense attitude about guests on the train. Especially old people like us!~


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## PaulM (Jan 13, 2013)

Twice I've gone Florida to CHI, one zone roomette to TOL with a coach ticket the rest of the way. When I boarded in NYP, I told the SCA attendent that I would be switching to coach in TOL so he didn't have to wake me until the last minute.

The first time he said said not to worry, we could stay in the sleeper as long as we wanted. The second time, he didn't bite.

I would guess that someone would book a room TOL to CHI much less often than TOL east.


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## boxcar479 (Jan 14, 2013)

Maine Rider said:


> Who has experience with this? I am interested to know about early or late occupancy of the roomette - that is, does it ever happen that Westbound, you can go into the roomette earlier than TOL, and coming back East, do you ever get to stay in the roomette past TOL?


In June 2011 we took a trip to Niagara Falls, We took the LSL-TE home to FTW, starting a coach ride from BUF to TOL, where in TOL we would switch to a AGR bedroom redemption the rest of the way home. When the Conductor came to lift the tickets, I mentioned we would be switching to a BR in TOL . He lifted our tix and went on about his way. We all ambled out to coach( there were surprisingly alot of people boarding the LSL at 11:59) as we were approaching our turn to climb aboard I heard my last name being called out, It was the Conductor. He took us out of the coach line and took us down to the sleeper where we were allowed to board and start our bedroom redemption early.  It could have been because we had our 3 year old grandaughter in tow. regardless the SCA got a nice tip and we got an uniterrupted night of sleep! :lol:


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## Bob Dylan (Jan 14, 2013)

On our trip to PHL for The Gathering via LAX  , the Conductors and SCAs allowed us to change to our Room on #1 in SAS instead of ELP, to stay in our Room on #4 all the way from LAX-CHI instead of changing in ABQ and to change to the NYP Section of the LSL in SYR instead of ALB!  Ive also been able to stay in my Room several times on the CL from TOL-CHI instead of changing to Coach as long as I Paid for my Breakfast in the Diner! And back in the Good Old AGR Loophole Days, I was able to stay in my Room from CBS-CHI! Of course YMMV but establishing a Good Raport with the Crew seems to help!


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## boxcar479 (Jan 14, 2013)

jimhudson said:


> On our trip to PHL for The Gathering via LAX  , the Conductors and SCAs allowed us to change to our Room on #1 in SAS instead of ELP, to stay in our Room on #4 all the way from LAX-CHI instead of changing in ABQ and to change to the NYP Section of the LSL in SYR instead of ALB!  Ive also been able to stay in my Room several times on the CL from TOL-CHI instead of changing to Coach as long as I Paid for my Breakfast in the Diner! And back in the Good Old AGR Loophole Days, I was able to stay in my Room from CBS-CHI! Of course YMMV but establishing a Good Raport with the Crew seems to help!


They just didn't want "foam" from a bunch of trainuts spread from one end of the train to the other


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