# strange NJT car



## Morris&Essex (Mar 20, 2004)

I saw a strange sight in an NJT consist today. I was walking out of the Dunkin Donuts  on Rt. 53 in Denville as I heard a train behind the shopping center. I looked down the tracks and watched it travel away from me towards Morris Plains. In the center of it was a car totally painted over with an advertisement kind of like those ugly Lakeland busses from a few years ago. Since it was totally covered in a wild paint scheme and was moving away from me, my guess is that it was a new Comet (V?); I couldn't discern what the advertisement was. I didn't think NJT's rolling mish-mashes could look any worse, but I was mistaken. :angry: I just hope that maybe the car was for some special purpose and not some advertisement after all. I saw this thing at 1:12 pm on 3/19 in Denville.

Another peeve I have with NJT was a recent trip I took from Clifton on the Main line to Philadelphia via Secaucus. Even though there is now automatic ticket machines in Clifton, and I can plan a door-to-door itinerary on NJT's web site, I can't get a SEPTA ticket from Clifton. Even worse, I couldn't make my SEPTA purchase in Secaucus even though it's possible in Newark Penn and NY Penn. Naturally, the SEPTA machine in Trenton was out of order, and I had to buy my ticket on the SEPTA train. Thankfully the SEPTA conductor gave me a break and didn't tack on the surcharge or lecture me about buying tix aboard the train or else I would have thrown a tantrum. :angry:


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## AlanB (Mar 20, 2004)

ELNewBranch said:


> Another peeve I have with NJT was a recent trip I took from Clifton on the Main line to Philadelphia via Secaucus. Even though there is now automatic ticket machines in Clifton, and I can plan a door-to-door itinerary on NJT's web site, I can't get a SEPTA ticket from Clifton. Even worse, I couldn't make my SEPTA purchase in Secaucus even though it's possible in Newark Penn and NY Penn. Naturally, the SEPTA machine in Trenton was out of order, and I had to buy my ticket on the SEPTA train. Thankfully the SEPTA conductor gave me a break and didn't tack on the surcharge or lecture me about buying tix aboard the train or else I would have thrown a tantrum. :angry:


Well that's thanks to NJT's refusal to join the real world and buy modern state-of-the-art TVM's. NJT's are the worst TVM's in the Tri-State area. They are slow, hard to use, and very unreliable.

The LIRR, Metro North, and the subway have all had the new touch screen TVM's for years now. NJT however refuses to buy the new style TVM's and continues to buy 10-year-old technology. They'd rather buy pink Italian marble to make the new station area in Penn look nicer, than buy the new TVM's to make their customer's commute easier.


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## Morris&Essex (Mar 20, 2004)

Excellet point, Alan. I should mention on that same trip, the NJT TVM did not accept my cash, forcing me to pay by debit card.


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## Viewliner (Mar 20, 2004)

Sounds, puzzling, I'll have to go to the station some time and keep my eye out for a car that strange, especially since it was a train on the Morristown Line (which is of course my line). I'd be surprised if it really were an advertisement, I also hope its something else. The thing is, with Warrington at the helm, a bonehead decision like this wouldn't really surprise me.


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## gswager (Mar 20, 2004)

ELNewBranch said:


> Excellet point, Alan. I should mention on that same trip, the NJT TVM did not accept my cash, forcing me to pay by debit card.


It could accept only old dollars, not new dollars. Like AlanB said, they use 10 years old technology, not the latest one. :lol:


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## AlanB (Mar 20, 2004)

ELNewBranch said:


> I saw a strange sight in an NJT consist today. I was walking out of the Dunkin Donuts  on Rt. 53 in Denville as I heard a train behind the shopping center. I looked down the tracks and watched it travel away from me towards Morris Plains. In the center of it was a car totally painted over with an advertisement kind of like those ugly Lakeland busses from a few years ago. Since it was totally covered in a wild paint scheme and was moving away from me, my guess is that it was a new Comet (V?); I couldn't discern what the advertisement was. I didn't think NJT's rolling mish-mashes could look any worse, but I was mistaken. :angry: I just hope that maybe the car was for some special purpose and not some advertisement after all. I saw this thing at 1:12 pm on 3/19 in Denville.


I just came through Penn tonight at 6:45 or so, after a day riding the new River Line along with some SEPTA.

Sitting over about three or four tracks from where my NJT train from Trenton arrived was another NJT consist. One of those cars was indeed wrapped in an advertisement. I can't at the moment recall what the add was for, since I was sprinting to catch a LIRR train leaving at 6:49.

But I can confirm without a doubt that NJT appears to be placing ad wraps on their cars. I couldn't tell if it was a new Comet 5 or not either. Again I was running for the stairs and trying not to knock my fellow passengers down or worse off of the platform.


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## AlanB (Mar 20, 2004)

Ps. The new River Line is way cool.  This was my second spin on it this week. I'll try to post something about my trip later.


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## battalion51 (Mar 20, 2004)

I have a hard time seeing the value in Commuter agencies wrapping their cars in advetisements. I saw this picture on railpictures.net today, and IMHO that's ugly. :blink: I understand some agencies are cash strapped, but there are other ways to make money.


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## Viewliner (Mar 20, 2004)

AlanB said:


> Ps. The new River Line is way cool.  This was my second spin on it this week. I'll try to post something about my trip later.


Glad you enjoyed it. It will probably be a few years before I'd manage to get a trip on the River Line.

This certainly sounds like grim news for NJ Transit, its going to really take away the desire to photograph it. (Though at first it'll be interesting to see)

Depending on how many cars have this, there may be a chance I'll see one when I'm in Newark in 1 week 5 days 15 hours 40 minutes (approximately). Was it the entire car, the windows, or just a portion of the car?


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## AlanB (Mar 20, 2004)

Viewliner said:


> Depending on how many cars have this, there may be a chance I'll see one when I'm in Newark in 1 week 5 days 15 hours 40 minutes (approximately). Was it the entire car, the windows, or just a portion of the car?


It was the whole car, windows top to bottom, vestibules, and wrapping around the curve at the top of the car. At least as far as I can recall, again remember that I was sprinting for the LIRR.


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## AlanB (Mar 20, 2004)

Ps. Some of the new River Line cars were ad wrapped too. All of those ads however were for something that one can access by riding the River Line. Things like the Camden Aquarium, the Rutgers Campus, and stuff like that.


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## Viewliner (Mar 20, 2004)

AlanB said:


> Ps. Some of the new River Line cars were ad wrapped too. All of those ads however were for something that one can access by riding the River Line. Things like the Camden Aquarium, the Rutgers Campus, and stuff like that.


Come to think of it, I think about a week or two ago I remember seeing an NJT Bus wrapped in an ad for Montclair State University (I think), so for now I guess its a sign of things to come. <_<


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## tp49 (Mar 20, 2004)

We've had Amtrak California cars wrapped when they were having the Yahoo promotion a couple of years ago and SF Muni and Sacramento RT have wrapped busses in ads which are just plain tacky.

As for the NJT TVM's they're as bad as the original LIRR TVM's which unless you could figure out the codes for each station you were in trouble. Thankfully then the condictors did not collect the penalty fare if the station ticket office was closed and only TVM's were available.


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## gswager (Mar 21, 2004)

I think ad-wrapped on the train/bus, etc. is a really good reason- graffiti. It stays on, weeks or even months, and then you'll peel it off and put on new ads. I've read on Popular Mechanics article several years ago about it. I once rode in it and I was surprised that I could see clearly out of the windows from inside, not outside.


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## Superliner Diner (Mar 29, 2004)

AlanB said:


> Ps. The new River Line is way cool.  This was my second spin on it this week. I'll try to post something about my trip later.


Fest #1 on River Line & SEPTA trains here.

Fest #2 on River Line & SEPTA trains here.


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## Alp46 Rocks (Apr 13, 2004)

> gswager Posted on Sun, Mar 21, 2004, 11:03 PM--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> I think ad-wrapped on the train/bus, etc. is a really good reason- graffiti. It stays on, weeks or even months, and then you'll peel it off and put on new ads. I've read on Popular Mechanics article several years ago about it. I once rode in it and I was surprised that I could see clearly out of the windows from inside, not outside.


I think LIRR, Amtrak and Metro North should get in on this, not only would the C3s, Amfleets, heritages, Viewliners, and M1/M3s look cool, but it would generate a good revenue into the agencys. And this would also bhe a good way for Septa to tighten its 70 million dollar defecit.


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## Morris&Essex (Apr 15, 2004)

Well, from my travels in Morris county and the Great Notch vicinity along with some recent trips on the Main Line and NEC lines, I haven't come across any more ad wraps on NJT train cars, so thankfully my original alarmist post apparantly wasn't a sign of things to come. (Except for a few wraps on NJT busses).


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## Viewliner (Apr 15, 2004)

ELNewBranch said:


> Well, from my travels in Morris county and the Great Notch vicinity along with some recent trips on the Main Line and NEC lines, I haven't come across any more ad wraps on NJT train cars, so thankfully my original alarmist post apparantly wasn't a sign of things to come. (Except for a few wraps on NJT busses).


Yeah, I didn't see any along the NEC on my trip, I'll be in Short Hills briefly tomorrow, so hopefully I wont see an ad wrapped car. I'll be getting pictures there too.


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## Viewliner (Apr 24, 2004)

Just got home, was in Madison earlier today, and a little after 7:00, saw an outbound train headed to Dover. To my surprise I saw the car, it wasn't really an ad, just ugly. It just advertised Secaucus Junction, and mentioned Newark Airport (I believe it had a picture of a Continental Airlines plane as well). The only picture I got was on my cell phone (didn't have my camera with me because I was there for dinner), if there's anybody interested in seeing the picture, and has the camera phone (can recieve pix messages, not sure if it has to be Verizon or not). At first I thought it might've been a Comet V, but now I'm beginning to think it was a II-R, judging by my picture (unless the quality of the camera just didn't capure the center double door detail).


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## pennsylvaniarailroader (Dec 21, 2004)

Comet V 's look alot like the acela passenger cars












They were both made by ALSTOM, (Acela cars were made by bombardier as well as ALSTOM)


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## Dutchrailnut (Oct 1, 2006)

pennsylvaniarailroader said:


> Comet V 's look alot like the acela passenger cars
> 
> 
> 
> ...


The Acela cars were made by Bombardier in La Pocatier only, only thing on the Acela's that came from Alstom is the propulsion system and design of trucks.

Even the powercars were made by Bombardier in La pocarier Canada.

The C5's are entirely Alstom.


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