# Chicago-Florida



## creddick (Dec 14, 2009)

Is there any possibility there may be a Chicago-Florida train again? Are there any plans at all for one?


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## the_traveler (Dec 14, 2009)

One of the proposals to restore the SL-East is to extend the CONO from CHI-NOL-Florida. But as of now, that is only a proposed proposal that they are looking at.


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## nferr (Dec 14, 2009)

the_traveler said:


> One of the proposals to restore the SL-East is to extend the CONO from CHI-NOL-Florida. But as of now, that is only a proposed proposal that they are looking at.


And that will probably take longer than the current Capital Limited switch to Silver Service option in Washington scenario.


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## henryj (Dec 14, 2009)

When I look historically at the Chicago Florida service there were three main routes and the Southern's longer route. The best route with today's minimal Amtrak service would seem to be a route through Atlanta. The train that did the best on this route was the Dixieland. This route was 1086 miles long and went through Danville, Evansville, Nashville, Chattanooga and Atlanta and took 23 hours and 15 minutes Chi to Jax. It seems the perfect route. A morning departure from Chicago gets a morning arrival in JAX to connect with trains going on to Miami or this train could continue on separately.

The question I have is what has happenned to this route with all the mergers? Is it a viable route anymore? It would serve several large population centers that as of now have no or limited Amtrak service.

I would think that to be successful, a Chicago to Florida train would have to make the Chi to Jax leg in 24 hours.

The old Southern route(now NS) through Cincinnati, Lexington, Chattanooga and Atlanta took considerable longer for the likes of the Royal Palm and the Ponce De Leon as it went over the 'rathole' division - something like 30 hours. Since those days NS has done a lot of work on this division. Could it support a schedule of 24 hours?

Finally, why does it take trains almost 9 hours to go the 319 miles between Chicago and Cincinnati?

Thanks.


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## MattW (Dec 14, 2009)

Frankly, a CHI-FL train via Atlanta makes loads of sense. I can pretty well guarantee you that the train would gets lots of GA-FL traffic off of I-75 especially an overnight train. People could get off work, catch the train and be in Florida the next morning. CHI-FL has got to be a big market with only airline service currently available!


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## battalion51 (Dec 14, 2009)

MattW said:


> Frankly, a CHI-FL train via Atlanta makes loads of sense. I can pretty well guarantee you that the train would gets lots of GA-FL traffic off of I-75 especially an overnight train. People could get off work, catch the train and be in Florida the next morning. CHI-FL has got to be a big market with only airline service currently available!


Hey don't forget about Greyhound! :lol:


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## NorthCoastHiawatha (Dec 14, 2009)

battalion51 said:


> Hey don't forget about Greyhound! :lol:


Yes 35 hours and 2 transfers later :blink:


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## WICT106 (Dec 14, 2009)

As a Midwesterner myself, I would also like to have a direct CUS - FL train, but it is just not in the works, unless one has the money to upgrade the tracks in several locations. Several other segments of track that were used in days gone by no longer exist, or are now owned by shortlines, and not maintained to passenger RR standards.

We have also address this topic on numerous occasions in the past. Some members of the Forum here, who are civil engineers, can weigh in on the various routings and itineraries, as well as the engineering challenges to going across the grain of the Appalachians, as suggested by one of the pervious posters.

There is the issue that the CHI & Upper Midwest market is just not the same size as the NYC - FLA market. Also, those of us who live in the Upper Midwest have been inclined to go to Southern TX, or Southern AZ, or Mexico, even in historic times. There just isn't the predisposition to go to FLA to the same degree as Northeasterners. To quote Craig Sanders, on Page 90 of _Amtrak In The Heartland,_: "The _Floridian_ often had good loads during the winter, and the Midwest - Florida market is vast. Amtrak's New York - Florida route is popular, so why couldn't a Chicago - Florida route have similar success? The answer lies in the differences between the markets. Railroads offering New York - Florida service in the 1960s made money and offered high-quality service. Railroads in the Midwest - Florida market saw it as futile and eliminated or downgraded their trains. Chicago - Miami is 80 miles longer than New York - Miami, but because of route configurations, the best time Amtrak might muster is 7 hours longer than the New York route. Amtrak's 1990 report observed that states along the Chicago - Florida route generate 60 percent of the travel volume of the Northeast - Florida market. Yet with a population 45 percent of New York, Chicago generated 30 percent as many airline trips to Florida. 'This seems to suggest that there may be less of a Midwestern affinity, as compared to New York, to travel to Florida by common carrier,' the report concluded."

An additional issue one has to contend with is drive time. Many Midwesterners can drive straight through from Southern WI to Florida in about 24 hours, give or take. The fastest of the historic CHI - FL trains covered the distance in about 36 hours. There would also have to be considerable track upgrades in KY, TN, GA, and possibly AL in order to increase maximum permissible and (more importantly) average overall speeds. What are the advantages to riding the train for possibly a longer time, arriving in one's destination, only to have to rent a car anyways ? For a route like this to work, you have to offer reliable service, time competitive with auto travel, in order to get Midwesterners out of their cars.

One resource I found is a website that lists the historic schedules for trains. We can compare the schedules for NYC - FL and CHI - FL trains. Streamliner Schedules.


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## delvyrails (Dec 14, 2009)

WICT106 said:


> As a Midwesterner myself, I would also like to have a direct CUS - FL train, but it is just not in the works, unless one has the money to upgrade the tracks in several locations. Several other segments of track that were used in days gone by no longer exist, or are now owned by shortlines, and not maintained to passenger RR standards.
> We have also address this topic on numerous occasions in the past. Some members of the Forum here, who are civil engineers, can weigh in on the various routings and itineraries, as well as the engineering challenges to going across the grain of the Appalachians, as suggested by one of the pervious posters.
> 
> There is the issue that the CHI & Upper Midwest market is just not the same size as the NYC - FLA market. Also, those of us who live in the Upper Midwest have been inclined to go to Southern TX, or Southern AZ, or Mexico, even in historic times. There just isn't the predisposition to go to FLA to the same degree as Northeasterners. To quote Craig Sanders, on Page 90 of _Amtrak In The Heartland,_: "The _Floridian_ often had good loads during the winter, and the Midwest - Florida market is vast. Amtrak's New York - Florida route is popular, so why couldn't a Chicago - Florida route have similar success? The answer lies in the differences between the markets. Railroads offering New York - Florida service in the 1960s made money and offered high-quality service. Railroads in the Midwest - Florida market saw it as futile and eliminated or downgraded their trains. Chicago - Miami is 80 miles longer than New York - Miami, but because of route configurations, the best time Amtrak might muster is 7 hours longer than the New York route. Amtrak's 1990 report observed that states along the Chicago - Florida route generate 60 percent of the travel volume of the Northeast - Florida market. Yet with a population 45 percent of New York, Chicago generated 30 percent as many airline trips to Florida. 'This seems to suggest that there may be less of a Midwestern affinity, as compared to New York, to travel to Florida by common carrier,' the report concluded."
> ...


Interesting points.

Looking at the earlier Chicago-Florida service, it seems to have been extremely and uneconomically dispersed over many routes, some of which had less than daily service a half century ago. Perhaps the wisest move now is to choose just one route which serves the most intermediate population and utilizes present Amtrak route miles. That suggests a Chicago-Cincinnati-Atlanta-Jacksonville routing and a combination with the Cardinal between Chicago and Cinci.

Granted the Chicago-Florida market is smaller, but we are considering just one train instead of the three Amtrak offers between the Northeast and Florida.

Between Washington and Florida, there are no huge metro areas to serve. On the Chicago-Florida run, we will have rapidly growing Atlanta to attract traffic both northward and southward, too, as noted in one of the posts.

The old "Rat Hole" rail line south of Cincinnati has been upgraded greatly since the last passenger trains operated. A map in Trains magazine suggests that about half of it is now double tracked. I believe that NS has much improved its Atlanta-Valdosta-Jacksonville line, too.

Finally, in Atlanta, there is potential of connection with the Crescent, which will restore through New Orleans-Florida travel capability if as expected, the Atlanta-Florida segment is run overnight.

I'm sure there are relatively few "motorheads" who dangerously drive 24 hours flat-out. Even truck drivers are being restricted now to less than half of that driving time daily because of the fatigue factor.

With much greater population, this route needs an Amtrak study far more than the Pioneer and North Coast Hiawatha routes did.


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## MattW (Dec 14, 2009)

Part of the problem CHI-FL vs. NYC-FL is there is no one single road route. "Drive the 65-24-75-turnpike" just doesn't have the same ring as "Drive the 95," but perhaps a single train route could change that. Yea, the market might not be as good, but is the rail market ever as good as the non-rail market? At least in this country?


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## battalion51 (Dec 14, 2009)

45% of the population, offer 45% of the service (ok well 50%). I know that there are inherent challenges to this project, but we can't be one sided to the scope we look at this with. What about the intermediate points that would benefit from this service. We should be discussing the challenges from a "what needs to be overcome so we can do this right," not from a "yeah but," perspective. There are a host of challenges, but there's never been a better climate to expand service under. Use HSR monies and see if you can get a kickstart with some of the challenging segments.


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## KurtisB (Dec 14, 2009)

A Chicago-Florida route sounds like a very good idea. Atlanta would have to be a stop on the route, of course. As said earlier, Atlanta is a major city, and would by most all odds benefit from a direct rail line to Florida. Additionally, the fact that neither Florida or Georgia has a direct rail link to Chicago, and subsequently the Midwest, suggests, that when combined with the other factors, a very high route ridership potential.

I, for one, would certainly ride it, even if I move to California before if/when such a route begins operations.

BTW, I think a potential name for the route could be the "Sunshine Express". Referring to Florida being the "Sunshine State", of course.

Kurtis


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## George Harris (Dec 14, 2009)

This topic has been discussed multiple times on this site.

When looking favorable at the "Dixieland's" route, it should be remembered that this was the first of the "fast three" to die.

To summarize previous discussion:

The fastest and most popular, the City of Miami through Jackson TN, Birmingham, and Columbus GA is no longer possible. Critical segments of the route have eitehr been abandoned or become slow speed short lines.

The South Wind route, which became the Amtrak Floridian's route would need major work between Chicago and Indianapolis and between Montgomery and Waycross GA to have a decently fast schedule.

The Dixieland route, while all in place and all with CTC signalling and higging the most centers of population, although missing such places as Indianapolis and Louisville in favor of Evansville IN, is very congested with freight, very curvey across northern Georgia and with reductions in Superelevation on many curves could not support the speeds of the past, nor given the current realitiies where the train could not be "given the road" there is no way the former schedule could even be approached.


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## henryj (Dec 14, 2009)

George Harris said:


> This topic has been discussed multiple times on this site.
> When looking favorable at the "Dixieland's" route, it should be remembered that this was the first of the "fast three" to die.
> 
> To summarize previous discussion:
> ...


Thanks George for the info. If it had to go to a 36 hour schedule then the former Southern route over the rathole would compare. How are the possibilities on that line?


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## battalion51 (Dec 15, 2009)

I can't find what I'm looking for at this moment, but I have to wonder something. CSX runs some fast UPS trains and other Intermodal JAX TOFC-CHI every single day. I can't imagine these schedules being too much longer than 36-40 hours, and there's probably some decent dwell time in there. Doesn't seem like it'd be rocket science to get these rails up to passenger standards and shave off some time. And I doubt if public financing were involved for capacity improvements CSX would be adverse to it, especially if it didn't effect their property taxes...


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## Bill Haithcoat (Dec 15, 2009)

The history of CHI to FLA service is very rich and quite complicated.

The pivitol moment was in 1940 when three new lightweight steamliners were put in service.

These were the Dixie Flagler via Evansville,Nashville,Chattanooga,Atlanta,Jax. The South Wind via Indy, Louisville,Nashville,Birmingham, Montgomery,JK: the City of Miami via Carbondale,Fulton,Birmingham,Columbus,Albany,Jax..

These trains each operated every third day. They ran in rotation with each other, thus one train a day but on three different routes. Between CHI and JAX the only stops they had in common was that the Flagler and the South Wind both stopped in Nashville. The South WInd and the City both stopped in Birmingham.

For many years, the times in and out of Chicago and every station between JAX and Miami were identical. Just to make up a time, say each left CHI at 9 a.m and each arrived in MIA the next afternoon at 5.25. This lasted for years but it eventually became too much trouble to keep up. Since the SW route was longest that meant it had the fastest mph. Since the Flagler's route was shortest it had the slowest mph since for many years the end point times were the same.

These trains were all coach originally. They each had one baggage coach, four full coaches, one diner and one observation tavern lounge car.They were originally going to be winter only trains but they were so popular they became year around.

There were other trains, heavyweight. that had both coaches and sleepers and ran all year and ran DAILY.. Such as the Dixie Flyer and Dixie Limited on the Dixie Flagler route. The Seminole on the City of Miami route.

Further there were winter only trains which were largely sleepers. Such as the (old) Dixieland on the Flagler route and a short-lived Dixiana. There was the Florida Arrow on the SW route and a name I can't immediately find on the City route.

For a time it was very confusing. Year round daily trains, every third day streamliners and winter only heavy weights. "Winter season" by the way was usually from about Dec.16 of one year to April 24 of the following.

A basic change began in the winter 1949-50 season. The every third day heavyweights(Dixieland, Florida Arrow,etc) were not revived from the previous winter but instead their heavyweight sleepers were attached to the previously all coach lightweight streamliners. These trains were still accorded the designation "streamliner" for historical reasons but they did run non streamlined sleepers for several years. Not too unusual, several trains were like that.

From this point all three streamliners began running with more sleepers in the winter than in the summer due to the snowbirds. The South Wind and City of Miami got new streamlined sleepers fairly soon. The Flagler did not get all lightweight streamlined sleepers until it was renamed the Dixieland December 16, 1954.

So,yes the Dixie Flagler was re equipped with new coaches and sleepers both and renamed the Dixieland.I saw it come through Chattanooga on that night 12/16/54.

I must point out the the City of Mami and South Wind sometimes ran every other day or two days out of three during the winter season. The Flagler only ran two days out of three during one of the winter seasons. Foreboding that it did not get as much business for whatever reason.

At the end of November, 1957 the Dixieland was discontinued, a sad note for me. Some on here know the first train I was taken on was the Dixie Flagler, later known as the Dixieland. Thus my "hang up" on the subject.

When this happened the City of Miami and the South Wind each became every other day all year and remained that way as long as they both operated. They also added through cars from Chicago to St. Petersburg and from Chicago to Tampa-Sarasota. This was due to the discontinuance of the Southland.

The Southland was a heavy weight train from Cincinnati,Knoxville,Atlanta to West Coast Florida points. It went via Perry, FL and by- passed Jacksonville. Though there were through cars from Cincinnati to Jax handed over to the Dixie Flyer in Atlanta. It had through sleepers from Chicago to St. Pete and Chicago to Tampa Sarasota and also from Detroit to St. Pete and Detroit to Tampa Sarasota. These also ran on revolving dates. There was a lot of that back then!! Another train on that route was the Flamingo but it did not have as much Florida stuff but was more of a Cincinnati,Knoxville, Atlanta, Albany overnight train.

Mention was made of the Southern RR with the Royal Palm and Ponce de Leon. via Chattanooga and Atlanta. Those were the year round trains. During some winter seasons there was the New Royal Palm, a streamliner which made very few stops on the Cincinnati to Jax portion of its route. It had through sleepers and coaches from Detroit to Miami and through sleepers from Buffalo, Cleveland and Chicago to Miami. During the summer as many of its streamlined cars as were needed were put on the year round Royal Palm.

After it no longer paid to operate a separate New RP, the regular RP just got more sleepers in the winter but on its slower schedule.

There was also the Kansas City Florida Special, which ran via Springfield, IL, Memphis,Birmingham,Atlanta,Jax with through sleepers KC to Miami.

Honorable mention must be made of the Georgian even though it did not go to Florida. It was a fast overnight streamliner Chicago, Evansville, Nashville,Chattanooga Atlanta with through coach and sleeper from St.Louis to Atlanta.Very popular at one time. It could be popular again today, how badly we need some way from ATl to CHI today. In its hey day, the Georgian left ATL at 6 pm. got to CHI next morning at 8.25, great for people traveling business.

The South Wind is the only train which became Amtrak. Shortly after Amtrak took over it was renamed the Floridian. As the only CHI Florida train left, of course it ran daily, none of all that confusion.

My pick of a name if ever a Chicago to Florida train is restored: Royal Palm (regardless of route)


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## henryj (Dec 15, 2009)

Bill Haithcoat said:


> The history of CHI to FLA service is very rich and quite complicated.
> The pivitol moment was in 1940 when three new lightweight steamliners were put in service.
> 
> These were the Dixie Flagler via Evansville,Nashville,Chattanooga,Atlanta,Jax. The South Wind via Indy, Louisville,Nashville,Birmingham, Montgomery,JK: the City of Miami via Carbondale,Fulton,Birmingham,Columbus,Albany,Jax..
> ...


Bill, great history of the Chicago-Florida service. One thing that is important is the timing. All three of these trains made the Chi-JAX leg in around 24 hours. Southbound leaving Chi in the morning with a next morning arrival in JAX. Northbound leaving JAX in the evening with a next evening arrival in Chi, thus a one night trip. The Southern's trains took something like 30+ hours and two nights. Amtrak's Floridian in the timetable I could find was on a 29 1/2 hour schedule. A morning departure from Chi and a next afternoon arrival in Jax. Northbound it was an afternoon departure from Jax and a next morning arrival in Chi. All these trains of course continued on to St Petersburg and Miami. If a revived 'Dixieland' could at least maintain this schedule it would still be a viable train with a faster schedule than using the CL or the CONO as both these routes require a two night out schedule. The route through Nashville, Chattanooga and Atlanta would seem to be the best as neither Nashville or Chattanooga have passenger service at the moment and Atlanta needs the Chi and Florida connection. To run a service like this all the way to Miami would require four sets of equipment. Not likely any time soon unfortunately.


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## George Harris (Dec 15, 2009)

Amtrak's Floridian made several flip-flops in schedule over its tortured life.

On Amtrak day 1, it was given what had been essentially the South Wind's schedule. However, the slide of Pen Central's track into slow, rough, and unreliable made this untenable. At the same time the L&N was becoming infested with slow orders and unreliablilty. The SAL south of Montgomery was not much better. As a result, the schedule was lengthened. it was then flipped a couple of times between night-day night- and then day-night-day with a really late night arrival in Miami. I do not remeber in what order or how many times this occurred. The route north of Louisville had a couple variations, and for a while it even ran chicago to Nashville via Evansville, but very slowly as the speed limit by that time was 50 mph.


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## delvyrails (Dec 15, 2009)

George Harris said:


> Amtrak's Floridian made several flip-flops in schedule over its tortured life.
> On Amtrak day 1, it was given what had been essentially the South Wind's schedule. However, the slide of Pen Central's track into slow, rough, and unreliable made this untenable. At the same time the L&N was becoming infested with slow orders and unreliablilty. The SAL south of Montgomery was not much better. As a result, the schedule was lengthened. it was then flipped a couple of times between night-day night- and then day-night-day with a really late night arrival in Miami. I do not remeber in what order or how many times this occurred. The route north of Louisville had a couple variations, and for a while it even ran chicago to Nashville via Evansville, but very slowly as the speed limit by that time was 50 mph.



Today Amtrak needs to be operated as a network in which all routes connect with each other. The scheduled arrival and departure times at Chicago of the four major western trains are what must set the arrival and departure times of the Chicago-Atlanta-Florida service (minimal two-hour connecting time). Another reasonable requirement is that all major cities be served at hours between 6 am and midnight.

These requirements suggest a schedule that is overnight between Chicago and Cincinnati and between Atlanta and Jacksonville. Much faster speeds would not much benefit the schedule between Chicago and Jacksonville but would be helpful south of JAX, along with use of the Florida East Coast route as far as West Palm Beach for the Miami trains.


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## Green Maned Lion (Dec 15, 2009)

delvyrails said:


> Another reasonable requirement is that all major cities be served at hours between 6 am and midnight.


Reasonable? If we are maintaining one frequency a day on the LD trains, its insane.


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## AlanB (Dec 15, 2009)

Green Maned Lion said:


> delvyrails said:
> 
> 
> > Another reasonable requirement is that all major cities be served at hours between 6 am and midnight.
> ...


I probably would have chosen a different word, like perhaps "impossible", but otherwise I do agree with GML it is simply not possible to do all that you suggest delvyrails with only one run per day in each direction.


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## WICT106 (Dec 16, 2009)

Another issue that will come up in the future is that Positive Train Control requirement. The freight RRs are already calculating the costs associated with this thing, and their respective managements are certain to demand that Amtrak bear its Just and Fair share of the cost of PTC installation and maintenance. The freight RRs may see PTC as a legal "Taking," for which they are entitled to "Just and Fair Compensation."


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## frequentflyer (Dec 16, 2009)

Getting the impression many think there is not a major market for a midwest to Florida train, am I right? I think a CHI-FL train through Indy or CIN through LOU, or NASH to Chattanooga and through the ATL would be wildly successful. There may not be the same amount of snowbirds as in the NEC but there is enough from the midwest. And trying to extrapolate numbers from how many that connect in DC to the Silver trains from the Cap Ltd is not a true gauge. No one is going to spend two nights on a train just to go from CHI to FL.


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## Bill Haithcoat (Dec 16, 2009)

George Harris said:


> This topic has been discussed multiple times on this site.
> When looking favorable at the "Dixieland's" route, it should be remembered that this was the first of the "fast three" to die.
> 
> To summarize previous discussion:
> ...


George, I think two things may have contributed to "my train', the Dixie Flagler/Dixieland falling first.

One, the fact that the Flagler was slower to run all streamlined sleeping cars, as noted per my earlier post. The City of Miami and the South Wind only suffered that anomoly one or at the most two winter seasons. The Flagler had some lightweight sleepers of course but it was not until it was re equipped and renamed the Dixieland 12/54 that all its sleepers were streamlined.

Secondly, the winter season New Royal Palm gave more daily competition than might be thought. It was all streamlined and daily and from Chattanooga and Atlanta to Jacksonville and Miami was fully as fast as the Dixie Flagler/Dixieland. Noted in my earlier post, both the SW and the City served Birmingham and the SW and the Flager both served Nashville. But the additional competition from the New Royal Palm on its faster winter schedule seemed fairly intense.


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## creddick (Dec 16, 2009)

frequentflyer said:


> Getting the impression many think there is not a major market for a midwest to Florida train, am I right? I think a CHI-FL train through Indy or CIN through LOU, or NASH to Chattanooga and through the ATL would be wildly successful. There may not be the same amount of snowbirds as in the NEC but there is enough from the midwest. And trying to extrapolate numbers from how many that connect in DC to the Silver trains from the Cap Ltd is not a true gauge. No one is going to spend two nights on a train just to go from CHI to FL.


I agree about two nights. It certainly stopped me from taking the train when I found that out. We would have gotten a sleeper too but, not at those prices. One night, most likely.


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## the_traveler (Dec 16, 2009)

creddick said:


> frequentflyer said:
> 
> 
> > No one is going to spend two nights on a train just to go from CHI to FL.
> ...


Correction - almost no one! I would! 

But I agree, most people would rather take the shortest route with the least overnights.

Look at (for example) CHI-PDX. I think many more take the EB for 2 overnights than take the CZ or SWC connecting to the CS for 3 nights! Or CHI-LAX, many more take the SWC for 2 nights than take the TE for 3 nights!


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## Rail Freak (Dec 16, 2009)

frequentflyer said:


> Getting the impression many think there is not a major market for a midwest to Florida train, am I right? I think a CHI-FL train through Indy or CIN through LOU, or NASH to Chattanooga and through the ATL would be wildly successful. There may not be the same amount of snowbirds as in the NEC but there is enough from the midwest. And trying to extrapolate numbers from how many that connect in DC to the Silver trains from the Cap Ltd is not a true gauge. No one is going to spend two nights on a train just to go from CHI to FL.



That's whats happening now!

RF


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## George Harris (Dec 16, 2009)

Bill Haithcoat said:


> George Harris said:
> 
> 
> > This topic has been discussed multiple times on this site.
> ...


Bill: I also suspect that the schedule of the Dixie Flagler was wound considerably tighter than the City of Miami, and possibly tighter than the South Wind. The CofM had more frequent stops and longer dwell times than the other two despite having the same end to end time. for Example: The CofM stop in B'han was scheduled for 30 minutes compared to the South Wind's 8 to 10 minutes. Therefore, there was less time in the DF's schedule to make up for delays. Given the crookedness of the W&A, it is also likely that the run between Atlanta and Chattanooga had a lot of stay in your seat and hang on distance.


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## henryj (Dec 16, 2009)

George Harris said:


> Bill: I also suspect that the schedule of the Dixie Flagler was wound considerably tighter than the City of Miami, and possibly tighter than the South Wind. Given the crookedness of the W&A, it is also likely that the run between Atlanta and Chattanooga had a lot of stay in your seat and hang on distance.


LOL George, "wound pretty tight" is probably a good description. The Dixieland was carded at around 23 hours through those hills whereas the Southern's Royal Palm was carded at around 31hrs between Chi and Jax. I doubt if you could sleep very well. Some good examples. Chattanooga to Atlanta, DL 3hrs, RP 4hrs. Atlanta to JAX, DL 8hrs and RP 9+hrs. Should service ever be restored on either route and since these are the only two viable routes left I would suspect the schedule would be in the 30+hrs range. If you have to wait for all the west coast trains to arrive then you are looking at a two nights out schedule between Chi and Jax with probably late evening departures from each end. The good news about this type of schedule is it would give good times through the major population centers such as Cincinnate, Lexington, Chattanooga and Atlanta via the NS or Evansville, Nashville, Chattanooga and Atlanta via CSX. Of course without Amtrak ordering substantial new equipment this discussion is just for fun. Run properly, the train could be as successful as any other Amtrak LD train and would fill an important missing link in Amtrak's network. But there are so many 'missing links' now days Amtrak would have to develop a whole new attitude toward LD trains to fill these needs and the traveling public would have to be retrained to use rail vs air or highway.


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## Green Maned Lion (Dec 16, 2009)

AlanB said:


> Green Maned Lion said:
> 
> 
> > delvyrails said:
> ...


Oh, its possible. Anything is possible except for skiing through revolving doors, and don't you forget it. This is even easily possible. You can just have the train sit for many hours waiting for time to pass to make sure that the next city isn't served until after 6- this is done with the Cardinal in Indy for example.

It is, however, insane to attempt this and expect ridership. So I'd say insane is a better word than impossible.



WICT106 said:


> Another issue that will come up in the future is that Positive Train Control requirement. The freight RRs are already calculating the costs associated with this thing, and their respective managements are certain to demand that Amtrak bear its Just and Fair share of the cost of PTC installation and maintenance. The freight RRs may see PTC as a legal "Taking," for which they are entitled to "Just and Fair Compensation."


No way. It was quite clear that this was the job of the freight roads to pay for this.


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## TVRM610 (Dec 16, 2009)

WICT106 said:


> Another issue that will come up in the future is that Positive Train Control requirement. The freight RRs are already calculating the costs associated with this thing, and their respective managements are certain to demand that Amtrak bear its Just and Fair share of the cost of PTC installation and maintenance. The freight RRs may see PTC as a legal "Taking," for which they are entitled to "Just and Fair Compensation."


Don't all frieght RR's of a certain class of rail and higher have to convert to PTC? So they will have to do this either way.... unless Amtrak wants them to make a higher class for them to operate on, which would require large expenses anyway.


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## frequentflyer (Dec 17, 2009)

There is no way 6pm chi departure takes two nights to get to Fl. If and thats a big if the they might as well not run it. Even with slow running through the mountains it should not take twi nights.


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## henryj (Dec 17, 2009)

frequentflyer said:


> There is no way 6pm chi departure takes two nights to get to Fl. If and thats a big if the they might as well not run it. Even with slow running through the mountains it should not take twi nights.


The departure time for a two nights service would be more like 11PM from both Chi and Jax. This is assuming that 30+ hours Chi to Jax is the best that could be hoped for. If you left early enough for a one night(before 9am) out you would go through Chatanooga and Atlanta at odd times and arrive in JAX in the early afternoon which would mean a very late arrival in Mia. When the Southern ran the Royal Palm it was exactly that schedule, two nights out with a morning arrival in Jax. They ran the Ponce De Leon on the opposite schedule with a morning departure from Chi one night out and an evening arrival in Jax with another overnight to Mia. With Amtrak only able to run single trains on these long routes you have to arrange the schedule so as to serve the large population centers at something like reasonable times. Currently to go Chi to Jax it's two nights out with a change of trains in DC and takes something like 36 or so hours depending on which silver service train you take from DC. This route would offer a one seat ride and would be slightly faster. But more importantly it would also serve Chattanooga and Atlanta which don't have north-south service or any service currently.


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## Shanghai (Dec 17, 2009)

GML wrote:

" You can just have the train sit for many hours waiting for time to pass to make sure that the next city isn't served until after 6- this is done with the

Cardinal in Indy for example."

I aways thought the Cardinal was held in Indianapolis for two hours because of the congestion in Chicago between 8:00am and 10:00am.


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## Bill Haithcoat (Dec 17, 2009)

Just for the heck of it, here are some schedules from back when. In every case I have shown just the departure times, and thus not the dwell time, at major stops.

Dixieland (former Dixie Flagler) 12/16/54, Every third day, rotating with South Wind and City of Miami as noted previously. they had similar point to point schedules

lv.CHI 9;10 am

Evansville 2.45 pm

Nashville 5.55pm CST

Chattanooga 10.10 EST

Atlanta 1.25 am

Jax 9.45 a.m.

ar Miami 5.05 pm

Georgian,12/16/54 neat overnigter good for business travel

lv CHI 4 p.m.

Evansville 9.40 p.m.

Nashville 1.20am CST

Chattanooga 5;30 a.m EST

ae ATL 8.35 a.m.

Then here is the New Royal Palm, mentioned several times above in my posts, somewhat faster than the regular year round RP. The New RP was winter only, as I have previously noted.

Here it is for 12/16/54. It had cars from Detroit,Buffalo and CLeveland but this discussion concerns Chicago.

lv CHI 10.45 p.m

lv Cincinnati 8.30 ESt

lv Lexington 9.10 CST

lv Chattanooga 4.10 pm EST

lf Atlanta 7.50 pm

lv Macon 10.00 pm

lv JAX 4.25 am

ar Miami 11.25 a.m.


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## henryj (Dec 17, 2009)

Bill Haithcoat said:


> Just for the heck of it, here are some schedules from back when. In every case I have shown just the departure times, and thus not the dwell time, at major stops.
> 
> Then here is the New Royal Palm, mentioned several times above in my posts, somewhat faster than the regular year round RP. The New RP was winter only, as I have previously noted.
> 
> ...



Bill the problem with this schedule is getting to JAX so early. And the whole vacation picture has changed since then with the main draw in Florida being Orlando and Disneyworld. The standard daily Royal Palm was a little slower and arrived in JAX around 7am. In 1963 it was on a 32 hour schedule Chi to Jax. South of Jax it would be the same as the silver trains are now so I don't even figure that part. Back in 1956 it was 31hrs. So it did not change very much. On the CSX route via Nashville, George doesn't think they could maintain anything like the former 23-24 hour schedule they had back in the 1950's and 60's. So I would assume that either route would be in the 30+ hours range. So leave the schedule as you have it with around a 7-8am arrival in Jax and you have it. The return would be similar. Leave Jax around 11pm, morning in Atlanta, mid-afternoon in Chattanooga and next morning in Chi. I still think it would be a viable schedule and train if NS or CSX could be talked into running it and on time.


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## MrFSS (Dec 17, 2009)

henryj said:


> Bill Haithcoat said:
> 
> 
> > Just for the heck of it, here are some schedules from back when. In every case I have shown just the departure times, and thus not the dwell time, at major stops.
> ...


What about going from CIN to Knoxville to Chattanooga and south. NS tracks south of CIN to Knoxville are in great shape.


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## Green Maned Lion (Dec 17, 2009)

Shanghai said:


> GML wrote:" You can just have the train sit for many hours waiting for time to pass to make sure that the next city isn't served until after 6- this is done with the
> 
> Cardinal in Indy for example."
> 
> I aways thought the Cardinal was held in Indianapolis for two hours because of the congestion in Chicago between 8:00am and 10:00am.


No, its to give it reliable leaving times as the Hoosier State.


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## MattW (Dec 17, 2009)

I think I like the latter schedule the best which puts the train in Atlanta at 7:50 PM. This way, you connect to/from the NB Crescent which can draw people from Alabama and maybe even NOL into Florida. Of course, a connection for the SB Crescent would have to be made on the flip side to get those people home and to get people from Florida out to LA.

The problem however seems to be the fact that it takes almost a full day to go CHI-ATL which is almost double the time Google says it takes by car. By car it's 715 miles so I used that which gives an average speed of around 34mph for the train with that schedule.


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## dlagrua (Dec 17, 2009)

If it were possible an AutoTrain running from Chicago to Sanford (Orlando Fl) would be a hit. The old AutoTrain corporation tried running service to Louisville Ky for a while in the late 70's but it was not profitable. I guess that the midwestern snowbirds and Disney vacationers didn't want to drive to Lousiville to catch the train there. I believe there is a market for another Autotrain to serve the mid West but it would need to be based in Chicago or in So. Ill.


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## henryj (Dec 17, 2009)

MattW said:


> I think I like the latter schedule the best which puts the train in Atlanta at 7:50 PM. This way, you connect to/from the NB Crescent which can draw people from Alabama and maybe even NOL into Florida. Of course, a connection for the SB Crescent would have to be made on the flip side to get those people home and to get people from Florida out to LA.The problem however seems to be the fact that it takes almost a full day to go CHI-ATL which is almost double the time Google says it takes by car. By car it's 715 miles so I used that which gives an average speed of around 34mph for the train with that schedule.


Matt, by rail it is 810 miles via Cincinnati and the NS and 731 miles via Nashville and the CSX. That was my guess too, that the train would have an average speed of around 35mph with all the stops and such. When the Southern ran the Royal Palm it's average speed was around 37mph.


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## delvyrails (Dec 17, 2009)

For those of us who are convinced of the necessity of routing any Chicago-Florida service via Atlanta, here is the main-stops schedule of the winter-season New Royal Palm. Accordng to "Night Trains" and Wikipedia, NRP operated between 12/15/49 and 4/55. It was a deluxe coach and sleeping car train with Cincinnati as the collecting point for sleepers on New York Central trains from Chicago, Detroit, and Cleveland-Buffalo.

Read down---------------Read up

1130pm Chicago 730am

8-830am Cincinnati 1015-1155pm

740-50pm Atlanta 1010-30am

405-25am Jacksonville 130-50am

1135am Miami 630pm

Apparently, the Chicago section was removed from 1953 on, but the others continued.

In the five decades since the heyday of this service, demography and the travel markets are much changed. Atlanta and Orlando are much more important. It is likely that relatively few would travel the full length of run from the major Midwest cities to Miami, but trips like Atlanta-Miami, Atlanta-Tampa, and trips from Chicago connections to intermediate point probably would predominate.

The addition of a Jacksonville-Orlando-Tampa section and use of the Florida East Coast route to Miami once again would allow all-year schedules that are not far off the above New Royal Palm schedules. Services both to Miami and to Tampa could be run with four equipment sets each.

NRP's night-day-night timing much better suits these needs than the day-night-day schedules of the other train on the route, the Ponce de Leon. The latter schedule, if essentially revived, would require train arrival times at Miami after dark much of the year, besides missing the Chicago connections.

If you think that energy and environment will become increasingly critical matters, here is one of several Amtrak network gap fillers which can have an growing transportation role to play.


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## jphjaxfl (Dec 17, 2009)

I traveled the pre Amtrak South Wind and Amtrak South Wind and Floridian frequently for the entire route and various parts of the route in the 1960s and 1970s. The pre Amtrak South Wind was great until about 1968 or 1969. It was fast and mostly ontime. In the winter its was usually about 18 passenger cars including sleepers from Chicago to Miami, Tampa and St. Pete and in winter a sleeper that was cut out or added at Jacksonville. There was a full diner, a full lounge (sometimes a teardrop observation), a 6BR sleeper lounger and coaches to all points. The South Wind ran every other day alternating with the City of Miami. It took two trains to cover the pre Amtrak South Wind, one train was powered by Pennsy locomotives, the other train by Coastline locomatives. In late 1969, the Penn Central withdrew from the through South Wind and ran a train with two coaches and a lounge car from Chicago to Louisville. L&N combined the South Wind with the Pan American between Louisville and Montgomery. A Sleeper and two coaches continued over the SCL from Montgomery to Jacksonville continuing on to Miami in another train. Also in the late 1960s, The Penn Central tracks between Chicago and Louisville became very deteriorated so the PC connection train was frequently late, but the connecting train was held which delayed Pan American passengers as well as South Wind passengers. When Amtrak started May 1, 1971, a daily through South Wind was introduced. It originally left from Central Station following PC's former NYC/Big Four Route to Indianapolis where it switched back to the former PRR route to Louisville, thence the same route as the former South Wind. The PC tracks in Indiana continued to deteriorate so that it was taking 12 hours to travel the 313 miles from Chicago to Lousiville where in the mid 60s the same route had taken only 6 hours and 20 minutes for the South Wind. Much of the track in Indiana became 10 MPH. The Chicago-Florida train was also switched to an overnite run from Chicago to Louisvile portion so the slow running would be at night. At that time the name was changed from South Wind to the Floridian. In early 1975, the train was switched for a few months to a Chicago- Evansville-Nashville route thence the regular South Wind Route. By the spring of 1975, the route was changed again to the former Monon Route between Chicago and Louisville. The 324 mile Monon line had always been slower than the Pennsy route, but in 1975, it was in much better shape than the PC route. The Floridian continued to use the Monon line until it was discontinued in the fall of 1979. The schedule was more reliable after the change to the Monon, but many of the Chicago-Florida passengers had already quit riding based on the horror trips of the first four years on Amtrak. When the Amtrak South Wind/Floridian was using PC between Chicago and Louisville, it wasn't unusual for the train to run 10-12 hours late. I remember arriving at Chicago Union Station on the Floridian at 3AM in the winter with a fairly full train of vacationers from Florida and absolutely no services available with lots of missed connections. The station was locked so those meeting passengers were not allowed in. Fortunately I had a confirmed reservation at a hotel just a few blocks away. There were so many disgruntled passengers and most were saying "never again". Amtrak would have to really come up with super train with excellent service to get people in Chicago and the upper midwest to take the train from Chicago to Florida again.


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## Bill Haithcoat (Dec 17, 2009)

henryj said:


> MattW said:
> 
> 
> > I think I like the latter schedule the best which puts the train in Atlanta at 7:50 PM. This way, you connect to/from the NB Crescent which can draw people from Alabama and maybe even NOL into Florida. Of course, a connection for the SB Crescent would have to be made on the flip side to get those people home and to get people from Florida out to LA.The problem however seems to be the fact that it takes almost a full day to go CHI-ATL which is almost double the time Google says it takes by car. By car it's 715 miles so I used that which gives an average speed of around 34mph for the train with that schedule.
> ...



Just for the record, the Dixie Flagler (later renamed the Dixieland), and the Georgian made the 731 miles fromCHI TO ATL in about 15 hours, factoring the time zone change. That was an average of 48mph. Not bad counting the dead time stopping etc.

I fully undertand that this is not adequate today but this was an era before the interstate highway had gotten of the ground like it is now. There was no I 75 back then. Compare the Flagler and the Georgian with old highway 41 and we railfans would have nothng to be ashamed of..

It is noteworthy that today's Crescent averages about 45 from NYP to NOL.

So many time I have noted that the interstate highway helps the bus as much as it helps the car to be faster than the streamlined train, at least in curvey winding areas. This has been discussed just recently, possibly on this same thread.


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## George Harris (Dec 18, 2009)

Bill Haithcoat said:


> Just for the record, the Dixie Flagler (later renamed the Dixieland), and the Georgian made the 731 miles fromCHI TO ATL in about 15 hours, factoring the time zone change. That was an average of 48mph. Not bad counting the dead time stopping etc.


The dead time stopping for these trains was very brief, probably well under an hour when all the arrival/departure time gaps were subtracted.

Twice I rode the night train out of Nashville to change to the Tennessean at Chattanooga, and the jolt of the first trip was at Wartrace. We pulled into the siding, and after a few minutes here came the northbound Georgian running like the back end was on fire. The second time, I was hanging out in the vestibule to watch it. Still a very respectiable train in length, and that was about 1965.


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## zoltan (Dec 18, 2009)

Green Maned Lion said:


> Shanghai said:
> 
> 
> > GML wrote:" You can just have the train sit for many hours waiting for time to pass to make sure that the next city isn't served until after 6- this is done with the
> ...


Indy to Chicago is about the most important and well-patronised city pair on the Cardinal's route (ignoring the East Coast locations it picks up/sets down in); it would be mad for Amtrak to compromise the reasonably-timed departures and arrivals in both directions so that someone from Ashland, Thurmond or Clifton Forge could have a slightly shorter overnight journey into Chicago.


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## Bill Haithcoat (Dec 18, 2009)

On post 35 I showed a condensed version of the Dixieland(former Dixie Flagler)schedule. Guess just to even it out I should post a City of Miami and South Wind brief schedule also. These were the trains which ran in rotation with the Dixieland, each every third day.(sometimes more in the winter).

I am not offering an opinion of what new service can be run some day with a few miracles, just giving a historical reference If I had it my way, they would all come back!! Atfer all, some of these are the trains I did my "teething" on.

Both schedules September 1957, Departure times shown only

City of Miami

lv CHI 9a.m.

Champaign 10.55

carbondale 1.40 pm(through cars from St Louis received here)

Jackson,TN 5.08

Birmingham 10.40 p.m. CST

Columbus 3.05a.m. EST

albany 5.30

JAX 9.45

Miami 5.15pm

South Wind

lv CHI 8.45 am

Indy 12.30pm

Louisville 3pm

Nashville 6.22

Birmingham 10.17 pm.

Montgomery 12.25 am CST

lv JAX 9.45 a.m. EST

Miami 5.15 pm

There were other, slower, trains besides the ones whose schedules I have listed. I have referred to them in earlier posts.


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## frequentflyer (Dec 18, 2009)

Bill Haithcoat said:


> On post 35 I showed a condensed version of the Dixieland(former Dixie Flagler)schedule. Guess just to even it out I should post a City of Miami and South Wind brief schedule also. These were the trains which ran in rotation with the Dixieland, each every third day.(sometimes more in the winter).
> I am not offering an opinion of what new service can be run some day with a few miracles, just giving a historical reference If I had it my way, they would all come back!! Atfer all, some of these are the trains I did my "teething" on.
> 
> Both schedules September 1957, Departure times shown only
> ...



The modern day train would have to leave CHI the after 6PM. Which according to some here would mean a two night train with a morning arrival in MIA.

I wander today how much of the Cap ltd. traffic transfers in DC to the Silver trains.


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## frequentflyer (Dec 18, 2009)

The ironic thing is that extending the CONO to Mia from NOL may actually be the quickest way travel time compared to going through the mountains in KY and TN.


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## zoltan (Dec 18, 2009)

frequentflyer said:


> The modern day train would have to leave CHI the after 6PM. Which according to some here would mean a two night train with a morning arrival in MIA.
> I wander today how much of the Cap ltd. traffic transfers in DC to the Silver trains.


It would only require that if you judged passengers traveling from out west to be important enough that the amount of passengers received from the west - beyond those destinations that the Amtrak and Metra trains that reach CHI for rush hour serve - would be more passengers than would be put off traveling from CHI by the two-night schedule and the less appealing times serving cities intermediate cities.

If you can fill a train with passengers that want a one-night service from the midwestern cities to the South-East, then that's what you'd do, and to hell with however many long-distance connections you'd manage to attract with a journey that would be a minimum of three nights, the same number of nights as a journey to Florida via DC would require, and an afternoon's layover in CHI.

Plus, the nature of the old schedules posted by Bill Haithcoat have the advantage of either a second schedule to Indianapolis, making rail a more serious proposition for that important city pair, or an improved frequency for Champaign and Carbondale.


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## henryj (Dec 18, 2009)

frequentflyer said:


> The ironic thing is that extending the CONO to Mia from NOL may actually be the quickest way travel time compared to going through the mountains in KY and TN.



Actually you are close to being right on that. The CONO is 19 hours and the pre-Katrina Sunset was 17 hours for a total of 36. And it would still be just a two nights out schedule leaving Chicago at 8pm and arriving in Jax the second morning. Probably have to send the CONO out an hour earlier in order for it to connect in Jax. The reverse would have to leave Jax no later than 9pm also and of course would arrive in Chi the second morning at 9am. And it would only require one extra set of equipment as you already have the CONO set sitting in New Orleans for 22 hours which could be better utilized traveling on to Jax. At Jax you just connect with the Silver trains for points south. You might even be able to go on to Orlando if they could turn the train quickly enough. It's really a pretty simple solution. Downside of course is that Atlanta still has no connections north to Chi or south to Jax. But since Amtrak has little extra equipment it would work in the interim.


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## DET63 (Dec 18, 2009)

One of the problems that I see here is that, in order to insure reasonable arrival and departure times at the endpoints (Chicago and wherever—say, Jacksonville and/or Miami), you have to allow for a number of intermediate points to be served at ungodly hours. If you want people traveling from Chicago to Louisville, Louisville to Atlanta, Chattanooga to Louisville, etc., is it possible for those cities to be served by trains that arrive and depart Chicago at reasonable hours? If not, would services going to some of the same cities, but not going all the way to or from Chicago, be possible? Would Amtrak pay for it, or would the states along the way have to pony up the bucks to buy and service the equipment? Are there any plans by the states involved (esp. Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia) to do so?


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## henryj (Dec 18, 2009)

DET63 said:


> One of the problems that I see here is that, in order to insure reasonable arrival and departure times at the endpoints (Chicago and wherever—say, Jacksonville and/or Miami), you have to allow for a number of intermediate points to be served at ungodly hours. If you want people traveling from Chicago to Louisville, Louisville to Atlanta, Chattanooga to Louisville, etc., is it possible for those cities to be served by trains that arrive and depart Chicago at reasonable hours?


Actually the two routes that are still usable don't go through Louisville. But if you do the two nights out type schedule, which it seems is all they can do given the slow times that Amtrak LD trains now run, you would serve Cincinnati, Lexington, Chattanooga and Atlanta at reasonable times using the NS route and Evansville, Nashville, Chattanooga and Atlanta using the CSX route. The sections served at night under that scenario really don't amount to much.


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## Bill Haithcoat (Dec 18, 2009)

Here is another schedule. This was the Dixie Flyer, the heavyweight secondary train on the Dixie Flagler/Dixieland route.

Dixie Flyer

Jan 26.1958 Its stops are so much longer than those on the other trains that I am going to list separate arrival and departure times

lv CHI 10:45 pm

ar Evansville 5.10am

lv Evansville 5.50-am

ar Nashville 9.55

lv Nashville 10.35am CST

ar Chattanooga 3.45 pm EST

lv Chattanoga 3.55 p.m.

ar. Atlanta 7.25 pm

lv Atlanta 9.30

ar.Jacksonville 6 am

terminate, connecting train leave JK 7.35 am arrive Miami 2.45 pm

You will notice this schedule is about ten hours slower than the big three fast trains, the Dixie Flagler/Dixieland, the South Wind and the City of Miami.

For all the need to be realistic about today's track speeds and freight congestion I must point out that in my family in the mid 50' s we were already joking about this train.How slow it was and how many stops. See,it had been the"King of the Road" in my parents and grandarents generation. But even in my day it was already "over the hill". Tragic if we have to go back to a schedule as slow as this. Not pretending to know the answer, let me repeat......not pretending to know the answer......two nights out seems bad.

Let me point out somethng I pointed out in an earlier post...there sits the Crescent making about the same time as it did back in this same period..Yes, I know its track has been maintained and some of the other has not.

Oh and keep it mind it is not so great to have an overnight JAK to Miami portion of the trip because though some of these beach towns have a relatively small year round population, they do generate a lot of beach business to add to that. Those people do not want to get off the train at 2, 3 or 4 o'clock in the morning.My understanding from the "good old days" of the FEC those trains started emptying out seriously in Daytona and were usually almost completely empty by the time they got to Miami. So convenience for that crowd needs to be factored in also, unless maybe so much FLa business has shifted over to Orlando.


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## MikefromCrete (Dec 18, 2009)

Florida is a big destination for midwesterners, maybe not as much as east coasters, but I think I read that Florida is the #2 destination for Chicago travelers, after Las Vegas.

Extending the CONO to Jacksonville or Orlando is probably the most practical way for direct Chicago-Florida service at this time (as well as getting that New Orleans-Florida route back that so many call for this on board).

A more direct route via Indianapolis, Louisville, Nashville and Atlanta, would fill a big gap in the Amtrak map, but achieving that goal will be hard, particularly given the poor state of north-south rail routes in Indiana (and don't expect those cheapskates in Indiana to pony up any money for track improvements, unless the legislature puts a tax on fireworks and cigarettes. LOL!). The problems in crossing the mountains south of the Ohio River on tracks that haven't seen a passenger train in 30 years would make the route difficult and expensive to resurrect.

The Chicago-Atlanta-New Orleans Georgian-Humming Bird that ran on the Chicago and Eastern Illinois and Louisville and Nashville railroads was a train that was lost way too early. Despite a combined consist of 15 or more cars on the C&EI, it was discontinued around 1968-69, just short of Amtrak. Had it survived until A-Day, we might still have some kind of service in that corridor.


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## George Harris (Dec 18, 2009)

One bright spot: It is likely that Atlanta to Jacksonville times could be better than they were in the 1950's to 1960's. At that time, if the information I have is correct, the passenger speed limits on the ACL were between 50 mph and 60 mph on the alos AB&C, and I have seen a 65 mph limit on parts of the Southern route via Valdosta. The KC-Fla Special was faster than the Royal Palm between Atlanta and Jacksonville, despite the fact that the Southern Railway portion (between Macon and Jesup GA) of the KC-Fla Special was and is unsignaled.

(When Southern discontinued the Jesup GA to Jackksonville FL portion of the KC-Fla Special, they did not adjust the schedule of the Royal Palm so that a connection could be made at Atlanta, even though it would have been easy to have done so, thus hastening teh death of the train over its whole route.)


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## DET63 (Dec 18, 2009)

Would a route through Louisville (considered highly unlikely by posters above) be necessary to get the state of Kentucky to help subsidize it (assuming that a subsidized service is the only one practical—or even possible)? Given that and other issues, perhaps an extension of the CONO to Florida would be most practical (Kentucky and Tennessee, at least, would see no change in existing service, except possibly for times).

BTW, if the CONO were to be extended to Florida, would it continue to have the same name?


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## delvyrails (Dec 19, 2009)

henryj said:


> frequentflyer said:
> 
> 
> > The ironic thing is that extending the CONO to Mia from NOL may actually be the quickest way travel time compared to going through the mountains in KY and TN.
> ...


Going via Cinci and Atlanta, the New Royal Palm took 27:35 running time against the sun. Even today, substituting the Cardinal's southbound time to Cinci would not increase that figure very much. It's still some six hours faster than the combined City/Sunset could be on two sides of the hypotenuse.

Results: it's faster and allows a cheaper fare for the passengers, not to mention opening up Amtrak to new travel markets involving Atlanta, which is now our eighth most populous metro area. That's the big picture; by comparison, reviving Sunset East is a little picture.

If train segments that have been discontinued have first claim on any new money, then Amtrak will be saddled with yesterday's train network in the 21st century.


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## Bill Haithcoat (Dec 19, 2009)

This might be a good tiime to remind folks that the December 2009 issue of TRAINS had a map of all the trains to Florida, both from New York and Chicago and other places. The things we have been talking about here.

It does not show equipment or schedules, but the map is interesting.


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## George Harris (Dec 21, 2009)

DET63 said:


> Would a route through Louisville (considered highly unlikely by posters above) be necessary to get the state of Kentucky to help subsidize it (assuming that a subsidized service is the only one practical—or even possible)?


The problem with going via Louisvill is that most of the track upgrades necessary to make it reasonable are in Indiana. Not likely that the state of Indiana will be willing to cough up major bucks for work to improve access to Louisville unless they see that it makes access to Indianapolis better.


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## Bill Haithcoat (Dec 21, 2009)

George Harris said:


> Bill Haithcoat said:
> 
> 
> > Just for the record, the Dixie Flagler (later renamed the Dixieland), and the Georgian made the 731 miles fromCHI TO ATL in about 15 hours, factoring the time zone change. That was an average of 48mph. Not bad counting the dead time stopping etc.
> ...


George, your re-telling of the Georgian running like its back end was on fire excites me to no end.

Reminds me of a story in TRAINS a few years ago about an engineer on the Dixie Flagler who liked nothing better than to receive the Flagler late from an interline road and run like the devil making up time. This was in the steam engine days.

Seems one day the Flagler had to make an unscheduled stop in Cowan for repairs. The public timetable shows no stop there, of course, but the employee timetable lists a time to pass through as employee tables do. Anyway it left Cowan 24 minutes late and ran several sprints at 100 mph and arrived Nashville exactly on time. Guess the fastest running was from Tullahoma to Nashville.

My sister and I were on the Dixieland one night when it left Nashville 20 minutes late and stopped exactly on the nose in Chattanooga. My grandfather recalled a time when he was on the Dixie Flyer and he overhead some of the employees talking about how they had just run 90 mph.

And I have a couple of other stories as well. Guess the plates have flown off the tables a few times in the diner on the old NC&STL and L&N back then.


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## rrdude (Dec 21, 2009)

DET63 said:


> One of the problems that I see here is that, in order to insure reasonable arrival and departure times at the endpoints (Chicago and wherever—say, Jacksonville and/or Miami), you have to allow for a number of intermediate points to be served at ungodly hours. If you want people traveling from Chicago to Louisville, Louisville to Atlanta, Chattanooga to Louisville, etc., is it possible for those cities to be served by trains that arrive and depart Chicago at reasonable hours? If not, would services going to some of the same cities, but not going all the way to or from Chicago, be possible? Would Amtrak pay for it, or would the states along the way have to pony up the bucks to buy and service the equipment? Are there any plans by the states involved (esp. Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia) to do so?


Where is you market? End point, or intermediates? I'm well aware on some routes it's a HUGE mix, but with one-train-a-day, you MUST make a choice.

I agree with the OP, "SCREW the connections", the "Gen Pub" could care less about "east coast-to-west coast", only the rail fan or the land-cruiser taking advantage of national rail travel (while it still exists) cares about this.

Gimmie the fastest route from the Midwest to Florida. Then I'm on the train.

And don't even get me started about adding personal autos to the consist. Why Amtrak hasn't partnered with, or invest themselves, on more auto-trains boggles the imagination. For a company burdened with many LD trains, they are missing the mark here..............

I try soooooooo hard to travel by train for business, and get shut down at every other connection..........


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## George Harris (Dec 21, 2009)

Bill Haithcoat said:


> George Harris said:
> 
> 
> > Bill Haithcoat said:
> ...


Unfortunately, it is a very different world today. If someone did anything like this now, everyone in any sort of government or regulatory agency would want the head of the engineer, conductor, dispatcher, and everybody else who could be found to be the least bit responsible, and every passenger that got a bruise could find a dozen abulance chasers out to "help them get what is coming to them"

At the time you were describing, most of the passengers and the management would be applauding the crew that was doing their best to sustain the reputation of the train and company.

By the way, to the best of my knowledge, the passenger train speed limit on the old NC was 60 mph, but it may have been 70 mph at one time on the N&C part, but probably never on the W&A part.

I do recall a few hints of this concept. One, the first weekend in January 1965 being on the Tennessean between Memphis and knoxville where it seemed that the orders were keep the train on time. The normal two coach one pullman train was three coaches two pullman and had sold out sleepers and some coach passengers, mostly college students or otherwise relatively young passnegers sitting on seat arms, in the restrooms, and in the aisle. The 70 mph maximum between Memphis and Chattanooga was treated as a suggestion. We were generally a few minutes late out of each stop and on time or really close to it at the next one. At Chattanooga a fourth coach was added and took on about 75 people, this at 4;00am. WE left about 15 minutes late. Now, between Chattanooga and Knoxville the line is so crooked that there is no break in the "speed limits due to curves" and the fastest section of these is a few miles at 65 mph, and for the most part was in the 50 to 55 mph range with a few spots that were slower. My memory is fuzzy, but if I remember correctly, Cleveland TN to Athens TN averaged right at 60 mph start to stop. I, and quite a few others, got off at Knoxville and another coach and a larger crowd of people were added there.

And what? three years later, the train was gone.


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