Questions about connecting trains?

Hello, please forgive me if this has been asked before. I haven't travelled on Amtrak in the last 5 or so years and have a question to ask. On Thursday I'll be travelling from NFS (Niagara Falls, ON) to WIL (Wilmington, DE). I need to catch a connecting train at NYP. I am not scheduled to arrive in NYP until 9:16pm. My connecting NE Regional to WIL is scheduled to depart NYP at 11:23pm. What happens if my first train arrives late to NYP and I miss my connecting train. Do I have to pay anything extra to board the next NE Regional to WIL?

Thank you in advance

tjemartin said:

Hello, please forgive me if this has been asked before. I haven't travelled on Amtrak in the last 5 or so years and have a question to ask. On Thursday I'll be travelling from NFS (Niagara Falls, ON) to WIL (Wilmington, DE). I need to catch a connecting train at NYP. I am not scheduled to arrive in NYP until 9:16pm. My connecting NE Regional to WIL is scheduled to depart NYP at 11:23pm. What happens if my first train arrives late to NYP and I miss my connecting train. Do I have to pay anything extra to board the next NE Regional to WIL?

Thank you in advance

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As long as both are booked on one reservation number, it is a guaranteed connection. Amtrak ought to automatically rebook you on the next regional, at 4:20 am.

If each leg was reserved separately, you will have to rebook yourself NYP-WIL at the current price.

With that said, the Maple Leaf's timekeeping is pretty good and it is seldom that late.

Iff (if, but only if) you booked it as a single trip, then Amtrak should take care of you one way or another, most likely putting you on the next available NER at no charge. But if you booked the two segments as separate trips, then you're on your own.

zephyr17 said:

As long as both are booked on one reservation number, it is a guaranteed connection. Amtrak ought to automatically rebook you on the next regional, at 4:20 am.

If each leg was reserved separately, you will have to rebook yourself NYP-WIL at the current price.

With that said, the Maple Leaf's timekeeping is pretty good and it is seldom that late.

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Yes, It's a round trip ticket under one reservation number. I've taken this exact route numerous times years ago and it was usually on time, but I know there can be unplanned delays like freight train traffic, etc. Just wasn't sure about if Amtrak made changes to their policies regarding late trains when a connection is involved

Anyone know the on time records for the Cardinal and the Capitol?

We are leaving Charlottesville VA on the straight through Cardinal (no train changes) and get in four hours before (10 am) our Zephyr heads to SF at 2 pm. Is that enough time to account for possible delays, etc.

Should we take the 8:55 to DC, wait 5 hours and catch the Capitol at 4pm which is less scenic? If the 8:55 was really late or breaks down, we could also take an 11 am train to DC with a 2 hour wait for the 4:04 Capitol to CHI

Or should we go a day early, book a hotel room, and be sure to be in CHI in time to catch our Zephyr.

If we miss the Zephyr do they book us on the next one with a bedroom?

As you can see, we are believers in Murphy's law and don't want to miss this once in a lifetime Zephyr trip so are trying out various contingency plans.

Thanks for your advice.

Westbound connections at Chicago tend to be much less fraught than eastbound ones. One reason is the eastern trains simply do not have as much distance and time in which to get messed up. Personally, I almost always build in an overnight layover in Chicago heading east, but never do heading west.

With that said, since January 1st the Cardinal has missed the the Zephyr on just 4 out of 99 arrivals. The Capitol has missed the Zephyr just once out of 225 arrivals.

Your odds of making a same day connection from either train are very good. In terms of advice, all I can say is that I book same day westbound connections at Chicago myself.

In the unlikely circumstances there is a miss, you will be accommodated on the next day's Zephyr. You will get the closest available accommodation to the one you booked. That could be a bedroom, but could be a roomette, family room, or accessible room. If no sleeping accommodations at all are available, you would be downgraded to coach. They will refund the fare difference for any downgrade. They will not put a reservation holder on that train out of their room to accommodate misconnects from the previous day. The consists are set and they do not add cars for misconnecting passengers. They don't have any extras.

https://juckins.net/amtrak_status/archive/html/home.php

zephyr17 said:

Westbound connections at Chicago tend to be much less fraught than eastbound ones. One reason is the eastern trains simply do not have as much distance and time in which to get messed up. Personally, I almost always build in an overnight layover in Chicago heading east, but never do heading west.

With that said, since January 1st the Cardinal has missed the the Zephyr on just 4 out of 99 arrivals. The Capitol has missed the Zephyr just once out of 225 arrivals.

Your odds of making a same day connection from either train are very good. In terms of advice, all I can say is that I book same day westbound connections at Chicago myself.

In the unlikely circumstances there is a miss, you will be accommodated on the next day's Zephyr. You will get the closest available accommodation to the one you booked. That could be a bedroom, but could be a roomette, family room, or accessible room. If no sleeping accommodations at all are available, you would be downgraded to coach. They will refund the fare difference for any downgrade. They will not put a reservation holder on that train out of their room to accommodate misconnects from the previous day. The consists are set and they do not add cars for misconnects. They don't have any extras.

https://juckins.net/amtrak_status/archive/html/home.php

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Ah I was just a bit too slow! Just as I started typing you posted

Thank you. That is very helpful. In your discussion you speak of Amtrak's taking care of us and giving us the closest available accomodation. However, I've just learned about "guaranteed reservation" I don't think we have one since I made two reservations one from CVS to CHI and one from CHI to Emeryville.
The reason for that was I had some money left over in a voucher and used it on our CVS train. Does that make a difference? Or would Amtrak still put us up in a hotel and given us rooms (we have a bedroom)- if available - for our Zephyr. I appreciate your help. This is all new. I've only done long, sleeper trains on the one day trip on the Auto Train.

BeeLady said:

Thank you. That is very helpful. In your discussion you speak of Amtrak's taking care of us and giving us the closest available accomodation. However, I've just learned about "guaranteed reservation" I don't think we have one since I made two reservations one from CVS to CHI and one from CHI to Emeryville.
The reason for that was I had some money left over in a voucher and used it on our CVS train. Does that make a difference? Or would Amtrak still put us up in a hotel and given us rooms (we have a bedroom)- if available - for our Zephyr. I appreciate your help. This is all new. I've only done long, sleeper trains on the one day trip on the Auto Train.

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Yes, it definitely makes a difference. What it boils down to is there is no guarantee on separate reservations. Amtrak will consider they have delivered you to your destination on your first reservation, and that you are a "no show" on the second. You will not appear on the lists of connecting passengers to be reaccommodated and provided hotel rooms. You may be able to make a retroactive case and get refunded your missed Zephyr trip that will have been forfeited as a "no show", but that will be after the fact. You will be pretty much entirely on your own as to making your own arrangements on the ground in Chicago for accommodations and onward travel, out of your own pocket.

Same day connections on separate reservations are a terrible idea. Your money on your voucher could have been applied to a single CVS-CHI-EMY reservation.

You should call Amtrak and see if you can get your trip rebooked as a single reservation. If you have not yet made your CHI-EMY reservation, and it sounds like you may not have, call and have your existing CVS-CHI reservation modified to CVS-EMY.

Note that a "link" between two reservations is another option, but a poor one. Such a "link" is just a manual note. It may help in an argument with Passenger Services in Chicago in getting you reaccommodated, but since you will not have appeared the automatically generated rosters of misconnecting passengers, the best possible outcome would be being the last in line for reaccommodation.

If, for whatever reason, you keep your trip on separate reservations, you should probably build in an overnight layover. If your connections were eastbound, I would say there would be no question that you should do it. Westbound, with few misses, odds are still in your favor. Westbound, it is pretty much a low probability/high impact scenario.

Oh my, the things we newbies don't know. I'll see if I can call Guest Rewards and get my t rip rebooked and a single reservation OR add a day in CHI as insurance. Thank you for this cold hard realization

BeeLady said:

Oh my, the things we newbies don't know. I'll see if I can call Guest Rewards and get my t rip rebooked and a single reservation OR add a day in CHI as insurance. Thank you for this cold hard realization

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You can definitely get rebooked as long as there is space. I don't know the timeframe of your trip, but the rebooking will be at current price under Amtrak's dynamic, yield managed pricing. It may be different from what you already paid. You may want to explore with the agent the relative advantages of cancelling one or the other reservation and modifying the other to be CVS-EMY. They may be able to hold the price firm on what is already booked on the reservation being modified, though I am not sure about that.

Finally, are you going to San Francisco or Emeryville (or elsewhere in the East Bay)? If you are going to San Francisco, your reservation should be to SFC, not EMY. There is a dedicated connecting bus to San Francisco that is essentially free, tickets to SFC and EMY on long distance trains are priced the same. But the bus can only be booked in conjunction with a rail ticket, you cannot buy a standalone EMY-SFC ticket.

zephyr17 said:

In the unlikely circumstances there is a miss, you will be accommodated on the next day's Zephyr. You will get the closest available accommodation to the one you booked. That could be a bedroom, but could be a roomette, family room, or accessible room. If no sleeping accommodations at all are available, you would be downgraded to coach. They will refund the fare difference for any downgrade. They will not put a reservation holder on that train out of their room to accommodate misconnects from the previous day. The consists are set and they do not add cars for misconnecting passengers. They don't have any extras.

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If they can't find you a sleeper accommodation on the next day's train, do you have the option to stay over a second night at their expense, if you don't wish to be downgraded to coach? Or longer, if necessary? Or being rerouted on another route, if available?

Probably not...at that point they would probably tell you to accept the coach ride, or take a refund...

If you are on the same reservation connecting the same day through Chicago, you will be rebooked on the next day's train. You will likely be on the coach because there are only one or two sleepers on each West Coast train, and they will likely be full.

Steve4031 said:

If you are on the same reservation connecting the same day through Chicago, you will be rebooked on the next day's train. You will likely be on the coach because there are only one or two sleepers on each West Coast train, and they will likely be full.

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If you are downgraded to coach, you will get free meals in the dining car, plus they will compensate you for the difference between sleeper fare and coach fare. Not sure whether you get an actual refund or just a voucher for future travel.

I was downgraded to coach on a points reservation from Boston to Chicago because the sleeper was bad-ordered. I got all of my points back. I was lucky.

railiner said:

If they can't find you a sleeper accommodation on the next day's train, do you have the option to stay over a second night at their expense, if you don't wish to be downgraded to coach? Or longer, if necessary? Or being rerouted on another route, if available?

Probably not...at that point they would probably tell you to accept the coach ride, or take a refund...

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1. No second night to wait for a sleeper. They may agree to let you have that space without changing the price, but you'd be responsible for any additional hotel stay, which you would have to arrange yourself.
2. They may work with you for an alternative routing, but you may pay more. This is better done with customer service, or better yet, Customer Relations, than the Passenger Services desk in Chicago. They're busy with a trainload of misconnects and generally just want to give you your vouchers and revised itinerary and get on to the next passenger. The Chicago Passenger Services people are not generally the people who set up the revised itinerary anyway, they're processing the herd of bewildered, irritated passengers with rebookings set up by, I think, CNOC.

If you do not think you would not like what would be the default revised itinerary, in these days of near universal cell phone possession, it is best to call while still on board the late inbound train and try to work out an better alternative before getting to Chicago.

An example of Amtrak being flexible with reaccommodation is misconnects between the SW Chief or Sunset and Starlight at Los Angeles. The normal reaccommodation for that is not to lay you over for the next day's Starlight, but to reroute you onto the much faster San Joaquin bus/train connection to EMY or SAC to catch up with the Starlight. For an intermediate California destination, a Surfliner/Thruway/San Joaquin reroute of some sort. They'll usually revise your ticket to the next day's Starlight if asked, as long as you accept that the overnight layover in LA must be arranged by you at your expense. They will not take responsibility for that. That's a double edged sword, though, if you take the San Joaquin to catch up, your sleeping accommodation will be waiting for you on the Starlight. If you layover, there may not be sleeper space on the next day's train. If there is, they'll generally give it to you at the price you initially paid.

zephyr17 said:

You can definitely get rebooked as long as there is space. I don't know the timeframe of your trip, but the rebooking will be at current price under Amtrak's dynamic, yield managed pricing. It may be different from what you already paid. You may want to explore with the agent the relative advantages of cancelling one or the other reservation and modifying the other to be CVS-EMY. They may be able to hold the price firm on what is already booked on the reservation being modified, though I am not sure about that.

Finally, are you going to San Francisco or Emeryville (or elsewhere in the East Bay)? If you are going to San Francisco, your reservation should be to SFC, not EMY. There is a dedicated connecting bus to San Francisco that is essentially free, tickets to SFC and EMY on long distance trains are priced the same. But the bus can only be booked in conjunction with a rail ticket, you cannot buy a standalone EMY-SFC ticket.

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Thank you, Zephyr. You've been most helpful. I do have a separate reservation for the CHI to EMY portion of the trip and will see if the Rewards people can combine the two. Since you've said that a 4 hour layover time from east to west is probably enough I should be OK. However, since we are both almost 80 the idea of missing the Zephyr and perhaps NOT getting a bedroom on the substitute train the next day is a bit daunting. I might very well consider booking a night at a CHI hotel. I assume that I can book the trip as "one ticket" even thought I would go CVS to CHI on Oct. 29 and CHI to EMY on Oct. 30.

The Rewards people were very helpful. Our two tickets are now one so we are now "guaranteed." Still mulling over the idea of doing a layover in Chicago.

BeeLady said:

Thank you, Zephyr. You've been most helpful. I do have a separate reservation for the CHI to EMY portion of the trip and will see if the Rewards people can combine the two. Since you've said that a 4 hour layover time from east to west is probably enough I should be OK. However, since we are both almost 80 the idea of missing the Zephyr and perhaps NOT getting a bedroom on the substitute train the next day is a bit daunting. I might very well consider booking a night at a CHI hotel. I assume that I can book the trip as "one ticket" even thought I would go CVS to CHI on Oct. 29 and CHI to EMY on Oct. 30.

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Yes, you can book that on the reservation, but there is no advantage to it with an overnight layover. I usually break up my trips into separate reservations at overnight and longer layovers. There is an advantage to that I will not bother to go into here. EDIT: since you now have a single CVS-EMY reservation, it is probably best to keep it that way even if you modify it later to include a layover in Chicago.

Since late October is getting close, the chances of a higher price than initially paid is significant. Today, 9/4, the price for a Bedroom for two seniors Chicago-Emeryville is:
10/30 $3455
10/31 $3455
11/1 $2556

Note that if you leave CVS on 10/29, you'd arrive Chicago 10/30, so leaving on the Zephyr 10/30 would be a same day connection. To build in a layover, you'd need to leave Chicago 10/31 or later.

Got it. Thank you.

zephyr17 said:

1. No second night to wait for a sleeper. They may agree to let you have that space without changing the price, but you'd be responsible for any additional hotel stay, which you would have to arrange yourself.

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What happens if you’re connecting to Train 421 from say, Chicago to Tucson?

railiner said:

What happens if you’re connecting to Train 421 from say, Chicago to Tucson?

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They might cover accommodation until the next less-than-daily train, but they might not, too.

Many, many years ago I missed the Cardinal to Indianapolis from the Empire Builder. It was a guaranteed connection then, and it was also during a time when the Hoosier State wasn't running (now isn't the first time the Hoosier State died). Since there wasn't a train the next day, they refunded my ticket and washed their hands of me. They did put me up in a hotel after the Builder's zero dark thirty arrival, but then I was on my own.

But, as I said before, the westbound Chicago connections are generally petty safe. With that said, the connection to the Eagle is the most risky, since it is the first westbound LD train to leave.

There was a time in Amtrak’s past, when I believe you could leave Chicago as late as 6:45 PM on the City of New Orleans, and still connect the next day in New Orleans on the same day westbound Sunset Limited…