a few “technical” questions

[jis]

Amtrak owns Boston - New York - Washington DC, plus a short section in Michican.

Crescent: NY to DC: Amtrak, DC to Alex., VA, CSX, the rest of the way to New Orleans: NS

Also, the Crescent operates mostly on Norfolk Southern trackage. I know it's on a brief segment of CSX just after it leaves the Capitol tunnels, but I don't know where it changes over (unless that's NS too), but I do know it's Norfolk Southern on most of its run starting way up in Virginia.

It is CSX from CP Virginia just outside the Capitol hill tunnel to CP AF south of Alexandria VA but north of Van Dorn, near Cameron's Run. The Crescent, the Cardinal and the Lynchburg Regional switch over from CSX to NS at CP AF, and then on usual routing cross under the CSX (ex-RF&P) Richmond Line at Cameron's Run.

 

[USGrant]

Do / can super liners fit into either station in New Yourk? Pen Station or into Grand Central Terminal ?

 

[AlanB]

Do / can super liners fit into either station in New Yourk? Pen Station or into Grand Central Terminal ?

Nope; the approach tunnels to either station would rip the roofs right off the cars.

 

[GG-1]

Do / can super liners fit into either station in New York? Pen Station or into Grand Central Terminal ?

Nope; the approach tunnels to either station would rip the roofs right off the cars.

Alan, at the moment, I can't find the drawing I have of the tunnels to Penn Station but I think I remember the dimensions giving 3 inch clearance above a dome car. I also remember from somewhere the pans on a "G" required a "lock" or "Unlock" to prevent them from leaving the wire due to the low clearance in the tunnels. Are Supper liners higher than dome cars? If not they would fit without ripping off the roof but sparks would sure fly due to the catenary closeness.

Aloha

Eric

 

[USGrant]

Thanks for the information and the help in all the questions

Ive been researching the Dome Cars and those super dome cars they have now that are all glass made by Raider seem very flimsy or not as well build as say the superliners of days of old, what are the opinions of the members here n these new ultra dome cars

 

[PerRock]

Amtrak also operates over commuter authorities' trackage include Metro North in the New York City area and Metra in the Chicago area.

Most Metra lines are owned & Run by a host railroad. I believe either UP or BNSF.

peter

 

[John Bredin]

Amtrak also operates over commuter authorities' trackage include Metro North in the New York City area and Metra in the Chicago area.

Most Metra lines are owned & Run by a host railroad. I believe either UP or BNSF.

peter

Depends on what you mean by "most". Three Metra routes are owned and operated by UP, and one by BNSF, and they are key routes. But Metra directly operates all the other routes: Milwaukee North and West, North Central, Heritage, Southwest, Rock Island, and the Electric. As I recall, Metra owns and maintains the tracks on the Milwaukee, Rock Island, and Electric routes and is operating on freight-railroad tracks on the other routes.

Thus, to MikeFromCrete's point, the Hiawathas and Empire Builder use Metra tracks as far as Rondout, the Chicago-Galesburg-beyond trains use BNSF tracks alongside Metra-branded BNSF trains as far as Aurora, the Chicago-St. Louis-beyond trains use CN tracks alongside Metra trains as far as Joliet, and the Chicago-Carbondale-beyond trains use CN tracks that share a right-of-way with separate Metra tracks. All these routes have shared Amtrak-Metra stations, with the nitpicky exception that at Homewood the Metra Electric and Amtrak stations are separate but directly adjoining

 

[Trogdor]

To add another to the list, the Cardinal/Hoosier State (and, when running on detour, the Texas Eagle) share the route of the Metra Southwest Service, which operates on NS tracks from 21st Street to CP 518 (about 40th Street), then on Metra-owned tracks to 74th Street. I think Metra may own the rest of the SWS line, but Amtrak branches off there back onto the NS (and then onto the Belt Railway of Chicago, UP, CN, and finally CSX). There are no station stops on that segment, however.

 

[jis]

Alan, at the moment, I can't find the drawing I have of the tunnels to Penn Station but I think I remember the dimensions giving 3 inch clearance above a dome car.

Depends on the height of the Dome Car. The tallest car that can get through the tunnels without shorting out the catenary is 14'6" tall. To go through the North River tunnels the ends of the roof-line need to be tapered as found on the NJT MLVs.

 

[had8ley]

Several years ago there was a tourist/freight line in upstate New York called the Adirondack Railway.I don't even know if it exists anymore but it covered a lot of the old NYC branch lines in upstate NY. Their money woes were of the worst magnitude. A friend and co-worker went three months without a pay check working there one summer when he was cut off at our RR. I think the two main subjects you need to tackle are the CFR (Code of Federal Regulations) pertaining to passenger operations and realistic money costs to run even a one car excursion train. You will be amazed at the obstacles you'll need to overcome that are contained in the CFR before you can even turn a wheel.

 

[jis]

Several years ago there was a tourist/freight line in upstate New York called the Adirondack Railway.I don't even know if it exists anymore but it covered a lot of the old NYC branch lines in upstate NY. Their money woes were of the worst magnitude. A friend and co-worker went three months without a pay check working there one summer when he was cut off at our RR. I think the two main subjects you need to tackle are the CFR (Code of Federal Regulations) pertaining to passenger operations and realistic money costs to run even a one car excursion train. You will be amazed at the obstacles you'll need to overcome that are contained in the CFR before you can even turn a wheel.

If you are talking of the Adirondack Scenic out of Utica to Thendara in the direction of Lake Placid, then it is still in operation and they have actually cleared some more track beyond Thendara the last I heard. I believe they were running some trips from Saranac Lake to Lake Placid in 2010, in addition to the Utica - Thendara runs.

 

[AlanB]

Several years ago there was a tourist/freight line in upstate New York called the Adirondack Railway.I don't even know if it exists anymore but it covered a lot of the old NYC branch lines in upstate NY. Their money woes were of the worst magnitude. A friend and co-worker went three months without a pay check working there one summer when he was cut off at our RR. I think the two main subjects you need to tackle are the CFR (Code of Federal Regulations) pertaining to passenger operations and realistic money costs to run even a one car excursion train. You will be amazed at the obstacles you'll need to overcome that are contained in the CFR before you can even turn a wheel.

If you are talking of the Adirondack Scenic out of Utica to Thendara in the direction of Lake Placid, then it is still in operation and they have actually cleared some more track beyond Thendara the last I heard. I believe they were running some trips from Saranac Lake to Lake Placid in 2010, in addition to the Utica - Thendara runs.

I did the Lake Placid to Saranac run in September 2009 and AFAIK it is still running during the summers and certain major holidays outside that summer window. There continues to be talk about fixing up the tracks enough to get from Saranac Lake over to Big Tupper, the next town south & west of Saranac and one step closer to restoring the entire line to normal working service down to Utica.

The entire line is technically passable, that's how they got the train set up to the Placid area, but its in such bad shape that any equipment moves take the better part of the day as they have to precede the train with a hi-rail vehicle and the train basically moves at walking speed between Saranac and Thendora.

One thing that the southern end has going for it however, is a direct connection to Amtrak at Utica and therefore the dream remains of one day actually providing regularly scheduled passenger service from Utica to Placid and the Olympic Region.

 

[MikefromCrete]

Amtrak also operates over commuter authorities' trackage include Metro North in the New York City area and Metra in the Chicago area.

Most Metra lines are owned & Run by a host railroad. I believe either UP or BNSF.

peter

Depends on what you mean by "most". Three Metra routes are owned and operated by UP, and one by BNSF, and they are key routes. But Metra directly operates all the other routes: Milwaukee North and West, North Central, Heritage, Southwest, Rock Island, and the Electric. As I recall, Metra owns and maintains the tracks on the Milwaukee, Rock Island, and Electric routes and is operating on freight-railroad tracks on the other routes.

Thus, to MikeFromCrete's point, the Hiawathas and Empire Builder use Metra tracks as far as Rondout, the Chicago-Galesburg-beyond trains use BNSF tracks alongside Metra-branded BNSF trains as far as Aurora, the Chicago-St. Louis-beyond trains use CN tracks alongside Metra trains as far as Joliet, and the Chicago-Carbondale-beyond trains use CN tracks that share a right-of-way with separate Metra tracks. All these routes have shared Amtrak-Metra stations, with the nitpicky exception that at Homewood the Metra Electric and Amtrak stations are separate but directly adjoining

I was thinking of the Hiwathas/Empire Builder since they run on Metra-owned tracks (i.e. Milwaukee North) from Rondout to Union Station. The other trains run on railroad-owned routes, with the Heritage Route trains running on the CN Chicago-Joliet line as trackage rights. Metra Electric is completely separate from the CN-owned route of the CONO, Saluki and Illini. I think the only connection between the two is at Kensington, where the South Shore crosses over the CN at grade to get to Metra Electric.

Metra's operations are much bigger than the UP/BNSF routes, although those are among the busiest lines.