Come to think about it, not just on the VIA Corridor, but in general, on most North American passenger train routes, even going back, say 70 years. Even now, I don't believe Amtrak has a NEC train as quick as the 1969 "Nonstop" Metroliner between NYP and WAS....
Looking up the non-stops on the New York to Washington run, I came across an interesting book. Of course Philadelphia objected. But Penn Central ran a nonstop in a 1969-1970 period, after the Metroliners had been reduced down to 120 mph, and the travel time was 2h30m. Then Amtrak ran one a day in 2019, at 2h35m. Perhaps nothing in between. But you folks are more expert than me.
For a real expert, how about E. M. Frimbo, the World's Greatest Railroad Buff? In 1969 one of the occasional pieces about his train adventures ran in the
New Yorker, entitled "Frimbo on the Metroliner." You could transport many of the issues he discussed to today. The hollowing out of long-distance bus service, for example, and the issue of highway safety. The railroads making it hard to get from New York to Hartford after 6:05pm. The railroads intentionally enfeebling service to upstate New York. Removal of dining cars. Problems with connections in Chicago (intentional at the time). Intercity train service to Boston done cut-rate because they have public transit rail anyway. But he thought the Metroliner was a good change, and hoped the government would take it over.
E. M. Frimbo was the pseudonym of Rogers E. M. Whitaker, and his scribe was Tony Hiss, back when shorter pieces in the
New Yorker were unsigned. (
Time went even further and ran most stories without a byline in the 1950s.) In 1974 Whitaker and Hiss published their train stories in a book,
All Aboard with E. M. Frimbo. It's serious, but also silly. Next to the Metroliner story is an illustration of "An early Swiss progenitor of the Metroliner," depicting the 1906-07 Ganz FS Class E.360 that ran through the Simplon Tunnel, without explanation.
The
New Yorker archives are subscriber only, but you can "check out" the book from the Internet Archive for an hour, for free:
https://archive.org/details/allaboardwithemf00whit/
