Crying Shame the Sunset Doesn't Run East of NOL

[JoanieBlon]

Speaking of the Sunset Limited ~ my husband and I are riding it from New Orleans to Los Angeles leaving this coming Monday. It's part of his HAPPY 60th BIRTHDAY trip....

Is there anything along the route from New Orleans to Los Angeles of interest or that's noteworthy? ^_^ Other than watching the desert scenery, which we both really enjoy! :blush:

 

[Devil's Advocate]

As you already seem aware it's mostly just a bunch of desert and a bit of swamp land but you do have several neat old stations (El Paso, Tuscon, & LA come to mind) along with the "Pecos High Bridge" West of Del Rio that Amtrak SL staff seem oddly proud of. You won't have much time in San Antonio from that direction IIRC, but you can still get out and have a look at the exterior of Sunset Station or run over to see the exterior of the Alamo.

 

[henryj]

Speaking of the Sunset Limited ~ my husband and I are riding it from New Orleans to Los Angeles leaving this coming Monday. It's part of his HAPPY 60th BIRTHDAY trip....

Is there anything along the route from New Orleans to Los Angeles of interest or that's noteworthy? ^_^ Other than watching the desert scenery, which we both really enjoy! :blush:

Well there is no desert in Louisiana and east texas. I would not recommend getting off in San Antonio because the train arrives between 2 & 3 AM and leaves at 5:40am. It's actually a good time to get some good sleep as the train is not moving for almost three hours. But west of San Antonio it will be just burned up because of the drought. Watch for the Pecos high bridge and then Alpine is a nice stop if only a brief one and you cross Piasano pass right after. El Paso is a long stop and you can visit the restored depot there. Tucson is also a long stop, but it's late in the evening. When I rode it there was plenty of partying going on across from the depot. But as the conductor reminded everyone, if you go into the bar to have a drink, just remember, the next train isn't for two more days. It's raining out in the desert so it might be really nice coming into El Paso and west of there. Watch to see if the train stops in Deming, Lordsburg or Benson. They are flag stops so it doesn't always stop. We stopped in Lordsburg and literally let people off in the middle of a street crossing. Benson does have a station, it looks like a bus shelter. Dropping down into Benson westbound you can get some spectacular sunsets. And this time of year with the 'monsoons' active you should see some great skys and lightning displays. Enjoy your trip. The Sunset Limited is a very friendly train with a good staff.

 

[henryj]

Try electing some pro-rail politicians and see what happens.

As I believe I have made clear on here, I don't vote for Communists, socialists or DEMOCRATS. I believe in putting my state and my country before trains. If that is somehow bad for Amtrak then so be it.

 

[JoanieBlon]

Speaking of the Sunset Limited ~ my husband and I are riding it from New Orleans to Los Angeles leaving this coming Monday. It's part of his HAPPY 60th BIRTHDAY trip....

Is there anything along the route from New Orleans to Los Angeles of interest or that's noteworthy? ^_^ Other than watching the desert scenery, which we both really enjoy! :blush:

Well there is no desert in Louisiana and east texas. I would not recommend getting off in San Antonio because the train arrives between 2 & 3 AM and leaves at 5:40am. It's actually a good time to get some good sleep as the train is not moving for almost three hours. But west of San Antonio it will be just burned up because of the drought. Watch for the Pecos high bridge and then Alpine is a nice stop if only a brief one and you cross Piasano pass right after. El Paso is a long stop and you can visit the restored depot there. Tucson is also a long stop, but it's late in the evening. When I rode it there was plenty of partying going on across from the depot. But as the conductor reminded everyone, if you go into the bar to have a drink, just remember, the next train isn't for two more days. It's raining out in the desert so it might be really nice coming into El Paso and west of there. Watch to see if the train stops in Deming, Lordsburg or Benson. They are flag stops so it doesn't always stop. We stopped in Lordsburg and literally let people off in the middle of a street crossing. Benson does have a station, it looks like a bus shelter. Dropping down into Benson westbound you can get some spectacular sunsets. And this time of year with the 'monsoons' active you should see some great skys and lightning displays. Enjoy your trip. The Sunset Limited is a very friendly train with a good staff.

Thanks for the suggestions... :hi: We visit Louisiana frequently and drive between New Orleans and Eunice, so we're really familiar with that neck of the woods. We also driven the entire I-10 route from Los Angeles to Florida, but I'm uncertain if the train always parallels the Interstate. As I said ~ we LIKE the desert vistas. Living in Florida, we enjoy seeing the mountains off in the distance. Florida is flat as a pancake and sort of on the boring side for traveling through... hboy:

 

[Ryan]

Try electing some pro-rail politicians and see what happens.

As I believe I have made clear on here, I don't vote for Communists, socialists or DEMOCRATS. I believe in putting my state and my country before trains. If that is somehow bad for Amtrak then so be it.

Seeing as I've never seen 2 out of the 3 ever run for office, that's not too hard. If that's how you feel, then quit whining when the politicians that you elect don't give you what you want.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

You could say the Sunset Limited follows I-10 in a very general sense but also deviates enough to provide an alternative view. For instance, West of San Antonio it's basically following Highway 90 which is a more interesting and entertaining route than I-10 IMO. It's also a lot slower than the I-10 route but that's where the tracks are so that's where Amtrak goes.

 

[jis]

As I believe I have made clear on here, I don't vote for Communists, socialists or DEMOCRATS. I believe in putting my state and my country before trains. If that is somehow bad for Amtrak then so be it.

So then stop boring us with your tiresome whine about how you are not getting your choo-choo train.

 

[George Harris]

As to the other many gaps in the system: There is alot to be done in the way of adding trains that could improve connectivity.

One that comes to mind is a restoration of the concept of the Twin Star Rocket with connections to/from teh Southwest Chief at Kansas City. Run Minneapolis-St. Paul - Des Moines - Kansas City - Dallas/Ft. Worth, split into San Antonio and Houston sections.

Another is Ft. Worth - Shreveport - Baton Rouge - New Orleans. Remember the proposed Meridian - Ft. Worth connection to the Crescent that never happened? Think of a through New York to Ft. Worth on this route with two nights giving an early morning arrival in Dallas. Could throw in a Houston connection out of Shreveport, as well.

How about making the City of New Orleans connection to Florida out of Memphis? Memphis - Birmingham - Montgomery then on the Floridian route to Jacksonville. This should give a connection to the Crescent at Birmingham to get you to Atlanta if done right. Maybe have an Omaha - Kansas City - Memphis train that should get you connected to the Southwest Chief at KC, and to the CNO for New Orleans at Memphis as well.

The thing you are achieving with all of these is additional connectivity. There are many more. I have not even tried to list all the things that should be done north of the Ohio and east of the Mississippi. There are many possibilities there.

 

[Bob Dylan]

Good stuff George! Are you available when Joe Boardman gets run out of WAS??? We need some LD thinkers/planners in the Executive Suite @ 60 Mass instead of the NEC First Crowd!!!

 

[henryj]

As I believe I have made clear on here, I don't vote for Communists, socialists or DEMOCRATS. I believe in putting my state and my country before trains. If that is somehow bad for Amtrak then so be it.

So then stop boring us with your tiresome whine about how you are not getting your choo-choo train.

I am so sorry that you are bored. But I have just as much right to post on here as you and Ryan do. So I guess you will have to live with it.

 

[henryj]

As to the other many gaps in the system: There is alot to be done in the way of adding trains that could improve connectivity.

One that comes to mind is a restoration of the concept of the Twin Star Rocket with connections to/from teh Southwest Chief at Kansas City. Run Minneapolis-St. Paul - Des Moines - Kansas City - Dallas/Ft. Worth, split into San Antonio and Houston sections.

Another is Ft. Worth - Shreveport - Baton Rouge - New Orleans. Remember the proposed Meridian - Ft. Worth connection to the Crescent that never happened? Think of a through New York to Ft. Worth on this route with two nights giving an early morning arrival in Dallas. Could throw in a Houston connection out of Shreveport, as well.

How about making the City of New Orleans connection to Florida out of Memphis? Memphis - Birmingham - Montgomery then on the Floridian route to Jacksonville. This should give a connection to the Crescent at Birmingham to get you to Atlanta if done right. Maybe have an Omaha - Kansas City - Memphis train that should get you connected to the Southwest Chief at KC, and to the CNO for New Orleans at Memphis as well.

The thing you are achieving with all of these is additional connectivity. There are many more. I have not even tried to list all the things that should be done north of the Ohio and east of the Mississippi. There are many possibilities there.

George, those are some interesting combinations. Some I have not even thought of. The one I miss the most is the Texas to Colorado connection as in the old Texas Zephyr and the former City of Portland connection via Denver. I like the idea of a CONO connection to Florida from Memphis. I wonder what the timing would be on this route. I still think however a Chicago to Florida connection should go through Atlanta.

 

[Ryan]

As I believe I have made clear on here, I don't vote for Communists, socialists or DEMOCRATS. I believe in putting my state and my country before trains. If that is somehow bad for Amtrak then so be it.

So then stop boring us with your tiresome whine about how you are not getting your choo-choo train.

I am so sorry that you are bored. But I have just as much right to post on here as you and Ryan do. So I guess you will have to live with it.

Sure, you've got the right to do a lot of things. That doesn't make them worthwhile or desirable.

If you want to continue to complain, but refuse do actually to do anything about it to make the situation, that's fine. I guess you'll just have to live with being called on it every time you do.

I still think however a Chicago to Florida connection should go through Atlanta.

Are you willing to pay the hundreds of millions in taxes to make that happen?

 

[henryj]

As to the other many gaps in the system: There is alot to be done in the way of adding trains that could improve connectivity.

How about making the City of New Orleans connection to Florida out of Memphis? Memphis - Birmingham - Montgomery then on the Floridian route to Jacksonville. This should give a connection to the Crescent at Birmingham to get you to Atlanta if done right. Maybe have an Omaha - Kansas City - Memphis train that should get you connected to the Southwest Chief at KC, and to the CNO for New Orleans at Memphis as well.

LOL George, I did some quick research on this one and it is recreating the Frisco's KC-Florida special, which did go through Atlanta. It left Memphis at 10:25am, Birmingham at 4:25pm and Atlanta at 10:25pm. Arriving at Jacksonville at 7:30am. West/north bound it left Jacksonville at 9:20pm, Atlanta at 7:30am, Birmingham at 12:05pm and arrived in Memphis at 6:45pm. It's a perfect fit with the CONO's current schedule and connects with the existing Florida trains. You would probably have to run it down to Orlando(three more hours only) and turn it there since Amtrak is so much against doing switching on it's Florida trains. We need you to head up the LD division at Amtrak.

 

[henryj]

That doesn't make them worthwhile or desirable.

Are you willing to pay the hundreds of millions in taxes to make that happen?

Well Ryan, what makes you think your ideas are so worthwhile or desirable? And your second sentence is just nonsense of course as are most of your posts. I would rather pay "hundreds of millions in taxes" for that in place of the NEC which is a bottomless money pit and does nothing for me or the rest of the country.

 

[Ryan]

Well Ryan, what makes you think your ideas are so worthwhile or desirable?

The fact that they're grounded in reality? The fact that they don't consist of complaining about the politicians that I voted for doing what they said they were going to do? The fact that rather than just bemoan the problems, I look for solutions (that are actually realistic)?

And your second sentence is just nonsense of course as are most of your posts. I would rather pay "hundreds of millions in taxes" for that in place of the NEC which is a bottomless money pit and does nothing for me or the rest of the country.

Nonsense? Yeah, saying "I'm willing to pay millions for a train that doesn't exist on tracks that no longer exist and wouldn't run where I live, but am not willing to pay millions to maintain the infrastructure for a train that serves the largest population concentration in the country and makes an operational profit" makes perfect sense, Henry.

I'm not surprised that someone that thinks that's a logically consistent argument would consider reasonable posts to be "nonsense".

 

[AlanB]

Gentlemen, please lets tone things down a bit.

I would rather pay "hundreds of millions in taxes" for that in place of the NEC which is a bottomless money pit and does nothing for me or the rest of the country.

Regarding the NEC Henry, please consider the following. Without the NEC mobility in the NE goes down. Lose mobility and one loses productivity. Productivity means taxes are being paid. So if you take away the NEC, tax revenues will go down putting a greater burden on the rest of the US.

In order to compensate without the NEC, the NE will be forced into building more airports and more roads. And the Fed has a hand in all those things too. So bottom line, no matter what you're going to see tax dollars being spent in the NE no matter what.

Now personally, and yes I know that I do benefit but please consider that I benefit without regard to whether we support roads & planes or rail, I'd rather see those dollars being spent on rail. And I hold out hope that as projects like the one in Illinios move forward and more people start seeing & realizing that you don't need the combined populations of Boston, NY, & DC for high or higher speed rail, hopefully more states will elect politicians that will push for rail without regard to their other beliefs & ideals.

 

[eagle628]

As I believe I have made clear on here, I don't vote for Communists, socialists or DEMOCRATS. I believe in putting my state and my country before trains. If that is somehow bad for Amtrak then so be it.

Well, if you believe voting that way puts your country and state first, so be it. But it's complete hypocrisy to vote for politicians who make it a point to oppose Amtrak, and then complain about how Amtrak isn't expanding enough.

 

[jis]

The thing you are achieving with all of these is additional connectivity. There are many more. I have not even tried to list all the things that should be done north of the Ohio and east of the Mississippi. There are many possibilities there.

You hit the nail on the head! Connectivity is what produces network effect, which causes ridership and revenue to grow better than linearly, which is all goodness. The problem is finding the seed money. This is where we have work to do to get the right people with the right attitude towards LD trains elected to the various legislature. And I am not talking Democrat or Republican or Green or Libertarian. Irrespective of political shade one must consider the attitude they have towards transportation infrastructure as a whole and the concept of a balanced transportation system with the right mix of modes. Unless we agree that acting on that agenda is important, this discussion is mostly whistling in the wind IMHO.

 

[Ryan]

Unless we agree that acting on that agenda is important, this discussion is mostly whistling in the wind IMHO.

That's really the million dollar question - how do we get to that point?

 

[MikefromCrete]

Try electing some pro-rail politicians and see what happens.

As I believe I have made clear on here, I don't vote for Communists, socialists or DEMOCRATS. I believe in putting my state and my country before trains. If that is somehow bad for Amtrak then so be it.

Then quit whining about Texas not having enough trains. The Obama administration is the first since the inception of Amtrak that is favorable to passenger rail, but the Republicans have vowed to oppose anything he favors, even if it brings the whole country down (i.e. the debt ceiling fiasco), so obviously passenger rail will completely go down that tubes if the Republicans gain control of everything. Hope you enjoy that.

 

[The Journalist]

Try electing some pro-rail politicians and see what happens.

As I believe I have made clear on here, I don't vote for Communists, socialists or DEMOCRATS. If that is somehow bad for Amtrak then so be it.

The sinking ship seems appropriate.

EDIT: Okay, Nevada has it even worse at #48.

Yup. Nevada tends to be at the bottom of all the good lists and the top of all the bad ones. It's sort of a running (sad) joke around here that we recently passed Mississippi in some category (I want to guess teen pregnancy rate) and moved up 49th.

 

[George Harris]

LOL George, I did some quick research on this one and it is recreating the Frisco's KC-Florida special, which did go through Atlanta. It left Memphis at 10:25am, Birmingham at 4:25pm and Atlanta at 10:25pm. Arriving at Jacksonville at 7:30am. West/north bound it left Jacksonville at 9:20pm, Atlanta at 7:30am, Birmingham at 12:05pm and arrived in Memphis at 6:45pm. It's a perfect fit with the CONO's current schedule and connects with the existing Florida trains. You would probably have to run it down to Orlando(three more hours only) and turn it there since Amtrak is so much against doing switching on it's Florida trains. We need you to head up the LD division at Amtrak.

Rode the KC-Florida special by myself just after I got out of high school (1962) took the overnight Sunnyland south to B'ham, wandered around till noon and took the KC Fla north. Had my first meal in a dining car.

It could go through Atlant, but the problem is the excruciatingly slow line between B'ham and Atlanta. A connection to the current CNO schedule, assuming about the same 6.5 hour time on the ex-Frisco, should get it into B'ham about 2:00 or a little earlier, makeing for a good connection to the Crescent. Following the ex South Wind Route would give service to Montgomery AL and should get it into Jacksonville about 3:00am, and give an early morning arrival into Orlando. Likewise, the NB train would be about 4 hours later than the KC-Fla.

 

[Bob Dylan]

As I believe I have made clear on here, I don't vote for Communists, socialists or DEMOCRATS. I believe in putting my state and my country before trains. If that is somehow bad for Amtrak then so be it.

Well, if you believe voting that way puts your country and state first, so be it. But it's complete hypocrisy to vote for politicians who make it a point to oppose Amtrak, and then complain about how Amtrak isn't expanding enough.

I dont either Henry, I live in Texas like you! There is no Socialists, Communists or Democrats on the ballot down here, they all are running for sheriff, bean counter in chief and Holy Preacher!(Oh yeah,Me too! is not a Political Platform!! :help: )The others made good points about those currently in office, and now the ultimate Twilight Zone Show has happened, Rick Perry is running for President of the Confederacy, er ,United States . These guys want what Mica and his corporate owners want, Sell off the NEC, subsidize the heck out of it, make sure the "Private" operators dont pay any taxes once it starts making money, and then do away with all those pesky, money losing LD Trains out there in Flyover Country!Say goodbye to the Sunset Ltd. for sure! :angry:

True Story, you could look it up!!

 

[The Davy Crockett]

As I believe I have made clear on here, I don't vote for Communists, socialists or DEMOCRATS. I believe in putting my state and my country before trains. If that is somehow bad for Amtrak then so be it.

Well, if you believe voting that way puts your country and state first, so be it. But it's complete hypocrisy to vote for politicians who make it a point to oppose Amtrak, and then complain about how Amtrak isn't expanding enough.

I dont either Henry, I live in Texas like you! There is no Socialists, Communists or Democrats on the ballot down here, they all are running for sheriff, bean counter in chief and Holy Preacher!(Oh yeah,Me too! is not a Political Platform!! :help: )The others made good points about those currently in office, and now the ultimate Twilight Zone Show has happened, Rick Perry is running for President of the Confederacy, er ,United States . These guys want what Mica and his corporate owners want, Sell off the NEC, subsidize the heck out of it, make sure the "Private" operators dont pay any taxes once it starts making money, and then do away with all those pesky, money losing LD Trains out there in Flyover Country!Say goodbye to the Sunset Ltd. for sure! :angry:

True Story, you could look it up!!

I ended up talking to a federal judge from Texas the day before yesterday (and NO, I was not a 'customer' in her courtroom, ^_^ but enroute to a baseball game and we happened to strike up a conversation) and she said something that I thought was interesting about the Texas governorship, that people who are not from Texas generally don't realize: That the governor is very limited in the power he/she has to actually govern. :lol: