Discontinued Amtrak Route You Want Revived.

[jis]

I am sure people from Philadelphia want to go to Cape Cod

 

[Seaboard92]

One problem the Floridian would have now is the route from Chicago to Louisville. South of Louisville to Nashville and on to JAX is relatively decent minus the fact that route is CSX and very busy as well. But excluding that part Louisville to Indianapolis is a shortline railroad with a very low track speed. It almost would be faster to operate via CIN. If it's going to take an extra few hours due to bad track. Might as well detour to another large city and have equal time with a longer route.

So would that be CHI-IND-CIN-Louisville-Nashville-ATL-JAX-ORL-MIA?

That would be my ideal route. I almost thought about making it a late evening like LSL departure time out toward Indy giving a daylight arrival to and from CIN which should get it down to the Atlanta area in daylight. Then night time to JAX as its eight hours of slow running from ATL-JAX. Then I would change the Silver Star schedule to being later in the day taking the old Meteor card out of New York when it left around six. Giving Columbia, and Savannah daytime service and a afternoon departure south of JAX. I would try and push the Meteor a bit to put some distance between the Florida trains. Basically making JAX-MIA a corridor and the Chicago train takes TPA off the star. And the star drops TPA

 

[Philly Amtrak Fan]

My secret plan for the Floridian involves convincing Kentucky that they really want a train from Indianapolis to Nashville, and getting them to pony up to buy and improve the tracks. Once that's done, I think the Floridian becomes more possible.

But that won't be plausible until the Hoosier State route is made much faster. On the whole I doubt people from Louisville are going to Indianapolis; more would be going to Chicago.

Baby steps...

I got a better secret plan: Convince Amtrak/Congress to fully fund this train without state support. It would be more than 750 miles. Otherwise, Congress should just come out and say we're not going to fund any new trains, 750 miles or not.

 

[brianpmcdonnell17]

If trackage north of Louisville is too bad currently for passenger services, than there could be two day trains out of Atlanta. One to Louisville via Chattanooga and Nashville and one to Florida. When trackage is improved, then one long distance train over the entire route could be operated.

 

[jis]

I suspect the trackage away from Atlanta could be improved quicker that getting adequate infrastructure in place in Atlanta to handle anything beyond the current once a day each way Crescent.

In short, forget about Chicago to Florida service through Atlanta if you want it to happen before the 22nd Century, by when Florida will be partly under the waves, and people will be packing up and moving elsewhere. So the whole thing will be moot And I say this as a Floridian.

OTOH, Chicago to Florida service via NOL appears to be quite feasible within a decade.

 

[railiner]

One problem the Floridian would have now is the route from Chicago to Louisville. South of Louisville to Nashville and on to JAX is relatively decent minus the fact that route is CSX and very busy as well. But excluding that part Louisville to Indianapolis is a shortline railroad with a very low track speed. It almost would be faster to operate via CIN. If it's going to take an extra few hours due to bad track. Might as well detour to another large city and have equal time with a longer route.

So would that be CHI-IND-CIN-Louisville-Nashville-ATL-JAX-ORL-MIA?

Indianapolis to Louisville via Cincinnati sure seems roundabout...

If the direct route from IND to Louisville is no longer viable, then wouldn't it be better to route from CIncinnati to Atlanta via Knoxville?

 

[Seaboard92]

One problem the Floridian would have now is the route from Chicago to Louisville. South of Louisville to Nashville and on to JAX is relatively decent minus the fact that route is CSX and very busy as well. But excluding that part Louisville to Indianapolis is a shortline railroad with a very low track speed. It almost would be faster to operate via CIN. If it's going to take an extra few hours due to bad track. Might as well detour to another large city and have equal time with a longer route.

So would that be CHI-IND-CIN-Louisville-Nashville-ATL-JAX-ORL-MIA?

Indianapolis to Louisville via Cincinnati sure seems roundabout...If the direct route from IND to Louisville is no longer viable, then wouldn't it be better to route from CIncinnati to Atlanta via Knoxville?

I thought routing it that way would make sense as then we add Louisville, and Nashville to the national network. And both of those have a larger population. But the NS south to Knoxville wouldn't be bad as well. It is well maintained, has a decent track speed. And it tends to be a very directional railroad with most southbound and northbound running marker to marker as a fleet.

 

[railiner]

Isn't there also a CSX route from CIN to ATL?

 

[Seaboard92]

Isn't there also a CSX route from CIN to ATL?

How round about do you want to go. Could go down the old Clinchfield to Spartanburg SC, to Greenwood then to Atlanta. Or go via Nashville.

 

[neroden]

I tend to look at routes which are owned by shortlines, because they're much more comfortable with selling the track to the state cheaply, and I really believe we're better off with state-owned track most of the time. This depends, of course, on a state which is willing to put in real money (like Massachusetts), as opposed to a state which refuses to spend a penny (like Georgia).

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

Indy-Chicago really needs corridor service (yeah, yeah, I know, Indiana's gotta pay). It would have to be faster than driving, have good arrival times and be reliable. I-65 is busy and there is a lot of traffic between the city as well as the cities in between. Once you had that, Louisville and Cincinnati would be right behind in demanding service. Then a Florida/southern bound train could happen with no crazy conniptions.

Isn't the Cape Codder revived in at least spirit by MBTA (i.e. rail to the cape at the very least)?

 

[jis]

Isn't the Cape Codder revived in at least spirit by MBTA (i.e. rail to the cape at the very least)?

Yeah. Only in the sense that there is a train going to Hyannis. The original Cape Codder was a New York to Cape Cod service via Providence.The current service is an entirely within Massachusetts service from Boston to Hyannis.

 

[Philly Amtrak Fan]

If Atlanta is a mess and needs to be avoided, how about the old Floridian route through Birmingham and Montgomery, AL?

http://www.timetables.org/full.php?group=19790429&item=0041

If we're going to serve Louisville/Nashville with a federally funded train, it has to be >=750 miles so the Chicago-Florida train is the only legitimate possibility. Otherwise you're asking KY/TN to contribute.

And if Indy-Louisville is so bad, what did the Kentucky Cardinal use?

I've thought about Chicago-Florida both via Louisville/Nashville vs. via New Orleans (CONO extension). The L&N option adds two new cities to Amtrak but with the Gulf Coast train it would help Southern travel a lot. You can then travel from California/Arizona/Texas to Florida without heading north to Chicago or Washington DC (although until they fix the schedule, you'd still have to spend overnight in NOL).

 

[Philly Amtrak Fan]

If Atlanta is a mess and needs to be avoided, how about the old Floridian route through Birmingham and Montgomery, AL?

http://www.timetables.org/full.php?group=19790429&item=0041

If we're going to serve Louisville/Nashville with a federally funded train, it has to be >=750 miles so the Chicago-Florida train is the only legitimate possibility. Otherwise you're asking KY/TN to contribute.

And if Indy-Louisville is so bad, what did the Kentucky Cardinal use?

I've thought about Chicago-Florida both via Louisville/Nashville vs. via New Orleans (CONO extension). The L&N option adds two new cities to Amtrak but with the Gulf Coast train it would help Southern travel a lot. You can then travel from California/Arizona/Texas to Florida without heading north to Chicago or Washington DC (although until they fix the schedule, you'd still have to spend overnight in NOL).

 

[WICT106]

Another option would be to go Chicago-- Cincinnati-- Birmingham-- Montgomery-- Bainbridge, GA-- Tallahassee, FL. I don't know how long the schedule would be, though.

 

[Anthony V]

The Kentucky Cardinal used the Louisville and Indiana railroad and was restricted to 30 mph on that segment. We all know how well that worked out lol. OTOH, believe it or not, those same tracks are being upgraded as part of a partnership between the L&I and CSX.

More information in this link: https://www.csx.com/index.cfm/about-us/media/press-releases/stb-approves-louisville-indiana-track-upgrade/

 

[Seaboard92]

I believe service via Nashville and Chat might serve the south just as well actually. New markets and the entire state of TN has horrible service, and Kentucky isn't doing that much better. But none of the southern states have good connections like the northeast.

 

[railiner]

Isn't there also a CSX route from CIN to ATL?

How round about do you want to go. Could go down the old Clinchfield to Spartanburg SC, to Greenwood then to Atlanta. Or go via Nashville.

My old Rand McNally RR Atlas shows an L&N route from CIN to ATL that looks more direct than the Southern Railway....doesn't even have to go thru Chattanooga.

Whether it still exists, I have no idea.... :unsure:

 

[Seaboard92]

Oh your talking about the route via Etowah. That is a difficult like to describe. The part of the line from Etowah TN to Copperhill/Mccaysville TN/GA is owned by the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum and is maintained up to 45 mph in places I believe. But has a lot of speed restriction curves. South of the state line it's owned by the Georgia Northeastern Railroad which is now a Patriot Rail property. It is an active tourist railroad from Mccaysville to Blue Ridge. Out of service exempted track from Blue Ridge to Elijay. Then it's active all the way to the Atlanta area.

 

[neroden]

So this is interesting. The consensus seems to be: on the southern end, the tracks are good (with multiple possible routes) but the political will is nonexistent. On the nothern end, the tracks are a mess *and* the political will is lacking.

Given the existence of Chicago, I think the northern end is a more profitable area to advocate.

 

[A Voice]

Hey! In my opinion your pet project is irrelevant as most of your state has FREQUENT service!

Sorry, you're wrong about this. Pennsylvania has MUCH more urgent service needs than *anything* in Montana. I give you as examples:* Bethelehem - Allentown

* Scranton - Wilkes Barre

These two metro areas together have more population than the *entire state of Montana*. Neither has intercity train service.

And it would be significantly cheaper to restore train service to these locations (both of them!) than to operate the North Coast Hiawatha.

Sadly, the rural voters of "Pennsyltucky" have prevented improvements in rail service anywhere in Pennsylvania for decades. The population dynamics have *finally* shifted enough that this deadlock has been broken (with Act 89 of 2013 as evidence). So we may finally see some long-overdue improvements... if we push hard for them.

It's really, really hard to care about service to Butte (where my mother grew up!) or Helena when you can't get to Columbus Ohio or Allentown PA by train.

I mean, sure, if you can get state funding for it, go for it. Good luck. But I strongly want federal funding to go either to:

-- the highest *national* priorities, which is to say the *biggest* cities with no service or terrible service;

or to

-- the most financially beneficial routes so that the profits can be used to add *yet more routes later*.

It's a question of priorities. Eventually we need it all. But if we spend money on Allentown (for example), I think it'll generate money which can be used to pay for other routes like NCH later. The same is unfortunately not true of spending money on NCH now.

I want Amtrak to focus first on increases in service which have a financial profile like Lynchburg service. I think there are several of these available.

You are largely correct, and frankly passenger rail advocacy efforts are much too broad and lack focus. Most people understandably concentrate on train service for their region though they usually support nationwide efforts. While we (desperately) need to have priorities (such as the City of New Orleans extension which has momentum we cannot afford to lose) it is also vital to have concrete plans for lower priority markets, because it is going to be very hard even to get advocates - let alone the general populace - in Montana and elsewhere interested in new trains for Pennsylvania if all they have is vague hints that maybe, possibly there might be some sort of North Coast Hiawatha service sometime in the distant future.

It should be pointed out, however, that a long distance passenger train such as the North Coast Hiawatha (NCH) serves more than just a few metropolitan areas. It is very difficult to make a valid comparison between one or two large cities in Pennsylvania and the entire route of the NCH; All markets combined certainly have the greater population, but then how many people in Chicago are headed to Montana? Further, there are also geographic considerations. An unserved or poorly served locale in the Northeast is still relatively close to an active passenger train route compared to southern Montana and many other regions of the country.

But where are we going to get the money from?

The exact same place(s) we get the money to build roads, schools, prisons and other infrastructure. Every single time a proposal is put forth for passenger rail expansion, the discussion gets shot down - by rail advocates, no less - by the issue of funding. Which is certainly a legitimate question (and the real problem and solutions are, of course, political), but at the same time the answer is obvious; The issue of funding lies primarily with Congress. Perhaps more specifically, we should be asking how we convince a (usually hostile) legislative body that a particular service expansion should be a funding priority.

I guess I am in a majority here, favoring the Floridian. I believe an Auto-Train consist would be successful would be successful on this route.

It's probably an exaggeration to say you could drive that distance twice in the time it would take the train to get there, but not a big exaggeration. There is no intact single-carrier direct rail route diagonally across the Appalachians. The most direct existing routes would use more than one carrier, rather than having the advantage of a single carrier. Much of the existing trackage would not permit the kind of speed required for any reasonable schedule. You add mileage (and time) if you go around. The Auto Train Company's demise can be attributed to a number of factors. I believe the expansion into the Midwest market was one of those factors. It might be possible to create a through routing for service between Chicago and Florida, but I suspect the way to do that is via a Chicago-New Orleans service, linked to a New Orleans-Florida service, or something similar. Putting automobiles on such a service would probably be prohibitively expensive because of the mileage, enroute switching, etc.

If you can figure out a way to surmount these hurdles, more power to you!

Tom

The big speed advantage for long distance trains comes from the need, in many cases, to make an overnight stop (or numerous "pit stops", perhaps) when driving. In such a case, then no, you cannot drive the distance faster. Every situation is different; There are going to be some cases in the Northeast Corridor when you can drive and beat Acela (or flying) too.

To say "there is no intact single-carrier direct rail route diagonally across the Appalachians" puts way too many unecessary qualifiers on the requirement! As already discussed, there are several potentially viable routes. Indeed, many long distance trains are neither single railroad lines or completely direct routings.

 

[railiner]

Oh your talking about the route via Etowah. That is a difficult like to describe. The part of the line from Etowah TN to Copperhill/Mccaysville TN/GA is owned by the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum and is maintained up to 45 mph in places I believe. But has a lot of speed restriction curves. South of the state line it's owned by the Georgia Northeastern Railroad which is now a Patriot Rail property. It is an active tourist railroad from Mccaysville to Blue Ridge. Out of service exempted track from Blue Ridge to Elijay. Then it's active all the way to the Atlanta area.

I was talking about the route via Knoxville, Etowah, and then Cartersville (not via Blue Ridge)....

The route of the former Flamingo

http://www.american-rails.com/flamingo.html

 

[west point]

There is no combination much less single carrier of rail routes either active or abandoned that can support much 79 MPH running south of the OHIO river except in west Tennessee. The glaciers cut deep valleys close together in a NE - SW direction and had effects from Columbus, Ms. - Tuscaloosa - south of Birmingham - Auburn - Columbus, Ga, - Macon, Ga. - Augusta - Columbia - Charlotte - East of Greensboro / Danville/ Charlottesville - West of DC. Since rail building even after the Civil War in the south had to follow the least expensive construction costs just traversing these mountains had to find what few passes available.

So rail miles thru these areas are much longer than as a crow flies. Evansville - Nashville fairly good in Ky. but after somewhere in Tn. gets crooked. Louisville Nashville definitely good track but slow. Cincinnati - ATL both L&N and SOU were fairly competitive but both crosses mountains in Ky. Now CSX is talking of at least temporary downgrading CIN - ATL to class 2 ( 25 MPH ). The NS (SOU) route has had continuing upgrades CIN - CHA by the city of CIN so how much faster NS could now traverse the route is unknown. However any Nashville or CIN route thru CHA will have the difficulty of approaching and departing CHA over and thru mountains. Then over 3 Hours CHA - ATL and then either CSX to Manchester or NS to Macon before grades and track speeds can improve.

Note these mountains even slow the Crescent which takes ~ 18:00 for 30 miles more than Meteor & Palmetto"s ~ 15:00 to Savannah. Mountains always mean slower.

 

[Ryan]

The big speed advantage for long distance trains comes from the need, in many cases, to make an overnight stop (or numerous "pit stops", perhaps) when driving. In such a case, then no, you cannot drive the distance faster. Every situation is different;

Well, yes. But in this particular situation, driving wins hands down. The train took 39 hours to get from Chicago to Miami. According to the Google (which in my experience is conservative), it's a 20 hour drive. Obviously you aren't going to drive it straight through (unless you team drive), but even two 10 hour driving days with 10 hours of rest in the middle gives you a 30 hour trip. You're making it in 3/4 the time, not half the time, but that's still a lot faster (and baked in is the assumption that you're going to be able to bring back the route at the same speed it existed before. Expensive and unlikely).

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

The big speed advantage for long distance trains comes from the need, in many cases, to make an overnight stop (or numerous "pit stops", perhaps) when driving. In such a case, then no, you cannot drive the distance faster. Every situation is different;

Well, yes. But in this particular situation, driving wins hands down. The train took 39 hours to get from Chicago to Miami. According to the Google (which in my experience is conservative), it's a 20 hour drive. Obviously you aren't going to drive it straight through (unless you team drive), but even two 10 hour driving days with 10 hours of rest in the middle gives you a 30 hour trip. You're making it in 3/4 the time, not half the time, but that's still a lot faster (and baked in is the assumption that you're going to be able to bring back the route at the same speed it existed before. Expensive and unlikely).

Except in the winter when you can have snow from the Kentucky line up to Chicago, driving slows down and gets more stressful... Last time I drove it there was snow from just outside Chattanooga all the way north (though not on the roads). Going south between Indy and just south of E-town it was icy on 65 (this was on either side of New Years).