Hoosier State last run

[Matthew H Fish]

Washington and Oregon have traditionally been very car centric, there was not really a tradition of using the train or public transit other than air between those city pairs. The Cascades service basically got off to a standing start in the 90s, and has been built, somewhat incrementally ever since (more frequencies have been added and the service extended to Vancouver and Eugene). Demand was built, it wasn't something that was there before the service started.

One way to look at it is rather than Oregon and Washington having good public transit because they are "blue states", maybe they got to be that way because they had public transit. Part of the reason why people feel better about public services is that they have seen them in use.

One of the things that is odd for me, growing up in Oregon, is that we are now part of the "Blue State Coastal Elite" or whatever, like Oregon is some urbanized hub. When I was growing up in the 80s and 90s, Oregon was an outpost away from the rest of the US, and Portland was a little city with nothing of note in it. Portland became a destination because of things it did, not because of anything it started with. Objectively speaking, there are cities that are the size of Portland or larger, and are much more tied in to the national transportation grid (road, rail and air), that started out with more advantages than Portland but have rejected them. And Cincinnati is one of those cities.

 

[zephyr17]

One word rebuttal:

California

 

[Philly Amtrak Fan]

I hope people don't mind me stating the obvious, but to me it is a little weird that there could be any trouble at all filling a daily, or bidaily train, between Indianapolis and Chicago. Indianapolis and Chicago are 180 miles apart, and are a metro area of 2 million people and a metro area of 9.5 million people. There are also no terrain barriers between the two cities.

Compare that with Portland and Seattle, also 180 miles apart, with smaller populations (2.5 million and 4 million, approx), and with some harder terrain to pass through in places...and where there are five trains a day between Portland and Seattle. I do wonder what type of political and social factors lined up that all of these cities in the east-central region of the US ended up without good (or any) train service between them. Cities like Cincinnati to Cleveland and Nashville to St. Louis seem to be cities that would be perfectly suited for intermediate distance rail travel: not worth the expense and hassle of flight, too far to drive comfortably, and between large population centers with easy terrain.

Well the Cincinnati-Cleveland and Nashville-St. Louis routes have never had Amtrak service. Almost all corridor service overlaps current or past service and very little new service has started since 2000. Washington/Oregon built corridor service off existing service. Ohio would have to build up Cincinnati-Cleveland service off no existing rail service. It would have been way easier to have started it in the days before PRIIA, today it would be next to impossible. Since PRIIA, the only "new" Amtrak service I can think of is in Virginia but that is just expansion of existing Virginia service.

 

[PaTrainFan]

Well the Cincinnati-Cleveland and Nashville-St. Louis routes have never had Amtrak service. Almost all corridor service overlaps current or past service and very little new service has started since 2000. Washington/Oregon built corridor service off existing service. Ohio would have to build up Cincinnati-Cleveland service off no existing rail service. It would have been way easier to have started it in the days before PRIIA, today it would be next to impossible. Since PRIIA, the only "new" Amtrak service I can think of is in Virginia but that is just expansion of existing Virginia service.

Let's not forget Ohio had the opportunity several years ago to build that infrastructure through Federal stimulus grants but a Republican governor, backed by a Republican legislature, turned their backs on those grants by not investing in their own matching funds. As a native Ohioan I would have liked to have seen how it would be patronized in a state that has not been blessed with good rail service. Really awkward grammar, but you get the idea.

 

[Seaboard92]

When you look at the US rail service in the 1950s there were several major corridors.

Chicago to

Short distance
Twin Cities- CNW, MILW, CBQ, SOO
Omaha-CNW, MILW, CRIP
Cincinnati-NYC(VIA INDY), PRR
St. Louis-GM&O.
Detroit-MC
Toronto-GTW/CN
Cleveland-NYC

Long distance
Los Angeles-ATSF, CNW/UP, CRIP/SP
New York-NYC, PRR, B&O, NKP/DLW, Erie, GTW/CN/LV.

And countless more everywhere else.

 

[Willbridge]

One way to look at it is rather than Oregon and Washington having good public transit because they are "blue states", maybe they got to be that way because they had public transit. Part of the reason why people feel better about public services is that they have seen them in use.

One of the things that is odd for me, growing up in Oregon, is that we are now part of the "Blue State Coastal Elite" or whatever, like Oregon is some urbanized hub. When I was growing up in the 80s and 90s, Oregon was an outpost away from the rest of the US, and Portland was a little city with nothing of note in it. Portland became a destination because of things it did, not because of anything it started with. Objectively speaking, there are cities that are the size of Portland or larger, and are much more tied in to the national transportation grid (road, rail and air), that started out with more advantages than Portland but have rejected them. And Cincinnati is one of those cities.

Portland always was a little different, but was considered to be a cultural dead-end by some. But on the other hand when the original New York Times Western Edition came out, sales in Portland-Vancouver exceeded sales in Seattle-Tacoma. Library circulation figures were higher than in many larger U.S. cities. And, relevant to this site, there were more rail passengers boarding in Portland than in Seattle when the Feds proposed the original Amtrak plan (which omitted Portland and San Diego).

What you see now in Oregon was influenced first by concerns about air pollution in the populated valleys, followed by land use concerns, and punctuated by two Energy Crises. It was also influenced by the realization that like it or not, the old earth resources industries were declining and we'd better figure out new ways to make our living.

There's a less discussed reason. Oregon invented the gas tax for highway construction and due to the seemingly unhindered freedom to focus on projects and its early start it got way ahead of other states in developing the problems associated with that. By the mid-1970's, completion of the Interstates in Oregon had led to a noticeable loss of non-Portland air service and a decline in intercity bus service, so there were people in both parties who wanted state action.

There also was an unusually good service by the "private" railways between PDX and SEA. Faced with paved highway competition by the 1920's, the three companies operating between the two cities received ICC permission to pool their services - combining revenues and expenses and running a transit-style operation. Ads in the late 1950's read "$4.95 round-trip - costs less than a tank of gas!" Tickets were pre-printed with no reservations for coach travel. Sometimes standees resulted, but usually the traffic departments had the right number of coaches on hand. Amtrak tried at first to kill what was left of this in 1971 and again in 1973, but by 1975 was taking it seriously when Oregon introduced the "Cascades" corridor concept. From the beginning Amtrak talked big about corridor service, but they couldn't see the two legacy corridors on the West Coast (including LA - San Diego) as having value till the states took interest.

 

[Seaboard92]

One other fun thing of note on the Portland-Seattle Corridor was the fact the Union Pacific contribution was the GM “Train of Tomorrow” which operated with several dome cars. Making it the most unique consist at the time.

 

[Willbridge]

One other fun thing of note on the Portland-Seattle Corridor was the fact the Union Pacific contribution was the GM “Train of Tomorrow” which operated with several dome cars. Making it the most unique consist at the time.

My first dining car meal was in the dome diner on that train with my family. Lucius Beebe wrote that the UP PDX-SEA had the finest economy steak on U.S. rails. Sadly, the first car of that trainset to be withdrawn was the diner, said to have been a victim of corrosion from steam and water leaks. Passengers used to ask for that train, driving the NP and GN partners in the pool crazy. Eventually the two other lines and the UP had enough dome coaches to assign them when they were available, especially in the winter, but I don't think they were ever advertised. Ditto with the GN Internationals.

All of this relates to the Hoosier State and the discussions about corridor service. Greyhound's "VIP Executive Express" in the 1960's was 15 to 30 minutes faster than the trains PDX-SEA, but they gave up after a while and went back to their typical service. Slight upgrades in service can offset slightly longer running times. It seemed that Ed Ellis understood this, but the whole set-up with the tri-weekly appearance of the Cardinal in the customers' eyes must have sent a mixed message.

 

[dogbert617]

Well the Cincinnati-Cleveland and Nashville-St. Louis routes have never had Amtrak service. Almost all corridor service overlaps current or past service and very little new service has started since 2000. Washington/Oregon built corridor service off existing service. Ohio would have to build up Cincinnati-Cleveland service off no existing rail service. It would have been way easier to have started it in the days before PRIIA, today it would be next to impossible. Since PRIIA, the only "new" Amtrak service I can think of is in Virginia but that is just expansion of existing Virginia service.

The extension of Virginia Amtrak service west from Lynchburg to Roanoke, essentially in a way was a partial restart of Amtrak service on a line that used to see service all the way to Catlettsburg, KY(back then in the 1970s also called Tri State Station), but was cut back after 1979 IIRC. It used to serve other communities in VA and WV west of there, such as Christiansburg, VA, and Welch, WV. IIRC there is Amtrak Thruway bus service beyond Roanoke, to Christiansburg and Blacksburg. I never pay as much attention to the connecting bus service part of Amtrak timetables, so someone correct me if I'm wrong on that.

Correct Cincy to Cleveland and Nashville to St. Louis, never was an Amtrak train route. Between Cincy and Cleveland, Columbus used to have the Amtrak National Limited(between NYC, Philly, west to Kansas City, only portions of that former east to west route still having Amtrak service are those on the Pennsylvanian, and also the Missouri River Runner) train stop there. Am I right in thinking the area between Harrisburg to Philly(that's now an Amtrak corridor service), was also served by the National Limited years ago?

Nashville was once served by The Floridian train, which was discontinued in I believe 1979. Between Nashville and St. Louis, there is some sort of Amtrak Thruway bus service one can take to get up to St. Louis, if they wanted to travel that way.

 

[dgvrengineer]

The former train between Lynchburg and Roanoke was the Hilltopper. It's biggest problem was it went via Richmond and Petersburg, then the old N & W to Lynchburg. It was very slow and when I rode it, it only had 2 cars, no food service and 2 passengers, my friend and me. Current train is much better.