There's a reason that you've got overnight trains between a number of city combos, but as noted it's not of the "rail cruise" variety. To be fair, I think there's a case to be made (on the basis of turnover) for some of the LD trains out west, but it's far less than the case for those in the east.
Now, sliding over to those eastern trains, there's a case to be made for them if you can get back to where the travel times were in the late 50s or a bit better (for NEC-CHI...you had the Broadway down under 16 hours at one point, which more to the point translates into somewhere around 14:30 from PHL). Likewise, BUF-CHI actually still makes sense in this rubric: WB you board at about midnight and get into CHI before 10 AM while EB you board at 9:30 PM and disembark in BUF at around 9 AM. It might be an hour or so off of ideal both ways, but it's still nearly perfect from that perspective.
There's the additional fact that the government is stuck dumping tens of millions of dollars into the EAS because there are a lot more areas in the US than in Europe that don't have the density to organically support much of any public transport, and they're much larger than those in Europe. Frankly, you could lose France between KCY and DEN, which is why you've got collapsing bus and airline service in a lot of those areas. In all fairness, it's probably questionable how much the EAS will be able to keep up in the coming years...the subsidies might end up being too small for those airlines, while the transfer situations just plain stink and the fares are still stratospheric in a lot of those markets.
And it's not just "puny" markets like Liberal, KS or Williston, ND (where even the added flights still slam into very real competition with the Builder since a lot of them hub out of Denver, not Minneapolis) that're in the "lousy air service" boat. You've got other places like Des Moines (or Roanoke) that airline service is either expensive, transfer-heavy, infrequent, or some combination thereof. Could most of these markets support a train on their own? Frankly, some of them couldn't support a puddle jumper if their lives depended on it (and the EAS may not be enough to save them). But in conjunction with a train that's got other markets to call on along the way and that is underpinned by two or more major cities? You bet.
Bear in mind that I generally focus my support on trains that have major one-night markets to call upon, or trains that can produce such markets. I would point out that most of the Western trains do contain one (or more) such markets:
-The
California Zephyr contains CHI-DEN. While this train has lost about half an hour or so off its' 1950 time on that leg (most of it apparently between CHI and Ottumwa) CHI-DEN is really more hobbled by the fact that the schedule was slid about an hour and a half earlier.
-The
Empire Builder at present contains CHI-MSP (which is a nicely-timed leg), SEA/PDX-SPK (albeit with lousy timing) and Minneapolis-Williston (while new in terms of its size, it and some of the other cities along this section of the line have long been bolstered by virtue of the lousy air service...I would point out, for example, that ND generated over 150,000 O/D out of the Builder's 543k riders. I would argue rather strenuously that these are not a bunch of casual tourists out for an excursion!
-The
Southwest Chief has LAX-ABQ. EB, this could perhaps use a little work (though commuter conflicts are likely to preclude much here); WB, it's got about as close to perfect timing as any long-distance city pair in the system, with 924 miles covered pretty much between 1700 and 0900. There's a reason the ABQ-LAX city pair is sitting around 30,000 passengers on a once-daily train. No, that's not WAS-NYP by any stretch of the imagination, but it's nothing to sneeze at by what is by any stretch a rather modest travel market to begin with.
-The
Sunset Limited has a whole slew of workable markets, as does the entangled
Texas Eagle*. LAX-Arizona and SAS-HOU-NOL are the big ones here.
Point is, you don't have a lot of through travelers on a lot of these routes, but you've got a bunch of markets that slide together. Now, can these trains make money? Probably not under the current transportation policy regime. I underline for emphasis: When put up against a system of "free" interstates and a heavily-subsidized airline system ($5bn for the FAA, $7-8bn for the TSA...even net of the 9/11 Security Fee, that's another $5-6bn...not to mention the discharge of airline debts in bankruptcies, the EAS, etc.), it's bloody crazy to expect Amtrak to turn a profit on those lines. And of course, keep in mind that I'm ignoring state/local contributions to longer-distance highways, airports, etc. (since I can't think of a single major city in the US that has let a non-redundant** airport collapse).
However, while I don't think they can make money, I think they can easily prove to be cost-effective for the government compared to the other options out there (i.e. adding lanes to expressways, etc.) and even stack up well against the current highway system in many regards. They'll be largely supported by passengers traveling <16 hours or so (with even more in the 8-12 hour range, but I think you've got a market for 12-16 hour runs), with longer markets supplying a share that, while not trivial, is still significant.
And of course, there's the question of track improvements and better average speeds. NYP-CHI on the LSL is 959 miles. At the present, WB takes 17 hours net of the time difference, or 56.41 MPH. At 60 MPH (not an outlandish goal), it would take almost exactly 16 hours. If that average could be raised to 65 MPH, you're looking at 14:45. At 70 MPH 13:42. With a reasonable investment program focused on upgrades to the Empire Corridor (NYP-ALB and ALB-BUF) and congestion relief elsewhere on the line, I do not think these are crazy goals to look at (especially since you could probably save 20 minutes without a single track change by getting rid of adding 449 to 49, and another 15 minutes on end-of-run padding)...and I do think those two hours have the potential to make a major difference.
But there's one last aspect that Amtrak would have to master: They need to get running pairs timed out better. Right now, WAS-CHI or NYP-CHI is a reasonable run for someone going to a business meeting (even if it could use some trip-length improvements). The return trip does not work: There is no way to get back to the NEC before lunchtime, and no way to get back to PHL or NYP and have even a modest part of a day to work with. Looking at the best example of a solid running pair, we've got the Crescent: NYP, PHL, WAS, and NWK to ATL make up somewhere around a combined 17% (+/-2%) of the train's ridership; put another way, you've probably got about 1/5 of the train's riders going from the NEC*** to Atlanta in spite of:
-Once-daily service
-Losing part of a day each way on the northern end of the run
-No meaningful public transit at/near the Atlanta station (I'm led to understand that MARTA service in the area is not very good)
-No car rental at the Atlanta station
-Awful parking at the Atlanta station
Frankly, this market shouldn't be that good: Atlanta isn't a transfer point, it's got half the population of Chicago, and the service is crap...but it can still pack an overnight train, and the train is probably "blocked in" by a lack of space (sleeper and otherwise; the train sells out a lot of the time). There's a reason that talk of cut-off cars here keeps coming back up: There's demand to be had.
Anyhow, to sum up:
-I firmly believe that there are significant markets to be had in the 8-16 hour range that can do well; the shorter ones (i.e. around 8-10 hours) can augment connecting trains in the 2-3 hour range at one or both ends of a run, while the longer ones will still have significant catchment areas in the 1-2 hour range (i.e. PHL-NHV for NYP, NYP-WIL for PHL, and BAL-RVR/CVS for WAS).
-These markets will be supplemented by significant sub-markets (i.e. Upstate NY-CHI on the LSL, and to a lesser extent resales of those seats NYP-upstate; WAS-PGH/PGH-CHI on the Cap).
-In many cases, upgrading tracks and other steps can put a large number of markets within reasonable ranges:
Code:
Time 60 MPH 65 MPH 70 MPH 75 MPH
6 H 360 mi. 390 mi. 420 mi. 450 mi.
8 H 480 mi. 520 mi. 560 mi. 600 mi.
10 H 600 mi. 650 mi. 700 mi. 750 mi.
12 H 720 mi. 780 mi. 840 mi. 900 mi.
14 H 840 mi. 910 mi. 980 mi. 1050mi.
16 H 960 mi. 1040mi. 1120mi. 1200mi.
65 MPH puts CHI-DEN into a 16 hour run, 70 MPH CHI-NYP.
-Longer-distance trains will primarily be supported by internal markets (i.e. the North Dakota situation on the Builder), but these can justify the existence of those trains, particularly when weighed against the cost of subsidizing air service, highway subsidies, etc.
*Great, now I'm making the Sunset sound like a fishing net...
**i.e. Ignoring a case where an old airport is shuttered because a new one replaced it; the best example I can think of would be Meigs Field in Chicago, though Montreal Mirabel is arguably a similar/comparable situation (considering that there's auto racing at the airport now).
***The top ten list didn't include BAL, WIL, or TRE...or ALX, which may absorb some DC-area traffic as well.
