One of the reasons Amtrak loses money

[user 5784]

Because of the excessive lateness of many of its trains, Amtrak oftentimes has to provide accomodation or alternative transportation to many passengers.

For example, in 1994 I was on a tardy Empire Builder into Chicago. I was connecting to the Texas Eagle.

Amtrak paid for me an many others to fly from Chicago to St louis to catch our train.

Im sure that wasnt cheap for Amtrak.

Anyone else have a similar experience?

 

[Guest_Old Engineer's Kid]

Well, not a similar experience but I arrived at Denver the other night on time (I knew the train was late but went on time anyway) and the ticket agent told me the train was late and wanted to buy me dinner. I had already eaten dinner as it was 7pm and he kept trying to buy me dinner. I assume he was going to give me a voucher to a local restaurant. I thought it was a very class act, but I just couldn't see wasting the money because I had already eaten. I remember thinking that if he had bought dinner for every sleeping car passenger that got on board that night, it would add up. Not the same as an airline flight, but as I say, it all adds up.

 

[trainboy325]

Here's one reason why Amtrak loses money: they don't run their trains! Alan B made a comment in another post that killing the Silver Service trains entirely rather than operating them between Orlando or Jacksonville from New York is just plain dumb! The only reason for this - pure laziness on the company's part. There'e plenty of room in SFD to service the trains. It may be hard and inconvienient, but so what! Businesses that want to make money make accomodations in response to adversity. You can't make money if you cancel a train, provide a full refund for every ticket and loose a few more passengers permanently when someone can't see the reason why Hurricane Wilma canceled their departure from Columbia, SC to Philadelphia, PA two days befor the storm hits Naples, FL!!! It's time like these that seem to tell the truth about how Amtrak management "really" feels about operating long distance trains. :angry:

 

[AlanB]

Here's one reason why Amtrak loses money: they don't run their trains! Alan B made a comment in another post that killing the Silver Service trains entirely rather than operating them between Orlando or Jacksonville from New York is just plain dumb! The only reason for this - pure laziness on the company's part. There'e plenty of room in SFD to service the trains. It may be hard and inconvienient, but so what! Businesses that want to make money make accomodations in response to adversity. You can't make money if you cancel a train, provide a full refund for every ticket and loose a few more passengers permanently when someone can't see the reason why Hurricane Wilma canceled their departure from Columbia, SC to Philadelphia, PA two days befor the storm hits Naples, FL!!! It's time like these that seem to tell the truth about how Amtrak management "really" feels about operating long distance trains. :angry:

Actually it wouldn't be hard to service the trains at all in SFD, since they also cancelled the Auto Train. The yard has plenty of room now. Especially since there is also no Sunset Limited running into ORL and therefore needing work at SFD.

But your point is well taken. At least they could have kept running the AT and one of the Silver Service trains, even if two Silvers in SFD would have been too much. And that probably would have made the most sense, since I'm sure that ridership will be down anyhow.

By the way, forget two days before the hurricane makes landfall, it's not expected to hit Florida till Monday afternoon at the earliest. Since they started cancelling yesterday, that make almost 5 days before landfall.

 

[trainboy325]

This all so true! I forgot about the Auto Train. Cancelling Auto Train for Wilma absolutely wasn't necessary at all. Even before the hurricane's track across Florida was very uncertain, the cone of error on the north side ran just along the south side of the I-4 Corridor. Although Sanford is just a little ways off the interstate, Sanford and points north have never been under the possible strike zone since the company pulled the plug on the trains. I don't know, but if capacity at SFA or JAX was an issue, they at least could have run the Star and provided a link between Florida and the Palmetto if a passenger needed to travel only on the ACL line. I can't understand why Amtrak would end service for almost a week on two of the busiest trains in the system outside the NEC. Oh well, I'm not surprised anyway. I don't really care if Amtrak gets full funding; they'll probably blow it anyway on something that doesn't do anything to improve the trains or passenger service. :angry:

 

[Miami Joe]

I would say that not being able to get a good prediction on the path of Wilma was a big reason for the cancellations of all trains in Florida.

After reading a news article about the financial condition of NOAA and the deplorable condition of their equipment, I've heard that CSX uses a private weather service to determine how to respond.

I think the #1 reason for stopping all train movement is all crossing guards are removed and with the projected path, that's alot of guards. Each train trying to cross a normally protected crossing would require the conductor to stop traffic and move the consist thru the crossing at 15mph.

The train would end up running 10-12 hrs late!

MJ B)

 

[trainboy325]

That makes sense. However, it's important to state too that like NOAA, CSX can't say much about how they fund the maintenance of their infrastructure. You're right though about the automatic grade crossing gates. Most railroads do drop the gates to the ground to prevent replace miles of signal devices in advance of adverse weather.

The reasons why the railroad quits running make sense, but it does show how the industry's infrastructure has become so fragile after years of deferring maintenance and cutting the ranks of people who work to keep up the ROWs.

 

[lepearso]

I think it's better to direct some of our frustrations toward CSX.

Help me remember something...a few years back, some adverse weather condition in Virginia caused Amtrak cancellations throughout the east. Was it an ice storm? Anyway, the bottom line was that CSX would not accomodate passenger trains on any of its routes, regardless of whether or not they were going through bad weather.

I seem to also recall that Amtrak applied enough pressure to convince CSX to modify its bad weather operating pattern. In my opinion, I think there's a great deal more that needs to be done.

I see no reason why the Silver Service trains can't operate on an abbreviated route!

 

[guest_jeffw]

You're right though about the automatic grade crossing gates. Most railroads do drop the gates to the ground to prevent replace miles of signal devices in advance of adverse weather.

This is a recent thing? Because after Hurricane Charley, I didn't see any gates taken down, and they were all thrown about, twisted, and snapped in half.

Same goes for billboards. Now they rip them all down at any sign of bad comings.

At anyrate, now Wilma is pushed back a day, and as of last night the Hurricane watches go all the way to Jacksonville. Sounds like another fast moving Charley.

 

[Viewliner]

I see no reason why the Silver Service trains can't operate on an abbreviated route!

I agree that Silver Service and the Auto Train were cancelled way too far in advance, and that it's sadly not a unique occurance with Amtrak. However there are several issues with truncating Silver Service. It's difficult to find a place to turn and service the train other than SFA and possibly SAV (which doesn't have a comissary IIRC). The other issue is the crew, which is based out of MIA and JAX, if you shorten the route, the crew becomes an issue as you either have to keep them working if Silver Service is running or accomodate them in hotels if they're not.

 

[Miami Joe]

Just a little info.

Amtrak will open Miami on Wednesday to resume maintenance.

Don't know when service will resume.

MJ B)

P.S. We are at the mercy of CSX! Can't roll until they say so!

 

[guest_jeffw]

According to the Orlando Sentinal on Thrusday(or was it wednesday?) The Silver Service terminated in orlando and didn't continue to Miami.

Did they changed it to a full cancelation?

 

[AlanB]

According to the Orlando Sentinal on Thrusday(or was it wednesday?) The Silver Service terminated in orlando and didn't continue to Miami.Did they changed it to a full cancelation?

Yes they did.

Nothing is running to Florida at all, not even the Auto Train. The closest one can get to Florida is Savanah on the Palmetto. All other trains along the east coast south of Richmond have been cancelled.