Poll on LDT frequency

capltd29 · Jul 21, 2004

I've never made a poll before so I hope that this comes out ok.

my choice would be twice daily service for a few LDTs (Florida service, SW Chief, and CAP LTD) Obviously Amtrak would need to have the equipment and money, but I think it would make it look less like a cruise ship on wheels and more like a viable travel option

jccollins · Jul 21, 2004

Hit UP where it hurts: get revenge by increasing the Sunset Limited to daily service. We need a magician to create some extra equipment out of thin air, though.

Viewliner · Jul 21, 2004

Face it, we'd all like more frequencies on most, if not all routes. Realistically, we don't have the equipment, not to mention the funding for it, unfortunately.

AlanB · Jul 21, 2004

capltd29 said:
I've never made a poll before so I hope that this comes out ok.
my choice would be twice daily service for a few LDTs (Florida service, SW Chief, and CAP LTD) Obviously Amtrak would need to have the equipment and money, but I think it would make it look less like a cruise ship on wheels and more like a viable travel option

capltd29,

Well it was a good effort, but you did end up with two choices on one line. Sadly I can't fix that, other than to edit the line and eliminate the "twice daily" choice from the "daily line". If you like I can do that.

Otherwise we can just leave things as they are or you could create a new poll at which point I'll delete this one.

By the way, Florida service already has thrice daily service, the Silver Star, the Silver Meteor, and the Palmetto. So that would not be a good route to choose to impliment twice daily service as they would now loose one train per day.

AmtrakWPK · Jul 21, 2004

"Florida service" really doesn't do much to describe what you would want to do down here in Florida. Right now you have almost-one-half, single, double, triple, or almost two-and-a-half round trips per day service in Florida, it just depends on where you look. From Jax to the panhandle (Pensacola), you have nearly every-other-day-in-each-direction service - (three times per week in each direction). From Jacksonville to Miami you do have triple, and from Winter Haven to Miami and all points (except Okeechobee) in between, you do have triple service. From Winter Haven west to Tampa and North to Jacksonville you have once-per-day service. From Winter Haven north and east through Orlando and up to Jacksonville you have twice daily service. From Orlando to Jacksonville you effectively have two-and-a-half trips per day, with the addition of Sunset Limited. And of course you also have auto-train from Sanford FL to Lorton VA. You also need to note that the three Miami-to-Jax trains do NOT use the same route north of Savannah. Two travel pretty much one route to go north from there, and a third takes another. Buses from Orlando to Lakeland and Tampa and back handle pax that have to transfer in order to get where they want to go if their train doesn't go there.

A couple of years ago, Amtrak and FEC, I think, entered into an agreement to develop daily passenger service on FEC tracks from Jacksonville down the east coast, including places like Daytona Beach, Melbourne, Stuart, and so forth. There were plans made, I think, for sidings or double-track areas and pax stations to be built, but as far as I know nothing of that has actually been started, construction-wise. What that would do to the existing service, I have no idea. There was also some talk at the same time, I think, of initiating Jax - Orl - Tampa train service, which does not currently exist. Has anybody heard as to whether (or when) any of this might actually happen? I would suppose that unless Amtrak gets at least close to it's funding requests for a few years, it ain't likely to happen.

AlanB · Jul 21, 2004

AmtrakWPK said:
A couple of years ago, Amtrak and FEC, I think, entered into an agreement to develop daily passenger service on FEC tracks from Jacksonville down the east coast, including places like Daytona Beach, Melbourne, Stuart, and so forth. There were plans made, I think, for sidings or double-track areas and pax stations to be built, but as far as I know nothing of that has actually been started, construction-wise. What that would do to the existing service, I have no idea. There was also some talk at the same time, I think, of initiating Jax - Orl - Tampa train service, which does not currently exist. Has anybody heard as to whether (or when) any of this might actually happen? I would suppose that unless Amtrak gets at least close to it's funding requests for a few years, it ain't likely to happen.

That was one of the more interesting and probably intelligent ideas that came out of the Network Growth Stratagey. Sadly it fell victim in part to funding and in part to negotiations with all the partners, including the State of Florida, the freight RR's, and the local towns that would have stations built.

This is one idea that could still be pulled off with a little funding. New equipement is not needed, since all the exisiting trains would be split upon reaching JAX. Money would only be needed for crews, track work, and station work. Much of the latter two items would have received money from the State and/or local towns along the routes.

Sadly this plan is dead at least for now, not because of continued funding problems, but because of the terms of the loan agreement from the Department of Transportation. That agreement states that Amtrak cannot start new services as long as the loan remains unpaid, unless a state guarentees that Amtrak won't loose any money on the service.

capltd29 · Jul 21, 2004

What meant to say about Fl service was that I would like to see more thrains to florida, I know that there already are 3 but I think 5 would be better and atleast one more to serve the star's route inland

Amfleet · Jul 22, 2004

I would want to see the Cardinal become a daily train and also the possiblity of breaking of the Sunset Limited route into two different daily trains. One would run ORL-NOL daily and would connect with a daily NOL-LAX train. IMHO, the ORL-NOL equipment would be shared with the City of New Orleans. Then I would support another train along the Silver Service routes; mostly along the FEC route and the return of the Silver Palm.