Silver Star to Bypass Tampa Feb 1 - 9

[AmtrakLKL]

Due to CSX trackwork, trains 91/92 will bypass Lakeland and Tampa on February 1 - 4 and Feb 8 & 9. Limited busing will be provided for affected passengers. No new bookings will be permitted to or from Lakeland and Tampa on these dates.

Northbound passengers to Tampa and Lakeland will detrain at Winter Haven and board buses to their respective destination. Passengers normally connecting at Lakeland for Dade City, Wildwood, The Villages, Ocala, Gainesville and Waldo will also transfer at Winter Haven. (It also appears bookings to/from south Florida and these Thruway stops is also blocked since Lakeland is blocked.)

Northbound from Tampa will board a bus departing at 4 PM to connect with the train in Orlando. Northbound passengers from Lakeland will have to go to Tampa and board the bus there (although Winter Haven is much closer and they could just board the train there.)

Southbound passengers to Tampa and Lakeland will detrain at Orlando and board buses to their respective destination.

Southbound passengers from Tampa will depart on a bus at 11:15 am and from Lakeland at 12:15pm connecting to the train in Winter Haven. Southbound passengers from Dade City, Wildwood, The Villages, Ocala, Gainesville and Waldo will connect in Winter Haven (and again, it appears the Thruway stops are blocked due to Lakeland being blocked.)

 

[neroden]

I expect the train to have really, truly awful ridership on these days. Is there anyone who wouldn't take the Meteor in preference?

 

[jphjaxfl]

Amtrak has sort of written off Tampa since the Silver Palm was discontinued. Several times, I have been waiting for the Silver Star in Tampa and it was announced we would be bussed to Dade City to board the Star. The busses picked up the passengers from South Florida. I am hoping Brightline will not have bustitutions like Amtrak frequently does.

 

[Bob Dylan]

Looks like the next step to eliminating Rail service to Tampa completely!

The bus rides to/from Orlando will increase and the Meteor will become like the Lake Shore and the Cardinal with High Buckets and Sold Out Days.

On the good news front, the Star could become like the old Mail,/Milk run Trains, except if the Sleepers are kept it will be the closest thing to a Slumber Coach which some of us really liked! ( but we did have the option of a meal or two in tbe Diner.) The jury is out on the New Menu for the Cafe Car on the Star!

 

[neroden]

With Amtrak not seriously contesting the market, it sounds like Brightline has a very solid opening for building fast rail from Orlando to Tampa. I hope the Orlando-Miami service goes well enough that they can finance it quickly.

 

[Ryan]

Looks like the next step to eliminating Rail service to Tampa completely!

 

[keelhauled]

Somehow I must miss the annual wailing and predictions of doom whenever the Crescent is truncated several hundred miles short of New Orleans for track work. Perhaps someone can point me to the relevant threads? I'm sure there must be some very entertaining meltdowns.

 

[MikefromCrete]

It won't be long until we get into the Silver Meteor being cancelled in favor of the life safety patrol specials two times a year as being the forerunner of all Florida service being cancelled.

 

[CCC1007]

Somehow I must miss the annual wailing and predictions of doom whenever the Crescent is truncated several hundred miles short of New Orleans for track work. Perhaps someone can point me to the relevant threads? I'm sure there must be some very entertaining meltdowns.

only four trips a week cancelled, no big deal to most of us.

 

[afigg]

Looks like the next step to eliminating Rail service to Tampa completely!

The bus rides to/from Orlando will increase and the Meteor will become like the Lake Shore and the Cardinal with High Buckets and Sold Out Days.

Tampa is the 3rd busiest station in Florida with 120.5K passengers in FY2015. It is the 2nd busiest station for the Silver trains as Sanford is the busiest station. It is 6 days of service disruption due to CSX track work. Nuisance, yesy, but hardly a sign of anything else.
Now if AAF/Brightline extends their system to Tampa, that will have a significant impact on prospects for the Star intra-state ticket sales, but any such extension is at least a decade away, probably longer. OTOH, if AAF/Brightline were to have a connection to CSX tracks in or near Tampa in a way that would allow the Star to use the AAF/Brightline station and then allow (really big if) the Star to take the much faster AAF/Brightline tracks to southern FL, that would be a big boost to the Star for longer range trip revenue.

 

[CCC1007]

Looks like the next step to eliminating Rail service to Tampa completely!

The bus rides to/from Orlando will increase and the Meteor will become like the Lake Shore and the Cardinal with High Buckets and Sold Out Days.

Tampa is the 3rd busiest station in Florida with 120.5K passengers in FY2015. It is the 2nd busiest station for the Silver trains as Sanford is the busiest station. It is 6 days of service disruption due to CSX track work. Nuisance, yesy, but hardly a sign of anything else.
Now if AAF/Brightline extends their system to Tampa, that will have a significant impact on prospects for the Star intra-state ticket sales, but any such extension is at least a decade away, probably longer. OTOH, if AAF/Brightline were to have a connection to CSX tracks in or near Tampa in a way that would allow the Star to use the AAF/Brightline station and then allow (really big if) the Star to take the much faster AAF/Brightline tracks to southern FL, that would be a big boost to the Star for longer range trip revenue.

when did the silvers resume serving Sanford?

 

[afigg]

Tampa is the 3rd busiest station in Florida with 120.5K passengers in FY2015. It is the 2nd busiest station for the Silver trains as Sanford is the busiest station. It is 6 days of service disruption due to CSX track work. Nuisance, yesy, but hardly a sign of anything else.

when did the silvers resume serving Sanford?

I did not say or imply that. I wrote that Tampa is the 2nd busiest station in FL for the Silver trains, because the busiest station in Florida is Sanford - which is of course only used by the AutoTrain.

 

[keelhauled]

Somehow I must miss the annual wailing and predictions of doom whenever the Crescent is truncated several hundred miles short of New Orleans for track work. Perhaps someone can point me to the relevant threads? I'm sure there must be some very entertaining meltdowns.

only four trips a week cancelled, no big deal to most of us.

Yes, precisely. There are six trips that bypass Tampa, and suddenly that has lead to consternation far out of proportion, whereas other trains get regular disruptions and no one bats an eye.

 

[OBS]

Calling Henny Penny.........

 

[CCC1007]

Tampa is the 3rd busiest station in Florida with 120.5K passengers in FY2015. It is the 2nd busiest station for the Silver trains as Sanford is the busiest station. It is 6 days of service disruption due to CSX track work. Nuisance, yesy, but hardly a sign of anything else.

when did the silvers resume serving Sanford?

I did not say or imply that. I wrote that Tampa is the 2nd busiest station in FL for the Silver trains, because the busiest station in Florida is Sanford - which is of course only used by the AutoTrain.

sorry, I just mistook the wording of the statement to indicate that you were only talking about the silvers.

 

[Ryan]

That's what "2nd busiest station in FL for the Silver trains" means. Technically, it's the busiest station in FL for the Silvers.

 

[neroden]

Seven of the nine top city pairs on the Silver Star include Tampa. Tampa is the single busiest station on the Silver Star by a factor of *two* -- 126K at Tampa, 61K at Orlando, 61K at New York. (Thanks to NARP for having and publishing this data. For some reason the per-station data is missing from the per-route reports for some of the western trains, but it's there for the Eastern trains.)

Bustituting Tampa is like.... bustituting *Chicago* on the LSL, or bustituting *Atlanta* on the Crescent. It's pretty close to cancelling the train for that day. And I do get a little distressed when the Lake Shore Limited gets cancelled. It's not really good for ridership to drop the most popular station on the entire route.

 

[jphjaxfl]

What about the days Amtrak does not announce a bustitution of Silver Star to or from Tampa? They just inform the passengers waiting in Tampa that they will be taking a bus to meet the train coming from Miami or from the North. I have had this happen numerous times.

 

[neroden]

All I can say to that is... yeeech. New York State & Amtrak don't let that happen on the CSX-owned Water Level Route.

It shows lack of seriousness about providing service to Tampa. Perhaps this is Amtrak management's lack of seriousness, or perhaps it is the State of Florida's lack of seriousness.

 

[MikefromCrete]

All I can say to that is... yeeech. New York State & Amtrak don't let that happen on the CSX-owned Water Level Route.

It shows lack of seriousness about providing service to Tampa. Perhaps this is Amtrak management's lack of seriousness, or perhaps it is the State of Florida's lack of seriousness.

It's six round trips, replaced by a rather short bus ride. It's not the end of the world.

 

[Thirdrail7]

What about the days Amtrak does not announce a bustitution of Silver Star to or from Tampa? They just inform the passengers waiting in Tampa that they will be taking a bus to meet the train coming from Miami or from the North. I have had this happen numerous times.

This happens if there an issue with the Star between MIA-TPA. Since the route is so slow, busing the TPA section allows the train to save as much as 2:30 on an uninterrupted run. This allows it to make up time to fit into or closer to its slot.