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There is no reason to cross the U.S. by train, but I did it anyway

nytimes.com

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Re: There is no reason to cross the U.S. by train, but I did it anyway

#331

Post by sandworm101 »

kyleblarson wrote: post #238

My (now) wife and I took the Empire Builder from Seattle to Chicago about 10 years ago. We purchased a private cabin. We were 8 hours late leaving Seattle and couldn't get into our cabin until we got to Spokane because of some sort of merge of trains coming from Portland and Seattle. Got to Spokane, got our cabin, another 6 hour delay. By the time we reached the upper Midwest, they were rationing food, literally cutt…

You were heading east. Notice that all these reporters start in the east and head west. Buy a ticket and start your journey as close to DC/NY as possible. It is very different. I dont know why. I suspect power politics, or the interaction with freight trends, but i have heard this from many travellers.

Re: There is no reason to cross the U.S. by train, but I did it anyway

#332

Post by Aloha »

barrkel wrote: post #298
rayiner wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yay government-run train service.

You know, I have a suspicion that the reason the US has poor government services compared to other countries is in large part because too manypeople in the US believe government services are poor. If the wrong people get in charge (and very likely if the ideology is widespread) they make little effort to improve things other than to cut costs. Competition usually improves things, it's true, but natural monopolies are…

There is no good economic rationale for long distance trains. The only part of Amtrak that is actually profitable is the NEC, the rest of it generally loses money.

Re: There is no reason to cross the U.S. by train, but I did it anyway

#333

Post by munk-a »

ghaff wrote: post #325
inferiorhuman wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

at least for the cities it services And that's the catch. I've been told that years ago it was better, but try to catch a train to a secondary city in New England and you'll often find that the only offering is an occasional Amtrak branded bus.

Fair enough. It's mostly the coastal corridor that's good with a couple on inland spurs from NY/New Haven up to St. Albans and Montreal that aren't terrible. But otherwise, there's something of a gap between commuter rail systems (which are pretty hub and spoke in any case) and what Amtrak covers.

As a former vermonter... The St. Albans service is terrible, trains go into Essex Junction (basically, Burlington) once a day and the train leaves NYC at 11:33 am and gets in at 8:18 pm, eight hours for what is a five hour drive with a single train a day.

I don't disagree that some other services might be alright, but that's clearly not one of them.

Re: There is no reason to cross the U.S. by train, but I did it anyway

#334

Post by vonmoltke »

plopz wrote: post #308
reaperducer wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and no. To the railroads it gets higher priority. But if a freight train bocks a passenger train the railroad gets fined by the hour (quarter hour?). However, the freight railroads often just eat the fine as a cost of doing business. Like delivery companies do with parking tickets.

Fined by who? Aren't all the railways privately owned and just licensed by Amtrak?

The law that created Amtrak provided for it to operate on tracks owned by freight companies, with usage fees, under the condition that passenger trains get higher priority than freight trains. Part of that condition is fines, payable from the freight company to Amtrak, for Amtrak train delays caused by the freight company.

Unfortunately, for various political reasons that part of the law has almost no teeth so freight companies openly flout it or treat the meager fines as the cost of doing business. It's a big part of the reason that passenger rail sucks in the US.

Re: There is no reason to cross the U.S. by train, but I did it anyway

#335

Post by afarrell »

nickjj wrote: post #15
afarrell wrote: post #6

Note that the author took a sleeper car. In terms of price, this is a bit of a luxury. As someone who has taken the Lateshore Limited service all the way from Chicago to Boston in just a regular seat, I would strongly advise you NOT to do that. It is just miserable.

Yeah that's a big difference. The regular seats are a much different story. I've never done it but I read about how it's basically 3 days of sitting shoulder to shoulder with someone and there's no showers. Can't imagine what that would be like in a car filled with 50+ people. I did take the Amtrak from CT To Boston once and it wasn't too bad, but that was a few hour trip. Much different than a few days.

The train wasn’t that full. The problem was trying to sleep. I tried multiple configurations to no avail.

Re: There is no reason to cross the U.S. by train, but I did it anyway

#336

Post by afarrell »

volkl48 wrote: post #51
nickjj wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah that's a big difference. The regular seats are a much different story. I've never done it but I read about how it's basically 3 days of sitting shoulder to shoulder with someone and there's no showers. Can't imagine what that would be like in a car filled with 50+ people. I did take the Amtrak from CT To Boston once and it wasn't too bad, but that was a few hour trip. Much different than a few days.

My understanding is that most people are not actually traveling coast to coast, but on shorter segments of the overall route. I don't think you're likely to be next to the someone for 3 days.

Yea the Lakeshore Limited Albany->Boston is fine.

Re: There is no reason to cross the U.S. by train, but I did it anyway

#337

Post by afarrell »

zackkitzmiller wrote: post #89
afarrell wrote: post #6

Note that the author took a sleeper car. In terms of price, this is a bit of a luxury. As someone who has taken the Lateshore Limited service all the way from Chicago to Boston in just a regular seat, I would strongly advise you NOT to do that. It is just miserable.

I disagree. I often take Amtrak from NYC to Chicago (and back) and just love it. The trip is about 24 hours each way. Train riders are generally friendly. Someone always has a couple of guitars, so it's fun to play and sing along. The bar car is typically friendly and the food car is generally pretty good eats. Also, some of the stopovers in small midwest towns are a few hours long so you can get out, stretch your le…

What do you do for sleep?

> find a nice quiet diner

Oh, are you getting out snd having dinner and sleeping and then catching the train again the next day? That sounds fine.

Re: There is no reason to cross the U.S. by train, but I did it anyway

#338

Post by vonmoltke »

Aloha wrote: post #329
plopz wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fined by who? Aren't all the railways privately owned and just licensed by Amtrak?

Amtrak doesn't even license it - Amtrak is actually owned mostly by the freight railroads.

The National Passenger Rail Corporation is a federally chartered corporation whose controlling interest is owned by the US federal government.

Re: There is no reason to cross the U.S. by train, but I did it anyway

#339

Post by bluewater »

dangrossman wrote: post #292
cjensen wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When evaluating the price, consider that it is also a hotel room and comes with free meals. Compare it to air fare + hotel room for X days + decent meals for X days and the price becomes less painful.

Amtrak's been stripping meals out of the service to save money. The Silver Star [correction: not Silver Meteor also], which runs the length of the east coast from Maine to Florida and back, for example, has no meal car. You can buy the roomettes and the rooms, still for significantly more than a plane ticket, but they do not come with meals. There's a "snack" car for all passengers with a microwave where you can buy…

Quick correction to this comment as I just took the silver meteor recently from FL-NY. Meals are definitely included when booking a room. The dining car has been renovated so perhaps meals were unavailable at some point. The price is significantly more than a plane ticket and while the rooms are older I would not consider them dirty. Sleep is difficult IMO as you do stop, bump around and you’ll occasionally get some random rattling. There is no observation car but they do have a lounge car with tables and snacks. You could get microwave meals like pizza, burgers, etc. Definitely not gourmet fair. The dining car meal is a significant step up and while not winning any Michelin stars is surprisingly decent.

Re: There is no reason to cross the U.S. by train, but I did it anyway

#340

Post by 333c »

godot wrote: post #266
kyleblarson wrote: post #238

My (now) wife and I took the Empire Builder from Seattle to Chicago about 10 years ago. We purchased a private cabin. We were 8 hours late leaving Seattle and couldn't get into our cabin until we got to Spokane because of some sort of merge of trains coming from Portland and Seattle. Got to Spokane, got our cabin, another 6 hour delay. By the time we reached the upper Midwest, they were rationing food, literally cutt…

I took the Coast Starlight (connects SF and LA) a couple of times in the past 10 years, and I have had a pleasant experience each time. Food was good and while the train wasn't sparkling clean, at least in the areas I cared about (my seat and car) it was fine. Just the bathrooms weren't great. Admittedly this is a shorter trip than yours; this one is only an 8~10 hours ride.

I've taken the Coast Starlight about 4-6 times between SF (well, Emeryville) and Portland/Seattle. Most were pretty much on time, except for one time when the train hit a person/car on its trip up from LA. It arrived around 5 hours late at the station and ended up being something like 10 hours late by the time we disembarked.

It can be frustrating to experience long delays if you have a tight schedule, but otherwise I think it makes the most sense to just relax and enjoy the view.

I'll be taking the California Zephyr (Chicago to Emeryville; said to be one of the most picturesque routes) this May, which I'm quite looking forward to. It will be my first time riding that line, and my first time in a sleeper.

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