What this would mean is that a much larger proportion of WAS- NYP trains will be continuing to or from Richmond. There are a couple of things to consider:
On time performance for the northbound departures from Washington. Trains are frequently delayed in Virginia. Is the state or Amtrak going to take over dispatching from CSX?
More NEC trains will be leaving from the lower-level tracks. I hope there are plans to put in high level platforms down there. I generally prefer to board on the upper-level tracks with the high platforms. There's also the issue of ADA compliance, which is currently handled with the hand-cranked wheelchair lifts. Unless they get high platforms on the lover level, loading wheelchair users will become more cumbersome for more riders. Also, for those of us who use the lounge, it would be nice to restore the direct boarding to the lower level, or at least make announcements for Regionals in the lounge and have priority boarding for Select Plus/Executive, seniors, families with children, military in uniform ,etc. at the gate like they used to have. In short, I'm really not fond of boarding crowded New York-bound trains from the lower-level platforms at Washington.
Well, Richmond and other destinations in VA. Remember, Virginia (and NC) should have 1-2 tracks under their control essentially from Charlotte to Washington once the current plans are complete: VA has half of the RF&P ROW in their possession, as well as the S-Line south of Richmond (down to the border, where NC takes over until Raleigh). I forget the
exact situation of the Raleigh-Charlotte line (IIRC it's state-owned but leased to NS).
At least as far as WAS-RGH, my understanding is "Two passenger tracks WAS-FBG, then one with passing sidings FBG-RGH". Remember, even with massively ramped-up service you've really only got about 1tph/hour on that line - you don't really need full double track until you get rather more than that.
I'm not sure who exactly is going to run the dispatching (there's a provision that allows VA and CSX to use one another's tracks in the event of a derailment, but in general the pax/freight traffic is supposed to stay separate), but I suspect that VA owning their tracks is going to limit the stupid games (or at least supplement them with stupid prizes). The bigger risk would be VRE/Amtrak getting in one another's way - this has been an issue with CSX (who get bigger payments for OTP from VRE), but in theory the two should be able to work out their schedules. But that should take care of trains on the "spine". The trickier point is those going to Roanoke/Lynchburg and Hampton Roads (though Newport News, in particular, may resolve itself if CSX decides to dump the Peninsula Subdivision - we're hoping for that).
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If I'm in Amtrak's shoes, I'll be honest - I'd probably look to split the branding between the VA trains and the NEC-restricted trains. You're basically at the point where even if Amtrak re-adds a batch of trains, Virginia (and/or North Carolina) will probably be accounting for a majority of those trains (and the vast majority that aren't leaving during times that would yield awkward times in VA). Actually, the "better" move might be to exercise the options on the Acela IIs (the extra cars), possibly put in for a few more sets, and (outside of those shoulder hours) just have the Acela brand/equipment (or whatever the heck they come up with) be the NEC brand. This would be closer to the proposal that some group or another came up with (they suggested three-class service on the high-speed trains and some other odds and ends).
I think this particularly makes sense since between the VA plans, the NC plans, and some other suggested stuff you're
probably looking at VA being able to account for most Regionals (basically, any train that would leave Richmond after 0500 or arrive in Richmond before 0000). The 2030 plans (four additional Regionals to Richmond)
probably exceeds the number of currently "available" Regionals that comply with this: There are five Regionals available which comply with the above standard, and it looks like VA has plans to add six (presuming that the extra train in 2026 isn't just pulled forward from 2030). You
could make it work with 172/137 (astoundingly, you could run that pair with a single crew south of Washington), but the endpoint times at RVR are getting
extremely early. Admittedly, with the VA track improvements those trains' times get quite close to 0000/0500 (172 probably gets there for RVR while 137 is touchier; both probably fall out of that timeframe at RVM) and there's also the option to add a few stops (essentially running 172 as a version of VRE 304) to nudge utilization up. 137 wouldn't replace an existing train on a similar schedule, but doing that would make it akin to the late MARC "sweep" train (the one that leaves WAS after 2200).
By the way, I think VA will also want/need to look at one or two round-trips that don't continue to New York (due to obscene operating times) - the lack of any departures after 1600 from Hampton Roads (or after 1700 from Richmond Main) is a bit of a deficiency, as is the plausible presence of only one train arriving before 1000 (and nothing before 0900) at Richmond and nothing before 1100 in Hampton Roads. The VA plans and the dual modes should help here somewhat, but it's still
really thin since a "sane" departure from NYP really locks up your morning options out of WAS southbound (in particular - northbound isn't
quite as handcuffed because there's more "after work" time).
Again, given my druthers I'd talk to MARC about the possibility of "taking over" a pair of super-early/super-late trains going to Baltimore (the post-2200 one from WAS and one of the pre-0600 ones from BAL) and running them as "reserved south of WAS, unreserved/MARC tickets honored north of WAS". There was a VA ridership projection I read like 6-8 years back that said (in so many words) that once VA starts approaching full build-out, the #1 stop out of VA is going to be WAS...but BAL and BWI move
way up the list (BAL becomes #2, and IIRC BWI was ahead of PHL and NYP as well). The other option, of course, would be to fiddle with things so that such a pair of trains is also running overnight from BOS, but I'm wary about ridership potential for anything that dumps WAS (in particular) too late at night - and believe me, I
want a train that would pair with a "flipped" copy of 66/67 (i.e. something like the old 0315 departure from WAS, which would probably leave Richmond around midnight/arrive in New York around 0700, and a matching number aimed at hitting Richmond around 0730 and Hampton Roads around 0900).