Silver Star has new Café menu and no diner

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tonys96 said:
Philly Amtrak Fan said:
JoeBas said:
xyzzy said:
tonys96 said:
29+ hours from NOL to NYP with no diner?...........AAARRRRRGGGHHHHHHH
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Yes, but not many people ride end-to-end. Even Southern sometimes dropped the diner on the south end of the run.
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And those of us who DO (or close enough, NOL-PHI regularly) will not, not, NOT do so without real food. So you might as well break the nat'l network and truncate the train in ATL.
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Sure you will. What other choice do you have? Is there some other train you're going to take? Oh wait, there is none.

I'm not saying removing the diner isn't wrong but the threat of a boycott isn't really going to work if there isn't any other similar choice available.
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1. Not go

2. Fly
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What if you have to go and don't want to and/or are too afraid to fly (which I am guessing is the case for at least some if not many LD train passengers including myself)? Buses but they're much less comfortable and if bad food is the reason you're not going to take train why would the bus be any more appealing?
 
Philly Amtrak Fan said:
Sure you will. What other choice do you have? Is there some other train you're going to take? Oh wait, there is none.

I'm not saying removing the diner isn't wrong but the threat of a boycott isn't really going to work if there isn't any other similar choice available.
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If Amtrak degrades itself down into that point, there are many, many other choices available for transportation.

Hay, no food? I might as well take a bus and at least the bus stops where I can get some food periodically.
 
tonys96 said:
Philly Amtrak Fan said:
JoeBas said:
xyzzy said:
tonys96 said:
29+ hours from NOL to NYP with no diner?...........AAARRRRRGGGHHHHHHH
Click to expand...
Yes, but not many people ride end-to-end. Even Southern sometimes dropped the diner on the south end of the run.
Click to expand...
And those of us who DO (or close enough, NOL-PHI regularly) will not, not, NOT do so without real food. So you might as well break the nat'l network and truncate the train in ATL.
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Sure you will. What other choice do you have? Is there some other train you're going to take? Oh wait, there is none.

I'm not saying removing the diner isn't wrong but the threat of a boycott isn't really going to work if there isn't any other similar choice available.
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1. Not go

2. Fly
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Exactly. My family and I typically make 2 round trips per year HOS-PHI to visit family. This is a non starter for us without a diner.
 
We will always choose the train over driving, or a bus, or a plane no matter what the food offerings on the train.

Although it is best to have a diner on an LD train- we would be ok with a Cafe car with an enhanced menu. (Even the new enhanced menu can be enhanced IMO.)

For us the train is relaxing and comfortable.
 
NETrainfan said:
We will always choose the train over driving, or a bus, or a plane no matter what the food offerings on the train.
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In other words it's virtually impossible to disappoint you enough to put your future business at risk. Which is fine in and of itself, I mean if you have no standards then why worry about it, but isn't broadcasting your perpetual indifference a bit like playing poker with your cards facing the other players? Kind of like daring Amtrak to do their worst. I guess I just don't understand what you expect to gain by proclaiming your perpetual indifference.
 
Oh- DA- You read things into the post. I did not mean the quality of food- I meant

whether there is a diner or cafe or nothing except water- we will ride the train.

That is my opinion and it is only my opinion and you should not make sweeping judgments

about other people's standards. Are your standards the norm?

We expect Amtrak to get us safely from one place to another, to be on time, to have clean

trains with clean bathrooms, and to offer polite and responsible service. Food is an extra for us.

We enjoy good food- we are cooks; we grow our own vegetables. But we do not expect

gourmet meals on a train. The "dining trains" can do that.

Speaking of standards- we do expect polite exchanges on forums- that is a good standard.
 
There are plenty of different ways to travel approximately 1000 miles. But there has to be one or more reasons that one would take the train over flying, taking the bus, or driving.

In my case, I am kind of afraid of and/or dislike flying, I don't really want to drive that long a distance, and buses are just uncomfortable (and I have done overnight buses too). So with all four options available for a trip of around 1000 miles the train is by far my preferred version of transportation. I can complain all I want about the lack of a direct train from PHL to CHI but I'm not about to say I'm not taking the train and subject myself to one of the other three more undesirable options because of it. Something would drastically have to change for me to fly, drive, or take the bus to Chicago instead of taking the train.

If you're going to say "well I can always fly", why aren't you flying now then? You can get somewhere in 2-3 hrs and you don't have a problem with doing so but instead you choose to take the 15-16 hrs option? Why? You can give me reasons but I would think you're crazy if you tell me the #1 reason (or one of the top five) you would rather take the train instead of fly are those wonderful Amtrak steaks. The scenery? Not going to go away because there's no diner car. The cost? Without the diner car, the cost to take the train in general will be cheaper. I can make similar arguments if you're going to say "well I can always drive" or "well I can always take the bus". Is the reason you're not now the Amtrak steaks?

If I were in charge of Amtrak and you came to my office and said to be give me a diner car or I'll fly/drive/take a bus instead, I would laugh in your face. I know the one thing you won't do and that is take some other train. I'm not saying it isn't wrong that Amtrak wants to remove diner cars and if you would rather take the SM over the SS because of the diner car I get it. But I highly doubt any of you will flat out change your mode of transportation because you can't get the Amtrak steaks anymore and the few of you who actually do Amtrak can find others willing to take your place.

You can complain, you can campaign, but no in Amtrak is holding their breath about you boycotting.
 
"What or where is PHI? Did you mean PHL = Philadelphia?"

Yes, Philadelphia

"There are plenty of different ways to travel approximately 1000 miles. But there has to be one or more reasons that one would take the train over flying, taking the bus, or driving.

In my case, I am kind of afraid of and/or dislike flying, I don't really want to drive that long a distance, and buses are just uncomfortable (and I have done overnight buses too). So with all four options available for a trip of around 1000 miles the train is by far my preferred version of transportation. I can complain all I want about the lack of a direct train from PHL to CHI but I'm not about to say I'm not taking the train and subject myself to one of the other three more undesirable options because of it. Something would drastically have to change for me to fly, drive, or take the bus to Chicago instead of taking the train."
That's YOUR story. Youth tends to believe that their story is everyone's story. It's not.

Philly Amtrak Fan said:
If you're going to say "well I can always fly", why aren't you flying now then? You can get somewhere in 2-3 hrs and you don't have a problem with doing so but instead you choose to take the 15-16 hrs option? Why? You can give me reasons but I would think you're crazy if you tell me the #1 reason (or one of the top five) you would rather take the train instead of fly are those wonderful Amtrak steaks. The scenery? Not going to go away because there's no diner car. The cost? Without the diner car, the cost to take the train in general will be cheaper. I can make similar arguments if you're going to say "well I can always drive" or "well I can always take the bus". Is the reason you're not now the Amtrak steaks?
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We are now, actually, at least partially. Last year's second trip we flew one way and took the train the other, due to the decreasing value we see in taking the train. The value in taking the train for us is that it's a more relaxing, CIVILIZED way to travel. When we started taking Amtrak, we told people that when we flew somewhere, we felt our trip really didn't start until we got there; when we took the train, we felt like it started when we stepped on board. And the time away to decompress again in a CIVILIZED environment had a value to us in excess of the time cost difference in taking that mode.

However, this calculus is steadily changing, as train travel becomes increasingly more UNCIVILIZED and Amtrak races to become more and more like the airlines, only at twice the cost and several times the time investment, and the airport environment becomes slightly (SLIGHTLY) better with the advent of Pre-Check.

So in a way, yes, the Steaks (as you so derisively put it, in your arrogance), or DECENT FOOD (not GOURMET, but REAL NON 7-11 FOOD), are a big part of what makes the train CIVILIZED. So was the cranberry juice for drinking and mixing, which have been axed. So was the morning paper, which has been axed. So was the all-day coffee, which has been axed. And it continues to degenerate.

Philly Amtrak Fan said:
If I were in charge of Amtrak and you came to my office and said to be give me a diner car or I'll fly/drive/take a bus instead, I would laugh in your face. I know the one thing you won't do and that is take some other train. I'm not saying it isn't wrong that Amtrak wants to remove diner cars and if you would rather take the SM over the SS because of the diner car I get it. But I highly doubt any of you will flat out change your mode of transportation because you can't get the Amtrak steaks anymore and the few of you who actually do Amtrak can find others willing to take your place.

You can complain, you can campaign, but no in Amtrak is holding their breath about you boycotting.
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Well, thank God for everyone, you're nowhere near being old, educated or bright enough to worry about you being in charge of Amtrak anytime soon then. Because a business whose CEO has such contempt for its paying clients that they actually laugh in their face, leads a company that is doomed to the trash heap of history. You seem to be locked into the fact that Amtrak has a monopoly on train travel, and can just say "It's my way or the highway", without any realization that for the VAST MAJORITY of people, that kind of attitude will lead directly to a response of "Okay, the highway it is then... literally. Enjoy your bankrupcy!"
 
JoeBas said:
Enjoy your bankrupcy!"
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Well, the calculus, as you put it Joe, is that Amtrak is already bankrupt and has never been otherwise afaik. Further, the unpleasant calculus is that the losses diminish along with the passenger load. Ugh!

Congress, not Amtrak, not Boardman, singled out food and beverage losses as a sore point; she who writes the checks calls the tunes. If you don't like what Amtrak is being forced to do COMPLAIN TO YOUR CONGRESS PERSON. To continue the calculus analogy, what happens with Amtrak is not necessarily a function of ineptitude, poor management et cetera ad nauseam, but is a direct result of Congressional dictate.
 
I would think there has to be some kind of good avenue to put Amtrak back into PRIVATE hands, likely the Host Railroads themselves by offering them some kind of incentives to form a "Big 5" (or however many end up being involved) Pool to run it and run it properly. I don't know about CSX or NS, but I just don't see BNSF or Union Pacific wanting their share of passenger service to be a second rate product. Just take a look at the beautiful UP Heritage Fleet.
 
But then there is the SP and other Class I "Run em off" Playbook that was followed in tbe 60s and early 70s. (pleasant exceptions being Santa Fe and Southern and a couple of others)

Basically Class Is don't want anything to do with LD Passenger Trains!
 
Evidence from elsewhere in the world suggests that when you try to transfer passenger service to private hands you have to be ready to increase subsidies by a factor of 1.5 to 2.5 depending on how thoroughly you wish to do the transfer. There is no free lunch and private sector is not financially more efficient for maintaining the same service or better all around. There is a reason that there have not been any serious takers for various attempts to entice the freight railroads into passenger service. They may be many things but they are not idiots.
 
OlympianHiawatha said:
I would think there has to be some kind of good avenue to put Amtrak back into PRIVATE hands, likely the Host Railroads themselves by offering them some kind of incentives to form a "Big 5" (or however many end up being involved) Pool to run it and run it properly.
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I'm not sure how that would be meaningful than the Amtrak we have today.
 
OlympianHiawatha said:
I would think there has to be some kind of good avenue to put Amtrak back into PRIVATE hands, likely the Host Railroads themselves by offering them some kind of incentives to form a "Big 5" (or however many end up being involved) Pool to run it and run it properly. I don't know about CSX or NS, but I just don't see BNSF or Union Pacific wanting their share of passenger service to be a second rate product. Just take a look at the beautiful UP Heritage Fleet.
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jis said:
Evidence from elsewhere in the world suggests that when you try to transfer passenger service to private hands you have to be ready to increase subsidies by a factor of 1.5 to 2.5 depending on how thoroughly you wish to do the transfer. There is no free lunch and private sector is not financially more efficient for maintaining the same service or better all around. There is a reason that there have not been any serious takers for various attempts to entice the freight railroads into passenger service. They may be many things but they are not idiots.
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I think that in a dream world we'd have multiple companies offering similar intercity rail services and we'd have choices and competition to lead to a better overall product. I think those of you old enough to remember the pre-Amtrak days (I'm not in that category) will probably tell you rail service was better pre-Amtrak than post-Amtrak. And when a private company is involved, you would think they care more about success than the federal government cares about Amtrak. Then who does and does not get rail service will be dependent on ridership and revenue instead of being based on politics.

Of course as jjs said rail travel in 2016 isn't as profitable as it was before the days of the airplane. But it appears that rail travel is more popular today than it was back in the 1970's and at least a few trains in the Amtrak system are going 100+ miles and there are at least some proposals of other high speed rail service (Xpress West, Texas, and Brightline among others). Typical LD service today is when I last checked around 50 mph. Right now the LSL travels 959 miles in about 19 hours. If Amtrak can travel the same route at even 70 mph, that cuts the time to under 14 hours and it would be hard for any driver or bus to average 70 mph on the highways. Then demand for overnight trains is going to increase rapidly. If the technology evolves and right of ways can be negotiated, maybe in 10-20 years passenger rail will be profitable enough for companies to want to get involved.

Getting back to the Silver Star dining car removed, Amtrak did "experiment" with the dining car removed for about half a year now. You can debate the validity of the financial numbers Amtrak publishes but Amtrak seems to find the experiment at least somewhat successful or not detrimental enough to say this is a bad idea. If so many passengers really thought that removal of the diner car was a deal breaker and ridership and revenue plummeted during that time, chances are they wouldn't have extended this further. Maybe there are people who really aren't big on the food and can deal with the cafe car and I can say I might try to get a sleeper instead of just a coach seat if the price was more reasonable. So Amtrak at least makes more money off me in that scenario.
 
Pre Amtrak, I believe a lot of passenger trains used to carry the mail. The loss of that business in the late 1960s essentially doomed many of the existing passenger trains, including the one that had my forum name.

That business won't be coming back, but I think you'd need some similar revenue enhancement added to basic passenger service to make the major rail carriers willing to run passenger trains again.
 
Yes, the death-knell for the American passenger train seems to have been the loss of "head-end" revenue. Off topic, but does anyone remember the REA cars?
 
Those few who remember the passenger trains of the 1930s through the early 1950s no doubt remember them as being better than Amtrak.

Those who only remember the passenger trains of the late 1960s certainly think Amtrak was a LOT better -- the late-period Pennsy, NYC, Lehigh Valley, Erie Lackawanna, New Haven, B&M stories I've read -- horrorshows. Under Alfred Perlman, NYC often didn't even have working lights or heat in the cars, apparently.

Having looked into it pretty deeply, the point at which passenger trains started to lose money was the federal funding of free roads, combined with widespread cheap automobile sales running on cheap gasoline, combined with free parking on citiy streets, in the 1920s. Passenger trains were often profitable right through the 1910s. They couldn't compete financially with the cheap autos, cheap gas, and government-provided free roads of the 1920s. The autos also blocked the tracks of the streetcars, so this is when the first big round of streetcar and interurban company bankruptcies happened. The train lines with their own right-of-way held up better, got some boosts during the 1930s (when more people couldn't afford cars, and parking meters first appeared), and got a big boost during WWII when gasoline was rationed... but the financial death knell was the free Interstates of the 1950s.

I'm not sure trains ever really competed with airplanes. Commercial airplanes were an expensive luxury for the rich from their introduction until, frankly, deregulation in the 1980s. It was the subsidies to passenger cars which caused passenger trains to become unprofitable.
 
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I agree with that assessment. Frankly I don't think passenger trains really compete with airplanes even today except for a few short/medium length corridors. For example, I don't think the cut throat competition on the NEC - Florida market that the airlines (JetBlue, American, United, Delta, Southwest and a few others) are involved in, really feels any effect of the existence of Amtrak in that market.
 
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The late 60's definitely did see a great decline in the quality of passenger service in the northeast. But, with a few exceptions (SP comes to mind) the railroads elsewhere continued to operate LD trains that were far better than Amtrak in terms of quality and variety of equipment, professionalism of employees, and certainly in quality of food. Sure, their numbers were greatly reduced and they had fewer sleepers, but those that remained continued to show a great deal of corporate pride. Especially notable: SCL, ATSF, Chessie, IC, and UP. I rode 'em all. The only thing missing: Amtrak's showers!
 
I rode around some on trains when I was in the US for a year back in '65/'66. The sense I got was that in the northeast things had pretty much gone to hell in a handbasket already. The Senator that I rode basically had no working A/C in the middle of sweltering summer day. The only notional A/C was provided by open dutch doors and open vestibule doors.There were a few LD trains that were operated with much elan, but no one was convinced that it would last another ten years. the general feeling I got was, ride 'em while you can. in ten years we will pretty much not have any passenger train service worth talking about other than some remaining commuters systems. So while there were some that were really good, there did not seem to be any sens of hope that they will remain so for any significant amount of time. In short, the writing on the wall was pretty much being read by all, as Pennsylvania Station in new York was being dismantled.
 
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