A New day For Amtrak
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Joel N. Weber II
Engineer
But it wasn't a regular scheduled passenger service that lasted for decades, and it wasn't something that the railroads had dozens of copies of. (Then again, maybe Acela trainsets are also something that Amtrak doesn't have dozens of copies of.)
Joel N. Weber II
Engineer
Running passenger trains frequently requires signifcant ridership. You can do a lot to entice people away from airplanes if you can remove the excuse that the airplane is faster. Otherwise, I think it's hard to get the majority of the US population excited about trains.
Joel N. Weber II
Engineer
The Autotrain also requires that you bring an automobile to ride it at all. When I took the Lake Shore Limited from Boston to Chicago, I don't think I was terribly interested in paying cab fare from Boston to New York Penn Station (I don't own an automobile these days). Whereas maybe a three to four hour drive wouldn't have bothered me if I actually was trying to get an automobile to Chicago.
RailFanLNK
Conductor
Last night when we were waiting at the station (midnight), I saw a friend of mine walking with a guy. I approached and it was her brother who lived in McCook NE. (a stop on the CZ) He had taken a train trip for the first time in 40 years. He had never ridden Amtrak but decided to take the CZ due to fuel costs and the hassle of driving. He was IMPRESSED! And is going to do it more often. Its just simple things like this situation where you can gain a new rider. He was very happy, the #6 had been about 1 hour late and the #5 was running about 30 minutes late which isn't bad.
George Harris
Engineer
The fastest speeds were probably in the 110 to 120 mph range.
The fastest speed limits ever before the northeast corridor work done for the Metroliners was 100 mph, and there was quite a bit of that. There was a lot of 90 mph speed limits particularly in the west. A few examples:
100 mph
Santa Fe: probably well over half of Chicago to Los Angeles
Milwaukee: much of St. Paul to Chicago
Illinois Central: one division in Illinois
ACL: much of Richmond to Jacksonville
90 mph
quite a bit of the CB&Q, Chicago St. Paul, Chicago Omaha?, Dallas Houston
Union Pacific: much of Omaha to Ogden
In general, the New York Central and Pennsylvania Railroads never had limits higher than 80 mph, despite having the heaviest volumes of long distance passenger trains in the country
Green Maned Lion
Engineer
Its plenty to sneeze at. It was a ridiculous marketing stunt done simply to be a marketing stunt. It would be like running the Acela from Washington to NYP in 2 hours. Sure, its possible. Its illegal, but its possible. To what end? None that I can think of.
had8ley
Engineer
Nobody is a doubting Thomas as the Acela whizzes by at 150 mph (not far off the 186 mph mark and that was over 40 years ago.). Irregardless of publicity stunt or not, the train did attain a speed of 186 MPH. The Wright brothers flew at speeds slower than the stall speed of a Cessna 150 and look at how most people, except for the AU faithful, travel around the country today.
So GML reckons 186mph is just a marketing stunt?! Better get on the phone to SNCF, DB ,RENFE and Eurostar and give them the really bad news.....
A quicker journey time allows you to make better use of your trainsets, the quicker you get to your destination, the quicker you can set off back again.
Means you need less trainsets to run the service, or you can run more trains for a given number of trainsets. Surely even you can see that?
There is also a slight matter of attracting more passengers to the service, such as the recent decrease in journey time from Paris to Strasbourg, was 4hrs for 300 miles, now is 2hr 20 and more reductions to come. Allows people to travel further and quicker and spend the time save doing the things they want to do, see their family, do their business, meet their friends,whatever.
Makes a significant difference to how people live their lives and how they spend their free time.
Not everyone has or wants to spend 8 hours sat on their butt making scrambled eggs.....
ThayerATM
OBS Chief
In an attempt to get back to the starting point of this thread---
If I want to get from point A (say ROC) to point B (say SAC), it's going to take a car, or a plane, or a train. Teleportation hasn't been invented yet, and I sure don't want to walk it.
The price of gasoline will stabalize sooner or later. In the meantine, I think that Amtrak is going to be a big winner. Car travel is getting pretty expensive because of gasoline, and it takes a lot of time. Plane travel is getting pretty expensive and takes less time, but it's a pretty miserable experience.
Train travel is somewhere in the middle. Sure... Amtrak has its difficulties in satisfying everybody, but it sure looks like the best alternative (to me) for getting from A to B, and have a bunch of fun in the process.
I've already begun my campaign by writing my reps in Albany and Washington. Clinton is one of my Senators, and I wrote to Obama too.
Let's keep a positive attitude and begin promoting train travel to everybody.
Casey Jones ran train oiver 100 mph and this was the 1800's.
transit54
Conductor
Much of this, and the overall situation with longer distance passenger rail travel in the US, reminds me of the ferry in downtown Burlington, VT. Lake Champlain is served by three ferries - one north of Burlington (the main one), one south of Burlington, and one which departs directly from downtown Burlington May-October (this is one, incidentally, that connects to Amtrak in Port Kent, NY and is the one mentioned in the Adirondack schedule).
All over Burlington there are these signs that have historical information on the place that you're standing. There's one of these down at the ferry terminal, and on it, among other things, is a photo of an old steam ferry with a caption that reads, "In 1857, a new, faster ferry was placed in service to Port Kent, which shortened the crossing time to 37 minutes."
Today, the ferry takes an hour and fifteen minutes to cross. Talk about progress.
All over Burlington there are these signs that have historical information on the place that you're standing. There's one of these down at the ferry terminal, and on it, among other things, is a photo of an old steam ferry with a caption that reads, "In 1857, a new, faster ferry was placed in service to Port Kent, which shortened the crossing time to 37 minutes."
Today, the ferry takes an hour and fifteen minutes to cross. Talk about progress.
Green Maned Lion
Engineer
Dude, that particular engine was a massive marketing stunt. No train uses its "technology" and thank god for that. It was basically a Budd RDC with a jet engine strapped onto its back. Craig Breedlove demonstrated that if you mount a jet engine on a wheeled dart, it can break the speed of sound. Care to think of a practical application for your next Camry?
I'm not saying that fast trains don't have a place, nor am I against them. But we aren't there yet. Lets get Congress to properly fund what we have before we ask for the moon. But to continue my coment on the NYC Jet RDC, it taught us nothing, caused nothing, created nothing. It had no useful purpose other than marketing. This is the description of... a marketing stunt, which is what it was, what it is, and what it will always be.
Can you afford to pay $4 per gallon of gas in your vehicle? If not, take public transportation.
My apologies if anybody has already mentioend this. But about 1905, the Broadway Limtied broke the speed limit at about 127 mph near Ada, Ohio.
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