December 2014 Monthly Performance Report

[afigg]

The December 2014 Monthly Performance Report (66 page PDF) has been released. The highlights.

Overall, December was a good month financially, but had a decline in ridership and ticket revenue. Part of the December ridership drop-off can be attributed to the Sunday after Thanksgiving falling on November 30 in 2014, while in 2013, the Sunday was on December 1, putting that peak travel day in December in 2013. Howver, the report also states: "In addition, lower gas prices began to have some negative impact on Amtrak demand, especially on Northeast Regional and state corridors."

For the month of December, Amtrak ran an operating adjusted loss of $4.4 million. For the first 3 months of FY15, the company has an adjusted operating surplus of $5.3 million, but the Net loss (before the adjustments of backing out depreciation, OPEBs, etc) is $217.6 million. Capital spending for the YTD remains well below the authorized levels.

Ridership and Ticket Revenue

A good month for the Pacific Surfliner, Capital Corridor, Pere Marquette, WAS-Norfolk, Pennsylvanian, Empire, and Keystone services. Not so good for the NE Regionals and the LD trains as a group.

Ridership and Revenue summary for the month of December:

System: ridership -2.1%, revenue: -2.6%

Acela: ridership +1.8%, revenue: +1.1%

NE Regional: ridership -4.2%, revenue -4.9%

State supported corridors: ridership -1.7%, revenue -4.0%

LD trains: ridership -2.5%, revenue -2.5%

Ridership and Revenue summary for the first quarter from October to December:

System: ridership +1.7%, revenue: +4.3%

Acela: ridership -1.2%, revenue: +5.4%

NE Regional: ridership +3.4%, revenue +7.1%

State supported corridors: ridership +2.3%, revenue +4.0%

LD trains: ridership -0.5%, revenue -0.1%

On-Time Performance: after an awful summer and through most of the fall, the system wide endpoint OTP improved to 76.3% in December. The LD trains endpoint OTP was 65.9%, which was an improvement over the December 2013 55.2% mark.

 

[afigg]

Ridership and Revenue summary for the first quarter from October to December:

LD trains: ridership -0.5%, revenue -0.1%

Some analysis follow-up from the December report for the LD trains. Looking at the LD ridership numbers for the quarter, what hurt the ridership totals was the big decline for the Empire Builder and the LSL, both off by the same percentage of a hefty -12.1% for the quarter. If I remove the ridership numbers for the EB and LSL and add them for the remaining 13 LD trains, the Oct-Dec FY14 versus FY15 numbers are better:
LD trains (minus EB and LSL): ridership +2.2%, revenue +3.4%

The terrible on-time performance and delays are obviously what has hurt both the EB and LSL. Both trains have been much better for OTP since December, but it is going to take some months for the ridership to recover, perhaps longer, given how bad the delays were and that the OTP doesn't crater again come summer track work season. The persistent delays the LSL continues to encounter across upper state NY can't be helping with in-state traffic either.

 

[Bus Nut]

I'm surprised by the gas price impact. It must be very short trips. The drop in price was very dramatic but there are multiple costs associated with car travel, not just gasoline. Perhaps some riders are relying on "informal" transportation.

 

[wolfspirit]

I'm surprised by the gas price impact. It must be very short trips. The drop in price was very dramatic but there are multiple costs associated with car travel, not just gasoline. Perhaps some riders are relying on "informal" transportation.

I would also guess that you see more transition at the higher price buckets. $80 round-trip for me to travel to DC on a train, going to take the train. Some of those high fare buckets, I'm driving.

I am at a loss to explain where the Pennsylvanian keeps finding more people to take the train. It averaged 22 extra people on each train over last december. There are currently places with actual train stations that get less people than flag stops in PA, is there a point where Amtrak is required to turn them back into a regular stop? If this year continues at the current pace, it will keep the streak going for another year of out-growing the NEC in both passenger count, and % ticket revenue over LY.

 

[afigg]

I am at a loss to explain where the Pennsylvanian keeps finding more people to take the train. It averaged 22 extra people on each train over last december. There are currently places with actual train stations that get less people than flag stops in PA, is there a point where Amtrak is required to turn them back into a regular stop? If this year continues at the current pace, it will keep the streak going for another year of out-growing the NEC in both passenger count, and % ticket revenue over LY.

Don't know if there are set rules for keeping a station as a flag stop versus scheduled stop. The 2 flag stops for the Pennsylvanian are not that busy with Latrobe getting 4,631 and Tyrone 3,346 passengers in FY14. Latrobe works out to an average of 6.3 passengers getting on or off per train, but that won't be evenly distributed. Maybe those stations get a lot more passengers on Friday and Sundays with days of no one getting on or off. By keeping them as flag stops, skipping those stops would save time and fuel.
As for the Pennsylvanian, the ridership growth is good news. As to where the growth is coming from, the Pennsylvanian had 64,689 passengers in the first quarter. Pretty sure more people took the PA Turnpike, buses, or airline flights along the PHL-PGH axis in the first quarter than rode Amtrak. Sustained ridership growth helps to make a case for PennDOT to fund a second daily Pennsylvanian service. There is a study report on possible improvements to the Western Keystone corridor that was funded and supposedly approved by the FRA, but that report still has not been released AFAIK. With a new pro passenger rail governor in PA, I think there will be movement on adding more service between PHL and PGH in the next several years.

 

[Bus Nut]

Ironically, I think all the drama over cancelling the Pennsylvanian due to funding issues was the best publicity the train had gotten in years!

A second train would probably be really good for ridership.

 

[cirdan]

I am at a loss to explain where the Pennsylvanian keeps finding more people to take the train. It averaged 22 extra people on each train over last december. There are currently places with actual train stations that get less people than flag stops in PA, is there a point where Amtrak is required to turn them back into a regular stop? If this year continues at the current pace, it will keep the streak going for another year of out-growing the NEC in both passenger count, and % ticket revenue over LY.

I guess it may be that the Pennsylavian has been discussed in the news a bit, especially in views of threats it might be defunded.

They say no news is bad news, so just by talking about it, people may have become more aware of its existence.