Deutsche Bahn has joined the Star Alliance. Should Amtrak follow?

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allanorn said:
sometimes for legal reasons (like France)
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Not really, the "ban on short flights" is a joke, only 3 routes are actually banned (Paris Orly <> Bordeaux / Nantes / Lyon), and they still exist to/from Paris CDG.
Even Lyon <> Marseille (158 mi / 255 km, a 1:40 train trip) is still allowed...
 
slasher-fun said:
Not really, the "ban on short flights" is a joke, only 3 routes are actually banned (Paris Orly <> Bordeaux / Nantes / Lyon), and they still exist to/from Paris CDG.
Even Lyon <> Marseille (158 mi / 255 km, a 1:40 train trip) is still allowed...
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My impression was that it was only Paris originating primarily O/D flights, hence Orly, and locations served directly by TGV. CDG flights I suppose have considerable international connecting traffic. I had never heard of any ban on any flights that did not serve Paris. Of course it is possible that on this side of the pond advocates overhyped things a bit and confused themselves. 🤷🏻
 
It was about:
- initially every flight between city pairs where a train connection under 4 hours exists
- then the 4 hours turned into 2.5 hours
- then if an airport has a long-distance train station (CDG and LYS), this station had to be taken in account, instead of the main train stations serving the city served by the airport
- then was added that existing train schedule between these two stations have to have "enough frequencies" and "satisfactory schedules" year round
- then was added the possibility for a discretionary exemption...

So from the initial 23 routes that were to be in the scope of this measure, there were only... 3 in the end.
And of course, that's only for intra-France flights, there are still flights every day between Paris and Brussels (1:22 by train), Luxembourg (2:12), London (2:21), Strasbourg and Frankfurt (1:48), etc.
 
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Yeah, I'm not surprised that details were overlooked in American media reporting on international news items. They focused on "OMG, you have to use a train!" over some of the finer details.

I do remember the Austrian government apparently making Austrian (the airline) stop offering some domestic flights into Vienna as part of their COVID bailout - I can't remember if it was Salzburg or if other airports were designated.
 
Doesn't, (or didn't) UA have some kind of code share or alliance with Amtrak at Newark, NJ? IIRC, they even had reciprocal use of each others lounges...
 
cirdan said:
With train services on that corridor being fast and frequent and relatively cheap, I don't think that the airline share of the modal split was ever very significant.

So abolishing these flights will not have hurt the airline very much, or made a very big impact in the bigger picture of things.
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I'm not sure how many flights they ran, but I wouldn't be surprised if they had at least a couple of day for O/D traffic specifically to connect to international flights.

I had to remind myself a few years ago that functional train service exists in Europe. I admit to looking at flights from Prague to Vienna years ago, which are available but are at least three times as expensive as the train and took longer overall from city center to city center. It's a hard habit to break if you live in a country where the default is to look at flying even short-haul if it's not within reasonable driving distance.

railiner said:
Doesn't, (or didn't) UA have some kind of code share or alliance with Amtrak at Newark, NJ? IIRC, they even had reciprocal use of each others lounges...
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No longer available. UA inherited it at the merger with CO.
 
railiner said:
Doesn't, (or didn't) UA have some kind of code share or alliance with Amtrak at Newark, NJ? IIRC, they even had reciprocal use of each others lounges...
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The program ended in 2020. It was a lopsided arrangement with most of the advantages of lounge sharing accruing to AGR Members, so much so that AGR members had more United lounge usage rights than United Mileage Plus members. It worked fine when it was a Continental deal because Continental did not have any overseas lounges worth talking about, and many fewer domestic lounges. Compared to that United has a vast network of lounges. And all that United passengers got to use were the NEC Amtrak lounges in exchange.

The actual code share was minuscule on Amtrak, only between EWR and Wilmington, Philly, Stamford and New Haven. No codeshare to Washington DC, Baltimore, New York, Providence or Boston. That was it. And the fact that no Acela stopped at EWR made it that much less attractive at least notionally.

Frankly there was very little in it for United Customers (except for rapidly accumulating AGR points on United flights I suppose. Not sure what restrictions were there on that) and quite a bit more for Amtrak customers. I don't think too many people really shed tears or miss it when it went away. Basically United let it lapse when it came up for renewal at the end of the previous contract period.

Here is the old FlyerTalk page on that relationship...

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/uni...codeshare-faq-including-zfv-philadelphia.html
 
jis said:
The program ended in 2020. It was a lopsided arrangement with most of the advantages of lounge sharing accruing to AGR Members, so much so that AGR members had more United lounge usage rights than United Mileage Plus members. It worked fine when it was a Continental deal because Continental did not have any overseas lounges worth talking about, and many fewer domestic lounges. Compared to that United has a vast network of lounges. And all that United passengers got to use were the NEC Amtrak lounges in exchange.

The actual code share was minuscule on Amtrak, only between EWR and Wilmington, Philly, Stamford and New Haven. No codeshare to Washington DC, Baltimore, New York, Providence or Boston. That was it. And the fact that no Acela stopped at EWR made it that much less attractive at least notionally.

Frankly there was very little in it for United Customers (except for rapidly accumulating AGR points on United flights I suppose. Not sure what restrictions were there on that) and quite a bit more for Amtrak customers. I don't think too many people really shed tears or miss it when it went away. Basically United let it lapse when it came up for renewal at the end of the previous contract period.

Here is the old FlyerTalk page on that relationship...

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/uni...codeshare-faq-including-zfv-philadelphia.html
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Slightly off topic but adjacent - in the era before spend requirements, I met a few UA mileage runners that would find the really cheap tickets ZFV-EWR-SAN and back. I would shuttle them to a local gelato shop while they were on their layover at SAN as they were often on the redeye back to EWR.
 

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