R
Randy Henderson
Guest
As an OBS attendent who worked the CoNO for over a year, I can attest to the fact that we never restocked the diner in CHI. Due to the 21/22 - 58/59 equipment swap during the daytime layover in CHI, the dining car crew stripped the stock off of the inbound CHI equipment and day stored it at the commissary. That afternoon, the very same "tubs" were placed back onto the outbound equipment, and we were off. Restocking issues is absolutely not a factor in the decision to abolish the diner.
Secondly, I can attest that we would only serve, on a good day, 25 to 30 coach meals in the diner round trip. The vast majority of the long distance coach ridership on the City is between CHI and HMW and Central Mississippi. These passengers are, for a lack of a better word, poor and do not eat, either in the lounge or diner. They bring aboard their food, a lot of chicken. I've been told by the old timers that the City was for years refered to the "Chicken Bone Express." As a coach attendant, I can attest to the truth in that! The train's busiest meals were the breakfast into CHI, very popular with the daily "commuters" traveling between CHM - CHI. Our second most popular meal was the lunch into NOL after leaving Jackson. A lot of people boarding in JAN would race to the diner after boarding to get into the very short lunch before we had to close at McComb. That's it. We never got coach passengers for dinner leaving CHI. Very low turnout for the breakfast out of MEM. Of course the sleeper passengers came to all of the meals, but much of the train's sleeping car passengers only traveled between NOL- MEM; MEM - CHI. Out of the four trips I worked the sleeper on the City, about 2/3 of the rooms turned over at MEM. Using this statistic, I can see how it was easy for management to cut the diner. Just before I left, management was serious about just operating the diner from NOL - MEM, similar to the Texas Eagle diner crew being discharged at Austin, leaving the car unstaffed into SAS. Giving box meals for breakfast into CHI due to train's 9am arrival and box dinner due to the train's 8pm departure could even be eliminated all together if they just modify the train's schedule earlier in CHI and later out of CHI.
As OBS has already said, major changes are coming to Amtrak. As a previous forum member stated, the beltway boys have made already made and approved of these major cuts for the coming fiscal year. It's only the minor details that are being decided now. It's going to get ugly on the rails in the next coming months. For those who want to ride a full service train on the so called "endanged routes", now is the time. Some trains, especially the Silver Service trains, where ridership is among the highest for the long distance trains, are in jeopardy for cuts as well. Time will only tell who's right among us all.
Secondly, I can attest that we would only serve, on a good day, 25 to 30 coach meals in the diner round trip. The vast majority of the long distance coach ridership on the City is between CHI and HMW and Central Mississippi. These passengers are, for a lack of a better word, poor and do not eat, either in the lounge or diner. They bring aboard their food, a lot of chicken. I've been told by the old timers that the City was for years refered to the "Chicken Bone Express." As a coach attendant, I can attest to the truth in that! The train's busiest meals were the breakfast into CHI, very popular with the daily "commuters" traveling between CHM - CHI. Our second most popular meal was the lunch into NOL after leaving Jackson. A lot of people boarding in JAN would race to the diner after boarding to get into the very short lunch before we had to close at McComb. That's it. We never got coach passengers for dinner leaving CHI. Very low turnout for the breakfast out of MEM. Of course the sleeper passengers came to all of the meals, but much of the train's sleeping car passengers only traveled between NOL- MEM; MEM - CHI. Out of the four trips I worked the sleeper on the City, about 2/3 of the rooms turned over at MEM. Using this statistic, I can see how it was easy for management to cut the diner. Just before I left, management was serious about just operating the diner from NOL - MEM, similar to the Texas Eagle diner crew being discharged at Austin, leaving the car unstaffed into SAS. Giving box meals for breakfast into CHI due to train's 9am arrival and box dinner due to the train's 8pm departure could even be eliminated all together if they just modify the train's schedule earlier in CHI and later out of CHI.
As OBS has already said, major changes are coming to Amtrak. As a previous forum member stated, the beltway boys have made already made and approved of these major cuts for the coming fiscal year. It's only the minor details that are being decided now. It's going to get ugly on the rails in the next coming months. For those who want to ride a full service train on the so called "endanged routes", now is the time. Some trains, especially the Silver Service trains, where ridership is among the highest for the long distance trains, are in jeopardy for cuts as well. Time will only tell who's right among us all.