Do major airline disruptions ever affect Amtrak?

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TaseMeBro

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As many have probably heard, Skywest, an operator for Delta (primarily) as well as a few of the other domestic carriers is going through major cancellations the past day or so, with over 700 flights cancelled. I happened to be on one of those - which was set to take me to the start point of a LD trip on the Southwest Chief. Fortunately, I was able to get another flight (barely) on Southwest, and will still be able to make it.

With so many flights cancelled, mislocated crews, time outs, etc - many will be delayed *days*, not just hours.

In cases like this (which, admittedly are seldom), does Amtrak ever "feel" it?

Obviously, some folks who were connecting Air-to-Rail will miss their scheduled travel, but is there any influx of bookings from people who look to Amtrak to get all or part of the way they're going?
 
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Probably in the NEC, several people will see if there is a convenient train if they can't get a flight, and maybe on other popular corridors such as the California Services. Other than that, I doubt many people would think of trains. I feel that people would think about renting a car before Amtrak.
 
One night I was working train 66 towards Boston, and was expecting to top out with less than 45 people onboard around Philly. Well…we get to BWI Airport and picked up just over 200 people. The airport shut down due to snow, and many people were trying to get back to Boston.

But as Cal said, it’s mostly corridor services that see this happen. NEC, California, maybe a couple of city pairs on the Chicago services. I can’t really say I’ve seen an influx of riders due to disruptions on the Cascades, though I will say that there are many riders who use the train to travel to the other airport to save money on tickets and/or have better flight options.
 
One night I was working train 66 towards Boston, and was expecting to top out with less than 45 people onboard around Philly. Well…we get to BWI Airport and picked up just over 200 people. The airport shut down due to snow, and many people were trying to get back to Boston.

But as Cal said, it’s mostly corridor services that see this happen. NEC, California, maybe a couple of city pairs on the Chicago services. I can’t really say I’ve seen an influx of riders due to disruptions on the Cascades, though I will say that there are many riders who use the train to travel to the other airport to save money on tickets and/or have better flight options.

In an unabashed way, this story warms my heart.
 
Let's just say this: My first Amtrak trip, from Houston to Chicago and on to East Lansing, Michigan, took place in July of 1979 (it had been reserved months before). If you look up the major events of July 1979, one you will find hard to miss is: "United Airlines strike."

You couldn't get a seat on that train. In fact the conductor was assigning seats in the lounge car. And due to shoddy maintenance half of the A/C on the train was out before we got to Chicago. Fortunately not in my (ex-ATSF) Hi-Level coach car, else I might have been one of the many who said, "Never again!"
 
I'd say that less than 5% of the people I talk to who don't want to fly but take their car long distance even know about train service from their city to our area. And those that do mostly don't think about it when they can't drive or fly. They just put off their trip.
For those that suddenly find themselves unable to fly for any reason but who generally fly all the time, I'd say it is a rare person who knows how to spell Amtrak, much less think about it.
 
I'd say that less than 5% of the people I talk to who don't want to fly but take their car long distance even know about train service from their city to our area. And those that do mostly don't think about it when they can't drive or fly. They just put off their trip.
For those that suddenly find themselves unable to fly for any reason but who generally fly all the time, I'd say it is a rare person who knows how to spell Amtrak, much less think about it.
Unfortunately, you are correct. I know that the International was running through from Chicago to Toronto (via Port Huron, Blue Water route) from at least 1983 because I took it from East Lansing to Chicago at that time. IIRC, it was discontinued after 9/11 due to security paranoia. I still recall a newspaper article about the last run of the (through) train; as part of it they interviewed a man who said he was traveling from Michigan to Ontario to visit relatives. It was his first trip, and he said (from memory, paraphrased) that this train is fantastic, it's comfortable, it runs exactly where I want to go when I want to go, and if I'd only known it was here I would have been riding it regularly for the past fifteen years. But his first trip was his last trip, and after that it was back to driving.
 
Hubby and I were on the EB one winter, and the conductor warned us over the PA system that the train would be filling to 100% capacity at Williston, because there was a blizzard going on that had stopped air traffic. Some of them were just headed to the midwest, but many of these guys were trying to make connections in Chicago, and they were going to miss their original plane -- but with long time-off periods, it was worth it to them to catch the train and get there next-day, instead of sitting in their man-camps waiting for the backlog to clear out.

BTW, the blizzard that stopped air traffic didn't have much of an impact on our train. After a longer-than-normal stop at Williston to load the crowd, we made our way in the usual fashion towards Chicago. They filled every available coach seat and sleeper.
 
The main problem with airlines is equipment and crew availability. When there's a delay on Amtrak, the biggest problem is supposed to be scheduling a proper slot for the train since they carefully set the slots. And maybe equipment availability. Doesn't the Auto Train only have two trainsets?

What happened when there was track flooding and they washed out? I think Amtrak has been through that before. However, I'm not sure it's the same as what airlines see, which is that a plane might need to start in Miami, head to Dallas, then Seattle, then Chicago. And with very little room to make up for a delayed plane.
 
What happened when there was track flooding and they washed out? I think Amtrak has been through that before.
It depends. There are a lot of variables, the availability of open alternate routes, willingness and capacity of a host railroad to take a detour, availability of pilot crews, availability of bus charters, which highways are open.

A few years ago, I recall that the CZ detoured over the UP through Nebraska when BNSF was closed due to flooding.

Bustitutions seem more common than detours.

Sometimes the train is just annulled with no alternative transportation.

The Dry Creek Trestle fire serves as an example, the first couple of days they bustituted the enroute trains, then the trains were annulled with no alternative transportation, then they ran stub trains with a bustitution bridge, then it was annulled south of K Falls again. BNSF either wasn't asked or refused a detour over the Inside Gateway, which itself was closed due to fire a bit later.
 
I was riding the Southwest Chief westbound to Los Angeles, sitting in coach, and when we got to Albuquerque it really filled up with air passengers trying to get to LA. One of them told me their flights had been cancelled due to very high winds there grounding the planes from takeoff. (This was around 2007.j

I also recall reading a news story once about air travelers in Chicago trying to get home between Christmas and New Year’s and some serious snow weather there and elsewhere created such a bad knock-on effect that this one woman was told she couldn’t get a flight home to Seattle for three whole days. Then they told her about the Empire Builder and how that could get her home in two, and she took it, greatly relieved not to be stuck in an airport all that time. (I think they said the hotels were jammed solid too.)
 
I've watched these situations over the years and the diversions from air travel seem to depend on how well-known the train service in that market is.

Regarding the Cascades, and I go back to the Pool Line, I think that the customers have already diverted from air travel before the emergency. Portland, Seattle and Vancouver, BC are all subject to fog disruptions. Another group of air passengers wait like sheep until the Gray Line charter buses show up for bustitution.

My favorite experience of this was going to Seattle to testify at an ICC hearing for ODOT. I rode the evening train up and showed up on time for the hearing next morning. An OPUC staffer planned to fly up in the morning and testify last. All morning we could hear planes circling, coming and going, and he finally called from Portland to say he wasn't going to make it. His flight had flown to Seattle, circled for a while, then returned to Portland. Luckily I had a copy of his prepared remarks and no one objected to me reading it into the record.

When we were developing the Cascades Corridor idea in the 1970's one of the most common justifications offered by non-rail oriented people was weather disruptions of flights. Other members of the public referred to the "I-5 Car Wash" driving in the dark and rain by feel as trucks spray your car.

The original FRA Railpax plan started with no service up the West Coast and then just had a tri-weekly Coast Starlight between Portland and Seattle, even though 3x daily service had survived till Amtrak took over. At ODOT we suspected that they were just looking at population figures and not the actual propensity to travel or the conditions for travel.
 
I'd say that less than 5% of the people I talk to who don't want to fly but take their car long distance even know about train service from their city to our area. And those that do mostly don't think about it when they can't drive or fly. They just put off their trip.
For those that suddenly find themselves unable to fly for any reason but who generally fly all the time, I'd say it is a rare person who knows how to spell Amtrak, much less think about it.
That's actually a major issue -- non-awareness.

If Amtrak were running on time, and people knew it existed, they'd pretty quickly be swamped by travellers and need to double the size of their fleet, IMO.
 
Speaking of airline disruptions affecting Amtrak, I was in DC on 9/11 and returned to Chicago on 9/13. When I got to the station in DC it was a madhouse. People who had been left stranded after all the planes were grounded were there trying to get home. There was a rumor that Amtrak was accepting air reservations for travel by an arrangement with the airlines (don't know if that was true). Fortunately I had a roomette , so was ok. I have to give credit to the Amtrak staff; they were overwhelmed; people slept in the sightseer lounge seats, in the cafe seats, on the floor in coach on I think sleeping bags, etc. Of course food in the dining car ran out quickly but somehow the staff managed to find some snacks in the cafe and gave to the kids. Staff did a great job, given the circumstances.
 
That's actually a major issue -- non-awareness.

If Amtrak were running on time, and people knew it existed, they'd pretty quickly be swamped by travellers and need to double the size of their fleet, IMO.
Yep, I'd love to know how much of the population actually knows of Amtrak services in their local area and long distance services. The percentage would probably be quite low. When I tell neighbors and friends about my Amtrak travels they are almost always surprised that it's' even possible. And then since they don't know about trains that much, they're sometimes surprised about how quick it takes.
 
Skywest operates 500+ aircraft and contracts with AA, DL, UA, & AS, so this is a pretty big deal. That being said the total airline market is big enough to reaccommodate most people on other flights leaving Amtrak largely unaffected.
Specially if you take into account where Skywest, Republic, Envoy and other regionals fly. Many smaller communities even some that Amtrak serve. About half the flights in/out of Denver (DIA) look like Skywest. I would think that Amtrak is a very viable alternative.
 
The answer is pretty much no. Maybe a tiny handful of savvy travelers turned to Amtrak if they were on the West Coast and they were only going a short distance but that's about it. SkyWest operates flights mostly west of Chicago, Houston, and Dallas with a huge presence on the West Coast too. Southwest, Spirit, and American had some meltdowns earlier this year too, and I doubt Amtrak felt much.
 
The main problem with airlines is equipment and crew availability. When there's a delay on Amtrak, the biggest problem is supposed to be scheduling a proper slot for the train since they carefully set the slots. And maybe equipment availability. Doesn't the Auto Train only have two trainsets?

What happened when there was track flooding and they washed out? I think Amtrak has been through that before. However, I'm not sure it's the same as what airlines see, which is that a plane might need to start in Miami, head to Dallas, then Seattle, then Chicago. And with very little room to make up for a delayed plane.

Well there is also a slot problem too. Take my airport of CLT we're so congested that it doesn't take a lot to skew the system and cause a cascade of delays elsewhere. Just look at us on Summer Afternoons you'll find out that our storms cause all sorts of havoc across the east coast. So for that it is hard to add extra capacity anywhere.

The other issue you have is the need for high utilization causing delays too. There just aren't spare aircraft lying around especially at an out station. Now in a hub you might have a spare plane and a spare crew but it all depends if they really want to use that crew and plane. I know in our airport I've seen inbounds that have been over 5 hours late and for some reason we don't use the spare plane that is parked over by the NS Main Line and use a crew from hot. We can always deadhead the original crew to their overnight to resume their trip. They did that to me once, well the deadhead part. To me it looks like it would be simpler to use what you already have but crew scheduling and fleet management have some grand plan that I'm not privy too.

Remember when it comes to utilization it is all about doing the most with the least amount of resources. So on my longest day I had six flights. I want to say it was CAK-CLT-GSO-CLT-BHM-CLT-TYS which actually pushed me over my legal 14 hours thanks to delays. We incurred a weather delay in BHM that pushed us into TYS significantly late. This system we use is basically like a cog in a wheel everything has to be perfect in order for it to work. That is why we have designed a "Hot Reserve" where a handful of employees have to sit at the airport and see if a plane needs a crew. This oftentimes is last minute sick call outs, but delays are part of it as well. I get stuck on Hot at least twice a week and it royally stinks. This week we had a major delay coming out of GSP due to a 5K being ran on the CLT Runways which delayed all inbound traffic which caused a lot of misconnections (passenger delays in my book) at CLT.

Amtrak does have it to a degree and it is a lot harder to deadhead an Empire Builder consist to Seattle than it is for my airline to deadhead something to FSD.

@Seaboard92 this sounds like something right up your alley.

Indeed it is.

That's actually a major issue -- non-awareness.

If Amtrak were running on time, and people knew it existed, they'd pretty quickly be swamped by travellers and need to double the size of their fleet, IMO.

I've watched these situations over the years and the diversions from air travel seem to depend on how well-known the train service in that market is.

The original FRA Railpax plan started with no service up the West Coast and then just had a tri-weekly Coast Starlight between Portland and Seattle, even though 3x daily service had survived till Amtrak took over. At ODOT we suspected that they were just looking at population figures and not the actual propensity to travel or the conditions for travel.

I would tend to agree in most of the country rail service isn't really that well known. I know that in my small town and my larger city that most people don't realize we even have Amtrak because it has horrible calling times here. Now if it went thru in daylight they might have a better chance of knowing about it, but it also comes down to marketing. Where is Amtrak going to make more money marketing some rural South Carolina towns and cities or on the major corridors. Honestly the best thing for Amtrak's marketing in my area is a late running Silver Star in rush hour because people see it and realize then we have a train. This is also why keeping the trains exterior clean should be a priority because it is a rolling billboard.

I know when I'm dealing with passengers who miss the last flight into Atlanta and have plans they have to make the next morning in Atlanta when the chance they can get a standby seat the next day are slim to make their meeting I refer them to Amtrak. Most are shocked it is even an option. The Crescent has horrible calling times but it will get you to Atlanta in time for a morning meeting most days and it's space positive. But if I wasn't there to tell them it existed, tell them the rough cost of it, and directions to the train station I strongly doubt they ever would.

Now most FA's won't do this but my theory is my loyalty is to the people who pay my paychecks which are our passengers. They have important meetings, life events, and other reasons for travel that are important. My job is to get them from point A to point B and provide them a good memorable service. When one of the cogs in the wheel messes up due to weather, mechanical, staffing, or other delays we aren't providing a good memorable service. But if someone who represents the company tries to do everything in their power to remedy it and get them to Point B by any means necessary that to me is real customer service. And we badly need that not just at my airline but in the entire world.

I agree there are several routes I think of that have a high chance people would ride the train if Amtrak offered more than one service a day. I think the real low hanging fruit is Charlotte-Greenville-Atlanta. Everyone hates driving in all three of those cities so if you had a way that wasn't flying that didn't involve dealing with their traffic you would have a great service.

Yep, I'd love to know how much of the population actually knows of Amtrak services in their local area and long distance services. The percentage would probably be quite low. When I tell neighbors and friends about my Amtrak travels they are almost always surprised that it's' even possible. And then since they don't know about trains that much, they're sometimes surprised about how quick it takes.

In South Carolina it is very very low. But we do put out some great ridership especially on the Silver Meteor/Palmetto across the state because having the second trains makes it a more usable service.

Specially if you take into account where Skywest, Republic, Envoy and other regionals fly. Many smaller communities even some that Amtrak serve. About half the flights in/out of Denver (DIA) look like Skywest. I would think that Amtrak is a very viable alternative.

Yes and it is the same in my airport with my regional and the other AA regionals. We do a vast amount of flying because we are flying to the smaller places. Airline travel somewhat follows the same theory that if Amtrak offers twice daily or greater service that ridership increases. If you give people an option their likelihood that they will use your service goes up. The more service the better ridership counts. That is why you see a lot of regional flying. The other reason is because you can pay regional staff less, and the planes cost less to operate per hour. All of that adds up to it. I know we fly into these Amtrak serviced communities on my regional. CAE/CLB, ATL, GSP/GRV/SPB, SAV, JAX, JAN, CHS, RDU/RGH/DNC/CYN, RIC/RVR, ORF/NFK, PHF/NPN, DCA/WAS/ALX, MSY/NOL, BHM, CHO/CVS, CRW/CHW, CVG/CIN, IND, CLE, ROC, ALB, YYZ/TWO, YUL/MTL. And that's an incomplete list those are just some of the ones I can think of.
 
The answer is pretty much no. Maybe a tiny handful of savvy travelers turned to Amtrak if they were on the West Coast and they were only going a short distance but that's about it. SkyWest operates flights mostly west of Chicago, Houston, and Dallas with a huge presence on the West Coast too. Southwest, Spirit, and American had some meltdowns earlier this year too, and I doubt Amtrak felt much.

I have a feeling you are about to see American have some more meltdowns shortly. The Piedmont FA's voted for a Chaos strike with a 100 percent vote. So that will definitely cause a problem. I'm not even sure if we would even cross the picket line if they would assign us some of their flying. So that will cause some issues as well. You'll probably see some other issues around too as more FA's and pilots quit or go to mainline. I know that since May my seniority has gone up over a hundred and fifty names. I'm really close to getting off reserve because of that.
 
Well there is also a slot problem too. Take my airport of CLT we're so congested that it doesn't take a lot to skew the system and cause a cascade of delays elsewhere. Just look at us on Summer Afternoons you'll find out that our storms cause all sorts of havoc across the east coast. So for that it is hard to add extra capacity anywhere.

The other issue you have is the need for high utilization causing delays too. There just aren't spare aircraft lying around especially at an out station. Now in a hub you might have a spare plane and a spare crew but it all depends if they really want to use that crew and plane. I know in our airport I've seen inbounds that have been over 5 hours late and for some reason we don't use the spare plane that is parked over by the NS Main Line and use a crew from hot. We can always deadhead the original crew to their overnight to resume their trip. They did that to me once, well the deadhead part. To me it looks like it would be simpler to use what you already have but crew scheduling and fleet management have some grand plan that I'm not privy too.

Remember when it comes to utilization it is all about doing the most with the least amount of resources. So on my longest day I had six flights. I want to say it was CAK-CLT-GSO-CLT-BHM-CLT-TYS which actually pushed me over my legal 14 hours thanks to delays. We incurred a weather delay in BHM that pushed us into TYS significantly late. This system we use is basically like a cog in a wheel everything has to be perfect in order for it to work. That is why we have designed a "Hot Reserve" where a handful of employees have to sit at the airport and see if a plane needs a crew. This oftentimes is last minute sick call outs, but delays are part of it as well. I get stuck on Hot at least twice a week and it royally stinks. This week we had a major delay coming out of GSP due to a 5K being ran on the CLT Runways which delayed all inbound traffic which caused a lot of misconnections (passenger delays in my book) at CLT.

Amtrak does have it to a degree and it is a lot harder to deadhead an Empire Builder consist to Seattle than it is for my airline to deadhead something to FSD.



Indeed it is.





I would tend to agree in most of the country rail service isn't really that well known. I know that in my small town and my larger city that most people don't realize we even have Amtrak because it has horrible calling times here. Now if it went thru in daylight they might have a better chance of knowing about it, but it also comes down to marketing. Where is Amtrak going to make more money marketing some rural South Carolina towns and cities or on the major corridors. Honestly the best thing for Amtrak's marketing in my area is a late running Silver Star in rush hour because people see it and realize then we have a train. This is also why keeping the trains exterior clean should be a priority because it is a rolling billboard.

I know when I'm dealing with passengers who miss the last flight into Atlanta and have plans they have to make the next morning in Atlanta when the chance they can get a standby seat the next day are slim to make their meeting I refer them to Amtrak. Most are shocked it is even an option. The Crescent has horrible calling times but it will get you to Atlanta in time for a morning meeting most days and it's space positive. But if I wasn't there to tell them it existed, tell them the rough cost of it, and directions to the train station I strongly doubt they ever would.

Now most FA's won't do this but my theory is my loyalty is to the people who pay my paychecks which are our passengers. They have important meetings, life events, and other reasons for travel that are important. My job is to get them from point A to point B and provide them a good memorable service. When one of the cogs in the wheel messes up due to weather, mechanical, staffing, or other delays we aren't providing a good memorable service. But if someone who represents the company tries to do everything in their power to remedy it and get them to Point B by any means necessary that to me is real customer service. And we badly need that not just at my airline but in the entire world.

I agree there are several routes I think of that have a high chance people would ride the train if Amtrak offered more than one service a day. I think the real low hanging fruit is Charlotte-Greenville-Atlanta. Everyone hates driving in all three of those cities so if you had a way that wasn't flying that didn't involve dealing with their traffic you would have a great service.



In South Carolina it is very very low. But we do put out some great ridership especially on the Silver Meteor/Palmetto across the state because having the second trains makes it a more usable service.



Yes and it is the same in my airport with my regional and the other AA regionals. We do a vast amount of flying because we are flying to the smaller places. Airline travel somewhat follows the same theory that if Amtrak offers twice daily or greater service that ridership increases. If you give people an option their likelihood that they will use your service goes up. The more service the better ridership counts. That is why you see a lot of regional flying. The other reason is because you can pay regional staff less, and the planes cost less to operate per hour. All of that adds up to it. I know we fly into these Amtrak serviced communities on my regional. CAE/CLB, ATL, GSP/GRV/SPB, SAV, JAX, JAN, CHS, RDU/RGH/DNC/CYN, RIC/RVR, ORF/NFK, PHF/NPN, DCA/WAS/ALX, MSY/NOL, BHM, CHO/CVS, CRW/CHW, CVG/CIN, IND, CLE, ROC, ALB, YYZ/TWO, YUL/MTL. And that's an incomplete list those are just some of the ones I can think of.
Love the dual codes you posted. I always have the tendency use airport codes (after 45 years in aviation) even when planning Amtrak trips. Someone mentions New Orleans I instantly think MSY not NOL. Or YYZ or YUL.
 
Love the dual codes you posted. I always have the tendency use airport codes (after 45 years in aviation) even when planning Amtrak trips. Someone mentions New Orleans I instantly think MSY not NOL. Or YYZ or YUL.
I think of the rail code first but I did twelve years working on trains. So my brain goes there first. And for Canada I think in three codes because I add the VIA ones in too. TRTO/YYZ/TWO, MTRL/MTL/YUL, VCVR/VAC/YVR, HLCX/YHZ
 
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