End of the Bar Car

[OlympianHiawatha]

The last of the Metro North Bar Cars is now rolling its way north out of Grand Central ending a colourful history in Commuter Railroading.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/10/nyregion/at-the-end-of-the-line-a-final-toast-to-the-bar-car.html?hpw&rref=nyregion&_r=0

 

[CHamilton]

AU member northeastern292 posts on Twitter:

Every railfan in the tristate area has descended on GCT

I bet they're drinking all the beer. A bunch of foamy foamers.

 

[Anderson]

I'm glad I grabbed a run to New Haven and back on one of these last spring. Dangit, I would rather have been up there than where I was about that time last night...*sighs*

Edit: I tried to grab an afternoon run on one last fall as well, but the car was unmanned...so I ended up having a nice dinner at a restaurant in one of the commuter towns along the tracks.

 

[fairviewroad]

So...what does everyone think?

Is getting rid of these a smart move? Was it an anachronism that stayed long past its due-date? Or does

its loss signal yet another stop in our society's move away from community to self?

 

[Anderson]

So...what does everyone think?

Is getting rid of these a smart move? Was it an anachronism that stayed long past its due-date? Or does

its loss signal yet another stop in our society's move away from community to self?

I think it is a mixed bag in some regards. On the one hand, they were well-patronized in spite of being shuttled around on the schedule, and if I am not mistaken the operating losses were very limited. On the other hand, the cost of replacing them was, if I am not mistaken, rather steep (i.e. in the tens of millions of dollars for a reasonable fleet of them).

I don't think the cars had outlived their usefulness in some regards...but I'm not sure they entirely made sense now like they did in the 1970s. I'm always going to mourn the loss of something "nicer" (such as the Sunlander being replaced by those tilt trains in Queensland), but sadly I'm also not sure the loss is wholly without merit. Probably the biggest argument against them would be, IMHO, the difficulty passing between cars (trying to open those end doors was a royal pain the one time I needed to pass between cars to get to one)...but that also did reinforce the social aspect of the bar cars, too...something I loved when I got to take that trip.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

"The bar car’s less social descendant, the cafe cars of Amtrak, still sell beer and liquor amid the sandwiches and chips, but offer little in the way of kinship, with travelers often returning to their seats to imbibe in solitude."

I'd like to see a real bar car on the long distance trains.

The 1970's style Fantastic Plastic Cafe Lounge they currently use is every bit as classy and jovial as drinking a beer in a McDonalds.

 

[CHamilton]

The Pacific Parlour Car on the Coast Starlight comes close.

 

[John Bredin]

"The bar car’s less social descendant, the cafe cars of Amtrak, still sell beer and liquor amid the sandwiches and chips, but offer little in the way of kinship, with travelers often returning to their seats to imbibe in solitude."I'd like to see a real bar car on the long distance trains.The 1970's style Fantastic Plastic Cafe Lounge they currently use is every bit as classy and jovial as drinking a beer in a McDonalds.

I don't think the comparison to the old bar cars is entirely fair, except for the Acelas where the Bistro's lack of seating discourages lingering. Classy is subjective, but I've seen AmCafes be pretty damn jovial. Tables full of kids* going to a Phish concert, or traveling to St. Louis for Mardi Gras, just for two examples in my personal experience. And while I've never spoke to a random seatmate in coach, I've often conversed with other Cafe patrons and even the attendant.
*When you're 40, twenty-somethings are kids.

 

[Palmetto]

There will be a bar car, of sorts, on the Cape Flyer between Boston and Hyannis, as there was last year. For those not familiar, this service is seasonal only.

 

[jis]

The so called bar car on the Cape Flyer is at best a very abridged version of an Amtrak Cafe car. On the run this Saturday their POS terminal was an iPhone! I did pick up a snack from there.

Sent from my iPhone using Amtrak Forum

 

[Shawn Ryu]

If they werent profitable they should have been retired.

No point selling booze without making money.

 

[Green Maned Lion]

They were profitable, actually, excluding speciliazed maintenance on rolling antiques. Make no mistake, they are being retired partly due to upfront capital costs (I.e. Stupidity), but mostly for 'social' reasons.

 

[Dutchrailnut]

out of 6 trips daily they were profitable on the one trip they made as bar car, they other 5 trips were as regular commuter car and they lost over 80 % due to severely reduced seating v.s. operating cost.

so in overall operation the Bar cars lost.

 

[Green Maned Lion]

That's metroNorth's incompetence, not an indication of their validity. And as per former Director of Planning for LIRR Joseph M. Clift, under peak conditions, bar cars provide more capacity than regular coaches, per their patrons willingness to stand.

 

[jis]

That's metroNorth's incompetence, not an indication of their validity. And as per former Director of Planning for LIRR Joseph M. Clift, under peak conditions, bar cars provide more capacity than regular coaches, per their patrons willingness to stand.

A car without any seats and bar would provide even more capacity. The Japanese actually do have consists in Tokyo suburban service where a car or two in the consist have only drop down seats from the side of the car, and other wise it is all standing space. But naturally when the train is not SRO very few stand and only the drop down seats are used.

It would be Metro North incompetence if they did not allow people in the car when the bar was not operating. It does effectively reduce seating capacity of a consist. As to whether that is or should be a major concern or not depends on many factors. So the final conclusion may not be as cut and dried in either direction as of course the folks arguing each side want to make it look like.

BTW, AFAICT the only bar service on LIRR is in the Hampton Reserve service of the Cannonball. I suspect others on that train can also get access to the bar. Also some years they have had the North Fork Wine Train with bar service from Ronkonkoma to Greenport. All these involved C3 cars and not EMUs. When and why did LIRR do away with its own bar cars in EMUs, which I understand ran on select Huntington and Babylon trains up till at least about 10 years back or so. Can't find the exact details of what happened to them. LIRR does operate bar carts on platforms these days AFAIK.

 

[Anderson]

That's metroNorth's incompetence, not an indication of their validity. And as per former Director of Planning for LIRR Joseph M. Clift, under peak conditions, bar cars provide more capacity than regular coaches, per their patrons willingness to stand.

A car without any seats and bar would provide even more capacity. The Japanese actually do have consists in Tokyo suburban service where a car or two in the consist have only drop down seats from the side of the car, and other wise it is all standing space. But naturally when the train is not SRO very few stand and only the drop down seats are used.

It would be Metro North incompetence if they did not allow people in the car when the bar was not operating. It does effectively reduce seating capacity of a consist. As to whether that is or should be a major concern or not depends on many factors. So the final conclusion may not be as cut and dried in either direction as of course the folks arguing each side want to make it look like.

BTW, AFAICT the only bar service on LIRR is in the Hampton Reserve service of the Cannonball. I suspect others on that train can also get access to the bar. Also some years they have had the North Fork Wine Train with bar service from Ronkonkoma to Greenport. All these involved C3 cars and not EMUs. When and why did LIRR do away with its own bar cars in EMUs, which I understand ran on select Huntington and Babylon trains up till at least about 10 years back or so. Can't find the exact details of what happened to them. LIRR does operate bar carts on platforms these days AFAIK.

I can say for a fact that Metro North did not seal the cars when they weren't manned. I rode from NYG up to...some stop with a very fine Italian restaurant about 100 yards from the station...last year. The bar car was unmanned but still on the train (this was a mid-afternoon departure), so I consoled myself with some excellent lasagna instead.

 

[Shawn Ryu]

"The bar car’s less social descendant, the cafe cars of Amtrak, still sell beer and liquor amid the sandwiches and chips, but offer little in the way of kinship, with travelers often returning to their seats to imbibe in solitude."I'd like to see a real bar car on the long distance trains.The 1970's style Fantastic Plastic Cafe Lounge they currently use is every bit as classy and jovial as drinking a beer in a McDonalds.

I don't think the comparison to the old bar cars is entirely fair, except for the Acelas where the Bistro's lack of seating discourages lingering. Classy is subjective, but I've seen AmCafes be pretty damn jovial. Tables full of kids* going to a Phish concert, or traveling to St. Louis for Mardi Gras, just for two examples in my personal experience. And while I've never spoke to a random seatmate in coach, I've often conversed with other Cafe patrons and even the attendant.
*When you're 40, twenty-somethings are kids.

On NE Regionals and Acela, people just buy food and go back to seats

I guess its a regional thing.

 

[strangebrew]

If i knew a train had a bar car, I would go out of my way to ride that train as a regular commuter. Just saying..

 

[user 1215]

That's metroNorth's incompetence, not an indication of their validity. And as per former Director of Planning for LIRR Joseph M. Clift, under peak conditions, bar cars provide more capacity than regular coaches, per their patrons willingness to stand.

A car without any seats and bar would provide even more capacity. The Japanese actually do have consists in Tokyo suburban service where a car or two in the consist have only drop down seats from the side of the car, and other wise it is all standing space. But naturally when the train is not SRO very few stand and only the drop down seats are used.

It would be Metro North incompetence if they did not allow people in the car when the bar was not operating. It does effectively reduce seating capacity of a consist. As to whether that is or should be a major concern or not depends on many factors. So the final conclusion may not be as cut and dried in either direction as of course the folks arguing each side want to make it look like.

BTW, AFAICT the only bar service on LIRR is in the Hampton Reserve service of the Cannonball. I suspect others on that train can also get access to the bar. Also some years they have had the North Fork Wine Train with bar service from Ronkonkoma to Greenport. All these involved C3 cars and not EMUs. When and why did LIRR do away with its own bar cars in EMUs, which I understand ran on select Huntington and Babylon trains up till at least about 10 years back or so. Can't find the exact details of what happened to them. LIRR does operate bar carts on platforms these days AFAIK.

The 6-door, folding seat cars in the Yamanote Line consist were phased out, returning to 4-door standard seating back in 2011.

As my memory serves, it seems like after 10 PM, ALL trains in Japan were bar cars. No- the Japanese are too proud to actually consume beverages onboard, but they sure did their best up until they boarded!

 

[Anderson]

IIRC, the old equipment was kept until it more or less collapsed from old age. When they put the new equipment orders in, IIRC the LIRR wanted to grab some ex-Amtrak equipment but that stuff couldn't make all the curves in Long Island or somesuch, so the plan was scrapped.

 

[jis]

Never heard of any LIRR plan to pick anything up from Amtrak. Could you provide a bit more background on it? Thanks.

Sent from my iPhone using Amtrak Forum

 

[Anderson]

Never heard of any LIRR plan to pick anything up from Amtrak. Could you provide a bit more background on it? Thanks.

Sent from my iPhone using Amtrak Forum

http://www.railroad.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=63&t=72532#wrap

"After the 2000 season, the Pataki administration tied to broker a deal where the MTA/LIRR would lease, or buy some first generation Amfleet cars to restore true Parlor Car type service (and even run a thru service from Albany to Montauk), but it was discovered that these cars could not negotiate sharper curves on the LIRR."