Food cart cut from Hiawatha

[rtabern]

Venture,
The issue is that you missing a lot of the expenses. First, it's not 2 employees. There has to be at least 3, since you need to cover sick days & vacations. Then it's not just salaries, you have benefits too. And when you say "the trolley" are you talking about the cost of the food? Or are you talking about the cost of the cart?

Finally, its my understanding that the employees are based out of Chicago, so that means that Amtrak has to pay a hotel to overnight one in MKE, and pay for dinner & breakfast for one employee. And I many still be missing a few things in my list too. So this isn't quite as simple as 1, 2, & 3.

It's amazing how many false things are posted on here... and also in the media covering this story in Milwaukee and Chicago.

First off, there were just 2 employees... Marty and Peter. If one was on vacation, it would be filled with extra board out of Chicago.

Second, one employee was based in Milwaukee (Marty) and the other was based in Chicago (Peter).

Third, neither were afforded a hotel room... Marty would do round-trips from MKE and Peter would do round-trips from CHI.

I am not sure where the $225K loss figure or whatever it is comes from. There is no way the cart service could be losing that much!!! Unless the LSAs were making $100K a year, which I highly doubt. I'd love to see the numbers. Even if the cart service cost $225K --- how much was brought in to offset the costs??

Sounds like cooked up numbers by Scott Walker's crew.

 

[Anderson]

Venture,
The issue is that you missing a lot of the expenses. First, it's not 2 employees. There has to be at least 3, since you need to cover sick days & vacations. Then it's not just salaries, you have benefits too. And when you say "the trolley" are you talking about the cost of the food? Or are you talking about the cost of the cart?

Finally, its my understanding that the employees are based out of Chicago, so that means that Amtrak has to pay a hotel to overnight one in MKE, and pay for dinner & breakfast for one employee. And I many still be missing a few things in my list too. So this isn't quite as simple as 1, 2, & 3.

It's amazing how many false things are posted on here... and also in the media covering this story in Milwaukee and Chicago.

First off, there were just 2 employees... Marty and Peter. If one was on vacation, it would be filled with extra board out of Chicago.

Second, one employee was based in Milwaukee (Marty) and the other was based in Chicago (Peter).

Third, neither were afforded a hotel room... Marty would do round-trips from MKE and Peter would do round-trips from CHI.

I am not sure where the $225K loss figure or whatever it is comes from. There is no way the cart service could be losing that much!!! Unless the LSAs were making $100K a year, which I highly doubt. I'd love to see the numbers. Even if the cart service cost $225K --- how much was brought in to offset the costs??

Sounds like cooked up numbers by Scott Walker's crew.

I suspect that the $225K includes some apportioned share of the cost of the commissary in Chicago. Still, if you figure three employees on the train that's easily $180K once you include salary, benefits, etc. Another $40K in costs for held-away time and overnighting (as necessary) plus simply poor performance? Quite believable.

As to the automats: Yeah, that's an issue. At least on the Sunset and Daylight, a cafe car wouldn't have been a stretch to maintain...but that's SP's malicious mis-applying of the concept for you.

I tend to agree that vending machines might not be a bad idea on some shorter routes. They might make sense on some longer commuter runs as well (the NYC commuter lines have some candidates), and I'd argue they might also make sense in cases where the "walk" to the cafe gets over about 5-6 cars.
As to SP...well, there were two issues there:

(1) As I understand it, SP didn't even bother to keep the machines running; and

(2) SP used automats as a substitute for actual dining cars, not for limited beverage and unheated snack service.

The automats were not an inherently bad idea. SP maliciously misapplied them.

Espee implemented Automat vending machine cars on all trains in the mid 1960s including the Sunset Limited, the Cascade and the Coast Daylight. The Coast Daylight even included a teardrop end Parlor Car on certain days and a Dome Lounge that sold snacks and beverages. The selection of the Vending machines was something like what a hospital would have in their vending machines. Also ironically, Espee had a couple of the former Dining Car waiters in the Automat to assist you in heating your selection in the microwave and of course they were expecting a tip. Vending machines now tend to have better selections anywhere than they did back in the 1960s so they might work better on short distance trains. I traveled on the Coast Daylight in the summer of 1970 via Parlor Car Oceanside from Los Angeles. It was a very crowded train. They offered cocktails at your parlor seat or you could enjoy them in the Dome Lounge, but what a disappointment to have to have lunch in the very crowded Automat car with very unappetising options. Espee even had an "extra fare" for first class travel. What a joke!

On a short-haul train, it does seem that the automats were doomed by the limits of 1960s vending machine options. On a long-haul train (and I do include the Coast Daylight in this), that seems like a bad move...especially given that from what I can tell, the Coast Daylight in particular probably had the customer base to support at least a "proper" cafe (I'll accept debate on the diner, though it would probably have made sense for the ICC to object to an "extra fare" for any train without certain amenities.

 

[TVRM610]

The lounge car on the Piedmont trains works wonderfully with vending machines. I've ridden it several times and there is always availability and people use them. It's silly not to use vending machines on Amtrak. I'm talking about short distance trains of course.