Future Amtrak Sleeper and ADA ideas

[jis]

This is the car to do some back-of-the-envelop figuring on. Two levels and fits in NYP:

View attachment 30796

It is ADA non compliant. No one will ever use one of those on an LD train so you can forget about it. This has been discussed before too.

That specific car won't work even in Penn Station because they would not be able to exit towards the West from all tracks in NYP. They can only be used towards the East.Only the NJT MLV shaped tri-levels will work universally at NYP.

BTW, one possibility is to use the naked Delta (or any for that matter) 72 innch pitch lie flat seat that is 21" wide, without the rest of the niceties of the pod and lay them out 4 abreast. You could fit 40 of those, but no pods or isolation or privacy. This is the sort of thing that the Queenslander in Australia has.

As soon as you start adding privacy pods the capacity goes down considerably. But then we keep getting told that Americans need privacy to be able to sleep flat, even though they can sleep inclined without privacy, and they have no problem sleeping in lie flat seats of planes that are not in pods. Go figure.

 

[cocojacoby]

So do the same exercise with the Bombardier cars! Same thing. Two levels and they fit in NYP. NJT needs to get to platforms that Amtrak doesn't have to. Amtrak just runs though on straight tracks for the most part. But the point is there is potentially a double-deck car design that can carry a lot of these mini-suites. You can have an ADA bedroom and an entrance door on one end and restrooms on the other end. Looks like there is plenty of room on those mezzanine ends (over the trucks).

 

[Mailliw]

What if we either staggered the Delta One Suites or stacked them vertically? As long passengers can comfortably situp during daylight in their pods and lie flat at night to sleep inside their pods they don't need to stand up.

It is ADA non compliant. No one will ever use one of those on an LD train so you can forget about it. This has been discussed before too.

That specific car won't work even in Penn Station because they would not be able to exit towards the West from all tracks in NYP. They can only be used towards the East.Only the NJT MLV shaped tri-levels will work universally at NYP.

BTW, one possibility is to use the naked Delta (or any for that matter) 72 innch pitch lie flat seat that is 21" wide, without the rest of the niceties of the pod and lay them out 4 abreast. You could fit 40 of those, but no pods or isolation or privacy. This is the sort of thing that the Queenslander in Australia has.

As soon as you start adding privacy pods the capacity goes down considerably. But then we keep getting told that Americans need privacy to be able to sleep flat, even though they can sleep inclined without privacy, and they have no problem sleeping in lie flat seats of planes that are not in pods. Go figure.

Yet at the same time it's the lack of privacy that Americans need to be able to sleep in public.

 

[jis]

So do the same exercise with the Bombardier cars! Same thing. Two levels and they fit in NYP. NJT needs to get to platforms that Amtrak doesn't have to. Amtrak just runs though on straight tracks for the most part. But the point is there is potentially a double-deck car design that can carry a lot of these mini-suites. You can have an ADA bedroom and an entrance door on one end and restrooms on the other end. Looks like there is plenty of room on those mezzanine ends (over the trucks).

Believe me, that is exactly the argument that I used originally, but then it came to light that these cars will not pass muster of ADA in a train that provides shared facilities like lounges and diners. So it is pointless discussing these cars.

Meanwhile, after giving some thought based on your argument I realized that I was double counting the space needed for access to the aisle from the window seats, so I agree that the capacity in a single level cars with the lie flat seats would be close to that of an all Roomette car, so at least the fare charged for a single could be less than that of a Roomette. In principle the accommodation charge could be half that for a Roomette per seat. This would work out well for single travelers and work out to be the same for a pair of travelers.

The difference between this and either Roomettes or Sections or Slumbercoach would be that the sleeping surface would be noticeably narrower, but one could live with that. enclosing them with floor to ceiling walls would create a remarkably claustrophobic environment though. Airline accommodation that has floor to ceiling enclosed roomettes e.g. Emirates. have a much larger floor footprint.

What if we either staggered the Delta One Suites or stacked them vertically? As long passengers can comfortably situp during daylight in their pods and lie flat at night to sleep inside their pods they don't need to stand up.

Yes I was missing a piece about the staggering, whether horizontal or vertical. That gets you close to the all Roomette capacity. Vertical staggering a la Slumbercoach gives a wider sleeping berth than the horizontal staggering, but is a bit more complex.

Of course at least one ADA accommodation per car will reduce capacity some irrespective of car type. If the ADA accommodation has facilities enclosed in it for it, then the common facilities can be much smaller in size, like found in Viewliner IIs for example.

So do the same exercise with the Bombardier cars! Same thing. Two levels and they fit in NYP. NJT needs to get to platforms that Amtrak doesn't have to. Amtrak just runs though on straight tracks for the most part. But the point is there is potentially a double-deck car design that can carry a lot of these mini-suites. You can have an ADA bedroom and an entrance door on one end and restrooms on the other end. Looks like there is plenty of room on those mezzanine ends (over the trucks).

That will not satisfy the new ADA codes. They must have access to the common facilities on the train like Diner and Lounge. The current cars are grandfathered and do not comply with current code. New cars will have to do so.

 

[cocojacoby]

Of course NO sleeper, Viewliner or Superliner, allows complete ADA access through the entire car. So one ADA room at the vestibule end, which would allow access to the adjourning dining car, is exactly what we have here and also in existing sleepers. I have read so many conflicting reports of how the new ADA standards will affect future car design that I have no idea what the facts are. Yes you need to provide access to common facilities but does that mean complete access throughout the train? There is no chance you or I can squeeze all of those mini-suits or slumber rooms in unless we make the new sleepers 12 feet wide and that might be a problem.

Would you have to eliminate 1/4 of the seats in the dining car (there aren't enough now in the new Viewliner) and the resulting kitchen would be too narrow to work in.

I think we need a better answer to exactly what the new ADA requirements are. If Amtrak can comply by providing "aisle wheelchairs" like on planes for getting around on the train, that would resolve a lot of issues since they are only 16-18 inches wide. Purhaps they need to apply for a waiver for that?

But for now this is no different from what we have now, an ADA room with private facilities with access to the dining car.

 

[jis]

Of course NO sleeper, Viewliner or Superliner, allows complete ADA access through the entire car. So one ADA room at the vestibule end, which would allow access to the adjourning dining car, is exactly what we have here and also in existing sleepers. I have read so many conflicting reports of how the new ADA standards will affect future car design that I have no idea what the facts are. Yes you need to provide access to common facilities but does that mean complete access throughout the train? There is no chance you or I can squeeze all of those mini-suits or slumber rooms in unless we make the new sleepers 12 feet wide and that might be a problem.

Would you have to eliminate 1/3 of the seats in the dining car (there aren't enough now in the new Viewliner) and the resulting kitchen would be too narrow to work in.

I think we need a better answer to exactly what the new ADA requirements are. If Amtrak can comply by providing "aisle wheelchairs" like in planes that would resolve a lot of issues since they are only 16-18 inches wide. Purhaps they need to apply for a waiver for that?

But for now this is no different from what we have now, an ADA room with private facilities with access to the dining car.

I am just mentioning what are the current constraints in new car layout design. Repeating over and over something else does not change that.

 

[Touchdowntom9]

It is ADA non compliant. No one will ever use one of those on an LD train so you can forget about it. This has been discussed before too.

That specific car won't work even in Penn Station because they would not be able to exit towards the West from all tracks in NYP. They can only be used towards the East.Only the NJT MLV shaped tri-levels will work universally at NYP.

BTW, one possibility is to use the naked Delta (or any for that matter) 72 innch pitch lie flat seat that is 21" wide, without the rest of the niceties of the pod and lay them out 4 abreast. You could fit 40 of those, but no pods or isolation or privacy. This is the sort of thing that the Queenslander in Australia has.

As soon as you start adding privacy pods the capacity goes down considerably. But then we keep getting told that Americans need privacy to be able to sleep flat, even though they can sleep inclined without privacy, and they have no problem sleeping in lie flat seats of planes that are not in pods. Go figure.

Sure they might not need it, but willing to bet that Americans would be willing to pay extra for that privacy

 

[Touchdowntom9]

Some quick back of the envelope calculations....

A Venture car, after taking out space for crumple zones, ADA restroom and ancillary closets and stuff has about 750inches of length available for passenger occupancy.

If each Pod takes around 70-72" as is true of the Delta Pods, you can have about 10 rows of those in 750" with a couple of feet to spare.

A typical Delta Pod is about 40" or so wide. So at most you can have a 1x1 layout in a cabin that is 120" wide if you wish to have an aisle.

Which means you can have 20 such seats and that is the absolute maximum capacity.

Compare this with a Viewliner Roomette like layout. Each Roomette has a footprint allowing 9x2 in the same space. It has a maximum capacity of 18x2 = 36. Admittedly some are sold as singles, but at somewhat elevated fare. But still it is not clear to me how this pod based car would have a lower fare than a Roomette based car.

It is also worth noting that any further space that is lost for ADA accommodation would be the same in either configuration losing equivalent amount of seating space, except that for each row lost Roomettes lose 4 berths whereas pods lose 2 seats. But still I do';t see how Pods will be cheaper fare than Roomettes.

Doing a Herringbone arrangement may allow addition of one or two more rows while keeping enough width for an aisle but that still does not quite get us there.

There is a reason that Slumbercoaches were built, which takes advantage of vertical staggering thus allowing more capacity and that is what allowed the lower fares in Slumbercoaches.

Just want to make a comment here that your calc may be off because the pods are staggered and while they take up about 72 inches, they actually net out to about 40 or so inches because the feet of the lie flat are under the seat in front of them. I think that impacts the calculations pretty dramatically here because the seat ahead of one doesnt begin 72 inches after but only 40 inches after. Based on the above calc you could have about 36 pods per car. Roughly.

 

[mcropod]

Those might be a tough sell for sleeper passengers here. (snip)

No doubt about that, given the conniptions many seem to have with even being asked to sit at the same *dining table* as people they don't already know

 

[crescent-zephyr]

I think the Amtrak sleeping car designs are the best of the best. They took what worked great for Pullman and modified it to maximize capacity and comfort.

The soft products (bedding, etc.) could be improved but the physical design is honestly my favorite.

 

[Seaboard92]

Platzcart is the equivalent of long-distance Coach, not a sleeping car. Back on topic, has Amtrak released any diagrams or information on seating capacity yet?

These Russian sleeper designs seem okay to me, but I can see why a lot of folks in North America wouldn't go for it--especially if you were always stuck up in the higher bunk.

It seems like all sleeper discussions on AU revert back to a "Bring Back Slumbercoaches" vs. "Import Airline-style Pods" discussion. Having never been in either, I can't contribute much. on those. I tend to think it boils down to whether we expect most people would sleep in their clothes or would they actually change into sleepwear in whatever idealized budget sleeper we are conceiving. The more private you get, the more likely they would be to change clothes for the night. (I know there will always be exceptions).

Something I'm very qualified to talk about the old Platzkarty cars, well now new cars. Honestly they are the long distance coaches of Russia but we also have day coaches as well that are more like what you think. Those are listed in the reservation as seating cars and you find them on quite a few trains even overnight ones. Honestly I'm not a fan of the Platzkarty cars over the traditional shared room second class kupe cars. One thing you'll notice if you ride a Platzkarty car is the smell that tends to waft out of them. It's a mixture of feet, food, and body oder. On the RZD system you do chose your bunk as the lowers cost more than the uppers. I think there might be some way to make Platzkarty better but the long standing rumor is they are trying to do away with it in favor of more Kupes. And you will be hard pressed to find a night train on the main premium markets carrying one unless it's going to points elsewhere. Now do I think there is a market for something where you can lie flat in a bed at night but not at the price of a sleeper absolutely.

Which means you can have 20 such seats and that is the absolute maximum capacity.

Compare this with a Viewliner Roomette like layout. Each Roomette has a footprint allowing 9x2 in the same space. It has a maximum capacity of 18x2 = 36. Admittedly some are sold as singles, but at somewhat elevated fare. But still it is not clear to me how this pod based car would have a lower fare than a Roomette based car.

It is also worth noting that any further space that is lost for ADA accommodation would be the same in either configuration losing equivalent amount of seating space, except that for each row lost Roomettes lose 4 berths whereas pods lose 2 seats. But still I do';t see how Pods will be cheaper fare than Roomettes.

Doing a Herringbone arrangement may allow addition of one or two more rows while keeping enough width for an aisle but that still does not quite get us there.

There is a reason that Slumbercoaches were built, which takes advantage of vertical staggering thus allowing more capacity and that is what allowed the lower fares in Slumbercoaches.

Well actually this isn't really unheard of in a sleeper. I've worked on several former 21 Roomette sleepers. The Eastern roads tended to have more of these than the western ones with the New York Central, the Pennsylvania Railroad, and I believe the Burlington had a few on the California Zephyr. I really don't know of any other railroads that rostered them. I believe the Florida roads leased theirs from the other two or got them from the Pullman pool. These sleepers were mainly used on high business travel markets because they fit well for the market then that business travel was just one person going for a short ride of just overnight. And these cars were mostly captive to the flagships like the Broadway Limited, or the 20th Century Limited. So truthfully it's not unheard of to have that arrangement. Even on a Parlor side the New York Central lightweight ones only had 28 seats. So you are on par with the all roomette cars and slightly under the traditional Parlor of the Golden Era.

I think you are wrong on the Viewliner dimensions because they are literally the same on my Pacific series sleeper. My mechanical diagrams have it listed at 6'6" for each room, and that is what Amtrak has listed as their Viewliner Roomettes as well. I remember doing a lot of research on this because to place it in tourist service I really need to add space so I was making sure seats for two would work in there. And with the same amount of space it should in theory work. If you are basing on the total usable space in my car which is similar to the Viewliner as both are standard length cars I think you could fit 11 rows of rooms because that is how the 21 roomette cars were laid out. But now you have these issues to take into account because of the modifications they are doing now taking the restrooms out. So you will lose one of your 11 right there, followed by the need for a crew room which can occupy the space across to the toilet. If you are adding a shower compartment you are now missing another room. Now there is a small 28" linen closest area which is good. You probably would need to have it organized really well to pull it off. So I don't know where you got the idea to do 9 rooms which would be 18 instead of 21. But I do support the idea of an all roomette car. It's something that is vastly needed. The problem you get now is the ADA act is going to prevent you from doing anything without it being built compliant. And there are ways around it I remember in the last years of the heritage sleepers they made one room compliant with slightly larger dimensions. This was done by removing the former Pullman Porter's room and merging it into the adjacent room if I'm remembering my diagrams correctly.

 

[Seaboard92]

I think the Amtrak sleeping car designs are the best of the best. They took what worked great for Pullman and modified it to maximize capacity and comfort.

The soft products (bedding, etc.) could be improved but the physical design is honestly my favorite.

Technically the physical product is the Pullman plan book. If you look at the diagram for my Budd built Pacific series car the roomettes are the same exact dimensions as the current Amtrak ones. And despite being a Budd car it had to be built to Pullman standards to be operated by Pullman. And I believe the double rooms are also very similar if not the same. My car doesn't have them so I would have to search for another diagram to tell you for fact what is right and what is wrong in that statement. But seeing the Superliners the top level is basically a 10/5 it makes sense. What Amtrak added was the second bunk in the roomette, which they basically got from the New York Central Sleepercoaches, and the Budd built Slumbercoaches.

 

[Septa9739]

Has the US ever had anything like the compartment cars in Harry Potter? I think something like that could be really lucrative. It would be four seats, maybe as couches, in what would otherwise be a roomette. Perhaps a table could drop down like the top bunk. They could be great for business people trying to get work done on the train, people only going daylight on a long distance, or even people who want privacy to sleep, but not the whole first class experience. The fare would be structured to encourage multiple occupancy, like the sleepers.

 

[jis]

I think you are wrong on the Viewliner dimensions because they are literally the same on my Pacific series sleeper. My mechanical diagrams have it listed at 6'6" for each room, and that is what Amtrak has listed as their Viewliner Roomettes as well. I remember doing a lot of research on this because to place it in tourist service I really need to add space so I was making sure seats for two would work in there. And with the same amount of space it should in theory work. If you are basing on the total usable space in my car which is similar to the Viewliner as both are standard length cars I think you could fit 11 rows of rooms because that is how the 21 roomette cars were laid out. But now you have these issues to take into account because of the modifications they are doing now taking the restrooms out. So you will lose one of your 11 right there, followed by the need for a crew room which can occupy the space across to the toilet. If you are adding a shower compartment you are now missing another room. Now there is a small 28" linen closest area which is good. You probably would need to have it organized really well to pull it off. So I don't know where you got the idea to do 9 rooms which would be 18 instead of 21. But I do support the idea of an all roomette car. It's something that is vastly needed. The problem you get now is the ADA act is going to prevent you from doing anything without it being built compliant. And there are ways around it I remember in the last years of the heritage sleepers they made one room compliant with slightly larger dimensions. This was done by removing the former Pullman Porter's room and merging it into the adjacent room if I'm remembering my diagrams correctly.

I was not trying to fit anything in Viewliners per se. I was looking at a Venture car layout and trying to figure out how things would be. For rough estimation I just used 6' per, and the space that is removed from passenger compartment usage is what is not available on Venture cars due to the crumple zones (the vestibule area) at the two ends (which Viewliners and older cars do not have since they are not Tier III) and the huge ADA restroom taking out a hunk of space at one end. Ideally in an LD car in addition to the one ADA restroom there should be at least one more restroom IMHO for 40 odd passengers.

I was merely using the following diagram for back of the envelope scratching. Of course a more detailed analysis would yield slightly different results. And incidentally my analysis in the post that you quoted was wrong anyway as pointed out by cocojoyboy, which has been discussed further down thread.

 

[travelplus]

How about lay flat airline seats for Business Class with Duvet with a sliding door per pair?

 

[jis]

How about lay flat airline seats for Business Class with Duvet with a sliding door per pair?

That is what we have been discussing in the last dozen or two posts, in case you missed it

 

[Seaboard92]

Has the US ever had anything like the compartment cars in Harry Potter? I think something like that could be really lucrative. It would be four seats, maybe as couches, in what would otherwise be a roomette. Perhaps a table could drop down like the top bunk. They could be great for business people trying to get work done on the train, people only going daylight on a long distance, or even people who want privacy to sleep, but not the whole first class experience. The fare would be structured to encourage multiple occupancy, like the sleepers.

To the best of my knowledge no. That's not saying something didn't exist at one point in time or another but to what I know there is nothing. I personally love what you are talking about which is basically the equivalent of the RZD Kupe.

I was not trying to fit anything in Viewliners per se. I was looking at a Venture car layout and trying to figure out how things would be. For rough estimation I just used 6' per, and the space that is removed from passenger compartment usage is what is not available on Venture cars due to the crumple zones (the vestibule area) at the two ends (which Viewliners and older cars do not have since they are not Tier III) and the huge ADA restroom taking out a hunk of space at one end. Ideally in an LD car in addition to the one ADA restroom there should be at least one more restroom IMHO for 40 odd passengers.

I was merely using the following diagram for back of the envelope scratching. Of course a more detailed analysis would yield slightly different results. And incidentally my analysis in the post that you quoted was wrong anyway as pointed out by cocojoyboy, which has been discussed further down thread.

Well even the old cars have some sort of a crash management system usually in the crash posts. My car had it's messed up by it's accident CN caused. And I'm the process of getting those back in order.

When we are talking about restrooms when you look at old passenger car designs the restrooms on coaches were roughly the same space. As shown in this diagram.



Now this is a New York Central car for the pre war James Whitcomb Riley (Chicago (Central Station)-Cincinnati. I wish it had better dimensions of the space on it but you can see what I'm talking about in terms of the large restrooms. Truthfully we only need one. So you are saving some space in on that side. And truthfully I think these restrooms are a bit too big. Interesting about this car it is a shorty by 5'3".

Personally I'm not a large fan of the two vestibule designs as I don't truthfully see much benefit to them, and I see better uses of space for that area. That's a great area to put your electric locker, storage closest, and anything else you might need for the operation of the car. I just think it's too much lost space. Now the 21 Roomette cars don't have a public restroom of any sorts as each car had their own direct dump back in the day. I believe when Amtrak did the converts on the final Heritage cars they used the room right next to the former community bathroom on the 10/6 which gave them an accessible space to use. And technically if I understand ADA properly you just need to have one handicapped space per car. Personally I would like to rewrite this a bit because it makes designs a bit more inflexible.

As far as a crumple zone I can't find what is the Tier III standard. But from what I'm saying is there is a lot of room to discuss all roomette cars, and I truthfully think they make a lot of sense now that we have a lot of single travelers again.

Now RZD has a different kind of new sleeping car that is rather unique being a tri level. The ADA room is on the main level (and it has a built in wheel chair lift in the vestibule), then two or three steps down to the lower level, and five steps up to the upper level. The aisles are on opposite sides of the car body on the various levels. Which is a great usage of space if you ask me.

 

[joelkfla]

Now RZD has a different kind of new sleeping car that is rather unique being a tri level. The ADA room is on the main level (and it has a built in wheel chair lift in the vestibule), then two or three steps down to the lower level, and five steps up to the upper level. The aisles are on opposite sides of the car body on the various levels. Which is a great usage of space if you ask me.

Don't know what RZD is, but I saw a YouTube of something like this. As I recall, there was a mid-level aisle which ran the full car length along one side of the car, and there were alternating stairways leading up or down. Each stairway led to a small landing with doorways to 2 adjacent rooms. Theoretically, if the aisle were wide enough with curves at the ends, a wheelchair could pass thru the car.

 

[Mailliw]

I know what you're referring to; those are the bilevel sleeping cars Nightjet uses on their Swiss routes.

 

[Just-Thinking-51]

Don't know what RZD is, but I saw a YouTube of something like this. As I recall, there was a mid-level aisle which ran the full car length along one side of the car, and there were alternating stairways leading up or down. Each stairway led to a small landing with doorways to 2 adjacent rooms. Theoretically, if the aisle were wide enough with curves at the ends, a wheelchair could pass thru the car.

RZD is the Russia National Operation.
The City Night Line railcars now Nightjet cars you referred to are going to be removed from service when the Siemens ordered railcars show up.

 

[jis]

Don't know what RZD is,

RZD stands for Rossiyskie Zheleznye Dorogi, the state-owned vertically integrated railway company in Russia. It both manages infrastructure and operates freight and passenger trains.

 

[Seaboard92]

Don't know what RZD is, but I saw a YouTube of something like this. As I recall, there was a mid-level aisle which ran the full car length along one side of the car, and there were alternating stairways leading up or down. Each stairway led to a small landing with doorways to 2 adjacent rooms. Theoretically, if the aisle were wide enough with curves at the ends, a wheelchair could pass thru the car.

I remember seeing a photo of the wheelchair lift on those cars and it was really rather cool. I'll try and find it again but on a short google search I didn't see it.

RZD stands for Rossiyskie Zheleznye Dorogi, the state-owned vertically integrated railway company in Russia. It both manages infrastructure and operates freight and passenger trains.

Well in a way you are right and wrong. Yes it is a vertically integrated railway company. But the only passenger trains RZD proper operates is the Sapsan between Sankt Petersburg-Moskva-Nizhny Novgorod. The rest of the passenger trains are technically operated by the Federal Passenger Company, or various suburban railways. Now the sole owner of all those companies is RZD, but by technicality they do not run anything but the Sapsan. Then there are two other private operators that exist too but they are on the Sankt Petersburg-Moskva corridor.

There is actually a lot of things we could learn from RZD for passenger services. The flagships have a VIP Class which has upgraded bedrooms above their standard first class. With enclosed showers with heated floors, and a unique VIP Class Lounge on the A End of the car. Somewhere I have the floor plan for those cars. I think there are certain Amtrak runs that could benefit from having those upgraded sleepers like the Silver Meteor, Coast Starlight, Lake Shore Limited, and the California Zephyr.

 

[TheCrescent]

But then we keep getting told that Americans need privacy to be able to sleep flat, even though they can sleep inclined without privacy, and they have no problem sleeping in lie flat seats of planes that are not in pods. Go figure.

I will not travel by train on a long trip unless I have a private room with a door and walls. There are many Amtrak sleeping car passengers like me. Railroads offered sleeping quarters separated by curtains. That ended by the 1950s.

If adding these non-walled seats is in addition to private sleeping car rooms with walls and doors, fine. I wouldn’t use them but if other countries have them and there is a market for them, go for it.

 

[jis]

I will not travel by train on a long trip unless I have a private room with a door and walls. There are many Amtrak sleeping car passengers like me. Railroads offered sleeping quarters separated by curtains. That ended by the 1950s.

If adding these non-walled seats is in addition to private sleeping car rooms with walls and doors, fine. I wouldn’t use them but if other countries have them and there is a market for them, go for it.

My guess is that compartment Sleepers will always be there in the US, and it will always be the case that compartments are sold as such to customers, unlike in many other parts of the world where berths in compartments are individually sold and thus compartments are used as shared accommodation. Cheaper non-compartment Sleeping accommodation, if it happens at all, will be in addition to the traditional sleeping accommodation. So I'd say that you have nothing to fear as long as we are talking about trains with Sleepers.

It is of course possible that there may be new overnight medium distance trains that do not have lie flat sleeping accommodation, as a few exist now.

 

[TheCrescent]

I’d say that Amtrak ought to take a few Amfleets, put some Delta One-style seats in them, and see how they fare in the marketplace.

Since airlines have clearly moved to lie-flat seats (customers demand them), I couldn’t see a transportation company moving away from a flat sleeping accommodation. But then again, it’s Amtrak, so you never know.