Kansas City - Tulsa - Springfield

[dart330]

I am working on a map showing the possible connections for OK, KS, and MO based off of feasibility studies done and previous passenger service prior to Amtrak. I am having a hard time finding a timetable for the Tulsan, or even which cities it served between KC and Tulsa. I also know nothing about passenger service that was available between Tulsa and Springfield.

I know that Miami, OK and Joplin, MO need to be served and I also found a study from KS in 2000 http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/33000/33200/33286/krpt6_1.pdf that showed a route through Ft. Scott & Baxter Springs.

Does anyone have a readable version of this?

Here is my map in progress:

 

[PerRock]

Very Interesting; I'd love it if there was Amtrak Service to Tulsa (the old station & platform are still there and at least the station is in decent shape). I might add a stop in Claremore (North East of Tulsa) as it has the areas only 4yr Public University; ad a number of museums (and is on both the UP & BNSF lines).

I was playing around with High Speed Corridors the other day on Google Maps and came up with the extension of the heartland flyer to Tulsa; and then possibly on to St.Louis.

peter

 

[dart330]

I updated the map showing the route of the Tulsan on the BNSF line and stops in Claremore, Vinita, Miami, Fort Scott.

My biggest question is where would the best place for a layover be? The quickest travel time from Tulsa would be to split in Afton, OK to head to KC or continue on to Springfield. But that is not ideal for KC to Springfield and also leaves out Joplin, MO and Pittsburg, KS.

 

[MJL]

It needs to go on to OKC to hit the Heartland Flyer there.

 

[dart330]

It needs to go on to OKC to hit the Heartland Flyer there.

If you click on the map, you can see OKC to Tulsa and Springfield to STL are already included as feasibility studies have been done. I am interested in showing an additional proposed connection between Tulsa and Springfield as well as a line from Joplin to KC. Just wanting some input on which route is actually the most feasible.

 

[George Harris]

Back to the original Chicago - Kansas City - Tulsa - Oklahoma City advertisement of the Santa Fe:

They did not run this route quite like you might think. They had Chicago - Kansas City - Tulsa trains on one route and Chicago - Kansas City - Oklahoma City - Ft. Worth - Houston trains on another route. the Santa Fe never ran between Tulsa and Oklahoma City.

Part of their line between Kansas Ciy and Tulsa have been abandoned. The current Kansas City to Tulsa route on the BNSF map is the ex Frisco line, somewhat longer than the Santa Fe line. Tulsa to Oklahoma City was Frisco, also, but west of Sapulpa OK has been sold to a short line. It was and is somewhat curvey and was never very fast.

In order to run a reasonably fast KC - Tulsa - OC train would require quite a bit of money and work.

 

[dlagrua]

Nice thought, but where is Amtrak going to get the equipmwnt to fund such a service expansion? The federal government gives them just barely enough money to keep the existing routes going. Plus they can't even get the Sunset Limited connection to Florida restarted while the trackage is sound and no new equipemnt is needed.

 

[dart330]

Nice thought, but where is Amtrak going to get the equipmwnt to fund such a service expansion? The federal government gives them just barely enough money to keep the existing routes going. Plus they can't even get the Sunset Limited connection to Florida restarted while the trackage is sound and no new equipemnt is needed.

This is not for anything realistic in the near future. Was trying to figure out which route would work the best if it were ever feasible to do so. This is a link shown on the NARP Vision map, was just basing it off of that.

All of these routes would have to be paid for by the states anyways. With the MRR doing so well, we can hope MODOT will look to expand elsewhere after they get a few more frequencies each day between KC & STL.

 

[George Harris]

If you click on the map, you can see OKC to Tulsa and Springfield to STL are already included as feasibility studies have been done. I am interested in showing an additional proposed connection between Tulsa and Springfield as well as a line from Joplin to KC. Just wanting some input on which route is actually the most feasible.

Let's be realistic here: OK,so that is somewhat irrational when we are discussing dreams, but . . .

Compared to driving time, the best practical train time between St. Louis and Springfield is too long to have any realistic hope of atracing decent ridership.

The best time of Frisco's Meteor was somewhere around or just above 12 hours in the early 50's, and was 14 hours for quite a few years from the mid 1950's forward. How much demand would there be with a train having this sort of average speed today? Given that, in retrospect, Frisco's passenger service was fairly well done all the way to the end, probably not much..