Kentucky Cardinal Update

[Viewliner]

Amtrak will curtail Kentucky Cardinal after July 4
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Amtrak says July 4 will be the last run for the Kentucky Cardinal between Louisville, Ky., and Indianapolis, Ind. Trains 850 and 851will continue to run between Chicago and Indianapolis once a day in each direction.

Slow speeds due to poorly maintained track and a late-night schedule between Louisville and Indianapolis have hampered ridership since the service was inaugurated in 1999. From October through February, 6,624 passengers rode the Kentucky Cardinal, an average of about 45 passengers per day.

Train 851 is slated to depart Louisville at 2120 and arrive in Indianapolis at 0230. That’s nearly five hours to cover 120 miles, with only one station stop – Jeffersonville, Ind. – in between. Travelers continuing to Chicago have a two-hour layover at Union Station in Indianapolis and don't arrive at Union Station in Chicago until 0900.

Train 850 leaves Chicago at 2015, arrives Indianapolis at 0205, departs 0245, and arrives Louisville at 0750. That’s 11 hours, 25 minutes to cover 312 miles.

Louisville and Indiana Railroad, which owns the tracks on which the Kentucky Cardinal operates, says it never received the financial assistance needed to upgrade the line it acquired from Conrail in 1994.

Amtrak has decided to cease hauling express freight behind the Kentucky Cardinal, ending any justification for its existence. However, a task force of advocates is forming to save the service to Louisville, which renovated its Union Station in 2001 at a cost of $370,000.

I hope that maybe one day service can be revived in the form of a Chicago-Florida (Floridian) Train. Its unfortunate they are cutting a portion of the train, but as many had said in the past, this would've been better with a daylight schedule (or Sleeper as was the initial case).

This story and more can be found it today's Trains Newswire

 

[AlanB]

However the good news is that they are not eliminating the train entirely, just the Louisville, KY to Indianapolis, IN leg. This makes restoration back to Louisville a little easier. If they had killed 850/851 entirely, it would be even harder to restore service to Louisville in the future.

Plus at least this way it continues to give Indianapolis daily train service, even if the hours are a little odd.

 

[Superliner Diner]

However the good news is that they are not eliminating the train entirely, just the Louisville, KY to Indianapolis, IN leg. This makes restoration back to Louisville a little easier. If they had killed 850/851 entirely, it would be even harder to restore service to Louisville in the future.
Plus at least this way it continues to give Indianapolis daily train service, even if the hours are a little odd.

My feelings exactly. Earlier reports gave us the impression that 850/851 would be eliminated entirely. That would have left those between Chicago and Indianapolis inclusively with just thrice-weekly service on the Chicago-Washington Cardinal.

My feeling is that the reason for the train being retained to Indianapolis is that it will continue to be a hospital train. While it will no longer carry express shipments, it still will be used to ferry Amtrak's own equipment to and from Beech Grove, which is just outside of Indianapolis. This saves Amtrak the expense (and the freight railroads the "inconvenience") of running a special hospital train between Chicago and Indianapolis.

Odds are likely too that the daily CHI-IND train will either become the Indiana Cardinal, or go back to its old name, the Hoosier State.

The problem with the odd calling hours at Indianapolis could be resolved by rescheduling the train to run independent of the Cardinal. Although this increases the number of movements over the freight lines and requires move motive power on the days the Cardinal operates, the benefit could be more human hours in Indiana's largest city. That alone should greatly help to increase ridership on what's left of this train.

Furthermore, steps will hopefully be taken to speed up service on the northernmost end of the line. As many of you know, the Cardinal (and the daily train in question) takes a roundabout route going between Dyer, IN and Chicago, passing between no fewer than five different host railroads in a relatively short span of time. The trains often have to wait at each junction for permission to enter the next railroad, or for clearance if the track is occupied by a slow-moving freight train.

I do feel sorry for the people of Louisville, who did spend a lot of time and money to not only refurbish the old Union Station (which had been converted to a bus garage) but they also rebuilt some track connections to access it. For the first period of its existence, the Kentucky Cardinal terminated in Jeffersonville, IN, tantalizingly close to Louisville, but really out in the boondocks because the local transit agency never provided any type of shuttle service between Louisville and Jeffersonville. Its eventual extension another five miles into Louisville made perfect sense, and paved the way for further extensions southward to Nashville and beyond. The old L&N track (now part of CSX) has been rated in pretty good shape, which is saying a lot by CSX standards. As bad as the schedule was, Nashville could have enjoyed decent calling times, and they would have been yet another stepping stone on the route to Florida.

 

[Viewliner]

I couldn't agree with you more Superliner Diner. I hope that Louisville will one day be able to see rail service again, with restoration of the Floridian to some degree, which would be nice to see. All we need is the willingness to run it and some (enough) Superliner equipment...

 

[thedude]

So does this mean that the people in Loisville won't have a train service?

 

[AlanB]

So does this mean that the people in Loisville won't have a train service?

Sadly, Yes it does.

We can only hope that some time in the future it can be restored, along with service to Nashville, TN.