No Cards in the Dining Car?

[Sproutis]

We traveled down yesterday CHI-NOL on the CONO and the dining situation is as bad as everybody says. It's simply untenable to have only one person seating, taking orders, bringing drinks, and then preparing, serving, and clearing food. That having been said, we were well prepared to wait. While waiting for lunch, we pulled out a deck of cards to keep our six-year-old entertained. We don't do electronic devices at the table. We were setting up for a game of "magic ten," a card game for children that teaches basic addition (to ten) and memory. The dining attendant, who had been completely absent for 15+ minutes appeared and informed us that we could not play cards in the dining dar. We let her know that we were playing to pass the time while we were waiting for our order to be taken and food to arrive. "You can't play cards in here. This is still a dining car." And off she went. Is this really a policy?

It was another fifteen plus minutes before she returned to take our orders. I had plenty of time to return to our room, get some books and magazine, and play tic tac toe on the back of the placemats. Looking around, there were plenty of folks doing things other than eating - reading books, somebody was drawing, three kids on iPads and folks playing games on their phones. Ultimately, we felt like we were being punished for trying to stay out of the modern era by engaging in conversation and interactive games as a family instead of plugging into a screen. We felt like we could have all been playing solitaire on our iPads and had no trouble for playing cards at the table.

Thoughts?

 

[greatcats]

Does not sound very fair to me. The lone employee sounds stressed out by the idiotic situation created by bureaucrats.

 

[Sproutis]

I agree! Which doubled down my resolve to keep ourselves entertained. If we're happily playing cards with an equally happy kiddo, we're not staring at her every time she walks by, reminding her that we haven't even had our orders taken, or complaining!

 

[Philly Amtrak Fan]

I'm sure the CONO situation is different than some of the trains I've been on recently (LSL, CL, SWC, CZ). I didn't actually eat in the dining room but I remember hearing them take lunch reservations first come first serve and dinner reservations by time. I don't think breakfast is an issue. Assuming you were seated for the purpose of eating or if there were empty tables available, you should have every right to do anything reasonable which doesn't interfere with any other passengers while waiting to be served. I can see them insisting on the tables being reserved for meal service customers (see the thread on electronic devices). If they knew you were waiting to be served they should've left you alone. I suggest complaining to customer service. I would recommend to any coach car passenger this happens to to threaten to eat in the lounge car.

 

[jis]

I am waiting for Amtrak to post signs saying "twiddling thumbs not allowed" or some such. Afterall why would anyone want to do such when it takes them half an hour to take the order and then 45 minutes to serve? How inconsiderate of the inconvenient passengers that one has to deal with!

 

[Cho Cho Charlie]

I am sure that this is simply the old "slippery slope" problem.

Its a Dining Car for the purpose of eating. If any passenger wants to play cards, they need to do such in, say, the lounge car. One clear, crisp, rule, enforced equally for all passengers. No excuses. No exceptions.

I mean, if someone other passenger sees you all playing cards, what's stopping them from coming back later, at say 7:30pm, and taking up a table to only play cards? I am sure the first thing out of their mouths will be, the staff allowed you to do such.

 

[Bob Dylan]

Does not sound very fair to me. The lone employee sounds stressed out by the idiotic situation created by bureaucrats.

Ditto!

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Does not sound very fair to me. The lone employee sounds stressed out by the idiotic situation created by bureaucrats.

If stress was the issue then why couldn’t the employee be calmly reasoned with after she brought it up? Who does she think is going to show up from Amtrak’s distant bureaucracy to ensure an unworkable overbroad rule was being followed by an underprovisioned staff pool?

I'm sure the CONO situation is different than some of the trains I've been on recently (LSL, CL, SWC, CZ).

Who's to say this isn't coming to other routes in the future? Indeed how can it not be coming with Amtrak’s brass already promising their opponents in Congress that they'll be able to break even on food and beverage service?

I am sure that this is simply the old "slippery slope" problem. Its a Dining Car for the purpose of eating. If any passenger wants to play cards, they need to do such in, say, the lounge car. One clear, crisp, rule, enforced equally for all passengers. No excuses. No exceptions. I mean, if someone other passenger sees you all playing cards, what's stopping them from coming back later, at say 7:30pm, and taking up a table to only play cards? I am sure the first thing out of their mouths will be, the staff allowed you to do such.

Yet the rule as currently enforced already allows plenty of unexplained illogical exceptions. If a slippery slope is the primary concern it sounds like we've already been sliding for a while now.

 

[neroden]

We traveled down yesterday CHI-NOL on the CONO and the dining situation is as bad as everybody says. It's simply untenable to have only one person seating, taking orders, bringing drinks, and then preparing, serving, and clearing food.

Yep. Amtrak has to cut it out with the penny-wise pound-foolish decisions. Fish or cut bait. If passengers are waiting 15 to 20 minutes just to order, you're never going to get decent turnover in the dining car. You'll probably get a line. Revenues will drop. It's a really good way to lose way more money on dining car service.

Who’s to say this isn’t coming to other routes in the future? Indeed how can it not be duplicated with Amtrak’s brass already promising their opponents in Congress that they'll be able to break even on food and beverage service?

Well, Amtrak's brass could buy some brains and put them inside their heads. Understaffing like this is setting money on fire.Foom, foom, burn that money.

 

[Sproutis]

Well, the slippery slope would apply then to reading a book, or drawing on a sketch pad, or kids using iPads while their parents talk. None of those things would be permitted in the dining car after hours either. If we've been seated at a table waiting for food service (included in the price of our ticket) during our appointed meal time, must we all sit with hands folded and eyes to the front to prove our earnest intention to eat the food?

 

[andersone]

I am waiting for the no negative thoughts regarding Amtrak rule, and interested as hell for the remonstrance's

 

[jis]

Indeed! Having done many of those so called slippery slope things while the Dining Car staff was taking its own sweet time to come around to serve me, I find this whole slippery slope argument to be somewhat ... well ... ahem ... slippery enough to not quite be able to stand upto scrutiny.

 

[KmH]

I suggest complaining to customer service.

Absolutely.

I would also complain about the length of time it took to get served.

With all dining car patrons having such a long wait I would probably visit each table in the Dining car and recommend my fellow passengers also contact Amtrak Customer Relations.

 

[jis]

Until the Conductor pulls put yet another policy out of his rear end and throws you off the train, that is.

 

[Sproutis]

I suggest complaining to customer service.

Absolutely.

I would also complain about the length of time it took to get served.

With all dining car patrons having such a long wait I would probably visit each table in the Dining car and recommend my fellow passengers also contact Amtrak Customer Relations.

It's funny - we were certainly planning to write a letter to Customer Service re: the length of time it took to get served, but not as a complaint about the server. A single person has no chance at success in that situation. None. If anything, our letter will offer her, or any other dining car attendant, support in that regard. For example, we were quite content to get our own coffee and my son's juice in the morning from our sleeper. We figured it's one less trip up the aisle she'd have to make and we were happy to do our part. It costs me nothing to walk back one car to the coffee urn set up there; I've got nothing but time. It costs her precious minutes. We'd planned to make the observation to customer service about her lack of support.

But, I confess the card thing is bothering me.

 

[Philly Amtrak Fan]

I am sure that this is simply the old "slippery slope" problem.

Its a Dining Car for the purpose of eating. If any passenger wants to play cards, they need to do such in, say, the lounge car. One clear, crisp, rule, enforced equally for all passengers. No excuses. No exceptions.

I mean, if someone other passenger sees you all playing cards, what's stopping them from coming back later, at say 7:30pm, and taking up a table to only play cards? I am sure the first thing out of their mouths will be, the staff allowed you to do such.

If there are passengers waiting to eat, they should have priority. If there are open tables, why not let people use the tables for other purposes?

 

[Mystic River Dragon]

Sproutis--

You sound like a very kind and considerate person, and I'm sorry you had to deal with someone so rude. Being singled out for playing an educational card game, especially while other people were reading or using their phones, is terrible. And that the dining car attendant would do that in front of your 6-year-old is even worse--a train ride is supposed to be a lovely experience for a child, not the equivalent of being sent to the principal's office!

After your experience, I have just added the CONO as one more Amtrak train I won't bother spending money on.

 

[PaulM]

I've been noticing that lately the dining car is never more than half full. This includes a Thanksgiving round trip on the SWC in which the sleepers were full and there were 4 coach cars. On two ocasions I noticed that the wait staff were on the ball getting salads, refilling drinks, etc. But there was some disfunction in the kitchen because nothing was coming up from it.

 

[HARHBG]

When I have encountered these arbitrary "rules" I've looked the server in the face and told them to go get the Conductor if THEY (the server) had a problem with what I was doing. Not one ever has.

Entertaining your children with an education game that includes "cards" while waiting for your wait-person (server) to take your order, bring your food, etc. is most reasonable. Period, end of discussion.

If the server/wait-person is overwhelmed with too much work, too many tables/persons that's HER and Amtrak's problem.

Most defiantly contact Amtrak Customer Service with a very polite and diplomatic yet reasonably detailed encounter you experienced and state directly how disappointed you were with the quality of service, speed of service, etc. that you relieved.

I've begun carrying a small Sony voice recorder in my shirt pocket to record such encounters with surly Amtrak personnel. I just mailed off two audio files of such encounters to Amtrak Customer Service. Too soon for any replies from Amtrak, but it will be interesting to see what, if any, replies I receive from Amtrak.

 

[HenryK]

I don't have my lawyer handy, but I suspect that recording a conversation surreptitiously (without the consent of your interlocutor) is illegal in certain states. You just might be liable for a defamation lawsuit.

 

[jis]

I don't have my lawyer handy, but I suspect that recording a conversation surreptitiously (without the consent of your interlocutor) is illegal in certain states. You just might be liable for a defamation lawsuit.

In general there has to be a reasonable expectation of privacy for applying the laws regarding recording. I think one would be rather hard pressed to establish that there is any expectation of privacy in a Diner. So I would be very surprised if any defamation suit materializes from the recording of a conversation between a server and a customer in a Dining Car.

One probably needs to be more careful in Massachusetts and Illinois though. See: https://www.rcfp.org/reporters-recording-guide/consent-and-its-limits

 

[niemi24s]

It's simply untenable to have only one person seating, taking orders, bringing drinks, and then preparing, serving, and clearing food.

On other long distance trains I've been on in the last year or so, there was almost always at least one sleeping car attendant (SCA) helping out in the diner. How come that doesn't happen on this train?

 

[fillyjonk]

I dunno about the no cards rule, but I admit if I had a small child, dinner was slow, I took out cards to entertain him or her, and was told not to, I'd shrug and go, "You'd rather have the child crying and fussing, then?" I mean, if people are "hogging" a table to play euchre long after their meal is finished, that's one thing, it's totally another to entertain a child while WAITING FOR YOUR FOOD. You would think an employee could see the difference but this is kind of how 'zero tolerance' works.

When I was a kid, and my family had to wait in restaurants for food or something, my parents ALWAYS played some kind of educational game with my brother and me to keep us entertained. Maybe not with cards, but I remember a lot of paper placemats used to play "Hangman."

 

[chakk]

I wonder if any current Amtrak employeee could chime in about what the employee manual might say on this subject. Certainly, gambling aboard the train is not permitted (if spotted), and in olden days I bet that card playing was equated with gambling. Perhaps there is a holdover rule in the employee manual on this?

 

[jis]

So I suppose starting a betting pool on whether dinner will come in less than half hour is out then?