Passenger train service Tulsa to Oklahoma City

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CHamilton

CHamilton

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Iowa Pacific and Watco to operate passenger train service Tulsa to Oklahoma City
(Oklahoma City) - For the first time in over 50 years a passenger train will operate between Tulsa and Oklahoma City suburbs. The service, billed as the "Eastern Flyer" will debut February 9 as a joint venture between Iowa Pacific Holdings and Watco, a short line railroad holding company.

The train will originate in the Tulsa suburb of Sapulpa and run to the Oklahoma City suburb of Midwest City. Short Line operator Watco Companies runs freight rail service on what is known as the Stillwater Central Railroad between Tulsa and Oklahoma City
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This sure sneaked up on us and looks very interesting-basically a longer haul Dinner type Train. While the Web Site shows departure information and fares from Tulsa, it does not yet show information for traveling from OKC; I'll call the Toll Free and sniff around. If need be one can always drive to Tulsa.
 
I've got my doubts here. It looks like Iowa Pacific is following a "throw everything against the wall and see what sticks" approach with these operations, which I applaud. The main issues I see with this are:
(1) There's not a clear timetable. I don't know what time arrival in OKC is, for example, and the once-a-week schedule makes me scratch my head at what they're hoping to achieve.

(2) As an addendum to (1), by not accommodating reverse traffic (even if on a once-daily schedule, which can work if you have service on most days), they seem to be omitting folks who might want to go the other way around.

(3) It's not clear whether the price is one-way or round-trip. If it's one-way, some of those prices are astronomical. If it's round-trip, those prices aren't unreasonable at all.

All of this comes down to the fact that, at $60 for a round-trip for coach service (not out of sorts when compared to VA Regional prices), this service actually has real potential.
 
This appears to be more of an excursion service than a true passenger service. The website has serious gaps as it provides locations for the Sapulpa, Stroud, Bristow stops but nothing about the Midwest City stop nor a schedule for Midwest City. Either they don't have an agreement for a location there yet or they are seeking to extend the service to the Oklahoma City Amtrak station - if that can be done without track upgrades - and are in discussions with BNSF about it? The problem with running a limited excursion train is how often does it lead to a restoration of proper passenger service rather being seen as just a "tourist" train?
 
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afigg said:
This appears to be more of an excursion service than a true passenger service. The website is has serious gaps as it provides locations for the Sapulpa, Stroud, Bristow stops but nothing about the Midwest City stop nor a schedule for Midwest City. Either they don't have an agreement for a location there yet or they are seeking to extend the service to the Oklahoma City Amtrak station - if that can be done without track upgrades - and are in discussions with BNSF about it? The problem with running a limited excursion train is how often does it lead to a restoration of proper passenger service rather being seen as just a "tourist" train?
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That's not an easy question to answer, since as a rule most tourist operations are either utterly disconnected from any semblance of the national network (e.g. Durango and Silverton), don't serve a "reasonable" pair of cities (e.g. Saratoga and North Creek), and/or focus very heavily on the scenery at the expense of any sort of reasonable runtime. More than a few tourist operations have all three shortfalls. Mind you, I'm omitting "once a year" type excursions from this list.

The lack of a reverse schedule and, as you noted, the lack of a time for Oklahoma City/Midwest City are interesting shortcomings. I can't tell how long the trip is expected to last in total, so I can't even stab at return times.
 
the_traveler said:
However, as shown by your example, Saratoga has Amtrak service but North Creek does not. Also Utica does, but Old Forge does not. Here, OKC does but Tulsa does not.
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Agreed. I guess the key here is that while North Creek is apparently a seasonal destination (the ski resorts), I've never even heard of Old Forge. Also of note: The Saratoga and North Creek has seasonal multiple-daily service to the point that I'd suggest that while it is tourist-oriented, they've got something reasonably akin to "regular" passenger service that can be used by locals in a meaningful way to connect with Amtrak. That Iowa Pacific is the operator there as well definitely has an impact on my speculation.

Looking over in the UK, at least, IIRC there are a few Heritage lines which actually do a surprising amount of "real" passenger service and have functional interchanges with the rest of the system.

I guess the key difference is that in the case of most lines with a passable interchange (Utica, Saratoga Springs, etc.), the destination on the other end is solely a "tourist" destination. With Tulsa-Oklahoma City, this couldn't be farther from the case, since both ends are major cities. Not only that, but to go from one city to the other, you don't need to change trains (which is the case for New York-North Creek, for example).
 
OlympianHiawatha said:
One thing I found interesting is all the details of the Diner Menu have already been worked out while many other gaps remain.
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That doesn't surprise me. Iowa Pacific has done enough of these operations that they can probably put together a menu in their sleep, and on top of that the menu is almost entirely an internal concern (assuming you can get a decent commissary contract together). On the other hand, details like scheduling, station locations, etc. are very heavily affected by external issues.
 
I am not familiar with either of those New York State operations--Saratoga/North Creek or Utica/Old Forge....but now I am curious...

Before I study the details of these operations, I would like to ask those that are familiar....is there any potential viability of Amtrak running a joint thru seasonal type service with either of those carriers to tap a resort market....say NYP to either or both, up on Friday afternoon, back on Sunday afternoon?
 
Anderson said:
the_traveler said:
However, as shown by your example, Saratoga has Amtrak service but North Creek does not. Also Utica does, but Old Forge does not. Here, OKC does but Tulsa does not.
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Agreed. I guess the key here is that while North Creek is apparently a seasonal destination (the ski resorts), I've never even heard of Old Forge. Also of note: The Saratoga and North Creek has seasonal multiple-daily service to the point that I'd suggest that while it is tourist-oriented, they've got something reasonably akin to "regular" passenger service that can be used by locals in a meaningful way to connect with Amtrak. That Iowa Pacific is the operator there as well definitely has an impact on my speculation.

Looking over in the UK, at least, IIRC there are a few Heritage lines which actually do a surprising amount of "real" passenger service and have functional interchanges with the rest of the system.

I guess the key difference is that in the case of most lines with a passable interchange (Utica, Saratoga Springs, etc.), the destination on the other end is solely a "tourist" destination. With Tulsa-Oklahoma City, this couldn't be farther from the case, since both ends are major cities. Not only that, but to go from one city to the other, you don't need to change trains (which is the case for New York-North Creek, for example).
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But they're not serving Tulsa or Oklahoma City, only two suburbs, so some work would be needed for it to be an actual intercity service.
 
True, though Amtrak also doesn't serve San Francisco. It's pretty clear they have a bus-to-downtown plan in place (that actually most closely resembles the B&O in New York back in the 20s-50s), and establishing the reverse in Tulsa wouldn't be impossible. And, as noted, it seems like they're still trying to get something together on the Oklahoma City end of things, too, though actually accessing OKC itself may run into technical issues with backup moves.
 
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Just to be clear, this rail service is set to run a grand total of 3 times, all in February. One assumes if the demand is

strong, there will be additional runs added. But for now, this seems to be little more than a trial balloon, not an

actual attempt at inter-city service or even a regular excursion service.
 
Tickets for Eastern Flyer passenger rail, running between Tulsa & OKC metros, selling quickly
The Eastern Flyer sold more than 400 tickets in three days, exceeding the goal of 300.

Supporters say it shows great demand for passenger rail between the state's two largest cities.
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Also, the Eastern Flyer website has been updated with a timetable:

https://www.easternflyer.com/faq.html

It's not exactly high-speed rail. They're allowing nearly 3 1/2 hours to go a total of 97 miles.

I suppose folks shelling out the big bucks for the dome car and dining service won't want

the trip to be over too fast anyhow. But as a demonstration for future regularly-scheduled

service, it probably won't "wow" too much.
 
If they advertise "take the train to the (OKC Thunder) game", and the train arrives at 11:20 am and departs at 3 pm and you still have to get to the stadium, with the next train in a week will there be enough time? :huh: Nothing personal, but I don't want to take a train to the game, then have to stay in OKC for a week to go ~100 miles back home.
 
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the_traveler said:
If they advertise "take the train to the (OKC Thunder) game", and the train arrives at 11:20 am and departs at 3 pm and you still have to get to the stadium, with the next train in a week will there be enough time? :huh: Nothing personal, but I don't want to take a train to the game, then have to stay in OKC for a week to go ~100 miles back home.
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I wouldn't worry about that. Eastern Flyer is selling packages that include a ticket to the game and a shuttle bus to/from the train station. The train is due in at 11:20 a.m. and the game starts at 12 p.m.

That should allow plenty of time to watch the game and get back to the station in time for a 3 p.m. departure. But even if the game goes into OT, or there's a traffic tie-up leaving the arena, I'd be 100% sure the train won't leave without the shuttle bus passengers since both the shuttle buses and the train are part of the same package. What would be the point of having the train depart without the passengers?
 
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As already mentioned, this is hardly "passenger service", rather three round trip excursions. I don't think they will get a lot of business if they want to actually "link" Oklahoma's two largest cities three times per year at less than 30mph.

The cost of dining is incredible. $89 for two meals. Breakfast sounds like continental and dinner is sandwiches, burgers or chicken or pork entrees. $100 on top of that for dome and adult beverages.

Knock it to 2 hours and it's respectable. 1.5 hours and you can almost beat the busy tollway. One hour flat, and the Fed's will give you HSR dough!

But this is short line track. Doubt if the speed will get much past the 30 mph average...

Perhaps they will show promise and perhaps they will find a way to make this transportation instead of a gimmick.
 
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VentureForth said:
As already mentioned, this is hardly "passenger service", rather three round trip excursions. I don't think they will get a lot of business if they want to actually "link" Oklahoma's two largest cities three times per year at less than 30mph.

The cost of dining is incredible. $89 for two meals. Breakfast sounds like continental and dinner is sandwiches, burgers or chicken or pork entrees. $100 on top of that for dome and adult beverages.

Knock it to 2 hours and it's respectable. 1.5 hours and you can almost beat the busy tollway. One hour flat, and the Fed's will give you HSR dough!

But this is short line track. Doubt if the speed will get much past the 30 mph average...

Perhaps they will show promise and perhaps they will find a way to make this transportation instead of a gimmick.
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Actually, from what I've been reading, "short line track" is ripe for passenger service in some cases. There's some discussion that Class IIs are more open to passenger service at a lower cost than Class Is (witness IAIS being open to the Des Moines/Omaha service and FEC's operations).
 
Tulsa to Sapulpa to Oklahoma City was part of the Frisco's main line, route of the Meteor, overnight between st. Louis and Oklahoma City. It was never fast. Scheduled for about two and one-half hours, and that with signals and a speed limti that was most likely 70 mph. It is fairly curvey. So, if you want to get down to much less, you are talking realignments, not just track upgrades. As noted, Sapulpa to Oklahoma City is not a short line. Tulsa to Sapulpa remains in BNSF ownership as part of their route to Dallas / Ft. Worth. Saying all the above to say that if there is a desire to start up regular Tulsa to Oklahoma City passenger service, it won't be cheap.
 
Sapulpa-to-Oklahoma City train trips sold out

The Eastern Flyer has sold all 900 tickets for three planned trips from Sapulpa to Oklahoma City.



Next month's three train trips from the Tulsa area to Oklahoma City are a hot ticket; too hot, in fact, for anyone who waited.

“We are thrilled to announce that all three Eastern Flyer trips are sold out,” said Charlotte Park, a representative for Iowa Pacific, the company sponsoring the train trips.

The Eastern Flyer is the name given to three tourist train trips in February from Sapulpa to Oklahoma City. The rides are some of the first passenger train excursions offered on the stretch in 47 years.

But for those who didn't get a ticket, the opportunity is gone.

Iowa Pacific has managed to sell all 900 tickets in three weeks.

Initially, the rail company expected to sell only about 300 tickets for the three trips, said Angela Arias, Iowa Pacific's vice president of marketing.
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That 300-seat goal feels like a case of artificially low expectations. Still, it seems possible that this might at least become a "regular" excursion.

Edit: One thing to consider: Even if timekeeping, etc. isn't great, if the cities are big enough and the total time involved isn't too long, there may be a market for a "bad" train in terms of average speeds, etc.
 
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The first one is out and running, looks like a great success, the Iowa Pacific and SLWC did a great job putting this together. If I can figure it out later I'll post some pictures and video later.
 
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