Superliner bedrooms

[Carolyn Jane]

Traveling Amtrak, PHL - SAN, with bedrooms on CL and SWC. We are assigned room D on both trains. Question is, do the cars run with the bedroom up front, or the roomettes? If the bedrooms are front, we would be riding facing the rear, which I do not want. Like to see where I am going, not where I have been...CJ

 

[zephyr17]

The cars can run oriented either way. You won't know until you get on the train how your car is oriented in the consist. In many consists one car is oriented one way, the other car the opposite. On my recent trip on the Builder 730 had the bedrooms forward, 731 had the bedrooms aft.

 

[Railsohyeah]

I remember on the Coast Starlight some years back in Los Angeles at the station of the train's origin, a passenger was raising cain with the conductor because his large, expensive room he'd booked (for the entire route) was not gonna be facing the ocean for the entire trip.

I felt sorry for him a tiny bit...but hey the poor conductor can't just get out and unhook the car and turn it around!

 

[PacificStarlight]

I remember on the Coast Starlight some years back in Los Angeles at the station of the train's origin, a passenger was raising cain with the conductor because his large, expensive room he'd booked (for the entire route) was not gonna be facing the ocean for the entire trip.

I felt sorry for him a tiny bit...but hey the poor conductor can't just get out and unhook the car and turn it around!

Didn't they make sure that the bedrooms always faced the ocean on the CS? Maybe things have changed.

 

[AlanB]

I remember on the Coast Starlight some years back in Los Angeles at the station of the train's origin, a passenger was raising cain with the conductor because his large, expensive room he'd booked (for the entire route) was not gonna be facing the ocean for the entire trip.

I felt sorry for him a tiny bit...but hey the poor conductor can't just get out and unhook the car and turn it around!

Didn't they make sure that the bedrooms always faced the ocean on the CS? Maybe things have changed.

Amtrak never does that. Switching crews have no instructions to always orientate cars in a particular direction. If a car needs replacing, the new car is cut-in in whatever orientation it is found in the yard. Crews make no effort to turn the car prior to inserting it into the consist.

 

[Paul CHI]

The bedroom has 2 facing seats, though one only holds a single person and isn't quite as comfortable as the bench seat.

 

[zephyr17]

I remember on the Coast Starlight some years back in Los Angeles at the station of the train's origin, a passenger was raising cain with the conductor because his large, expensive room he'd booked (for the entire route) was not gonna be facing the ocean for the entire trip.

I felt sorry for him a tiny bit...but hey the poor conductor can't just get out and unhook the car and turn it around!

Didn't they make sure that the bedrooms always faced the ocean on the CS? Maybe things have changed.

Nope. Never. That's a myth.

 

[Swadian Hardcore]

The bedroom has 2 facing seats, though one only holds a single person and isn't quite as comfortable as the bench seat.

If it's the same size as a roomette seat, then it's more than enough for me!

 

[D.P. Roberts]

The bedroom has 2 facing seats, though one only holds a single person and isn't quite as comfortable as the bench seat.

If it's the same size as a roomette seat, then it's more than enough for me!

It isn't. It's small, thinly padded, and uncomfortable. If you want a really good seat near the window, the bedroom only has one good seat, but the roomette has two. For this reason, I prefer a roomette.

 

[Bierboy]

The bedroom has 2 facing seats, though one only holds a single person and isn't quite as comfortable as the bench seat.

That's being kind. It's VERY uncomfortable compared to the bench....

 

[Blackwolf]

I have to wonder why the chair provided inside the bedrooms had to be made so uncomfortable. It cannot be just because it is a folding chair. I know that before a few wrecks caused the NTSB to recommend that all chairs be fixed, the rooms had chairs not tremendously unlike those still found on VIA in the Budd-built sleepers. They were not attached to the wall or floor, were movable anywhere the occupants wanted, and folded up to be somewhat out of the way when not in use. I never had the chance to sit in one on Amtrak, but the ones on VIA are pretty darn comfortable. I'm sure there are those here on AU who remember them.

Alas, in the light of safety, Amtrak has every fixture and piece of furniture now bolted down. I imagine this is part of the reason there are booths in the dining and lounge cars instead of individual chairs. That being said, someone had to have gone out of their way to ensure the chairs now found in the bedrooms were as uncomfortable as physically possible without actually putting spikes in them.

 

[AlanB]

I have to wonder why the chair provided inside the bedrooms had to be made so uncomfortable. It cannot be just because it is a folding chair. I know that before a few wrecks caused the NTSB to recommend that all chairs be fixed, the rooms had chairs not tremendously unlike those still found on VIA in the Budd-built sleepers. They were not attached to the wall or floor, were movable anywhere the occupants wanted, and folded up to be somewhat out of the way when not in use. I never had the chance to sit in one on Amtrak, but the ones on VIA are pretty darn comfortable. I'm sure there are those here on AU who remember them.

I've sat in both the VIA and the old Amtrak folding chairs, and the VIA ones are far more comfortable than the Amtrak ones were. That said, the old Amtrak folding chairs were a bit better than the current wall mounted chairs.

 

[Swadian Hardcore]

Looks like I'm not gonna shell out the money for a Bedroom!

 

[Bierboy]

If you have a choice of seats, why not? You can sit on the bench if you like as long as they're aren't three or four of you staying in the bedroom. I don't have the distaste that some here have of facing back if that's the way the sleeper car is oriented.

 

[rickycourtney]

There are a few pictures of the chair in the Superliner Bedrooms or as Amtrak calls it, the "Bedroom Occasional Seat" in the Amtrak Service Standards Manual. Check out page 12-19 thru 12-21. It also shows how the armchair folds up against the wall to give you extra space for luggage.

Here's the link to the manual:

http://www.governmentattic.org/4docs/AmtrakServiceStandardsManual_2011.pdf

Trainweb also has some good pictures of what the armchair in the Superliner Bedrooms look like here:

http://www.trainweb.com/mvc/year2005/12/2005l05b/index.html

 

[boxcar479]

The bedroom has 2 facing seats, though one only holds a single person and isn't quite as comfortable as the bench seat.

If it's the same size as a roomette seat, then it's more than enough for me!

It isn't. It's small, thinly padded, and uncomfortable. If you want a really good seat near the window, the bedroom only has one good seat, but the roomette has two. For this reason, I prefer a roomette.

My wife called it the king chair. Me being the gentleman that I am :huh: always let my wife have the couch, while I sat in there. On one of our trips she said "you always sit in the king chair, why don't you ever let me sit there" I said you never told me you would like to sit there. When I got up to go get a cup of coffee I told her to swap seats with me and she did. When I got back to the room she was already back on the couch, and told me that is the most uncomfortable chair she has ever sat in(.duhhaa) She has never called it the "king chair" or wanted to sit there since then :lol: