The East bound Boston section of today's 6/30/14 Lake Shore Limite

[railpost]

I have some friends who are on today's 448 riding from Chicago to Boston. The train is now slightly over 3 hours late and they will be arriving Boston after midnight.

I just saw that Lake Shore has had a dismal punctuality record as of recently.

It was running about 5 hours late however I believe it has some schedule padding built in.

Does anyone out there know why the train has been running so late?

I know that Empire Builder has been running way behind schedule for several years because of freight congestion however some of that route is single track ,but a train running on the "Empire Corridor" I wouldn't expect to run from 4 to 5 hours late.

The Lake Shore left Chicago last night 6/29/14 over an hour late and it kept getting later as it went on.

Were they held for a late train from the West Coast? or was it mechanical?

These friends who are on that train I had gotten to join NARP (National Association of Railroad Passengers) over a year ago and they are a family that likes traveling via train however with the delays that they have been experiencing that last few summers on Amtrak I really wonder how much longer they will be willing to take the train on their annual vacation.

Two years ago the Empire Builder that they were riding on was so late that they were put on a bus to Chicago and Glenview at St Paul to make up time.

 

[amamba]

There is a good amount of padding built into the LSL between Worcester and Boston, they should be able to make up time there.

 

[OlympianHiawatha]

Both the Cap and LSL can be held for a reasonable time in Chicago for connecting trains from the west. It happened to me on the Cap last year, but our delay was only for about 30 minutes and connecting pax from the CZ were literally pulled off the train and tossed onto ours.

 

[Railroad Bill]

But unfortunately, when those two trains are held for later western connections, they no longer fit into their assigned spot in the NS & CSX freight mantra and the delays begin. Sitting outside Elkhart waiting for NS freights becomes a daily event and it continues across the entire LSL route after that. Construction in New York has also contributed to slow running Amtrak trains.

 

[PaulM]

But unfortunately, when those two trains are held for later western connections, they no longer fit into their assigned spot in the NS & CSX freight mantra and the delays begin.

I often see this as an explanation for further delay when a train departs late. But do freight RR's really schedule operations that closely, i..e, create a slot for the passenger train such that it stays in the slot unless a significant event occurs, such as equipment failure, freight train wreck, broken track, mud slide, etc? Or is it simply random, two trains find themselves near each other and the dispatcher decides how to handle it.

I mean if the LSL leaves 3 hours late and looses another 3 hours, we say it's because they were out of their slot. But what about when it leaves on time and looses 3 hours due to "freight train interference"? The latter case isn't all that rare.

Manufacturing has a similar situation. Based on an actual or forecasted book of business, it can lay out a schedule stating which job gets worked on by what machine when. The other approach is to just push the work out and let the foreman decide which job to work on next based on some rules of thumb.

 

[PRae_Train]

It's hard to figure the hour schedule padding between Worcester and Boston. If the 448 train is [only] an hour late getting into Worcester, chances are very good that it will be right on time to Boston. To me, this just improves their on-time statistics, Boston being the terminus of the run.

Wouldn't you think they would schedule the buffer times into the more commonly delayed segments? When they leave Albany on time, there are more often delays from there to Worcester than from Worcester to Boston.