what is the best way to take in these routes?

[chucklehead]

I need your help:

What is the best way to take in all these routes?

The more daylight travel the better.

I can start from anywhere along the route(s).

1.portland oregon to sandiego (“Coast Starlight” + “Pacific Surfliner” LA to SD)

(which is the southernmost SD Stop?

San Diego - Old Town, CA OLT

San Diego, CA SAN

San Diego - Sea World Bus Stop, CA SDS

San Diego - Zoo Bus Stop, CA SDZ

2.”Capital Corridor” San Jose to Sactown

3.”San Joaquins” Sactown to Bakersfield

thanks for your help!

 

[gswager]

The most scenic area would be riding the train along the coast. However, the southbound Coast Starlight has the worst on-time performance so it may getting dark when you're along the coast. There's an alternative if you decide to spent the night in San Luis Obispo. I pick San Luis Obispo because there are several launch pads in Vandenberg AFB that is very interesting to see. If going northbound from LA shouldn't be no problem at all. From February to March or April is the greenery season, depending on how much rainfall. It's pretty dry this winter.

San Joaquins' scenery is miles and miles of farmground. There's no trains between Bakersfield and Los Angeles, so there are busses.

Stop by the railroad musuem in Sacramento. From what I've heard, it's a really good musuem that I want to see someday.

It is possible that you can make a loop between Bay area and Los Angeles.

You can ride a trolley from San Diego to the US/Mexico border (Tijuana). It's a stark contrast between our comfortable environment and slums in Mexico.

 

[yarrow]

what is the otp of the cs lately? we will be on it in a week and it would be interesting to know what we might have in store. thanks

 

[Trogdor]

The Coast Starlight has been on time about 30% of the trips for this fiscal year.

 

[TransAtlantic]

Actually, getting all these in would be pretty simple: take the Coast Starlight to Sacramento, then transfer to the San Joaquins to Bakersfield w/ bus connection to L.A., then Surfliner from LA to SD; Surfliner back to LA, then CS from LA to San Jose, then Capitol Corridor from San Jose to Sac.; maximum daylight, except for the CapCor, which, if truth be told, probably looks better by night...

 

[GG-1]

The Coast Starlight has been on time about 30% of the trips for this fiscal year.

Aloha

I sometimes wonder what management says to not take responsibility to improve the situation.

Mahalo

 

[Trogdor]

The Coast Starlight has been on time about 30% of the trips for this fiscal year.

Aloha

I sometimes wonder what management says to not take responsibility to improve the situation.

Mahalo

The situation has improved. The OTP was at close to 0 a year or so ago.

Another indicator of whether or not the situation has improved (and one that I don't have an easy way of obtaining) is, for the trains that arrive late, how late are they?

If the route used to average 4-5 hours late, and now the late trains are 1-2 hours late, that's an improvement. Similar to the improvement that the Sunset Limited has had (25% on time for the FY). Trains used to run 8-10 hours (or more) late. Now, the trains that are late are often less than 2-3 hours behind schedule.

Not ideal, to be sure, but unquestionably an improvement over the past.

Just as a comparison: As of January 8, 2007, the Coast Starlight has a fiscal-year end-point OTP of 30.8%. Out of 198 trips (October 1 through January 7), 51 were on time.

As of January 5, 2006, the Coast Starlight had a fiscal-year end-point OTP of 2.4%. Out of 206 trips (October 1 through January 4, including, I believe, several days where the Starlight was split on its southbound trip due to trackwork, and apparently they were counted separately), five were on time. Incidentally, one of those five happened to be the train that detoured via Tehachapi and arrived four hours early.