What should Amtrak change?

[Mystic River Dragon]

Amtrak’s approach: plenty of nasty employees combined with a system that emphasizes lots of contact between employees and passengers likely compounds customer dissatisfaction.

For example:

1. If I could order dinner online, then I wouldn’t have to deal with employee attitude when the Amtrak employee comes by to take my order. (One time when I asked for a glass of wine with dinner, the employee fussed at me and said that it wasn’t her job to wait in line in the cafe car for me.)

2. I don’t need a wake-up call, particularly when my stop is before dawn and particularly when the wake-up call is often 30 minutes or more before arrival.

3. I would prefer to be able to just get off the train by myself. (I’ve been yelled at when I came to the door nearest my room to get off.)

4. I don’t need someone interrupting me to tell me how to use the room. I’m Select Plus; I’ve taken Amtrak sleeping cars many times before, which Amtrak should know.

5. I can raise and lower the bed myself.

6. Why doesn’t Amtrak have a place where you can put your ticket so that it can be scanned without the ticket collector needing to knock on your door and interrupt? I’ve been fussed at for NOT leaving my ticket in the window of the sleeping car, and fussed at for needing to unlock the door so that the ticket collector can come in; either way, I get fussed at.

If Amtrak had consistently helpful employees, the “high touch” level of service would be fine. But since each interaction with an Amtrak employee increases the chance of the employee yelling at the customer and the customer being dissatisfied, Amtrak should move as much as it can to be online and reduce the contacts unless the customer wants them.

If I had simply been left alone by one sleeping car attendant on the Crescent, I would still be an Amtrak regular. But thanks to Amtrak employees, I am an American Airlines twice-a-week flyer.

I like lots of peace and quiet and solitude, but there’s plenty of that on an LD trip, and I enjoy or need all the interactions with the crew that you have listed.

I prefer to make sure in person that the conductor has scanned my ticket, and I prefer to see an LSA in person in case I have questions or to let them know if I want to eat in the room or in the dining car—if I ordered ahead online, I might change my mind later.

I can use help getting off the train, and I would never try making the bed by myself.

I only needed a wake-up call once—early morning arrival in Sacramento—but I was grateful for it.

I must just be lucky, because I have never run into a truly bad or rude crew member on the LD trains.

Instead, I have met a few truly nice and helpful ones that I sometimes come across again, which makes the trip even better.

 

[cimmee]

First of all, totally defund high speed rail. Take the funds and actually buy the needed track. It does work, high speed rail don't.

Replacement for the rolling stock. I think I recognized the dining car from my last train ride in 1975.... My roomette on the CZ was filthy and manufactured in ????

Simply said, a lot of money is needed.

I like lots of peace and quiet and solitude, but there’s plenty of that on an LD trip, and I enjoy or need all the interactions with the crew that you have listed.

I prefer to make sure in person that the conductor has scanned my ticket, and I prefer to see an LSA in person in case I have questions or to let them know if I want to eat in the room or in the dining car—if I ordered ahead online, I might change my mind later.

I can use help getting off the train, and I would never try making the bed by myself.

I only needed a wake-up call once—early morning arrival in Sacramento—but I was grateful for it.

I must just be lucky, because I have never run into a truly bad or rude crew member on the LD trains.

Instead, I have met a few truly nice and helpful ones that I sometimes come across again, which makes the trip even better.

All true.

The Conductors and SCA's are there to help. I needed help getting off in SLC to smoke and the SCA was right there.

If you take a sleeper train and want solitude I suggest a good psychiatrist. I prefer solitude but found it refreshing to get outside myself. Seriously....

 

[Mystic River Dragon]

All true.

The Conductors and SCA's are there to help. I needed help getting off in SLC to smoke and the SCA was right there.

If you take a sleeper train and want solitude I suggest a good psychiatrist. I prefer solitude but found it refreshing to get outside myself. Seriously....

I was unclear—I meant peace and quiet and solitude as in getting away from day-to-day chores and to-do lists at home. I agree, meeting and talking with other passengers is a very nice part of the sleeper train (or any train) experience.

 

[TheCrescent]

I like lots of peace and quiet and solitude, but there’s plenty of that on an LD trip, and I enjoy or need all the interactions with the crew that you have listed.

I prefer to make sure in person that the conductor has scanned my ticket, and I prefer to see an LSA in person in case I have questions or to let them know if I want to eat in the room or in the dining car—if I ordered ahead online, I might change my mind later.

I can use help getting off the train, and I would never try making the bed by myself.

I only needed a wake-up call once—early morning arrival in Sacramento—but I was grateful for it.

I must just be lucky, because I have never run into a truly bad or rude crew member on the LD trains.

Instead, I have met a few truly nice and helpful ones that I sometimes come across again, which makes the trip even better.

Sure, people’s experiences and needs vary.

For me, before providing services that I don’t want, the SCA should say, when stopping by at the beginning of the trip, “Do you need help with your bed/dinner/wake-up call/getting off?”

I could say no, be left alone and be happy.

You could say yes, get those services and be happy.

 

[cimmee]

Yes they do have to. Amtrak’s very existence comes from acts of Congress - Congress determines what they are allowed to spend federal money on. Service largely went to tri weekly during the pandemic due to a Congressional failure to pass more Covid relief after Amtrak’s initial relief ran out. Additional follies such as food service and other cuts came as a result by congressional meddling and failure to make up its mind on what Amtrak’s mission should be. I think you’re letting our elected reps off the hook way too much on Amtrak issues. They are just as much at fault for Amtrak’s back and forth inconsistency as anything or anyone else and as the real power perhaps the most at fault.

What would make Amtrak better is a multi year operational funding model that would insulate the company a bit from the year to year partisan politics and maintain a longer term direction. Having to shift directions constantly because of changes in power in Washington doesn’t help things. I don’t disagree about reforming the board but that’s not the only thing that’s needed.

GSE's can work well, in fact, great at times.

While I truly enjoyed my CZ ride to Reno, it wasn't Swiss Rail. All of the issues that I noticed (shitty track, filthy/old rolling stock, etc) were related to a massive lack of funding. There are two paths; break up Amtrak and sell off the routes or fully fund Amtrak. Each path has benefits/risk.

 

[I like rolling hotels]

o Walk the coach cars to keep an eye out for problems like dangerous passengers.
o Standardize customer service training and make it easy to complain quickly if there's a need. I've seen more than one above-and-beyond bit of customer service but Amtrak needs to cut out the bottom.
o Use the $#@! PA system for announcements instead of expecting people who aren't close to the gate to hear you in a noisy station.
Can I do more than three things?
o SCAs should pay attention to the call button. I don't use it often but it's annoying to wait for hours.

 

[Bonser]

Amtrak’s approach: plenty of nasty employees combined with a system that emphasizes lots of contact between employees and passengers likely compounds customer dissatisfaction.

For example:

1. If I could order dinner online, then I wouldn’t have to deal with employee attitude when the Amtrak employee comes by to take my order. (One time when I asked for a glass of wine with dinner, the employee fussed at me and said that it wasn’t her job to wait in line in the cafe car for me.)

2. I don’t need a wake-up call, particularly when my stop is before dawn and particularly when the wake-up call is often 30 minutes or more before arrival.

3. I would prefer to be able to just get off the train by myself. (I’ve been yelled at when I came to the door nearest my room to get off.)

4. I don’t need someone interrupting me to tell me how to use the room. I’m Select Plus; I’ve taken Amtrak sleeping cars many times before, which Amtrak should know.

5. I can raise and lower the bed myself.

6. Why doesn’t Amtrak have a place where you can put your ticket so that it can be scanned without the ticket collector needing to knock on your door and interrupt? I’ve been fussed at for NOT leaving my ticket in the window of the sleeping car, and fussed at for needing to unlock the door so that the ticket collector can come in; either way, I get fussed at.

If Amtrak had consistently helpful employees, the “high touch” level of service would be fine. But since each interaction with an Amtrak employee increases the chance of the employee yelling at the customer and the customer being dissatisfied, Amtrak should move as much as it can to be online and reduce the contacts unless the customer wants them.

If I had simply been left alone by one sleeping car attendant on the Crescent, I would still be an Amtrak regular. But thanks to Amtrak employees, I am an American Airlines twice-a-week flyer.

Sounds like you might have a bit of an attitude yourself.What do you define as being yelled at? It seems you're not only upset at rudeness but also helpfulness.

 

[joelkfla]

Just boarded 91 at NYP for KIS, preboarded because I have a mobility scooter. As we walked down to the rear of the train, I noticed that the windows were particularly filthy. After getting into my room, I broke out my folding squeegee, wet it at the sink, and walked outside to clean my windows, then repeat and polished. Both SCAs and the conductor, who were gathered at the car door, were laughing. I told them, "If Amtrak won't do it, I'll do it myself!" An SCA replied, "Amtrak won't do it." When I was done, the conductor said, "Those are the cleanest windows on the railroad."

 

[alpha3]

Pathetic. (not you of course). Amtrak can't even clean windows when they turn a train?? An Amtrak critic I know told me he recently rode 92 and it still had someone's trash in his room. Could be exaggerating I guess, but one wonders.

 

[AmtrakBlue]

Oh, darn. I wasn't "out there" in Newark, DE to catch those clean windows.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

In the time I've been riding Amtrak the windows have slowly morphed from real glass repeatedly cleaned en route into some kind of plexiglass that is rarely cleaned before the first departure. The era of Anderson, Flynn, and Garner has been a net negative for the long haul customer and the few bright spots seem to be courtesy of a micromanaging congress rather than the top brass having any real presence or pride in their long haul product.

 

[jis]

I get the feeling that it is time to somehow get the top management of Amtrak to actually want to run a good railroad and work diligently towards such instead of spending a very significant proportion of their time crafting excuses for not doing so. They also need to internalize the idea that you fight a war with the army that you have, not with the army you wish you had. If you can't do what you have been appointed to do you should gracefully step aside and let someone else who might be more capable than you take over and give it a shot.

How difficult can it be to fix the car washes and actually run the trains through it before sending them to the platform? Railways of the world seem to be able to do so for hundreds and thousands of trains and Amtrak struggles to do so with 15 LD trains. How does this make any sense?

This should be at the top of the list of things to change at Amtrak.

 

[lordsigma]

I don't get what the issue is with the Florida trains as they seem to be one of the most consistently dirty. They seem to have gotten back to washing the western trains as the Chicago wash rack has been back in service since late Spring/early Summer. Are both New York and Hialeah racks still down?

I'd add the Acelas and Regionals lately have looked particularly dirty. Was it ever the practice for those trainsets to get washed daily or was it less frequent with the back and forth running of NEC equipment?

 

[jis]

I'd add the Acelas and Regionals lately have looked particularly dirty. Was it ever the practice for those trainsets to get washed daily or was it less frequent with the back and forth running of NEC equipment?

When the Acelas were introduced their windows were spotless clean specially early in the day. They got somewhat dirty by the evening, but the next morning they were clean again. One can surmise they were actually washed regularly. At least they were run through the car wash once a day. They used to have working car washes in Ivy City, Sunnyside and Southampton Street as far as I could tell. For some reason all that has gone to pot.

 

[lordsigma]

Several months back I caught wash rack renovations for three locations on Amtrak's procurement portal - Chicago, Boston, and Seattle. Because they don't archive past postings its impossible to determine if there were others posted at times I didn't look.

 

[JamesWhitcombRiley]

Several months back I caught wash rack renovations for three locations on Amtrak's procurement portal - Chicago, Boston, and Seattle. Because they don't archive past postings its impossible to determine if there were others posted at times I didn't look.

RFQ's now for the maintenance facilities in Boston, New York, Washington, Seattle; then, maybe now, Philadelphia, Rensselaer. Then 15 layover sites, including the four NECR ones in Virginia. Meanwhile NPN's new station on Bland Blvd. in Newport News will open next year with a new wye. It's mostly all built now. Track times will improve because it's so far upline, moved away from the CSX seaport yard.

The other 11 weren't specified in the only source I found for the layover site news, https://www.washingtonpost.com/transportation/2023/09/01/amtrak-new-trains-rail-yard/

Amtrak's press release was July 14, Amtrak Kicks Off Procurement for New Maintenance Facilities

 

[Bob Dylan]

Pathetic. (not you of course). Amtrak can't even clean windows when they turn a train?? An Amtrak critic I know told me he recently rode 92 and it still had someone's trash in his room. Could be exaggerating I guess, but one wonders.

When boarding,don't look under your Seat(s) in Sleepers if you don't want to be Shocked by what's under there!

 

[AmtrakBlue]

Engineer cleaning their windows today.

 

[lordsigma]

When boarding,don't look under your Seat(s) in Sleepers if you don't want to be Shocked by what's under there!

I found I think a water bottle wedged a nook and cranny on one train once crammed into an awkward spot that a person just going through and doing the basic vacuuming and wiping down and not looking in nooks and crannies like they should would have missed. That’s all I’ve seen on all of my trips. Not excusing Amtrak (as the cleaning crews should always catch this kind of stuff) it kind of amazes me that people would leave stuff like that for someone to pick up to begin with. I always do a once over in my roomette and pickup anything I wouldn’t want to have to pick up for someone else if I was on a cleaning crew out of common courtesy and throw it in the garbage bag provided but then you see how some passengers treat the restrooms and I guess it is what it is. I do those once overs especially when I am disembarking at a point where I know it’s possible another passenger may be taking over my roomette.

 

[AmtrakBlue]

I found I think a water bottle wedged a nook and cranny on one train once crammed into an awkward spot that a person just going through and doing the basic vacuuming and wiping down and not looking in nooks and crannies like they should would have missed. That’s all I’ve seen on all of my trips. Not excusing Amtrak (as the cleaning crews should always catch this kind of stuff) it kind of amazes me that people would leave stuff like that for someone to pick up to begin with. I always do a once over in my roomette and pickup anything I wouldn’t want to have to pick up for someone else if I was on a cleaning crew out of common courtesy and throw it in the garbage bag provided but then you see how some passengers treat the restrooms and I guess it is what it is. I do those once overs especially when I am disembarking at a point where I know it’s possible another passenger may be taking over my roomette.

Can’t explain why some people are like that. I’ve seen cups left within a few feet of a trash can, which they walk right by to board their train, at the Newark, DE station.

 

[mgkeihl]

When boarding,don't look under your Seat(s) in Sleepers if you don't want to be Shocked by what's under there!

I dropped a pen and took my phone flashlight under seat to look for it and filled a little bag with garbage! Including some unidentified medications!! I was upstairs last time but used hand sanitizer on inside windows and the paper towel was filthy!! Still love that train though!

 

[Sunrobber]

I dropped a pen and took my phone flashlight under seat to look for it and filled a little bag with garbage! Including some unidentified medications!! I was upstairs last time but used hand sanitizer on inside windows and the paper towel was filthy!! Still love that train though!

We’re doing two first-ever long-haul rides starting November 15. The first will be the Sunset Limited from NOLA to LA. After a few days with friends there, we board the Coast Starlight going to Portland.

I'll report back what I find on cleanliness. Should I pack my own cleaning supplies or ask for them if we find what so many are finding?

 

[alpha3]

When boarding,don't look under your Seat(s) in Sleepers if you don't want to be Shocked by what's under there!

Ewwwwww....

 

[Northwestern]

I would like to see Amtrak, if at all possible, reduce the number of bustitutes. You're looking forward to a great overnight trip on a LD train, and you get a notice that, instead, you're in for a long bus ride to your destination. And, possibly a very long bus ride. Derailments, washed out bridges, & forest fires are all real reasons for a bus substitutions. But, what about bus substitutes for a lack of equipment, insufficient Amtrak staff, etc. I don't find that to be acceptable.

Can there not be arrangements for the train to take dedicated freight track detours, in some cases? If a bus is necessary, besides travelling to your Amtrak destination could the bus also stop at an airport, along the way, for a possible airplane substitution?

 

[west point]

One bus substitution might be eliminated is the EB. If Amtrak had say spare 2 coaches, lounge, and loco(s) based in SEA then when short turning EBs at Spokane run the spares just to Spokane with #7s passengers & let them transfer to turned train. Then return spare to Seattle taking #8s passengers. There might be a problem if #7 is very late 2 days in a row trying to turn the spares back.