Here's some fodder for discussion from the United Rail Passenger Alliance:
"
http://www.unitedrail.org
Volume 3, Number 4
1) As said before, those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it.
Read what URPA Vice President and guiding light Andrew Selden has to say
about Amtrak’s latest misadventure regarding dining car service on long
distance trains.
By Andrew Selden
Amtrak is about to embark on another doomed project. The company in the
past has often tried to starve itself into prosperity by cutting costs
without sufficient regard to the adverse effect on revenues (Tri-weekly
trains, limited advertising, closed stations, and elimination of checked
baggage service, all come to mind.). This time, in a troubling
innovation, Amtrak plans to starve not itself, but its customers in its
quest for prosperity.
As famous historian and philosopher George Santayana observed nearly a
hundred years ago, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to
repeat it."
Amtrak has been down this road before. It didn't work then. It won't work
this time, either.
In 1980, Amtrak was reeling from Congress' refusal two years earlier to
allow its annual subsidy to creep up over a billion dollars. In 1979, it
had tried to "cut costs" by eliminating five entire routes, but to no
avail – the annual losses continued their inexorable climb. By 1980,
attention focused on Amtrak's onboard food and beverage services, a
perennial favorite target of critics ignorant of the nature of Amtrak's
business.
The dining cars are labor-intensive operations with a sharply limited
revenue potential because of the limited number of passengers able to use
any given train (Because management also tried to "control costs" by
limiting the number of cars operated on the trains, hence the number of
seats and berths that could be sold on any given trip.). Diners and
lounge cars are, nevertheless, an indispensable element of the backbone
of Amtrak's key business, the long distance trains, for this simple
reason (which the critics, often government accountants, have never
grasped): the typical, average journey on an Amtrak long distance train
is more than 600 miles, and in the west more than 800 miles. That trip
spans 11 to 18 hours, which encompasses two, three or even four meal
periods. Many trips are even longer, during which the passenger is
utterly dependent upon Amtrak for all of her and her family's sustenance
over periods of up to three days. Take away the food, or reduce it to
inedibility, and the passenger will respond in the only rational manner
possible: she won't come back for a second trip.
For discretionary passengers (And, everyone has a choice: to travel by
Amtrak, or another mode, or to forgo a trip.), there can be little appeal
to a trip spanning one to three days with no serious meals. Indeed,
attractive dining service is often cited as a principal attractant to
travel by rail.
This is much less of a concern with Amtrak's many short corridor markets,
where the average trip length is just one to two hours, and providing
more than a snack and beverage service is superfluous. But for the long
distance trains, which produce about half of all of Amtrak's
transportation output and ticket revenue (on about one fifth of the
annual subsidy), attractive meal service is a vital necessity.
In 1981, Amtrak challenged these truths with a scheme championed by one
Rima Parkhurst, the hapless Vice President of Customer Service at the
time, to feed long distance passengers by serving reheated, preplated
tray meals. Pay in advance, wait for the food tray to show up. Ms.
Parkhurst promised the quality of "airline First Class standard" meals.
She was wrong. The food was awful. The service was awful. Dining car
employees were totally embarrassed and dispirited. Tips vanished. Soon,
the passengers started to vanish, as well – it didn't happen overnight,
because long distance trips are infrequent enough for most passengers
that the experience of the micro-waved airline-style meals had to wait
for the next trip after the experiment was launched. But it took only one
trip, and even rail loyalists started staying away, in droves. Word of
mouth, the most powerful of all consumer education channels, was
devastating.
Within less than a year, Ms. Parkhurst was gone, and so were the tray
meals. A compromised level of real meals, with real food cooked on board
(if not always cooked to order), was reinstituted, and traffic began a
slow rebound.
The failed point of this was to get the cost of the diner down by
slashing staff on Superliner diners from 11 people to three people, and
single level diners from eight employees to three. After the disaster was
reversed, the staff was rebuilt up to a level of five to nine, depending
on the dining car.
There were earlier examples from which Amtrak could have learned, but did
not. In the late 1950s, as part of its designed campaign to drive away
passengers from a service that it wanted to eliminate, the notorious
Southern Pacific Railroad replaced its dining car service on the Sunset
Limited (New Orleans-Los Angeles) with lounge cars equipped with
Automat-type sandwich and snack vending machines. It worked – passengers
abandoned the Sunset Limited with vigor. Other railroads simply
eliminated food service cars altogether. That worked, too. Costs were
cut, but so was patronage and the tremendous revenue streams they
represented, and soon so were the trains altogether.
None of this is to say that Amtrak should pretend that it is 1955 again
(or even 1975), and try to offer a five-star fine dining experience in
which its customers are plainly not interested. Most passengers today are
accustomed to modern standards of what in the dining industry is referred
to as "fast casual" or "casual" dining. Think of an Applebee's, Denny's
or Olive Garden restaurant. Families are welcome and comfortable.
Business travelers can get a decent meal, and at dinner enjoy it with a
decent wine. Single diners are accommodated respectfully. Food is cooked
to order, on site. Staff is trained to be accommodating, polite and
respectful (and don't last long if they aren't). Customers are expected
to pay a fair, but modest, price, and to leave a full tip for good
service. A manager is always on site to assist service staff, greet
customers, solve problems, and coordinate activities.
Of course, none of these successful restaurant chains ignores costs and
cost management, but none allows itself to skimp on food, service or
quality simply to "cut (or control) costs" to the point that it takes
away the reason that customers patronize the restaurant in the first
place.
If that is the path that Amtrak follows, the outcome is predetermined:
passengers will find another way to get where they want to go, and it
won't involve trains. History teaches us that. Empirical contemporary
experience in the foodservice industry teaches us that. How many times
must Amtrak shoot itself in the foot with ill-conceived schemes to "cut
costs" in the food service area before it learns the lesson that to
accommodate passengers who contribute half the company's revenue it must
feed them in the manner the customer expects?
2) You never know what’s going to come in flying over the transom when
you open the URPA e-mail box. Here is a "testimonial" from a very recent
Amtrak passenger.
"I just rode train # 50 (The Cardinal) between Chicago and
Charlottesville, Va. That god-awful "Diner Lite" was in effect and
frankly the food service stank. Same for Superliner Train # 4 (The
Southwest Chief, LA to CHI). I have lodged a complaint with Amtrak. My
thoughts are this ‘dumbing down’ of food service will benefit the
already-awful airline industry more than Amtrak.
"On the above trains I was a First Class passenger."
This is just one person that has been heard from. How many other
disgruntled passengers are out there no one will ever hear from, again?
3) Here are some samples from Amtrak’s new menu. There are four breakfast
entrees, three priced at $10.00, and one at $6.75. Each entree includes
juice, and coffee, tea, or milk. The entree that proves the most
interesting is the Western Omelet for $10.00. Amtrak says the omelet is
"draped with cheddar cheese, then topped with peppers, onion, and
vegetarian ham, served with pork sausage and breakfast potatoes." A prize
is offered to all of those who immediately see the inconsistency of this
offering. Ready? "Vegetarian ham" as an omelet ingredient, but "pork
sausage" is served as the accompanying breakfast meat. And, what exactly
is "vegetarian ham?" And, perhaps more importantly, "why" is there
vegetarian ham? What is vegetarian ham made of? Do we really want to
know?
At lunchtime, entrees run from $7.00 to $12.00, and passengers add
minestrone or chicken noodle soup to any entree for $4.00.
Dinner prices have become a bit more reasonable, with entree ranging from
$11.00 to $18.00, with selections of beef, chicken, fish, cheese
tortellini and a daily special. Half bottles of wine are offered for
$12.00, and desserts run from $3.50 to $5.00.
You may note the great American staple of bacon is not included in the
menu; when you initially look at the menu (and, there is no "mix and
match), things are pretty much take it as offered, or leave it. Not much
room for those with special dietary needs, or much variety if you're on
the train for more than 24 hours.
3) Here’s some great news: CSX has reopened its Gulf Coast line for local
traffic only, which was devastated by Hurricane Katrina. This will
eventually allow two good things to happen when the line soon starts
accepting through traffic. The Norfolk Southern main line from Atlanta to
New Orleans has been clogged by the railroad’s own heavy traffic to New
Orleans, plus it has been helping CSX by operating detour trains over the
same line, causing massive congestion, and making the Crescent
perpetually late all along its route. By soon eliminating the CSX detour
trains, Norfolk Southern, even with its own heavy capacity, should be
able to operate the Crescent in a more timely manner.
And, with the CSX Gulf Coast line soon to host through traffic, how long
will it take to restore the beleaguered Sunset Limited to its full route
of Los Angeles to Orlando, via New Orleans and the Gulf Coast line?
Amtrak, we're watching and waiting for the earliest possible moment that
CSX has the line in good enough shape to host the Sunset.
One item not mentioned in the press release - CSX and its insurance
carrier that handles catastrophic events ponied up $250 million in a
combination of lost business and replacement costs to get this line
running again, without whimpering about the need for free federal money
from the government treasury. That’s what private enterprise is all
about; CSX had a problem, not of its own making, but it took care of what
needed to be taken care of to get back in business.
4) Progressive Railroading magazine has reported that the executive
search firm of Heidrick & Struggles Inc. (No jokes, please, that really
is the name.) has been hired by the Amtrak Board of Directors to help
conduct a nationwide search for a new president and chief executive
officer. The company has more than half a century of experiencing placing
top executives in both domestic and international firms.
5) Amtrak’s Southern Division is being naughty, again. Apparently no one
in Jacksonville got the memo about now providing alternate transportation
when trains are either annulled or truncated. Unlike the Pacific Division
in the Pacific Northwest (directed by Jon Tainow, the corporate interim
Vice President, Transportation) which provided alternate transportation
due to mudslides in Washington State, the Southern Division seems to be
doing things the same shameful way as before. This includes last week,
when the Crescent was annulled west of Atlanta due to a fiery two train
collision on the Norfolk Southern main line to New Orleans, and no
alternate transportation was provided then, either.
We had thought this non-friendly passenger service had ended. Who’s not
paying attention at the division office in Jacksonville (or elsewhere)?
Here is the info, from the Amtrak computerized reservations system:
CATEGORY-MGC SUBJECT-JAN ... 19JAN06
01 CSX TRACKWORK IN FEBRUARY
02
03 CSX WILL BE CARRYING OUT TRACKWORK BETWEEN ROCKY MOUNT, NC
04 AND FLORENCE, SC IN FEBRUARY, AFFECTING AMTRAK SERVICE:
05
06 FEBRUARY 6-9, 2006 ONLY:
07 - TRAIN 79 WILL OPERATE NYP-RVR ONLY, AND BETWEEN RGH-CLT
08 ONLY (AS TRAIN 1079). NO ALTERNATE TRANSPORTATION RVR-RGH.
09 - TRAIN 80 WILL OPERATE CLT-RGH ONLY; NO ALTERNATE
10 TRANSPORTATION RGH-NYP.
11 - TRAIN 89 IS CANCELLED; NO ALTERNATE TRANSPORTATION.
12 PASSENGERS MAY USE TRAINS 79, 91 OR 97.
13 - TRAIN 90 WILL OPERATE RVR-NYP ONLY; NO ALTERNATE
14 TRANSPORTATION SAV-RVR.
15
16 FOR THE ENTIRE PERIOD FEBRUARY 6-23, 2006:
17 - TRAINS 89 (FEB. 10 AND AFTER), 91, 53 AND 97 WILL BE
18 DELAYED 30-45 MINUTES DUE TO SLOW ORDERS AND TRAFFIC
19 CONGESTION.
20
CATEGORY-MGC SUBJECT-JAN ... 20JAN06
01 CSX TRACKWORK IN VIRGINIA
02
03 CSX TRANSPORTATION WILL CARRY OUT RAIL AND TIE REPLACEMENT
04 WORK IN VIRGINIA MONDAYS THROUGH THURSDAYS, FEBRUARY 6
05 THROUGH MARCH 2, 2006, AFFECTING AMTRAK SERVICE AS FOLLOWS:
06
07 - TR 67 ORIGINATING DAILY, FEB 5 THROUGH MARCH 1, OPERATES
08 BOS-WAS ONLY. NO ALTERNATE TRANSPORTATION WAS-NPN-VAB.
09 - TR 66 ORIGINATING DAILY, FEB. 6 THROUGH MARCH 2, OPERATES
10 WAS-BOS ONLY. NO ALTERNATE TRANSPORTATION VAB-NPN-WAS.
11 - TR 1094 MONDAYS-THURSDAYS, FEB. 6 THROUGH MAR. 2, DEPARTS
12 NPN AT 710A, TWO HOURS EARLIER THAN TR 94, TO BOSTON.
13 - TR 176 MONDAYS-THURSDAYS, FEB. 6 THROUGH MAR. 2, CANCELLED.
14 TRAIN 1094 PROTECTS ITS SCHEDULE WAS-BOS.
15 - TR 94 MONDAYS-THURSDAYS, FEB. 6, THROUGH MAR. 2, OPERATES
16 WAS-BOS ONLY, ON ITS NORMAL SCHEDULE.
17
18 TRAINS (EXCEPT 66/67) OPERATE NORMALLY MONDAY, FEBRUARY 20.
6) Meanwhile, back on the ranch in the Pacific Division, a printed
Passenger Service Notice has been issued for the Cascades service,
telling about temporary service delays between Seattle and Portland. Five
well written, quick paragraphs tell passengers about trackwork being
performed, and why that will delay trains for approximately 30 minutes,
and thanking the passengers for their patience.
This is absolutely making the best of an annoying situation. Regular
passengers are being warned in advance of an inconvenience - and
apologized to at the same time - and new passengers are being told this
is an exception to the service, and not normal routine. Guys, is this
such a hard concept to implement in these days of desktop publishing and
quick printing? Back in the days of hot metal type and noisy mechanical
printing presses, the Milwaukee Road and other commuter and regional
railroads used to do this type of thing on a few hours notice for their
regular riders. This is a good concept that needs to be used more often.
7) Here’s a bright spot of news. Amtrak is now yield (they call it
revenue) managing both Wondertrain Acela and Metroliners on the NEC. This
is a good move towards both fiscal sanity and better marketing strategy.
One unheralded part of this announcement is apparent confirmation the
well respected Metroliner brand is not going down the track into
oblivion. During last year’s brake crisis on Wondertrain Acela, the
Metroliners did yeoman’s service filling in for Acelas on the NEC. This
is from the Amtrak computerized reservations system:
REVENUE MANAGEMENT OF NEC PREMIUM SERVICE
BEGINNING JANUARY 28, 2006 FOR SALE ON OR AFTER FEBRUARY 6,
06, AMTRAK WILL REVENUE MANAGE ACELA EXPRESS AND METROLINER
TRAINS IN THE NORTHEAST CORRIDOR.
FIVE NEW FARE LEVELS OR "BUCKETS" WILL REPLACE "PEAK",
"SHOULDER" AND "OFF-PEAK FARES ON ACELA EXPRESS AND METROLINER
SERVICE. EACH "BUCKET" WILL BE REPRESENTED BY A NEW FARE PLAN.
8) In the category of starving yourself to alleged good health, Amtrak is
on the warpath again, thinking of shuttering 26 stations, most on the
long distance system. Looking at the internal document, the merits of the
argument seems to be money; the majority of the stations are staffed by
only one ticket agent. Interestingly, Meridian, Mississippi is on the
list. Meridian is the home of former Amtrak Chairman of the Board John
Robert Smith, and former Federal Railroad Administration Administrator
Gilbert Carmichael.
Here is part of the argument that is probably not being heard at all:
perhaps, instead of closing viable assets such as manned train station,
Amtrak should apply some basic marketing and attempt to increase business
at these locations instead of writing them off? This basically comes down
to squandering resources and is all about lost opportunities, not Amtrak
starving itself into alleged good health. Every time the Amtrak system
shrinks to save money, even by the closing of what are considered
relatively small stations, what really happens is that a greater amount
of revenue is lost versus savings. In the case of Meridian, total labor
cost for the station is $181,875 annually. Total site sales (ticket and
Package Express) is $351,805. This is a defensible savings? Hardly. When
will this silliness stop?"
Wait, there's more:
"Volume 3, Number 5
Re-Thinking America's Rail Passenger Service
by Andrew C. Selden
Amtrak is at another of its many cross-roads: financially hopeless,
working with an interim "acting" CEO, strapped to irreconcilable
strategies (to provide abundant social services in its corridor markets,
yet expected to produce tolerable financial results of operations
overall, with an underdeveloped interregional business that it doesn't
understand or appreciate and supports halfheartedly for the wrong
reasons). Many of its management systems are ineffectual or unreliable,
according to the October 2005 GAO analysis.
Amtrak can - and must - do better in all of its activities.
It is very easy to sit in the back benches and criticize Amtrak's
manifest shortcomings, or to drift in from somewhere in outer space and
demand that Amtrak re-create the rail passenger network of 1920, or even
1960. But, to offer an implementable program of commercially,
economically and politically viable reforms in the environment of today
is a bit more daunting. No one who has deeply studied Amtrak doubts that
a huge latent demand exists for a properly positioned intercity rail
transportation service. How to service that demand, effectively,
efficiently and productively, is the principal challenge to Amtrak's next
CEO. What follows is my vision for how to realize Amtrak's potential,
with structural and operational reform, real growth in service and
economic results, and real growth in productive employment.
Reform must occur in four principal areas for Amtrak to succeed in both
economic and political terms:
- Management systems: Amtrak desperately needs an all-new management
information system, and reformed internal accounting, strategic planning
and budgeting procedures; and greater transparency to its various
stakeholders.
- Capital allocation: A greater share of available capital resources must
be redirected to allocations that produce the greatest rate of return on
invested capital measured, at the margin, by ticket revenue and
transportation output. Too much capital today is invested in applications
with the lowest (and sometime negative) rates of return on investment.
- Train operations: Amtrak must better align both services and capacity
to actual customer demand; updating its unfulfilled 45-year-old business
model to 21st Century actual market conditions and travel demand is a
must.
- Strategic partnerships: Amtrak must focus on creating, reinvigorating,
or reinstating good working relationships with critical resources: the
host railroads, American Society of Travel Agents, states and communities
served, cruise ship and destination operators, AARP, employees, and
Amtrak’s investment banker, Congress.
Congress has made clear that it is willing to invest more than a billion
dollars a year into intercity rail passenger services. How would I use
that money to get better results than Amtrak has accomplished over the
last 15 years?
First, I would invest – and it will cost as much as $40 to $50 million
over three years – in a totally new management information system.
Amtrak’s Route Profitability System is worse than useless. Another $50
million will have to be invested over about a three-year period to
correct the many serious management system deficiencies identified in the
October 2005 GAO Report.
I support the Board’s initiative to investigate the benefits and
drawbacks to spinning off the fixed assets of the NEC to a neutral
third-party owner. Amtrak operated fine before it owned the NEC and, like
most passenger trains in Europe, and all of its trains elsewhere in the
U.S., will operate fine if even this 400 miles of railroad is owned by a
neutral third party. And, ownership of the NEC fixed assets is both a
huge distraction and a financial albatross to Amtrak without obvious
benefit. To fail at the very least to study divestiture would be highly
irresponsible. Studying something does not predetermine outcomes.
As a prelude to any further significant capital spending, on any route or
activity, Amtrak should conduct the independent, unbiased, expert study
called a comprehensive consumer segmentation study, designed to elicit
(a) what intercity rail passenger transportation services (including
routes, kinds and levels of service, and collateral services) customers
are interested in purchasing, and at what prices; and, (B) who those
customers (persons likely to purchase rail transportation services) are
and through what advertising and promotional channels they can be reached
efficiently. Then, Amtrak needs to experiment aggressively to test the
research conclusions to ascertain the actual strength and scope of
potential demand for its services in various market segments.
As part of this experiment, one short distance corridor, competing
operating rights over the Northeast Corridor, and one long-distance
market should be franchised out to a third-party operator (such as Virgin
Trains, Carnival, Marriott, Disney, the host railroad, or Herzog or
Bombardier) to determine what operating efficiencies, and demand
elasticity, can be realized through genuinely fresh, innovative,
entrepreneurial stewardship of a defined market segment.
Amtrak also has a huge opportunity to enhance its operations and
financial results by going through a "back-to-basics" program, to make
sure that its stations are clean and inviting, its passenger cars are
restored to roadworthy condition, that windows and restrooms are clean
(and stay clean en route), its employees are trained and supported to
deliver enthusiastic "come back" service, and programs are in place to
deal with operational breakdowns.
Then, I would use significant operational reform (designed to drive up
load factor without sacrificing output; i.e. match capacity to demand)
and extraneous, non-operating asset sales not related to core
infrastructure in the Northeast Corridor to raise $150 to $200 million a
year in avoided costs and sale proceeds. With that, plus about a hundred
million from the Congressional subsidy we could fund the remaining
capital subsidy needs of the NEC at a steady rate of about $250 to $300
million a year. If and when actual demand requires more infrastructure or
more intense use of infrastructure, more capital can be sought from
Congress, or private sector sources. The absurdly low load factors in the
NEC can also be addressed by modest and inexpensive enhancements to the
network of services offered in the northeast. These include management
initiatives such as single-ticket, cross-platform services between Newark
and Wall Street on PATH; creating a stop somewhere in Queens, New York,
or even running through trains onto Long Island; running more trains on
the inland route to Boston; extending some NEC trains to Charlottesville,
Virginia and Albany, New York; and adding service in the Lehigh Valley.
The rest of the available discretionary capital from Congress can be used
to focus on rail passenger markets with real growth potential. With the
information and capital resources described above, I would undertake an
urgent rehabilitation of all rescuable Superliner and Viewliner rail
cars. Amtrak is turning away tens, if not hundreds, of millions of
dollars a year in incremental revenue for want of roadworthy carrying
capacity. Even if no changes were to be made in Amtrak’s routes or
services, huge and heretofore untapped latent demand exists for current
services, which Amtrak can reach with renewed focus on growth in its core
business.
I would put out an immediate solicitation of two proposals from the
worldwide rail vehicle industry:
- First, for supply of up to a hundred new Viewliner sleepers in "bed and
breakfast" configuration (sacrificing one standard bedroom/roomette for a
small galley facility; all of these cars will be used in one-night
markets in the East, Northeast and Atlantic Coast Corridor), and about a
hundred new long distance single-level coaches and associated lounge-type
food service cars, to be delivered, starting in two to three years, over
a four-year period.
- Second, I would negotiate for an open-ended Superliner production line
designed to deliver cars, beginning in two to three years, at a rate of
about one a week, which we could accelerate later, to begin with sleeping
cars to expand capacity on existing trains. In total, the capacity and
network expansion throughout the national system would require a fleet of
as many as 1,500 new Superliner rail cars.
Available capital remaining should then be allocated into national system
infrastructure investments, which I would leverage through tax
credit-financed joint ventures with host railroads, and with state
partners, to fix terminals and junctions, to create route
intraconnectivity, and to make minor route adjustments and extensions. I
would ask states to invest only in capital projects, not subsidizing
train operations (except in cases of services operated at the request of
a state).
Many of Amtrak's smaller community stations are not in good condition,
and are regarded more as "cost problems" than as "revenue opportunities."
Rather than un-staff or even close these stations, Amtrak should
experiment with a franchise program that would place these facilities,
and the Amtrak agency business opportunity they house, into the hands of
motivated local entrepreneur owner/operators. A financing program would
be part of the franchise to assure that existing employees have the first
opportunity to own these businesses. In most cases, the Amtrak agency
business would be combined with one or more other businesses or tenants
to create a commercially-viable business proposition. In many other
cases, partnering station rehabilitation with the municipality, as has
occurred at Oceanside, California and Del Rio, Texas, provides a model.
Network density (derived from capacity growth and network
intraconnectivity) inevitably creates flow density through the network,
and traffic will grow rapidly … even at constant levels of market
penetration on existing and newly interconnected routes. Growing train
lengths will absorb all available rehabilitated and new cars in the first
few years, and demand will drive additional frequencies on existing
routes next. Then, and only then, and this is probably five to ten years
out, we would look to add carefully selected routes, such as Washington,
D.C. to Atlanta to Jacksonville to Orlando to Miami; Atlanta to Dallas;
Dallas to Denver; or restoring the Desert Wind between Los Angeles, Las
Vegas, Salt Lake City and Chicago.
Other low cost, easy, near-term network enhancements, the real
low-hanging fruit, would include such things as making the Sunset Limited
a daily train; creating a regional hub at Albany linking Boston and New
York to Montreal and Toronto; extending the Silver Star to Montreal
(Nearly 10 million Canadian visitors go to Florida every year; Amtrak’s
current share of that market is zero.); extending the California Zephyr
to run down the coast line overnight to Los Angeles, partly to provide a
second through frequency on that route, but mainly to consolidate western
Superliner maintenance at Los Angeles. I'd fix the terminal trackage at
such locations as San Antonio, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Phoenix and
Portland.
With this kind of vision, and an investment strategy focused on real
business results and real growth, in as little as five years Amtrak can
be at a genuine operational breakeven in its national system precisely
because, for the first time in its history, it would be operating a
large, robust, and growing national network of intercity passenger
services.
Other service initiatives would include realigning food service
operations better to match the needs of passengers in various markets.
All day or even 24-hour operation of full-service dining cars is smart
business on long distance trains where customers are in Amtrak’s care for
one to three days at a time, and demand a quality dining experience as a
component of their rail travel. Operational reform and slight
repositioning of these services can bring long-distance dining car
services to break-even in short order. Snack and beverage service is more
than adequate on most corridor trains, where typical trips rarely exceed
two hours. On any corridor or regional train whose route is long enough
for average trips to exceed three to four hours, a full "casual dining"
food service must be offered and actively promoted.
In the area of strategic partnerships, Amtrak is missing out on huge
opportunities by not reinvigorating relationships with other groups and
organizations with which it shares economic goals. One example is retail
travel agents, whose support could be highly valuable in corridor markets
(where load factors are so low now that plenty of salable inventory goes
wasted every day) and in off-season long distance markets where some
excess capacity exists seasonally. The rewards of an alliance with AARP
would include both new sales to AARP’s members (who are more flexible to
take high-value experience trips on long distance trains in non-peak
periods), and having a powerful political ally. Amtrak serves many cruise
ship ports of call, from Los Angeles to Vancouver, New Orleans to Ft.
Lauderdale, even Memphis, for Mississippi River paddlewheel steamboats.
Why Amtrak doesn't aggressively pursue interline and packaged travel with
cruise companies (and other major destinations, such as Disney resorts;
Branson, Missouri; the National Parks; and even the Mall of America in
Minnesota) is a complete mystery.
Much can be done to evolve Amtrak’s often contentious relations with its
represented employees, into a more collaborative, productive, mutually
respectful and pleasant working relationship. Growth in the national
network necessarily entails growth in the number and quality of jobs and
opportunities for career advancement for line employees."
I really regret what is about to transpire, if rumors posted by OBS and others come to fruition. I have every intention of letting my Elected Representatives, state and federal, know that I don't want other regions of the country getting trains while my region gets nothing. Other parts of the United States want trains? I'd expect to see the Midwest HSR initiative come into being. I'd like to think that High Speed ( or moderately high speed) rail in the corridors named by the FRA and the DOT would be a legacy that a politician could leave behind - like what Eisenhower did for the Interstate highway system. Truncation of routes? Individuals who suggest that have no idea that a passenger train generates business because of the stops along the route, not end-point to end-point.
:angry:
