Why so few Acelas on Saturdays

[jack615]

Hello guys, I was wondering why there are so few Acelas on Saturdays was thinking of taking advantage of NTD and the AGR points by doing a RT from Boston to NYP but realized i couldnt do that last acela leaving as i get into penn from boston. Now I realized I could take train to Stamford and then go back north from there on the nb acela and get 500 points both ways. But I'm still surprised there isnt an afternoon Boston Acela on Sat?

Jack

 

[MrFSS]

Hello guys, I was wondering why there are so few Acelas on Saturdays was thinking of taking advantage of NTD and the AGR points by doing a RT from Boston to NYP but realized i couldn't do that last acela leaving as i get into penn from boston. Now I realized I could take train to Stamford and then go back north from there on the nb acela and get 500 points both ways. But I'm still surprised there isn't an afternoon Boston Acela on Sat?
Jack

It is primarily for business people who don't need the train on weekends.

 

[had8ley]

And add in the factor that the Acela is high speed but it is also high maintenence; week-ends give crews a chance to catch up on train repairs.

 

[Green Maned Lion]

Reasons:

1) The Acela is junk, it needs a lot of work to keep moving. This takes time. Weekends are ideal

2) The Acela is heavy, and quite inefficient, especially compared to the Regionals- they'd rather spend less money and run the regionals.

3) Acela is expensive ticket-wise. This matters not one whit to people operating off their expense accounts, but it does matter to the rest of us. Much less demand on weekends.

4) The Acela sets are, age wise, in worse condition than the Amfleets. Amtrak is aware of this. They don't want to wear out the sets, so they don't want to put more mileage on them when the runs aren't going to be profitable. If the current Acela sets last another decade, I personally will be astonished. Unless Amtrak gets into one of its periodic "lets scrap anything that we can" moods, one thing I am positive about, beyond any doubt, is that the Amfleets will be running long after the current Acela sets ae scrapped.

You are running a railroad for profit. Which would you run?

 

[George Harris]

3) Acela is expensive ticket-wise. This matters not one whit to people operating off their expense accounts, but it does matter to the rest of us. Much less demand on weekends.

You obviously have very limited experience with what most companies do concerning travel expenses.

I had a job once where the employment contract had travel by "lowest cost economy class airfare" in it in three places.

Maybe if you are Joe Fathead in rarified upper management of MegaCorp or Dilbert's "Pointy haired boss" you can get away with high cost travel, but for most of the rest of us it is a little different.

 

[AlanB]

1) The Acela is junk, it needs a lot of work to keep moving. This takes time. Weekends are ideal

Amtrak has three facilities to maintain Acela, and they can't handle more than three trains at any given moment. That leaves many other sets just sitting around. That leaves them with more than enough trains to run more service.

2) The Acela is heavy, and quite inefficient, especially compared to the Regionals- they'd rather spend less money and run the regionals.

It doesn't cost Amtrak all that much more to run an Acela trainset than it does to run a Regional, especially if one were to close off the First Class car and not staff it. Regardless though, an asset just sitting around earns no money.

3) Acela is expensive ticket-wise. This matters not one whit to people operating off their expense accounts, but it does matter to the rest of us. Much less demand on weekends.

I can't tell you how many times I've seen cheaper prices on Acela than on a Regional train on a weekend. People just seem to gravitate to the Regional, even though it's top bucket is priced higher than the Acela at that time.

 

[Chris J.]

3) Acela is expensive ticket-wise. This matters not one whit to people operating off their expense accounts, but it does matter to the rest of us. Much less demand on weekends.

You obviously have very limited experience with what most companies do concerning travel expenses.

I had a job once where the employment contract had travel by "lowest cost economy class airfare" in it in three places.

Maybe if you are Joe Fathead in rarified upper management of MegaCorp or Dilbert's "Pointy haired boss" you can get away with high cost travel, but for most of the rest of us it is a little different.

"Lowest cost fare" on the Acela is Business class tho; so if you need to be on that train on expenses you're going to go business. If you ride a regional on expenses you're going to be in coach.

 

[jackal]

3) Acela is expensive ticket-wise. This matters not one whit to people operating off their expense accounts, but it does matter to the rest of us. Much less demand on weekends.

You obviously have very limited experience with what most companies do concerning travel expenses.

I had a job once where the employment contract had travel by "lowest cost economy class airfare" in it in three places.

Maybe if you are Joe Fathead in rarified upper management of MegaCorp or Dilbert's "Pointy haired boss" you can get away with high cost travel, but for most of the rest of us it is a little different.

True for many people, but I've seen a lot of people boast about how much they've been able to wring out of their company's expense account. Just look at this thread on FlyerTalk:

What's the most you have ever spent on a meal per head?

Some of the worst offenders:

Drinks only: once spend 500USD together with my then boss in the bar of the Ritz Carlton Seoul, Korea, so about 250USD each. Most drinks were double Cognac @ 30$ IIRC. We had just closed a difficult deal, the expense report was paid without any quations being asked.

Tantra in Miami. A friend of mine and I just quietly spent about $700 USD.
I remember the waiter coming to the table and offering us "the oysters on the half shell special" and us saying.... "Ooh. I could eat a couple dozen oysters!". I think they came 4 to an order at $25 an order. A bottle of wine and dinner and some porto later and Bang!

Luckily we were at a confeence and it all went on the expense account.

It was back in 1997 or 98 or 99 at a Siemens sponsored event in Chicago. memory is foggy but I think it was Gibson's. Our table of 8 racked up something like $6k in over-the-top ordering.

Ah, The gold old days!

Ouch!

 

[GG-1]

3) Acela is expensive ticket-wise. This matters not one whit to people operating off their expense accounts, but it does matter to the rest of us. Much less demand on weekends.

You obviously have very limited experience with what most companies do concerning travel expenses.

I had a job once where the employment contract had travel by "lowest cost economy class airfare" in it in three places.

Maybe if you are Joe Fathead in rarified upper management of MegaCorp or Dilbert's "Pointy haired boss" you can get away with high cost travel, but for most of the rest of us it is a little different.

True for many people, but I've seen a lot of people boast about how much they've been able to wring out of their company's expense account. Just look at this thread on FlyerTalk:

What's the most you have ever spent on a meal per head?

Some of the worst offenders:

Drinks only: once spend 500USD together with my then boss in the bar of the Ritz Carlton Seoul, Korea, so about 250USD each. Most drinks were double Cognac @ 30$ IIRC. We had just closed a difficult deal, the expense report was paid without any quations being asked.

Tantra in Miami. A friend of mine and I just quietly spent about $700 USD.
I remember the waiter coming to the table and offering us "the oysters on the half shell special" and us saying.... "Ooh. I could eat a couple dozen oysters!". I think they came 4 to an order at $25 an order. A bottle of wine and dinner and some porto later and Bang!

Luckily we were at a confeence and it all went on the expense account.

It was back in 1997 or 98 or 99 at a Siemens sponsored event in Chicago. memory is foggy but I think it was Gibson's. Our table of 8 racked up something like $6k in over-the-top ordering.

Ah, The gold old days!

Ouch!

Aloha

After reading the above one can see why we are in this economic pinch (double ouch )

 

[PRR 60]

2) The Acela is heavy, and quite inefficient, especially compared to the Regionals- they'd rather spend less money and run the regionals.

It doesn't cost Amtrak all that much more to run an Acela trainset than it does to run a Regional, especially if one were to close off the First Class car and not staff it. Regardless though, an asset just sitting around earns no money.

Our Lion friend is correct with that one. The Acela trainsets are huge energy hogs compared to AEM-7 powered trains. That results from the weight of the trainset and the 12,000 hp required to provide decent acceleration due to all the speed changes on the route. Unlike aircraft where the newest planes are the most efficient and are flown all the time, parking some of the Acela sets on the weekend cuts the power bill.