Worst Passenger Rail Experience Ever?

[buck1108]

Well, my 'bad' experience would probably be when my roomette door locked me out. It puzzled the crew, as it was the "first time that ever happened"! After the Sleeping Car Attendant tried using a nail file to no avail, the Conductor arrived, and then finally at the next stop, someone found a sledgehammer and a large pick. The Conductor had to enter the room across from mine to get enough room to swing the hammer. Finally he and his assistant were able to knock my door off its track and allow me in the room. I got in the room, but unfortunately, I was unable to have privacy beyond a curtain all night.

In addition to this, on the same trip, previous train, all of the in-room toilets ceased to function, and my previous car occupants left their calling cards in mine (and on the outside as well)!

To top it off, on the third train, I had the anal crew in coach who were waiting for that big bunch of boarders that never showed.

All said, I would take another train trip like a shot, if not in a hurry and if not really caring about things. That's the thing really, you just have to not care and let it happen sometimes, unless it goes beyond the personal boundaries into areas of security, theft, etc. Now, when Jack Benny took the Superchief, he lost his room due to some meddling by the ticket seller, and then he had to serenade the seller's daughter (a newlywed) on the violin, accompanied by his prize turkey. Seeing that as an option, my trips haven't been *that* bad.



Okie doke...that's it.

 

[JackieTakestheTrain]

As a person of a certain age (60 is the new 40!!! :lol: )I have travelled many moons over many routes since Amtrak came into being 40 years ago!! Ive experienced almost everything one can experience while riding the Rails, both Wonderful and even what some call "the Trip from Hell!"

In all honesty, none of these experiences compare in the Least to the really Crazy,Crappy,and Insane things that Ive experienced while riding Busses, Planes and Driving! :excl: :excl: :excl: Amtrak has lots of room for improvement, we all agree on this, but as for me, in every case I can, I choose to take a Train!!! :wub:

I have to add a "ditto" to this. My worse experiences ever traveling were on buses and planes and driving.

My worse experience however was a bus. The driver got into a verbal fight with a passenger who had problem with walking. I can't remember all the details but it started innocently enough with the passenger asking a question and the driver responding and the passenger not liking the answer. So, when the bus finally stopped, they literally took it off the bus and into the parking lot. Fists. A lot of screaming and profanity.

Btw: Did I mention these were both women?

Who needs WWF smackdown when you have Greyhound Friday Night fights??

That was my last Greyhound bus ride.

-- jg

 

[dlagrua]

OVERALL our experiences on Amtrak trains have generally been good but what amazes me is the competancy of some of the SCA's and the incompetantcy of others. Some have been extremely helpful and cheerful while others are grumpy, rude, disinterested and just plain obnoxious. Same with the dining car crews. My wife and myself are pretty easy going and not at all hard to deal so we don't understand why this is. Its obvious that Amtrak needs to put their employees through sensitivity training in order to gain some consistency in how passengers are treated. However,onboard an Amtrak train, its still better than the filthy,crowded,unhealthy,dehumanizing,degrading conditions at airports and the blatantly poor attitudes of the TSA airport personel. They can keep that mode of travel.

 

[Bob Dylan]

This one wasnt Amtraks fault, in fact the agent I called about the problem @ Midnight on a Cold,Wet, Lonely night @ KCY's Union Station was Commended for Service "Above and Beyond"!

Rode the Missouri River Runner to KCY from STL(great trip in BC), spent a great day visiting the Jazz HOF/Black Baseball Museum,checking out the WWI Monument, eating Arthur Bryant Bar-B-Q etc.Arrived @ Union Station about 11PM, not looking forward to the Busride between KCY and OKC on Jefferson Lines, but really looking forward to the ride on the Heartland Flyer from OKC-FTW, my first! A Cold, Wet Norther had blown in, it was warm and snug inside the beautiful Old Station which is basically closed down after the SWC departs around 10:30PM.

There were four of us waiting on the Bus, the Night watchman came around every thirty minutes or so checking things, finally he told us that the Bus had bveen showing up "Late", when 1 AM came and went, I called Amtrak (1-800-USA-RAIL) and talked with a most helpful Agent named Susan who said said she'd call me back ASAP with Info.

About 15 minutes later my phone rang, and Susan told me that Jefferson Lines had "Quit" running this route that very day! She told me that a Taxi was on the way to take us to the Greyhound Station where we'd catch a Bus for Tulsa (that was being held for us on Amtraks Nickel!!! ), the other folks would change to a Bus for OKC , I would have a ticket for Dallas from Tulsa, that I should be able to catch the Eagle for Austin in Dallas! Everything went as she said it would, even though the Bus was crowded, smelled and took forever to get to Tulsa @ 6AM! A lot better Bus was waiting in Tulsa for Dallas, but it was a "Local", took 12 hours to get to Dallas,went through every burg in Eastern Oklahoma, so I had missed connections with the Eagle in Dallas! The only bus with seats for Austin was "Americanos", a Mexican Bus, which was a great ride down I35, I finally arrived @ 8PM, beating the Eagle to Austin by 2 hours! (broken down UP freight between TPL and AUS) I received a nice voucher from Amtrak which I used for a Summer California trip on the TE/CZ/CS/SSL, but still havent ridden the Heartland Flyer, which is on my Bucket List for this year! Moral: Dont take the Bus or fly or Drive, trust Amtrak to get you where you're going!! ^_^ ^_^ ^_^

 

[buck1108]

Yes, I'd much rather have a train than plane or bus, with the 'uber' crowded conditions. That bus topic got me to thinking about my first train trip, which included a leg from OKC to KC, overnight. Between the pervading odors (ranging from b.o. to Oscar Meyer Bologna), cramped legroom, and loud phone conversations all around (a pregnant lady behind me shouting "I'm getting real fat! You ought to see me!"), there wasn't much time to sleep. ;-)

After Tulsa, the crowd thinned considerably, and there were only about 15 on the bus to Kansas City.

 

[Shanghai]

My worse trip on Amtrak was in the middle of July on the Cardinal when the air conditioning broke

followed by the toilets not working from Charlottesville to Indianapolis. We had to walk from

the sleeper car to the coach whenever we needed a bathroom!! It could have been worse.

 

[Cho Cho Charlie]

My worse experience was being stuck not moving on a Silver for 24+ hours. Matter of fact, both northbound Silvers sat motionless.

While I know from past discussions here, that it is quickly pointed out that this was caused by a freight train derailment, and those are out of Amtrak's direct control, there are still many things which Amtrak did wrong (words like "incompetent" seem so inadequate).

I do have to separate Amtrak from the employees on the train. The employees certain did their best in a bad situation. When Amtrak would not provide info, the Conductor called his friends back at the office to get info. The LSA made sure that every passenger in the sleepers was well fed. The sleeper attendants kept the Viewliners working.

Back to Amtrak itself, Amtrak ...

... didn't seem to understand that the engineer and the crew would "time out". This is so evident by the complete lack of a relief crew being made available to the trains. After 24 hours, the derailment was cleared, and we started to move again, only to stop in the middle of swamp 1 hour later because the crew "timed out". And we sat for several more, completely unnecessary, hours.

... could have sent food. The passengers in coach ran out of food. Most only brought enough for an overnight trip, not enough for an adventure spanning three days. Amtrak didn't care.

... could have bussed us or offered some other alternative. But nope. "Sit, wait, and shutup" is Amtrak.

 

[pismobum]

bunch of pikers! been awhile, but top THIS! http://trainweb.org/web_lurker/swiss2/

 

[haolerider]

bunch of pikers! been awhile, but top THIS! http://trainweb.org/web_lurker/swiss2/

so now we need "the rest of the story". what finally happened? did you ever hear from anyone in middle/senior management or get an apology from Amtrak?

 

[pismobum]

got a $500 voucher from Chicago,and a $1500 voucher from Amtrak headquarters. Also got the double charge from Amtrak credited back. No apologys. Took a NARP Amtrak/Via trip (better) soon afterward, but still had a lot of problems. Link to that trip is at the end of the previous report

 

[A.J.]

my worst was not at all amtrak's fault, or the fault of any staff. nevertheless, it was my worst trip, rail or otherwise, ever. my grandmother and i were traveling to florida and we opted to take the auto train. as we were planning on being in florida for nearly two weeks, it seemed like a good idea and we could visit relatives near lorton. anyway, my grandmother has never spent the night on the train and if I have any say in the matter she never will again. she couldn't sleep and her confusion was wildly exacerbated by not getting any sleep. she was awake all night long, asking me questions like, "where are we?" "why is the boat moving so much?" she was in the lower bed of a bedroom and i was in the upper. early in the night she panicked and didn't know where i was, so i ended up getting into the lower bed with her. and there we lay, all night long, her asking questions and me answering them. it was a long, almost endless night. i wouldn't do it again if you paid me!

i would like to say to the fellow who was so dismissive of this thread: life is not all sunshine and roses. sometimes bad things happen, sometimes annoying things happen. sometimes you have the trip of your life and sometimes you don't. that's life. this thread wasn't started to whine, or complain or curse amtrak. to me it is the equivalent of a bunch of friends getting together to share stories. if you don't like it, don't read it and better yet, don't bother commenting on it.

 

[Michael061282]

my worst was not at all amtrak's fault, or the fault of any staff. nevertheless, it was my worst trip, rail or otherwise, ever. my grandmother and i were traveling to florida and we opted to take the auto train. as we were planning on being in florida for nearly two weeks, it seemed like a good idea and we could visit relatives near lorton. anyway, my grandmother has never spent the night on the train and if I have any say in the matter she never will again. she couldn't sleep and her confusion was wildly exacerbated by not getting any sleep. she was awake all night long, asking me questions like, "where are we?" "why is the boat moving so much?" she was in the lower bed of a bedroom and i was in the upper. early in the night she panicked and didn't know where i was, so i ended up getting into the lower bed with her. and there we lay, all night long, her asking questions and me answering them. it was a long, almost endless night. i wouldn't do it again if you paid me!

i would like to say to the fellow who was so dismissive of this thread: life is not all sunshine and roses. sometimes bad things happen, sometimes annoying things happen. sometimes you have the trip of your life and sometimes you don't. that's life. this thread wasn't started to whine, or complain or curse amtrak. to me it is the equivalent of a bunch of friends getting together to share stories. if you don't like it, don't read it and better yet, don't bother commenting on it.

A.J. trust me.. I know where you're coming from. I used to take trips to get away from a situation that sounds very similar to that.

 

[MARC Rider]

Worst Amtrak, or worst passenger rail in general?

My worst Amtrak experience was about 9 or 10 years ago when they still has some unreserved Northeast Regionals. I had an unreserved ticket and accidentally boarded a train that required reservations. The conductor treated me like I was some criminal turnstile-hopper an unceremoniously dumped me off at New Carrolton. Fortunately, I was able to take a later train.

Actually, the cattle lines at the boarding gates at WUS that they introduced after 9/11 also detract from the experience. I also think that the crowds are a security vulnerability, and I don't know why they don't use the inner departure lounges to disperse the crowds. Everybody thinks that security is all about cops and dogs and guys with guns and badges, but sometimes rearrangement of the physical environment can make a big difference.

Another fine trip was the summer before last, we took the Vermonter home from Essex Junction, 12 hours in an Amfleet I coach packed to capacity (at least between White River Junction and New Haven). After a while, the aroma from the toilets wafted in to the rest of the car. I had heard about such things in traveler's descriptions of various third world and eastern European trains, but I had never experienced it first hand, not even in the days when I used the ride the Penn Central.

As to non-Amtrak, experiences, I gues my worst was last summer after the earthquake in DC, I got to WUS to ride the Marc TRAIN home, and it was a mess, my normal Penn Line train was indefinitely delayed, but a amden ine train was just leaving, so I said, what the heck, I can take light rail back to my car. What I didn't count on was good old CSX being ultra cautious about their track conditions. As we were pulling out (when it was too late to get off), the conducter informed us that we were going to be speed-restricted to 15 mph the whole way up. I did get home before dark, but that's only because it was summer. I suppose I could have ridden from DC to Baltimore on a bicycle just as fast.

The ultimate bad train story in our family is that of my sister, who had to get back to college in the Chicago area from Philly back circa 1970 during an air traffic controller's strike. She rode the Penn Central (not the Broadway Limited), on a train that was late, ran out of food in the "snack bar coach" (which was the only food service), had the toilets back up, and I believe they lost heat, too.

But nothing I've had on Amtrak beats my experience with the Frank Lorennzo Continental Airlines back in 1967, where they cancelled our flight about 20 minutes after we took off, returned us to the airport, and didn't book us out until the next day.

 

[The Davy Crockett]

My worst experience is always watching the train I was just on roll down the track. :wub:

 

[MARC Rider]

How could I have forgotten my real worst exerience? It was just last year (almost exactly a year ago) when the HHP-8 pulling #67 flipped a breaker and stranded us without power on a 10 degree night between Route 128 and and Providence. I was sitting in the cafe car as the cold started seeping in, listening to the conductor radio to wake up the technician with the "Million dollar laptop" that contained the super top-secret proprietary software they needed to reset the breaker. The tech finally arrived, but he wasn't having much luck fixing the engine, and the cold was starting to seep in. Finally, they decided to transfer us to a northbound train and return us to South Station. That was actually pretty cool, with the little gangplanks they has so we could move from train to train without having to climb down to the roadbed. (which I once had to do on a crippled Empire Service train south of Albany.)

We ended up getting back to South Station at about 1 AM (we had originally left about 9:30 PM), the place was deserted, and we had to sit in those uncomfotable metal chairs they have in the waiting room. The eventually rescued the crippled train, brought it back to Boston, put on a new locomotive, and we left at about 4 AM. After that, the trip was uneventful, but it got light about when we hot New Haven, so I didn't get the sleep I was expecting to get. Well, at least I got a $100 voucher from Amtrak for my trouble.

 

[VentureForth]

Any one here on Amtrak during either A)9/11 or B)Katrina; Post Katrina Evac?

 

[Henry Kisor]

There so far have been 40 replies in this "Worst Experience" thread to the 22 in the "Best Experience" thread. What does this mean? That we are a bunch of bellyaching crybabies—or smart consumers who expect value for their dollar and when they don't get it, speak out?

 

[VentureForth]

I think it actually reflects a philosophy that we pretty much tend to gravitate towards in this forum. If everything goes as planned, it's boring.

No one would ever sell a novel, or a story without having an element of unexpected thrill.

There's no doubt that probably most of us really prefer the good trips over the bad. But it's the bad trips that we continue to enjoy talking about - the sensationalism, the mystery, the adventure, the unexpected and when everything goes downhill, the Monday morning quarterbacking discussing the what ifs...

When we talk about a great trip, its... well... it's nice.

 

[CHamilton]

I think VentureForth is right. We like to talk about memorable trips, which can often be the ones where something went wrong. And yet, when I think of my first long Amtrak trip, back in 1973, it's what got me hooked on trains, even though many things didn't go well. It seems that AUers are into adventure: the old "getting there is half the fun" mindset.

 

[MikeM]

I'll toss out my worst experience...

It was about 10 years ago. The four of us (wife, two kids, and myself) were returning from Chicago to Hutchinson KS on the SWC. Arrival time of the SWC is around 3am or thereabouts. We were in two economy sleepers on the lower floor. Knowing it takes a bit of time to get kids ready, asked the car attendant if we could be woken up at the Newton stop or shortly later, so we could get dressed.

You can guess where this is going.

3am in the morning, wild banging on my sleeper door (Sally and Amy were in one room, Cliff and me in the other). "Wake up, we're here!". Huh, what to you mean we're here. I look out the window. Boy, Newton looks a LOT like Hutchinson. Same types of mills, etc. "No Mike, we're HERE!. Get UP!". Open the door, and the Conductor is moving bags, saying we need to hurry, don't make the train late, etc. No apologies. Sally is wearing a sleep top and her levis, I'm pulled into as many clothes as I could assemble in under a minute, both kids in pajamas, and we're hopping off the train. As the train pulls away from the station, my wife looks at me, hair standing all over the place, kids clutching blankets, and says she's never stepping foot on a train again with me.

Have to admit, it really was quite the experience. We laugh about it now, but she has never ridden Amtrak again, sad to say.

 

[MikeM]

There so far have been 40 replies in this "Worst Experience" thread to the 22 in the "Best Experience" thread. What does this mean? That we are a bunch of bellyaching crybabies—or smart consumers who expect value for their dollar and when they don't get it, speak out?

I think it means we're the fools that keep coming back and experience the good and the bad. However, the bad is what sticks. Nobody remembers the on time arrival (unless your train is on the UP, in which case, an on time arrival has yet to happen...). But everyone remembers the AC breakdown, toilets flushing up rather than down, etc.

 

[Henry Kisor]

It's the same with literature. Evil characters and terrible events are the ones that fascinate us, not the angels and sweet happenings.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

There so far have been 40 replies in this "Worst Experience" thread to the 22 in the "Best Experience" thread. What does this mean? That we are a bunch of bellyaching crybabies—or smart consumers who expect value for their dollar and when they don't get it, speak out?

Believe it or not, my original idea included posting a "Best Experience" thread as well. Then I started wondering just how good it could possibly get. The train could be on-time, the food could be good, the staff could be responsive, and the passengers could be friendly. That's great and all, but is it really all that noteworthy? Maybe some people would tell the story of their first ever rail trip as an impressionable youth and that could be interesting to read. In exceptional circumstances maybe we would get a story of how someone met their future wife or husband on the train or was witness to some courageous or heartwarming experience that changed their life forever. But, the more I thought about it the more convinced I was that statistically there was a much better chance of average passengers suffering and remembering a noteworthy negative experience over a positive one. I was still mulling over the idea of a 'best experience' thread when I noticed that CHamilton had already beat me to it with nearly identical wording. ^_^

 

[OBS]

Any one here on Amtrak during either A)9/11 or B)Katrina; Post Katrina Evac?

On 9/11, I was working train #56, the Vermonter NB. Somewhere around Trenton, peoples' cell phones started ringing, and the info about what happened, as well as a lot of misinformation started to circulate. The train went as far as Newark NJ, Where it was held and eventually terminated. Eventually, about 2-3 hours later, they ran the engine around and we operated live back to Wash. DC. From the Newark area you could see a plume of black smoke rising in the East...

 

[debmep]

Worst experience on the train. Amtrak Pere Marquette about 10 years ago. It was a overnight trip to Chicago from Grand Rapids. We stayed in one of the big hotels on Michigan near Grant Park. Our last meal in Chicago was lunch at a Irish restaurant inside the hotel. I remember that I had a grilled chicken sandwich and toss salad. I know by the time we arrived at Union Station I wasnt feeling so well. I remember sitting in the general boarding area feeling like S**t. We asked for and got early boarding, I must have really looked sick<smile> I spent most of the return trip vomiting in the handicapped bathroom just behind the seats we had chosen. I know that I threw up at least 6 different times. I didnt stop throwing up until past the Bangor exit. I have no idea what if anything other passengers could hear. We didnt get any special consideration from any of the train staff, I dont remember if anyone was even aware of how I felt. I was never so glad to get back home.

I felt then and still feel that it was food poisoning from the restuarant. We did write a letter to the hotel and did recieve a free nights stay. It turned out really great as we booked our next stay on a night which happened to be a Bears home game day. We were upgraded to the actual floor that the visiting team was staying on. We ran into the quarteback of the other team right outside our room, hubby shook his hand. I remember that we ordered evening room service and that the meal was outstanding. Looking forward to our big trip in March on the SWC to Albuquerque.