"Call Attendant" button

My wife and I were traveling on the Silver Star earlier this year, along with her parents. Her dad was disabled by a stroke a few years ago and is partially paralyzed. So, I got the Accessible Bedroom ('H' room) for him and my mother-in-law, and a roomette for the wife and I.

Other than the stroke, my father-in-law's health was pretty much back to normal. There was no real reason to think anything would happen. But wouldn't you know, in the middle of the night (3AM somewhere in South Carolina) he began having seizures. My mother-in-law pressed the "Call Attendant" button that many of you are familiar with inside the Viewliner sleeper. Nothing happened. No noise, no 'ding', nothing.

She ran down to our roomette and woke me up. I sent my wife toward the cafe/diner to find the conductor - I ran to the 'H' room to find my father-in-law on the floor. For whatever reason the train happened to be stopped at a siding waiting. The conductor and assistant conductor appeared shortly and radioed for assistance. As luck would have it, we were right next to a grade crossing. We waited for paramedics, who arrived in about 10-15 minutes.

We all de-trained and took my father-in-law to the nearest hospital.

So now the question for the group. If there is a "call attendant" button, is there some sort of reasonable expectation that it should work? And that, if pressed, someone should come?

My father-in-law recovered thankfully. But I wonder what kind of litigation Amtrak might be subjecting itself to. What if someone was traveling alone and needed assistance and couldn't get anyone's attention? Everything worked out OK for us, but I could see this being a big issue if it didn't.

Unfortunately, no one individual on board a train can be reasonably expected to be immediately on-call 24 hours/day. The right thing to do was to find the conductor (not as difficult on a single-level train as on the Superliners). The attendants are entitled to something resembling sleep on an overnight train, and in fact on some trains, there may be no sleeper attendants at all. If someone has a physical problem and is traveling alone, they almost always make the attendants aware of this, so that someone can check in on them regularly; but when traveling with friends or family, it is reasonable to expect that someone will alert crew members to a problem (when traveling alone, it might not even be POSSIBLE to hit the call button).

The call buttons almost always work, but if the attendant isn't in his or her dedicated room, they may not hear the call (say, if they're in the shower, or if they have detrained for any reason - crew members have medical emergencies, too!)

There is no perfect system - basically, one should take whatever course is prudent to ensure one's own safety and security on a train, be it asking for extra attention from the staff, or bringing along friends for assistance.

I have had many roomettes across from the attendant's accommodations and have often heard the sound of the call buttons going off repeatedly. Many times, the steward was either attending to other passengers, fixing beds, or in the diner car waiting on meals for folks that did not want to dine in the dining car. Although it is a feature (resembling your call button on an airline) it really doesn't serve the same purpose since there is only one individual who is often running about and not confined to his sleeper waiting for a call to come in. I know this is not what you want to hear, and I think Amtrak needs to make this clear to the sleeping passengers upon boarding. I can't imagine how stressful your trip must have been and I am certainly glad that you had the right reaction to find a conductor. That is why I only "shower" when I know we are at a station, since I can't imagine slipping, injuring myself and pressing the call button only to have no response.

I was in a viewliner sleeper the other day on the Cardinal, and my call button did not work. I didn't need it anyway. But when I first boarded the train the attendant tested it while describing the amenities on board the train.

Seeing that the Amtrak has had a problem with non-operable call buttons, even in the 11 yr old Viewliners and that an attendant probably won't respond very quickly, especially in coach, I think Amtrak should simply remove the call buttons. In their place, an emergency button should be installed, which would either set off an alarm throughout train or on the conductor's radio, alerting employees to the emergency. Of course, the button would only be for actual emergencies.

Sadly, if such an "emergency" button were installed, it would probably be used just like the conductor's valve on a Surfliner the other day in Simi Valley, which was pulled by two teenaged bimbos who didn't hear the THREE announcements of their stop, and wanted to get off the train; the emergency stop caused at least 3 people in the train to fall in the aisles, though thankfully none required medical attention.

Guest said:

Sadly, if such an "emergency" button were installed, it would probably be used just like the conductor's valve on a Surfliner the other day in Simi Valley, which was pulled by two teenaged bimbos who didn't hear the THREE announcements of their stop, and wanted to get off the train; the emergency stop caused at least 3 people in the train to fall in the aisles, though thankfully none required medical attention.

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Those three "bimboos" could be brought up on Federal charges for interfering with Interstate commerce.I'm sure the ambulance chasers pounced on this one already.

If I remember correctly, on Superliners, the attendant button has to be pulled, not pressed. Is it different on Viewliners?

printman2000 said:

If I remember correctly, on Superliners, the attendant button has to be pulled, not pressed. Is it different on Viewliners?

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Depends on the Superliner. On Superliner Is, the button is pulled. On Superliner IIs, the button is pressed. On the refurbished Superliner Is that have received the new control panels, I think it's just a touch strip (or, maybe I'm misremembering it).

Don't forget a Attendant call button is not a trailine fuction its in the one car only, and only if the attendant is on duty.

One can push or pull till cows come home, but in middle of night the car attendant most likely is off duty and in the crew dormitory car.

Dutchrailnut said:

Don't forget a Attendant call button is not a trailine fuction its in the one car only, and only if the attendant is on duty.One can push or pull till cows come home, but in middle of night the car attendant most likely is off duty and in the crew dormitory car.

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While I certainly empathize with people who have experienced serious problems with calling attendants, I believe at least part of the problem is due to jerks who abuse the button. I've been aboard more than one sleeper on which the call attendant button was clearly overused by selfish clowns who thought it meant they had a personal butler/maid to cater to their every whim. Since I could also hear the incessant calling, even in the middle of the night, it was especially annoying.

I'm not talking about special situations or medical necessities. That's fine and okay, and I'm glad that Rex's father-in-law is okay.

But I suggest that the slow repsonse to the problem was at least partly caused by thoughtless jerkingtons pushing the buttons so many times that car attendants become jaded about responding. And who can blame them? You can only cry wolf so many times before people get wise. And the real downside is that people with legitimate problems, like Rex' dad-in-law, get screwed. No doubt any savvy attendant can figure out how to disarm the attendant call buttons. They try to do so because of passengers who hit the button every time their hair is mussed or their pillow is ruffled.

Folks, I've seen it. How do some people figure they're better than everybody else?

Dutchrailnut said:

Don't forget a Attendant call button is not a trailine fuction its in the one car only, and only if the attendant is on duty.One can push or pull till cows come home, but in middle of night the car attendant most likely is off duty and in the crew dormitory car.

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In my experience, the car attendant sleeps in either the unumbered "attendant's room" in Viewliners or room 1 in Superliners. I know I've read travelogues from four or five years ago where the car attendants did indeed retire to the dorm; however, I've never seen it happen.

There are usually empty rooms in the dorm where the car attendant could theoretically sleep, but it would probably be easier for him/her to stay in the assigned sleeper for assisting passengers at middle-of-the-night stops.

AmtrakCrescent20 said:

Dutchrailnut said:

Don't forget a Attendant call button is not a trailine fuction its in the one car only, and only if the attendant is on duty.

One can push or pull till cows come home, but in middle of night the car attendant most likely is off duty and in the crew dormitory car.

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In my experience, the car attendant sleeps in either the unumbered "attendant's room" in Viewliners or room 1 in Superliners. I know I've read travelogues from four or five years ago where the car attendants did indeed retire to the dorm; however, I've never seen it happen.

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Not saying it doesn't happen but I have never witnessed a revenue sleeping car attendant sacking out in the transistion dorm. Only possible reason I could see for him/her to do so would be if the other car attendant agreed to cover and he/she did not want to be disturbed.

had8ley said:

Not saying it doesn't happen but I have never witnessed a revenue sleeping car attendant sacking out in the transistion dorm. Only possible reason I could see for him/her to do so would be if the other car attendant agreed to cover and he/she did not want to be disturbed.

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The attendant is not on duty 24 hours per day, so yes the attendant station is vacant for several hours per night, when the attendant gets his well deserved rest.

Dutchrailnut said:

had8ley said:

Not saying it doesn't happen but I have never witnessed a revenue sleeping car attendant sacking out in the transistion dorm. Only possible reason I could see for him/her to do so would be if the other car attendant agreed to cover and he/she did not want to be disturbed.

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The attendant is not on duty 24 hours per day, so yes the attendant station is vacant for several hours per night, when the attendant gets his well deserved rest.

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Actually unless the sleeping car attendant has no passengers boarding or detraining, or has worked out a trade with the other attendant in the other sleeping car, then yes he/she is on duty 24 hours. They can catch some shut eye in between stops, but they must be awake for detraining or boarding passengers at stops in the night.

Now many attendant do trade off, meaning that one sleeps through the night on a one night outbound trip, while the other covers both sleepers during the night. They then reverse that on the return leg. On a two night trip then they each get one night. But I have encountered attendants that won't trade off for one reason or another and are therefore getting up at each stop during the night.

I recall on my recent trip how relieved our attendant was at the CZ detour through Wyoming, since she got to sleep through the night since there were no stops on the diversion route.

I'm not sure what happens with the coach attendants, since the conductors are usually back there anyhow to open the doors.