Long distance seat reservations

I guess this question may have been asked and answered previously but can someone please suggest what I should anticipate with a "reserved seat" coach ticket on the California Zephyr.

I'll be travelling from Denver to Salt Lake City on 3 June 2017. Then two days later from Salt Lake City to Sacramento.

I appreciate that a reserved seat on Amtrak is not an allocated seat.

Do you simply board the train and wander through until you find what appears to be a vacant seat?

What if a seat appears vacant but the passenger may be temporarily absent?

I will be travelling alone.

It's 21 years since I travelled on an Amtrak long distance train (from Miami to New Orleans).

Paul in Australia

pn1 said:

I guess this question may have been asked and answered previously but can someone please suggest what I should anticipate with a "reserved seat" coach ticket on the California Zephyr.

I'll be travelling from Denver to Salt Lake City on 3 June 2017. Then two days later from Salt Lake City to Sacramento.

I appreciate that a reserved seat on Amtrak is not an allocated seat.

Do you simply board the train and wander through until you find what appears to be a vacant seat?

What if a seat appears vacant but the passenger may be temporarily absent?

I will be travelling alone.

It's 21 years since I travelled on an Amtrak long distance train (from Miami to New Orleans).

Paul in Australia

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I would say my experience with most LD trains they assign you a seat. If this is the case and you are traveling solo, expect to be assigned next to another person (they need to leave paired seats for pairs traveling together) and unless you ask (I've never tried asking) they will just give you a seat without regards to window or aisle (at least I am not aware of any trains with "middle" seats). If the train is not very full, they probably will let you choose any open seat. In my experience on my last trip I got on the train at SLC and was able to choose a seat. Often if you board at the origin or a popular boarding place you are more likely to be assigned. If I had to guess, you will be assigned a seat at DEN but not at SLC (train leaves late at night so it isn't popular).

There will be a colored piece of cardboard with your destination code over your seat. This designates the seat is taken and helps attendant and Conductor get coach passengers off at the correct stop.

In Denver, to get to the train from the station you either

1. Go down to the underpass and try to figure out which elevator to take up to the California Zephyr.

2. Turn left as you come out of the station to the end of the tracks, turn right and you will see passengers lining up in two lines, one for sleepers and one for coach.

If I remember correctly, the conductor at the coach line will check your ticket and give you a boarding pass with an assigned seat.

If a car is not full and you decide there is a better seat, be sure to take your seat check that Loanstar mentioned and place it above your new seat.

Each passenger, already seated before you board, will have had a small card called a seat check placed on the edge of the overhead luggage rack above the seat pairs. This card will be marked with the station the person is getting off at. If you find a seat with no seat check card then that is an available seat. Empty seats with seat checks means the people are elsewhere on the train, such as the rest room, cafe car, lounge, or diner car.

It depends on any number of factors, but that far mid-route it's almost a given that you'll have a seat assigned before you board the train. Certainly boarding the CZ in Emeryville typically means being assigned a car, but where it's sort of a free for all until later down the line when they start assigning specific seats or even moving passengers around.

Anyone know how they tend to do it by Denver? My experience with LD trains differed depending on the station. At one station where only 3 passengers (myself, my kid, and another guy) boarded through a single open door and our seat checks were written up based on an assignment that was already down on a diagram. At a busier station for that route, there were several open coach doors and we were asked what our destination was and directed to a particular car where we were given an assigned seat. I've also taken a ride where I was directed to a car and the attendant picked a seat for me.

Like others said, from DEN you will most likely be assigned a seat number and depending on how friendly or power-trippy the attendant is on that particular day, your request for a window seat or aisle seat may be happily accommodated or rudely declined, or anything in between.

For the DEN-SLC stretch in particular I would highly recommend take whatever seat they give you, get your ticket checked quickly and RUN to the Observation Car to grab a seat there for the spectacular climb through the Rockies. That section is very popular and seats in the observation car get filled up super fast.

Whatever you do avoid getting a Superliner Coach seat next to the Stairs Upstairs ( lights on all night and foot traffic to/from the bathrooms downstairs) or on the ends of the Car next to the doors which open and close all night!

The ideal seat is a Window Seat in the middle of the Car,and hopefully you will not have a seat mate during your trip!

Since SLC is a stop in the middle of the night, you will most likely be assigned a seat, so you don't disturb the other passengers sleeping. (I was, but was also told that I could change seats in the morning if I wanted.)

I don't know about Denver, but I agree with the recommendation to take whatever seat (assigned or not) then go to the lounge car immediately. Most days in that stretch, I'm in the lounge car seeing the scenery! Very little time is spent in my seat in coach.

I don't think you've ridden in Coach on a LD Train since the Nixon Adminstration Dave!

Yes I have! :angry:

It was during the Ford Administration! :giggle:

RRRick said:

Each passenger, already seated before you board, will have had a small card called a seat check placed on the edge of the overhead luggage rack above the seat pairs. This card will be marked with the station the person is getting off at. If you find a seat with no seat check card then that is an available seat. Empty seats with seat checks means the people are elsewhere on the train, such as the rest room, cafe car, lounge, or diner car.

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But if the OBS have a chart marked off as to which seats are occupied and which aren't you mess with that. I'm not saying that's wrong but they could be mad at you. I would say the biggest problem for this seat assignment is making sure pairs can sit together. Any single passenger would love to not sit next to a stranger but if everyone thought like that and a couple gets on later they'd be split up.

Maybe they can mark off some seats for pairs and let the others be "first come first serve". I think the OBS should absolutely ask for "window or aisle". I would want an aisle because if you're at the window you either have to get them to move or climb over them. But if more people thought like me (or the other way around) that can also be a problem. Then again, that could be first come first serve and if you are too late you are stuck with the other choice.

I think it's better to have pre-reserved seats, especially in this day and age where you can choose a seat before an airplane flight. There's no other obvious solution otherwise and it does bother me to be told where to sit without any choices or considerations. This is another reason why Amtrak having a monopoly is bad. If there's other intercity train companies and some other train didn't "boss you around", I would take a competitor.

Philly Amtrak Fan said:

I think it's better to have pre-reserved seats, especially in this day and age where you can choose a seat before an airplane flight. There's no other obvious solution otherwise and it does bother me to be told where to sit without any choices or considerations. This is another reason why Amtrak having a monopoly is bad. If there's other intercity train companies and some other train didn't "boss you around", I would take a competitor.

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The main reason why Amtrak has a virtual monopoly is that the now freight railroads were tired of operating their mandated oligarchy.

We might possibly have some alternatives depending on state or private rail operators, such as California HSR and the proposed Desert Xpress to Las Vegas. If California HSR is built, that's going to be a direct competitor for Amtrak services.

I don't necessarily see the way things are done now as an issue. In the end they're going to have the authority to order passengers into different seats anyways just like airlines do. As it stands currently, there's less of an issue with people getting angry when that happens because they understand that it's up to the attendant to assign seats. The passenger who gets to select a seat at purchase may be more invested in keeping that seat.