A look at fares on the Crescent

[Train2104]

How did you add the vertical lines for the stations? In office or in Photoshop?

I'm working on the CZ and SWC.

 

[Tracktwentynine]

How did you add the vertical lines for the stations? In office or in Photoshop?

I'm working on the CZ and SWC.

First off, use XY Scatter not a line graph in Excel. This will allow you to vary the distance between stations based on mileage, instead of each stop being equivalently spaced.

So doing that, your "X" value (let's say the first column) should be the mileage from the origin. If the origin is not the terminus (like Atlanta), you can use negative values to represent mileage.

The second column should be the low-bucket coach fare. The third column should be roomette upcharge + coach fare. Fourth would be bedroom upcharge + coach fare.

Now, for the vertical lines:

Whatever the highest fare is, round to the nearest 50 and make that the top of the graph. Create a 5th and 6th column in your spreadsheet. For whichever stations you want a vertical line, in the fifth column, put the mileage in the row for that station. Copy that number into the row right below it. Next to the first mileage in the 6th column, enter the number 0. Next to the second mileage in the 6th column (right below the 0 you just entered), put whatever the top of the graph is + 1. For the next city you want a vertical line, the max+1 goes above the 0. This creates a zig-zagging vertial line in all the appropriate places.

PM me if you still have questions. Glad to hear you're working on other routes.

 

[Anderson]

Hmm...I know you did NOL-(insert place here), ATL-(insert place here), and so on...could you do a comparison on to/from Anniston versus to/from Atlanta?

 

[Train2104]

How did you add the vertical lines for the stations? In office or in Photoshop?

I'm working on the CZ and SWC.

First off, use XY Scatter not a line graph in Excel. This will allow you to vary the distance between stations based on mileage, instead of each stop being equivalently spaced.

So doing that, your "X" value (let's say the first column) should be the mileage from the origin. If the origin is not the terminus (like Atlanta), you can use negative values to represent mileage.

The second column should be the low-bucket coach fare. The third column should be roomette upcharge + coach fare. Fourth would be bedroom upcharge + coach fare.

Now, for the vertical lines:

Whatever the highest fare is, round to the nearest 50 and make that the top of the graph. Create a 5th and 6th column in your spreadsheet. For whichever stations you want a vertical line, in the fifth column, put the mileage in the row for that station. Copy that number into the row right below it. Next to the first mileage in the 6th column, enter the number 0. Next to the second mileage in the 6th column (right below the 0 you just entered), put whatever the top of the graph is + 1. For the next city you want a vertical line, the max+1 goes above the 0. This creates a zig-zagging vertial line in all the appropriate places.

PM me if you still have questions. Glad to hear you're working on other routes.

I will try that for the vertical lines. I'm plotting roomette/bedroom as they are listed on AmSnag. Should I add the coach fare to it? Also, what about the station symbol text next to the lines?

 

[Ryan]

That's pretty clever, I copied the graph into PPT and added the lines and station codes there. Kind of a pain in the neck, though, your way sounds easier.

 

[Tracktwentynine]

I will try that for the vertical lines. I'm plotting roomette/bedroom as they are listed on AmSnag. Should I add the coach fare to it? Also, what about the station symbol text next to the lines?

The way AmSnag displays data is the same way Amtrak's website would. So, for instance, the coach fare might be $57. On Amtrak, were you to select a sleeper upgrade, it might say "add $241" for a roomette. So that would be 57 + 241 or $298.

For the station names, I just added text boxes to the graph in Excel and rotated it 90 degrees.

 

[Anderson]

These charts are neat. Useful way to see where the peak market pricing is for LD trains. Of course, if people going to Atlanta start booking roomettes or bedrooms to stops beyond Atlanta but getting off in Atlanta becomes widespread, Amtrak will have to adjust the pricing to compensate once Amtrak figures out that people are doing this.

The FY2010 numbers for the Crescent and Atlanta are interesting.

Crescent: 298,688 total passengers

Atlanta boarding & alightings: 112,364

Since Crescent is the only train serving Atlanta, that means a full 38% of the Crescent passengers are either traveling to or from Atlanta. Which has got to be close to the largest market share for a city that is not the endpoint of one of Amtrak's LD trains. Shows that Atlanta is an under-served market that could support more Amtrak trains if Georgia and Atlanta political leadership were so inclined.

Another thing to point out about the Crescent, is that it is one of the 5 LD trains that is to be the subject of a Performance Improvement Plan for FY11. The FY10 PIP reports for the Cardinal, CL, CZ, Texas Eagle and Sunset Limited were released last October. The FY11 PIP reports are due for the Silver Star & Meteor, Palmetto, LSL, and the Crescent. So there must be a staff group inside Amtrak that has either started or will get started soon to review options for improving the Crescent. But I guess they are not set up to take public comments or suggestions.

I checked this. The Empire Builder is probably #4 for a mid-route destination with Minneapolis (24.1%), and the Zephyr is #3 with Denver (33.9%). #2 is Atlanta (37.6%). #1 is Orlando/Tampa, which combined account for negligibly under 40% of the business of the Silvers (290,587 of 745,872)...not strictly comparable, I know. The Silvers are odd, though, in that their endpoint city is actually a pretty limited-sized destination (90k) compared to overall ridership (745k), though this is probably due to both having about four other stops on the way down the coast (Fort Lauderdale and Hollywood have more business combined than Miami) and due to the amount of business Orlando gets. It's still interesting, though: Tampa alone has more business than Miami, and it's only got one train per day (33.3% of the Silver Star's business is strictly Tampa).

I would take this moment to point out that Denver-Chicago and Minneapolis-Chicago were two decent-sized markets for intercity travel, and that most of the trains headed to the West Coast originated there (I think possibly with through car service from Chicago in both cases, but they both had plenty of dedicated trains running that route).

 

[Train2104]

Here they are: No real surprises, unfortunately.

The California Zephyr from Chicago. Note that the fare in all classes increases after DEN, and again after SLC. The jump in the beginning is from the shared portion of the route east of GBB to the first stop west of GBB. Also, the fares in CA and the sparsely populated areas between SLC and REN are relatively flat, probably a means of CalTrans to encourage Amtrak travel.

The Southwest Chief from Chicago. Surprisingly, fares are higher on the SWC than the CZ, which has a higher ridership. Again, the fare in CA is relatively flat.

The interesting one: the Keystone Service. From NYP:

The fare jumps significantly after PHL on through trains and remains relatively flat from there. The first fare is EWR, which is higher than MET. Since the Keystone is non-reserved west of PHL, here is a chart from PHL. The EWR bump (AirTrain fee?) is prominent in this one. The effects of state subsidization of fares is very visible. Also seen is how the NEC is so much more expensive than other corridors.

Working on Northeast Regional.

 

[Ryan]

Good stuff!

If anyone else is going to jump in on these, I've got the Cardinal half-done.

 

[Pastor Dave]

That's pretty clever, I copied the graph into PPT and added the lines and station codes there. Kind of a pain in the neck, though, your way sounds easier.

Ryan,

PPT - is that powerpoint?

 

[Ryan]

Yep - looks like you can do it all in Excel as well...

 

[Train2104]

Yep - looks like you can do it all in Excel as well...

And I did it in Word.

 

[Tracktwentynine]

Here they are: No real surprises, unfortunately.

The California Zephyr from Chicago. Note that the fare in all classes increases after DEN, and again after SLC. The jump in the beginning is from the shared portion of the route east of GBB to the first stop west of GBB. Also, the fares in CA and the sparsely populated areas between SLC and REN are relatively flat, probably a means of CalTrans to encourage Amtrak travel.

Good work, 2104. One thing, though, you drew a false conclusion (or at least an unsupported one) regarding the Zephyr.

"Also, the fares in CA and the sparsely populated areas between SLC and REN are relatively flat, probably a means of CalTrans to encourage Amtrak travel."

The if you look at all the Long-Distance routes analyzed so far, the further you get, the less the price increases per mile (at least in coach). You only analyzed fares from Chicago. A fares from Reno to destinations toward Emeryville might not show much increase, or they might. But they probably won't start at $150. You'd need to do a separate graph for, say, Emeryville in order to see how fares compare there.

Another thing to consider is that some of the Crescent's strangeness wouldn't have been revealed if I hadn't looked at different origins. Leaving from New York, for instance, Bedrooms in the low bucket are always more expensive than roomettes in the low-bucket. Exactly what we expect.

But when we look at Charlotte and Atlanta, roomettes are more expensive than bedrooms in the low-bucket as far as Washington, DC (and from Charlotte, as far south as Atlanta).

That could mean that something similar happens from, say Kansas City or Denver. But we can only know that for sure if we look at origins from those stations.

At any rate, you did good work. Thanks for contributing!

 

[Ispolkom]

I would take this moment to point out that Denver-Chicago and Minneapolis-Chicago were two decent-sized markets for intercity travel, and that most of the trains headed to the West Coast originated there (I think possibly with through car service from Chicago in both cases, but they both had plenty of dedicated trains running that route).

None of the major trains to the Pacific Northwest ever originated in Minneapolis, and the Empire Builder doesn't stop there now. Remember that the CB&Q was controlled by the Great Northern and Northern Pacific, so all the name trains (the Empire Builder, the Mainstreeter, the Western Star, the North Coast Limited) started in Chicago. That's true in the postwar era, though I might be wrong about the 60s, when many trains were consolidated. The same is true with the Milwaukee Road's trains, as long as they lasted.

There's always been a big traffic between the Twin Cities and Chicago, and even if Amtrak added a dedicated St. Paul - Chicago train it would be a drop in the bucket of the demand.