choose a specific roomette on Superliner

[ehbowen]

The airlines a city pair and a flight number, so the seat layout is in the computer. For Amtrak, there are many scenarios between Origination and Final Destination of a specific train. Then, there are those who are coach part of the way and Sleeper the balance. It would take a lot of programming time to develop and troubleshoot such a program.. Finally, where is the return on the money invested into such an on-line program. Will it increase revenue or decrease costs?

Good points you made. Perhaps for those who want to travel from, say, Seattle to L.A.X.', on train #11, an option to reserve certain bedrooms could be created for their benefit?

Already, you have to enter a city pair to see which fare and accommodation options are available for you to book from. If you pull the trigger, one is selected (essentially) at random. Why not display the rooms which are available between those city pairs at the time of booking and allow the prospective passenger to pick? If someone wants to ride coach from Grand Junction to Denver and sleeper from Denver to Chicago, just have them book it as a multi-city trip.

There is an argument...perhaps not a strong one, but an argument...for keeping coach seating in its current catch-as-catch-can system, since turnover is higher and leg lengths tend to be shorter in coach and conductors need the flexibility to move some people around en route...if a family of four books a trip three days before departure, do you really want them to be seated in three separate cars? The only other alternative is turning them away, either formally by rule or by self-selection when they choose to drive or fly because they can't expect to be seated as a group. (They'll probably be seated separately booking a flight at the last minute, too, but that's a little easier to tolerate for 2 hours with everyone in one vehicle than 24 with them separated into three!) Sleeper passengers already have specific reservations and are very, very seldom moved at the last minute (but still could be if necessary under the new system), so why not let them choose? First come, first served that #4 roomette....

What I would like to see on the Amtrak website is online access to the sleeper layout that shows what rooms are available. Then you can simply choose what sleeper room you would want with a check mark at the time of purchase. Airlines have been using this system for years and the info is already in the Amtrak booking system.

I was thinking exactly the same thing the other day.

At the very least Amtrak could easily do a program that shows room availability at the initial station of departure or for city pairs. It would not be a revenue generator but if they were looking to cut costs it may result in less agents on the phones.

So you want someone to lose their job?

I want productivity to be increased so that more passengers can be accommodated without having to increase overhead.

 

[Ryan]

At the very least Amtrak could easily do a program that shows room availability at the initial station of departure or for city pairs. It would not be a revenue generator but if they were looking to cut costs it may result in less agents on the phones.

That program is only "easy" in the minds of those that don't know what it would take to actually do the work.

Also, it does nothing to solve the problem. Once again, consider the simplified 2 room, 3 traveller scenario. The Cardinal now magically has 2 rooms (say standard bedrooms when she's running with one sleeper). I'm going CHI-IND; you're going WSS-PHL. I book first and see that both rooms are available for those city pairs, and select room A. You book second and also wee both rooms available for your city pair, but you select B.

Guess what happens when that third traveller going from CHI-NYP sees? No room for you; whereas an intelligently designed system would put both of us in the same room since we don't overlap, leaving the other room available for our friendly through traveller.

Now increase the number of rooms by an order of magnitude and work that through all the possible city pair combinations that you can have on a single train. Maybe you'll be able to see that it isn't an "easy" solution.

 

[ehbowen]

Why not display the rooms which are available between those city pairs at the time of booking and allow the prospective passenger to pick?

That program is only "easy" in the minds of those that don't know what it would take to actually do the work.

Also, it does nothing to solve the problem. Once again, consider the simplified 2 room, 3 traveller scenario. The Cardinal now magically has 2 rooms (say standard bedrooms when she's running with one sleeper). I'm going CHI-IND; you're going WSS-PHL. I book first and see that both rooms are available for those city pairs, and select room A. You book second and also wee both rooms available for your city pair, but you select B.

Guess what happens when that third traveller going from CHI-NYP sees? No room for you; whereas an intelligently designed system would put both of us in the same room since we don't overlap, leaving the other room available for our friendly through traveller.

Now increase the number of rooms by an order of magnitude and work that through all the possible city pair combinations that you can have on a single train. Maybe you'll be able to see that it isn't an "easy" solution.

No, I don't. Again:

Why not display the rooms which are available between those city pairs at the time of booking and allow the prospective passenger to pick?

"Available" doesn't have to mean, "Every last room on the train." If Amtrak is expecting a significant amount of through business on, say, the Southwest Chief, the system might be set to "hold out" on making some of the rooms "available" for a short-distance traveler seeking to book CHI-KCY. He would see all of the rooms which are already booked from KCY to further down the line, perhaps most of the rooms which are booked from La Junta or Albuquerque westward, and only, say, twenty percent of the rooms which remain vacant for the entire journey. If the partially booked "down the line" options are fewer (say, early in the season or because no partially booked rooms are available), he would see more of the completely vacant rooms.

I've explained my position. Now, you explain yours: How does the "intelligently designed" system respond when the second passenger calls an agent at Amtrak Reservations and says, "But I don't want Room A!"

 

[Ryan]

You vastly overestimate the number of people that care about such things. The agents will keep doing what they do today. Remember that the average passenger has no clue this form exists or that there is any difference between any of the rooms.

You're talking about catering to the edge case of the edge case here. What is the business case for doing so? Is Amtrak going to see an increase in revenue from the programming work required to implement such a scheme? Not to mention, your "only display some of the available rooms" just greatly increased the complexity of the work needed, since you'll have to design an algorithm to choose what of the vacant rooms it decides to show.

 

[Lonestar648]

The cost of programming is high because, there is the design phase, the actual program written, the initial test phase, the troubleshooting trying to break phase, the final fixes implemented, a limited on line "live" testing, then once all these hundreds of hours are completed, the management approval process. So say it takes the IT group 200 hours to complete at the normal $100 per hour charge back rate, management would need to see an increase in revenue or cost reductions over $20,000 in the first 12 months, and I am very conservative on the total of man hours IT team would rack up.

 

[PVD]

More and more airlines are selling seat selection as an add on. They already had the capability, but now you get to pay for the privilege. I think Ryan has it pegged. While there will be a group of people who would be happier with a pre-selection system being online, is there a business case for it? Does anyone not travel Amtrak because they can't pick a seat or have to talk to an agent to get a specific room, and if so, is it in sufficient quantities to make it worth changing, and also dealing with re assignments for later reserving groups or bad ordered or swapped cars. Southwest seems to have made money for a long time without assigned seating.

 

[Tennessee Traveler]

Another topic that has gotten way too deep for me.

 

[Lonestar648]

Bottom line on the topic of upgrading the web site is that since Amtrak doesn't have extra money, it would be better to save the money to lower costs, by leaving as is.

 

[Paperbackrider]

Something you train wizards probably already knew, but I just learned:

Yesterday I booked my train #11 and 14 on the return SEA - LAX - SEA trying for a roomette as close to the centre of any car upper deck.

On-line, I found one price that was OK for me. But to get my wish of a certain car and roomette, I knew I had to call an agent.

I explained what I wanted, but all that came up were located at the end of each of 3 cars (1130,1131, 1132). Not my wish due to the extra rocking motion in those rooms. Other rooms to my liking were some $100 more per direction than the prices on-line.

I have traveled this route on 2 past occasions over recent years and my choice of rooms was always given without a higher cost.

FYI I did book past trips some months earlier to departure than the 3 weeks here.

Any comments are welcome. Just trying to understand the system, as I wasn't aware that roomette prices vary according to location. Many thanks.

 

[AmtrakBlue]

Something you train wizards probably already knew, but I just learned:

Yesterday I booked my train #11 and 14 on the return SEA - LAX - SEA trying for a roomette as close to the centre of any car upper deck.

On-line, I found one price that was OK for me. But to get my wish of a certain car and roomette, I knew I had to call an agent.

I explained what I wanted, but all that came up were located at the end of each of 3 cars (1130,1131, 1132). Not my wish due to the extra rocking motion in those rooms. Other rooms to my liking were some $100 more per direction than the prices on-line.

I have traveled this route on 2 past occasions over recent years and my choice of rooms was always given without a higher cost.

FYI I did book past trips some months earlier to departure than the 3 weeks here.

Any comments are welcome. Just trying to understand the system, as I wasn't aware that roomette prices vary according to location. Many thanks.

Call and ask to MODIFY your rez and if the agent does not know how to do it without charging you more, ask for a supervisor.

 

[Ryan]

He wasn't changing an existing reservation, he was trying to make one.

Roomette prices don't vary by location, you got an agent that didn't know what they were doing.

When rooms are loaded for sale, they are all assigned to the different price tiers, and sold in order cheapest to most expensive. This is done to balance the load between the various sleeping cars.

You can get any room at the current selling price, but the agent has to be smart enough to adjust the system to provide the desire room at the correct price.

(always possible that this is a recent policy change, but untrained agents incorrectly trying to charge more for specific rooms is an old story)

 

[Lonestar648]

If the agent wants to charge you more it is that they are changing the reservation instead of modifying the reservation. Seems like the same thing, but modifying doesn't get the charge for switching rooms. I was downstairs and wanted upstairs, the agent wanted to charge me, so I politely said no thank you and called back, getting a really helpful and very experienced agent. No extra charge and gave what rooms were available in each of the sleepers.

 

[Ryan]

Except for the part where there wasn't an existing reservation.

This guy was trying to make a *new* reservation and being told different rooms had different prices.

Changing and modifying doesn't have anything to do with it in this case. You can't change or modify something that does not yet exist.

 

[PerRock]

Something you train wizards probably already knew, but I just learned:

Yesterday I booked my train #11 and 14 on the return SEA - LAX - SEA trying for a roomette as close to the centre of any car upper deck.

On-line, I found one price that was OK for me. But to get my wish of a certain car and roomette, I knew I had to call an agent.

I explained what I wanted, but all that came up were located at the end of each of 3 cars (1130,1131, 1132). Not my wish due to the extra rocking motion in those rooms. Other rooms to my liking were some $100 more per direction than the prices on-line.

I have traveled this route on 2 past occasions over recent years and my choice of rooms was always given without a higher cost.

FYI I did book past trips some months earlier to departure than the 3 weeks here.

Any comments are welcome. Just trying to understand the system, as I wasn't aware that roomette prices vary according to location. Many thanks.

Chances are, between when you looked at the price online & when you talked to an agent the bucket price on the whole train (sleeper section?) went up. It's not just that those particular rooms are more expensive, but all the rooms are.

peter

 

[chakk]

I believe the OP's original assumption that the ends of Superliner sleepers rock more than the middle of the cars is incorrect. The cars have very little "flex" in their steel bodies -- each room of a car on the upper level rocks equally. The lateral distance of rocking is somewhat less for rooms on the lower level.

On airplanes, the "ends" of the plane fuselage rock more because the plane tends to pivot in 3 dimensions around the center of the fuselage at the leading edge of the wing.

 

[ehbowen]

I believe the OP's original assumption that the ends of Superliner sleepers rock more than the middle of the cars is incorrect. The cars have very little "flex" in their steel bodies -- each room of a car on the upper level rocks equally. The lateral distance of rocking is somewhat less for rooms on the lower level.

On airplanes, the "ends" of the plane fuselage rock more because the plane tends to pivot in 3 dimensions around the center of the fuselage at the leading edge of the wing.

Many passengers feel that the seats/rooms in the center of the car ride "better", that's one of the reasons why on the old 6-section, 6 roomette, 4 bedroom streamlined sleepers you will normally find the bedrooms in the center of the car. However, I've never personally noticed any difference significant enough to bother with.

 

[Lonestar648]

Being on the ends of the Pullman cars you got the wheel noise, which could be annoying. Also the ends of the cars today and then you get the door noise as people come and go.

 

[PVD]

which is why many longer planes have yaw dampers

 

[jis]

which is why many longer planes have yaw dampers

Well, yaw dampers have more to do with the aerodynamic characteristics of swept back wings than the sheer length of planes. But this line of discussion is wildly off topic.

 

[PVD]

I was looking at distance of the movement, which is greater further from the pivot, much like upstairs vs downstairs in a SL. making it more noticeable to passengers in a longer or taller vehicle regardless of cause.