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Where you need to go with this is to restore the morning and afternoon Twin Cities Zephyrs using the BNSF route through LaCrosse and Savanna. Forget Milwaukee, they already have service to Chicago all day. Greyhound charges $56 full fare on this route with 8hr service. Amtrak charges minimum of $102 and it's always at least 2 hours late or more eastbound. So there is basically NO reliable rail service. According to my calculations, if you ran the two trains a day, Charged around $60 one way, carried 250 passengers per trip and make the trip in under eight hours(the Zephyrs made this trip in 6hrs 50min) you would make a profit of around $10 per passenger. You can use the Talgo trains or piggy back onto the double deck order. You only need two sets of equipment plus spares. You can sell this to the states that way. They can fund it with a bond issue to be paid off with the 'profits' from the operation. No tax money involved. Just lease the equipment. And try and avoid Amtrak's bloated overhead by having someone else run it.
 
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henryj said:
Where you need to go with this is to restore the morning and afternoon Twin Cities Zephyrs using the BNSF route through LaCrosse and Savanna. Forget Milwaukee, they already have service to Chicago all day. Greyhound charges $56 full fare on this route with 8hr service. Amtrak charges minimum of $102 and it's always at least 2 hours late or more eastbound. So there is basically NO reliable rail service. According to my calculations, if you ran the two trains a day, Charged around $60 one way, carried 250 passengers per trip and make the trip in under eight hours(the Zephyrs made this trip in 6hrs 50min) you would make a profit of around $10 per passenger. You can use the Talgo trains or piggy back onto the double deck order. You only need two sets of equipment plus spares. You can sell this to the states that way. They can fund it with a bond issue to be paid off with the 'profits' from the operation. No tax money involved. Just lease the equipment. And try and avoid Amtrak's bloated overhead by having someone else run it.
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Even in a world where Wisconsin goes back to its more rail-friendly stance that it had for most of the last 20 years or so, I cannot imagine it helping to fund a train that trades Milwaukee for Savanna, IL. Using a different route CHI-MSP means you have 2 sets of stations to build/operate/maintain, plus all the other costs that would come along with opening a new route. Use the existing route, and you already have the stations, you're offering enhanced/increased service to populations at least somewhat aware of/exposed to/familiar with rail, and you serve what is by far the largest market between CHI & MSP.
 
henryj said:
Where you need to go with this is to restore the morning and afternoon Twin Cities Zephyrs using the BNSF route through LaCrosse and Savanna.
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Essentially this would be an extension of the Dubuque Black Hawk, right, or would that be a separate option for the IL part of the route?

If so, no new stations would be needed, unless they want to add Prairie Du Chien.
 
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railbuck said:
henryj said:
Where you need to go with this is to restore the morning and afternoon Twin Cities Zephyrs using the BNSF route through LaCrosse and Savanna.
Click to expand...
Essentially this would be an extension of the Dubuque Black Hawk, right, or would that be a separate option for the IL part of the route?

If so, no new stations would be needed, unless they want to add Prairie Du Chien.
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Your routing would be the most feasible option, but the train would not enter Dubuque proper instead serving Dubuque by way East Dubuque and then heading up through Prairie Du Chien (with or without a stop) and then connecting back with this current Empire Builder line at La Crosse.

The option others here are suggesting would operate over BNSF serving Chicago - Aurora - Rochelle - Oregon - Savanna and then East Dubuque.

Serving Aurora wouldn't be a problem as its a Metra station. There is no longer a depot in Rochelle as far as I know. I believe Oregon still has a depot and I dont know about Savanna. So it would require the building of at least one station, and the rehab of two others.
 
Originally there were three, even four routes and at least 5 corridor type trains between the two cities. The CNW ran the 400's, the Q ran the Zephyrs and the Milwaukee ran the Hiawatha's. If you want to use the current route through Milwaukee that's ok, it's just slower. The CNW 400 made the run in 7 hours flat. The Milwaukee's afternoon Hi took 6 hrs 45 min and the Q's Zephyr's 6hr 50min. You should be able to get under 8hrs on the current route. But you will need four sets plus spares for a morning and afternoon train. Talgo already has a facility there and apparently they have a couple of trains that no one wants you could probably lease pretty reasonably. People still line up to ride the chronically late EB so apparently there is potential there. Like I said, if you can average around 250 passengers a train the service will pay for itself. If you plan to run these trains for just bus loads of passengers, then forget it.
 
henryj said:
Originally there were three, even four routes and at least 5 corridor type trains between the two cities. The CNW ran the 400's, the Q ran the Zephyrs and the Milwaukee ran the Hiawatha's. If you want to use the current route through Milwaukee that's ok, it's just slower. The CNW 400 made the run in 7 hours flat. The Milwaukee's afternoon Hi took 6 hrs 45 min and the Q's Zephyr's 6hr 50min. You should be able to get under 8hrs on the current route. But you will need four sets plus spares for a morning and afternoon train. Talgo already has a facility there and apparently they have a couple of trains that no one wants you could probably lease pretty reasonably. People still line up to ride the chronically late EB so apparently there is potential there. Like I said, if you can average around 250 passengers a train the service will pay for itself. If you plan to run these trains for just bus loads of passengers, then forget it.
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Actually, doesn't that depend on scheduling? I know there was some chatter of being able to do a turn at one end of a route or the other, but at the same time I don't know how practical that would actually be (and 8 hrs vs. 7 hrs does make a big difference, since a 14-hour day plus a turn might be manageable...but 16 hrs plus that just ain't happening). For example, unless I'm mistaken, didn't one or more of the roads do something with a turn in Fargo rather than Minneapolis/St. Paul?

I don't see a complete problem with having two (or, theoretically, more) routes between the two cities. A route via Madison would make sense, for example, as would extending the Black Hawk (and indeed, doing the latter might well benefit both IL and MN). Anyhow...point is that doing a second route can allow coverage of more intermediate cities, and if the routes are well-separated (such as the Builder's route would be from the Black Hawk route, for a fair part of the run) or hit different decent-sized population centers (witness the Silvers...two different routes to Miami. One is faster, the other hits a few more cities.), it can seriously help out the network as a whole.
 
The Blackhawk through Rockford took 4 hrs to go 182 miles to Dubuque using the old IC(now CN) route. The Q's Zephyr's took only 2hrs 45min to go the same 182 miles to E. Dubuque. Then once you are in Dubuque, which route do you take to get to MSP? Do you cross over to E.Dubuque and take BNSF or is there another route that could support high speed passenger trains? I don't know of any. Unless you are prepared to spend a lot of money, you pretty much have to follow the routes that exist today and are supported and maintained by the freight RR's.
 
henryj said:
The Blackhawk through Rockford took 4 hrs to go 182 miles to Dubuque using the old IC(now CN) route. The Q's Zephyr's took only 2hrs 45min to go the same 182 miles to E. Dubuque. Then once you are in Dubuque, which route do you take to get to MSP? Do you cross over to E.Dubuque and take BNSF or is there another route that could support high speed passenger trains? I don't know of any. Unless you are prepared to spend a lot of money, you pretty much have to follow the routes that exist today and are supported and maintained by the freight RR's.
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Yeah, you definitely want to go east by crossing to E. Dubuque. If you had paid attention, you would have seen the posts talking about how it would not cross the Mississippi until La Crosse.
 
johnny.menhennet said:
Yeah, you definitely want to go east by crossing to E. Dubuque. If you had paid attention, you would have seen the posts talking about how it would not cross the Mississippi until La Crosse.
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If I only knew what you were talking about I would respond. lol. I have no idea what this means. But if you wanted to extend the Blackhawk on to MSP there is no connection across the river to the BNSF and there is no connection in LaCrosse between the BNSF and the CN in the MSP direction. So you would have to continue up the west bank from Dubuque to LaCrosse where you could connect back onto the CN to MSP. Problem is this track is listed as freight service only even back in the 1950's when it was Milwaukee Rd. It's 108 miles. Anyone know what it's current condition is? Is it signaled? How much work would be required to bring it up to 79mph? Who owns it now? Just curious.
 
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The EB #8 is four hours late again today. This is happenning every day. Amtrak is offering train #808 between MSP and CHI all the way through August so far. Is this a bus substitute or a make up train? Looks like a daily corridor train is needed more than ever. As soon as winter hits the EB will be running even later.
 
henryj said:
The EB #8 is four hours late again today. This is happenning every day. Amtrak is offering train #808 between MSP and CHI all the way through August so far. Is this a bus substitute or a make up train? Looks like a daily corridor train is needed more than ever. As soon as winter hits the EB will be running even later.
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Bus are filling in between MSP and CHI.

Fours hours late is nothing. It was 27+\- hrs late, and 12+\- hrs late last two days.

Per the Amtrak town hall meeting a few years back (not a direct quote) "your not going to happy with the timeframe for starting of corridor service". This due the new law about state support requirement for this short of a route.

I agree this corridor need better service, but I am not holding my breath.
 
Rail Freak said:
How long does it take the bus from MSP-CHI?
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7 hours, if there are no unusual delays.

Amtrak is offering train #808 between MSP and CHI all the way through August so far. Is this a bus substitute or a make up train?
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It's an extra coach, attached to the end of the Empire Builder. It gets passengers who are going all the way to Chicago.
 
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