What I want: more Pennsylvanians

[Nathanael]

The main, southern part of the T in Pittsburgh is old -- a survivor from the golden age of streetcars, much like Cleveland's Shaker Heights lines. It survived for much the same reason as the systems in Cleveland, Philadelphia, Boston, and San Francisco: streetcar tunnels through hills. The streetcars in Pittsburgh were still running at grade level downtown in the 1970s.

The current subway route in downtown was built more recently, in the early 1980s, mostly over a railway line formerly used for intercity passenger and freight service.

The Alleghany tunnel was a damn good idea and hopefully now that it's open it will raise awareness of the existence of urban rail in Pittsburgh. Replacing the East Busway with rail would be pretty easy because *it used to be a rail line*; maybe they'll do it when it's falling apart and needs to be rebuilt anyway.

Apparently other people consider the Pittsburgh T to be "hidden":

http://publicsource.org/investigations/pittsburgh-area-has-light-rail-can-you-find-it

---

Anyway, on the topic of intercity rail west of Harrisburg, there is a viable route from Harrisburg to State College to Tyrone, which could probably be made faster than the existing route and would reach the all-important State College location. This would unfortunately be a large, new-build project which would have to revive routes long lost to rail between State College and Harrisburg, but if Pennsylvania ever got a really rail-friendly administration, I think it would be an extremely wise move. However, given that Pennsylvania can't even manage to get passenger rail to Bethlehem or Allentown (despite owning the route) or Scranton (despite support from all the local governments in the region), it may be a hard slog to get any improvements at all.

 

[railiner]

This is a little off topic, but as Pennsylvanian fairly new to train travel I would like to ask if there were ever trains going north and south in the area? I know there is a station in Altoona, and Rochester to the north and then Cumberland to the south but nothing In between.(Locals tell us that there used to be traids up and down every major valley)

I live near the NY/PA border (near Corning) and we ride up to ROC to pick up a train going west. Erie is too late boarding and Altoona is further. It's overnight to Chicago for us and that is convenient but going east is easier to drive and nothing goes south unless we got o NY or Cleveland, i Believe. I understand the Cost involved but wondered if the tracks were still there and usable. To be able to get a train south to Hburg and then west to Philly would be great!

There hasn't been any passenger trains in the Southern Tier part of New York State, since before Amtrak started in 1971. The last New York (Hoboken) to Chicago train thru there was the Erie-Lackawanna 'Lake Cities', which ended in 1970.. The Penn Central also ended its Washington-Harrisburg-Corning-Buffalo trains at that time.

 

[WoodyinNYC]

First study the Amtrak/Penn DOT studies.

http://www.amtrak.com/ccurl/96/928/PennsylvaniaServiceStudies.pdf

NS really does not want a second passenger train on this route at all. Not at all. Short version of their reply, "You want another train, we'll need another set of tracks."

As an aside, that study found that Altoona-Harrisburg-Philly would be a viable route., requiring a modest subsidy, but not out of line with the usual for routes like this. I guess to push a Keystone to Altoona would not require another train set. If we're gonna fight NS, and in the end pay many millions for upgrades, why settle for a Pennsylvanian? Nobody in Philly, Lancaster, Harrisburg, Altoona, Johnstown, and Pittsburgh wants another train to Cleveland, Toledo, Chicago? One with daylight service thru Cleveland would be worth a lot. Call it the Broadway Limited, the Three Rivers, the Rust Belt, whatever. Would cost helluva lot to get going, and we'd need some more Viewliner II cars from the CAF option. But as ever, for Amtrak we have to chose one: Stagnate, wither, die. Or grow.

 

[PaulM]

Isn't the station (PGH) in a rather sketchy area as well?

Some might say that. It's in the financial district. h34r:

 

[PaulM]

Amtrak is a completely unknown quantity in Pittsburgh too. As is mass transit in general. There's no commuter trains or anything, so people are vaguely suspicious of the whole thing.

Anything doesn't include light rail?

 

[TML]

Although I took the Pennsylvanian to/from college during those years, I do have one major complaint about its current schedule: the arrival/departure times at PGH are outside the operating hours of most car rental agencies (the only exceptions being the ones at Pittsburgh Airport). So, if I were to make changes not involving additional service, I would change the times a bit - let both 42 & 43 depart around 8-8:30 am, making for a 5:30-6:00 pm arrival time. This way, there would be sufficient time to retrieve the rental car on the evening of the arrival and to return the rental on the morning of the departure.

 

[benjibear]

Car rentals are an issue at many stations.

 

[afigg]

Although I took the Pennsylvanian to/from college during those years, I do have one major complaint about its current schedule: the arrival/departure times at PGH are outside the operating hours of most car rental agencies (the only exceptions being the ones at Pittsburgh Airport). So, if I were to make changes not involving additional service, I would change the times a bit - let both 42 & 43 depart around 8-8:30 am, making for a 5:30-6:00 pm arrival time. This way, there would be sufficient time to retrieve the rental car on the evening of the arrival and to return the rental on the morning of the departure.

The earlier arrival at PGH would mean a much longer wait for those connecting to the Capitol Limited. A 8-8:30 AM departure from NYP would also be in the middle of morning rush hour where there are no slots to spare. It would also mean an earlier morning departure from PHL rather than mid-day. That the one train from NYP and PHL gets in too late to pick up a rental car from a downtown car rental office points out the limits of one train a day corridor service in devising an optimum schedule. Two daily Pennsylvanians would allow for an earlier train to PGH that would arrive late afternoon,. in time to get to a in-city car rental office or do evening activities in the city.

As for car rentals, that is indeed an issue at many stations. Need a station with a lot of passenger volume to support an in-station or near the station car rental office or offices. The more stations that have high frequency corridor service, or are hub stations shared with busy commuter services, or at the airport, or have a local direct rail transit link to the airport, the more stations that will have better car rental options.

 

[Anderson]

First study the Amtrak/Penn DOT studies.

http://www.amtrak.com/ccurl/96/928/PennsylvaniaServiceStudies.pdf

NS really does not want a second passenger train on

this route at all. Not at all. Short version of their reply,

"You want another train, we'll need another set of tracks."

As an aside, that study found that Altoona-Harrisburg-Philly

would be a viable route., requiring a modest subsidy, but

not out of line with the usual for routes like this. I guess to push

a Keystone to Altoona would not require another train set.

If we're gonna fight NS, and in the end pay many millions

for upgrades, why settle for a Pennsylvanian? Nobody

in Philly, Lancaster, Harrisburg, Altoona, Johnstown, and

Pittsburgh wants another train to Cleveland, Toledo,

Chicago? One with daylight service thru Cleveland

would be worth a lot. Call it the Broadway Limited,

the Three Rivers, the Rust Belt, whatever. Would cost

helluva lot to get going, and we'd need some more

Viewliner II cars from the CAF option. But as ever,

for Amtrak we have to chose one: Stagnate, wither,

die. Or grow.

Nice rhetoric. The reality is that Amtrak barely has enough equipment to support existing services, and even that is on a perpetual knife's edge, and lacks the funding for more at the moment. With the added car orders, there's probably equipment for a few corridor extensions or another set or two on the NEC. You might even be able to lengthen a few eastern LD consists.

The likely cost of an additional daily eastern LD train seems to be somewhere in the $300-600m range, and the cost for a daily western LD train is probably in the $500-1,000m range in terms of setup costs. In the Eastern cases, this includes $50-100m in new equipment; out west, you're probably looking at $100-150m. The rest of the cost is going to go to track improvements (which will vary based on how busy the host railroad(s) in question are and how negotiations go) and other costs; in some cases, track segments would need to be restored. Corridor trains are a bit less, but even there you often end up looking at $100-150m per round-trip plus equipment (though in a lot of cases, you can do one round trip per equipment set).

I do believe there has been a leadership failure at Amtrak in not promoting a medium-term plan for expanding service or explaining what could be done with certain equipment orders. From what I can tell, Amtrak has mostly stayed back and let states take the lead rather than working to promote either expanding LD service (not a state function) or corridor service (a more complicated animal, since some corridors are destined to be multi-state tangles in need of coordination). The Viewliner IIs are an exception to this, but even then there's no clear talk about "If we get X, we can do this with it. If we get Y, we can do this other thing with it."

For example, there have been serious examinations of restoring the North Coast Hiawatha, Desert Wind, and Pioneer over the last five years. There have also been visions proposed for the NEC, many of which could swallow decades of HSR funding. Why has there been no serious proposal for expanding the LD system pushed? Where is an attempt to take the seriously-proposed regional systems, add a few new LD links or "daily doubles", and produce a "National Network Vision 2030" in the vein of similar NEC documents?

 

[tricia]

Isn't the station (PGH) in a rather sketchy area as well?

Some might say that. It's in the financial district. h34r:

 

[afigg]

Nice rhetoric. The reality is that Amtrak barely has enough equipment to support existing services, and even that is on a perpetual knife's edge, and lacks the funding for more at the moment. With the added car orders, there's probably equipment for a few corridor extensions or another set or two on the NEC. You might even be able to lengthen a few eastern LD consists.

The likely cost of an additional daily eastern LD train seems to be somewhere in the $300-600m range, and the cost for a daily western LD train is probably in the $500-1,000m range in terms of setup costs. In the Eastern cases, this includes $50-100m in new equipment; out west, you're probably looking at $100-150m. The rest of the cost is going to go to track improvements (which will vary based on how busy the host railroad(s) in question are and how negotiations go) and other costs; in some cases, track segments would need to be restored. Corridor trains are a bit less, but even there you often end up looking at $100-150m per round-trip plus equipment (though in a lot of cases, you can do one round trip per equipment set).

I do believe there has been a leadership failure at Amtrak in not promoting a medium-term plan for expanding service or explaining what could be done with certain equipment orders. From what I can tell, Amtrak has mostly stayed back and let states take the lead rather than working to promote either expanding LD service (not a state function) or corridor service (a more complicated animal, since some corridors are destined to be multi-state tangles in need of coordination). The Viewliner IIs are an exception to this, but even then there's no clear talk about "If we get X, we can do this with it. If we get Y, we can do this other thing with it."

For example, there have been serious examinations of restoring the North Coast Hiawatha, Desert Wind, and Pioneer over the last five years. There have also been visions proposed for the NEC, many of which could swallow decades of HSR funding. Why has there been no serious proposal for expanding the LD system pushed? Where is an attempt to take the seriously-proposed regional systems, add a few new LD links or "daily doubles", and produce a "National Network Vision 2030" in the vein of similar NEC documents?

Adding an eastern LD train that operates the lion's share of its mileage over existing passenger routes shouldn't cost that much beyond the rolling stock. The proposed western LD route restorations are a different matter because so much of the routes have not had passenger service in a long time. As for making a big proposals to restore LD services, the current political climate is not even remotely favorable for any such proposal. Improving the cost recovery, ridership, and performance of the current LD trains will provide a stronger foundation on which to make such proposals when or if the time is right.
But this is getting waaay beyond the subject of this thread which is adding a second corridor for NYP-PGH. If you want to discuss the idea that Amtrak should propose expansion of the LD services and not be satisfied with incremental improvements to the current 15 LD trains, I suggest you repost your comments above into a new thread with an appropriate title. Should make for an entertaining discussion.

 

[Anderson]

Good call. I meant it as a response to the "expand or die" comments, but I'll break it off for its own discussion.

 

[Alexandria Nick]

Amtrak is a completely unknown quantity in Pittsburgh too. As is mass transit in general. There's no commuter trains or anything, so people are vaguely suspicious of the whole thing.

Anything doesn't include light rail?

A lone, no matter how much they try to wrap it up as two lines, light rail line that goes in an effectively straight line in one cardinal direction barely counts as anything