Conductor's Punchers

Amtrak Unlimited Discussion Forum

Help Support Amtrak Unlimited Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Next time you ride Amtrak ask you conductor if he or she has a punch. If so ask if they would punch something for you.
No thank you. I don't want my travel companion to get a bloody nose.
default_mosking.gif
 
Other than random requests to just punch a piece of paper, what do they use them for? Multi-rides haven't been live in a while. I suppose there's the occasional live ticket such as those issued from rail passes. The only thing I know of is that on Capitol Corridor they'll use them to punch the expiration date for their public transit transfers.
 
There are some "real" tickets still out there. USA Rail Passes are still paper. Group tickets were still being handwritten on the old red carbon stock, though with the group desk disbanded I guess these are history now. There are a couple through-ticketed services still on paper. Oh, and don't forget COTS - Conductor Onboard Ticket Stock - for cutting tickets, upgrades or baggage charges onboard in cash.
 
From the Coast Starlight, December 2012 -- quote from conductor, re the scanner: "I love these things". He certainly seemed happy about it.
default_smile.png


amtrak_punch_and_scanner.jpg
 
SEPTA and NJ Transit still have some. I always get a paper ticket into Philly from NJ (even with the Key thing now), and my tickets to/from work on NJT are paper. I will check next time to see if they punch them--never really paid much attention. Sometimes on NJT they just tear them, so you can't use them again.
 
In general I like the e-ticketing and I think it's great what those scanners do, but I really really miss the ticket punching. For those that don't know, each conductor had / has their own personal design, like a signature. If you worked as a Ticket Agent for the N&W 50 years ago, you could look at someones ticket in a scrapbook and say "oh yeah, old Casey Jones was your Conductor that day on the Pocahontas." Won't be able to tell who scanned your ticket 50 years from now.

But that's technology for better and worse.
 
SEPTA and NJ Transit still have some. I always get a paper ticket into Philly from NJ (even with the Key thing now), and my tickets to/from work on NJT are paper. I will check next time to see if they punch them--never really paid much attention. Sometimes on NJT they just tear them, so you can't use them again.
Amtrak requires paper tickets be turned in. Including things like a step up ticket for a VRE pass rider to ride Amtrak.
 
Oh, of course, I forgot. On SEPTA, they pick up all the tickets from the seat backs a couple of stops before going into Center City. And the NJT conductors collect them, too (at least from me, because I'm going just two stops, and they'll remember where I'm getting off). So although they do still have paper tickets, I'm not sure where/when I've seen them punched lately for any reason.
 
SEPTA and NJ Transit still have some. I always get a paper ticket into Philly from NJ (even with the Key thing now), and my tickets to/from work on NJT are paper. I will check next time to see if they punch them--never really paid much attention. Sometimes on NJT they just tear them, so you can't use them again.
Amtrak requires paper tickets be turned in. Including things like a step up ticket for a VRE pass rider to ride Amtrak.
I remember keeping the stub though. And the perforation was really fragile too, so the point where I'd tape the stub to my 10-ride. I remember using the last ride once, and the conductor ripped right through the tape after three quick punches of the ticket and twice of the stub.
 
As of this past April, Open Sleeper tickets were still paper value and had to be manually punched. When boarding the Empire Builder, the first conductor repeatedly tried to scan it before I told her that it was 'the old fashioned punch type'. She took the whole ticket and said she would figure it out later. When boarding the Cascades later on, the conductor had to borrow the AC's punch since he didn't have his with. Punch tickets are definitely few and far between!
 
In general I like the e-ticketing and I think it's great what those scanners do, but I really really miss the ticket punching. For those that don't know, each conductor had / has their own personal design, like a signature. If you worked as a Ticket Agent for the N&W 50 years ago, you could look at someones ticket in a scrapbook and say "oh yeah, old Casey Jones was your Conductor that day on the Pocahontas." Won't be able to tell who scanned your ticket 50 years from now.

But that's technology for better and worse.
Here's one of the transfers punched by a conductor on Capitol Corridor:

capitolcorridortransfer.png


The shape of the punch shows up pretty well in this photo. Another thing was that the requirement was supposedly for the next calendar day, but I remember getting some as far away as two weeks later. I also rarely saw them being taken, although I think a bus driver took one once.
 
Still see that on the LIRR. The last post made me think of the old Hawaiian Punch commercials...."Anyone want a nice Hawaiian punch?"
Correction: the tagline was “How ‘bout a nice Hawaiian punch?”
 
I went back and watched a couple of them after I posted.... Back in those days, HP (not Hewlett-Packard) came in big metal cans (46 oz?)
I thought it was multiple sizes including 12 oz. Some were concentrates to be mixed with water, as well as powders. Ready to drink seemed to come in a variety of sizes, although they weren't any kind of pull-tab, where you needed a can piercer.

Here's one where you can clearly see the size:

4467359793_c052e039c0.jpg
 
Back
Top