Your funniest Amtrak story?

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.
Status
Not open for further replies.
Conductor to drunken passenger: "If you don't sit down and behave, I can have you put off this train."

Drunken passenger to Conductor: "You just try and put me off, Sonny Boy!"

End of conversation.

I got my last glimpse of this passenger as we pulled away from the station in Rocky Mount, NC. He was getting into a police car, which he may have mistaken for the Rocky Mount Welcome Wagon.

Tom
 
Another funny one from my sophomore year in high school. My Dad, mom, and I were riding the crescent from New Orleans to New York. We departed Philadelphia and a drunk preacher started in preaching and telling us we were going to hell. The conductor came through and warned him to be quiet. The guy agreed to be quiet but I knew this wouldn't last long. The conductor left the door open at the end of our car (heritage fleet).

The guy got going again as we left Trenton. Accompanied by the noise coming from the end of car. I kept waiting for the conductor to reappear. I had guessed that he left the door open so he could sneak back in to catch him preaching. The conductor reappeared, glowering at the preacher. "I thought I told you to be quiet." The preacher said, "your going to hell". The conductor said, "and you are going to Newark".
 
Not on amtrak but an ex amtrak car so I'll throw my story out here. I was working the Pelican last summer pulled by N&W 4-8-4 611 which was the excursion from Roanoke to Radford. And our route has one tunnel along it. And my car I was in charge of was a vista dome and I knew where all the switches were. So what I did as we were entering the tunnel as we kept the dome lights on all day. I started turning the switch off and on. And as we made our way into the tunnel I completely turned the lights back on. The passengers were laughing and having a great time with the little joke I played on them. Come ride with me this season I'll probably do a repeat version.
 
My Amtrak career goes back to 1972 and spent many hundreds of thousands of miles in various management and agreement positions including being a field technician in the days of Turbotrains and Turboliners.

My story of the day was on a trip on Amtrak 350 using a Turboliner. The crowd was light and the rear coach-powercar was not being loaded.

Leaving Kalamazoo I walked through the train and went back to ride in the rear powercar cab. Before we were into Battle Creek I came out of the baggage section into the coach.

Lo and Behold I encountered a monkey wearing a dress , the beast was swinging from the baggage racks and the seat tops. Not seeing or hearing anyone in the car Isaid out loud *** but using the full words. All of a sudden I hear the voice of a very small and very elderly woman say "Ethyl get back here and away from that nasty man!" Now, the monkey's name may not be right but it started with an E. I had been out drinking the night before but I was sober.

I walked past and both the woman and the monkey were curled up in a seat next to a window. I stopped at the seat and they seemed to be cowering in fear, now at the time, I was 120 pounds lighter and skated with the BlackHawk scrimmage squad. All 4 foot 19 inches of me.

I told the woman that I didn't think that she could have her monkey of the train. she said that the conductor let her on. Off I went to find the conductor, he told me that an elderly woman with a beach bag boarded at Kalamazoo going to Detroit. I proceeded to tell him what I saw and he asked me if I was sober!

He walked back and asked me to follow and as soon as he entered the car there was the monkey swinging again. He blew his top and told the woman and here companion they were getting off at Jackson and he would give her a ticket good for a refund of her fare. She asked him what should she do as Greyhound would not let her ride. His reply (remember now that he worked for the Railroad, not amtrak, with 45+ years service was "Lady learn ro drive and by a car, maybe the monkey can help you drive."
 
Single-level dining cars don't normally have side doors for passenger boarding, but they do have small doors for loading stock. There is no vestibule; just a small vertical ladder built into the car side below the door.

Back in the pre-Superliner days, there came a day when we were boarding number 52 in Sanford. The station agent made the usual boarding announcement, which always included a reminder that passengers should only board at a location where a uniformed attendant was present.

We were all busy attending to our own boarding locations when one of the attendants looked up and noticed a commotion by the diner. An elderly man was trying to push his equally elderly wife up the vertical diner ladder. She was having a hard time of it and was almost falling backwards, resting on his shoulders! A couple of us rushed to the diner and got her down off his shoulders (fortunately without injury) and directed them to the proper boarding location for their car.

No need to resort to fiction when you've got stuff like this in your memory banks.

Tom
 
Last year, I had a horrible trip on Amtrak CZ. Nearly 12 hours late. When I got back from my trip, I had a survey waiting from Amtrak in regards to the trip they knew was bad. I gave them a call to talk to them about it. I got sent to another department, something like a loyalty department. As I wait to talk to someone, the song "Why Can't We Be Friends?" By War came on for hold music. I laughed. Ended up getting a sizable voucher after everything was done.
 
I just found it! This version has 100 questions actually asked on the Auto Train. Obviously, some are more amusing than others, so I won't repeat the whole list:

1. Which way is the train going? (asked at nighttime; answer: "North", which leaves the person equally perplexed).

2. Is the lemonade real? (No, it's imaginary)

27. Do you live here (asked anywhere enroute)

38. Have you seen my wife? (probably)

41. Do you eat the same food we eat? (No, the crew has its own private dining car)

44. Where's the free snacks? (we used to have them in the lounge car)

48. Do you get asked a lot of questions? (I'll let you guess)

49. Is this the diner? (usually asked in the diner, but sometimes in the lounge)

50. Are we here? (Yes, we're not someplace else)

51. Is the fish tough?

55. Is [name of employee from the distant past] still on the train?

56. Will the cars come up on the other train? (What other train? The autos are in the carriers at the rear of this train)

71. What's that smell? Do something about it. (asked while passing a paper mill)

75. Can I have a cigarette here? (asked in the vestibule)

83. What's the weather like in Virginia (or Florida)?

88. Aren't you hot? (asked in Sanford, FL in July, when the temperature is often 100 deg. on the platform during mid-afternoon boarding. Answer, "Uhhhh, yeah.")

89. Do you like your job?

93. Can we have two desserts?

94. Can we have seats facing forward?

98. Are you the nurse? (A real question asked of a chef who was wearing his white jacket)

Unnumbered addition. Do we go through any tunnels? (The train hugs the coast, traversing generally flat terrain for the entire trip, but we were not above resorting to fiction. Once we told somebody about the Great Okeechobee Mountain Range with its many long tunnels, and high bridges spanning spectacular gorges. Then we relented and told them the more mundane truth)

Tom
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Several years ago, Amtrak President David Gunn was traveling south with an entourage of Management sycophants and toadies. They entered the lounge car, where the LSA happened to be one of Auto Train's most accomplished BS artists. He proceeded to give them a sales pitch worthy of P. T. Barnum, extolling the virtues of Amtrak's "complimentary souvenir napkins, emblazoned with the copyrighted Amtrak logo, suitable for framing." Mr. Gunn stood back and chuckled, while the younger and more naive members of the group bought the sales pitch, hook, line, & sinker.

Maybe I'm being too harsh in my description of those guys. Actually I don't know them. Maybe they're a lot smarter & had more going for them than they let on. At least I hope so.

Tom
 
Last edited by a moderator:
On NJ Transit we were so cynical about management that I suggested an appropriate theme song for them when there was trouble would be " Send In the Clowns. "
 
Tom--

I have been guilty of "Are we here?" :blush: But in my defense, it was on a train that had more than one stop at each end.

And I would definitely be guilty of "Can I have two desserts?" if I had the nerve to ask :p !

greatcats--

I met Tom at the Gathering in DC last year, and he is just as delightful in person as in his posts. :)

On the other end of the scale, NJ Transit hasn't changed much. Although they did, amazingly, avoid a strike recently.
 
When I first was hired by Erie Lackawanna in 1974, there was an Assistant Trainmaster, a nice young man by the name of Troy Hardin. I am not trying to slander him at all, but nearly everybody on the railroad acquired a nickname. He was one of those bosses that seemed to acquire the job because he was the son in law of the superintendent. People like that would get hired as a trainman and a few months later became a boss, earning the title of " 90 day Wonder. " Troy's nickname was " Try Harder. " He wasn't in Hoboken for very long - don't know whatever happened to him. I hope he had a good career, whatever he may have ended up doing.
 
Eric you said "On NJ Transit we were so cynical about management that I suggested an appropriate theme song for them when there was trouble would be " Send In the Clowns. " I was a union rep for a long time and the other union reps agreed that the theme song of the group should be Stealers Wheel "Stuck in the Middle", especially the line "Clowns to the left of me and jokers tothe right"!
 
93. Can we have two desserts?
If they want 2/person, why not? They have a price! Just quote it to them for the extra desserts. Whenever my wife asks for an extra anything at a restaurant, it is either "Sure" or "It is $xxx additional". Only Amtrak would refuse additional income. "Can I have extra cheese on my ...?" should be able to be answered in the positive as "It is $xxx additional". Only, of course, if the company wanted to maximize its income. Instead, it is "No!".
 
Actually, the second dessert is and was a problem on the Auto Train because the entire meal is included in the fare, and the accounting system dictates one per customer. No cash changes hands, and we have no price to quote and no way to process receipts in the diner. We often were able to do this for the customer because we frequently had other customers who didn't want dessert. In order to make sure we were being above board, we would generally check with the "donor" before delivering the second dessert, to be sure he approved and wasn't going to change his mind.

Tom
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Another few I just thought of which I found kind of amusing is... "Oh, it's not like Subway and you don't make the sandwiches fresh?" Meanwhile, I have so much stock on display on the counter that you barely see the back wall, so there's no room to even put a cup on the counter.

"You don't serve french fries?" (I get this almost weekly.) I use to respond and give them thought of 400 degree oil sloshing around on a train moving at up to 150mph, and the safety hazard it would be for everyone. Now I simply say no, and move on.
I can imagine that first time riders who didn't look up the menu before hand can come to you fairly disgusted at the selection/prices...does it happen on every trip?

I don't know what it is about 67/66, but it really draws the crazies out of the wood work. Which is exactly one reason why it's my favorite train! I get paid to work, and I get free entertainment in the process!
I've spent many hours in NYP, but nothing would compare in terms of crazies to the time I waited from 1am to 6am for a late 66 on a Saturday morning/Friday night....
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Was just on the phone with my travel partner who will be going to Europe with me and was telling him about Tom's story of the elderly couple trying to board the service door of the dining car. He jogged my memory about our own funny incident. In the fall of 2011 he and I were on the Capitol Washington to Chicago. He was in the upper bunk. I was up first and was down the hall getting coffee. He appeared in the door of the roomette and stood up, but he had a kink in his back. Since he is somewhat hearing impaired, he wasn't quite aware of how loud his blood curdling yowl was, as I tried to shush him up. The next week, busting his chops as I'm prone to do, I told him that there were reports that patronage on Train 29 had plummeted. due to reports of a madman shrieking in the sleeping car!
 
2. Is the lemonade real? (No, it's imaginary)
Imaginary or fake lemonade is made from powder with "artificial lemon flavor" in it. Real lemonade is made from lemon juice. Just so you know how to determine the *correct* answer to the question next time!
 
Last edited by a moderator:
2. Is the lemonade real? (No, it's imaginary)
Imaginary or fake lemonade is made from powder with "artificial lemon flavor" in it. Real lemonade is made from lemon juice. Just so you know how to determine the *correct* answer to the question next time!
Of course. We joked about the phrasing, but we knew what the passenger meant, and we gave them a straight answer. But we often pointed out the odd phrasing, in a good-natured way. As I said before, these were not necessarily stupid questions, but the wording was often smile-inducing. Anyway, the problem disappeared a long time ago with a menu change that eliminated lemonade.

Tom
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top