September 2016 (Final FY 2016) MPR is out

Just under three million for the Surfliner. Hopefully we'll break that, and then some, with the new round trip.

I wonder what the $500k capital budget surplus is from specifically?

Since I live along the Keystone route, a couple other things that caught my eye: 130k ridership is 16% better than the same month in FY15 and an increase in ticket revenue of 12%. All while maintaining an on-time percentage of 95, which is one of the best of all the routes.

The topic title should be fixed as the September report is the last month of FY2016, not FY-15. I suggest the moderators change it to a more descriptive title of "September 2016 Monthly Performance Report, final month of FY2016 is out".

Initial comments on and numbers in the September 2016 monthly report.

Adjusted Net Operating loss = $181.5 million, beat the budget projected loss by $62.9 million. From a bottom line view, another year where Amtrak continued to shrink its net operating loss. But projected capital spending came in at $472.9 million less than authorized, so a lot of funded capital work is getting delayed.

Summary stats from the September 2016 monthly report by category.

Ridership and Revenue summary for FY2016 from October to September:
System: ridership 31,274,790 passengers; +1.3%; revenue: $2.192 billion, +0.3%
Acela: ridership 3,489,311 passengers, +0.5%; revenue: $593.7 million.+1.5%
NE Regional: ridership 8,409,662 passengers, +2.4%; revenue $614.0 million, +0.4%
State supported corridors: ridership 14,709,344 passengers, +0.2%; revenue $490.7 million, +0.3%
LD trains: ridership 4,655,599 passengers, +3.7%; revenue $492.3 million, -1.0%

Ridership and Revenue percentage increase/decrease for the month of September compared to 2015:
System: ridership +4.4%, revenue: +6.5%
Acela: ridership +6.4%, revenue: +11.7%
NE Regional: ridership +4.1%, revenue +7.5%
State supported corridors: ridership +4.1%, revenue +3.3%
LD trains: ridership +5.0%, revenue +2.4%

The September ridership had a sizable jump for the Acela, but the Sept 2016 ridership is close to Sept 2014; Sept 2015 had a big drop. Good month overall for the state supported corridors which as a group has been flat this year.

Route Performance summary on page C-1:
The Acela and NE Regionals generated a net surplus of $478.7 million, $39 million more than FY2015.
LD trains had a net loss of $492.4 million, but this is a $26.9 million smaller loss than FY2015.

On-Time Performance for the FY for the entire system was 79.1%, a nice improvement over the 71.2% in FY2015.

The LD trains OTP were also improved at 63.1% for the FY compared to a terrible 53.7% in FY2015. The east coast LD trains, the AutoTrain, Palmetto, Silver Star & Meteor continue to drag down the LD OTP with poorer numbers than last year. Better time-keeping through VA and NC on CSX would boost the overall LD train OTP stats. Maybe in FY2018 with the completion of the stimulus funded track projects and the advancement of the VA funded track projects.

So I reran my usual attempt to back out the overhead and get direct costs numbers for the so-called long-distance trains.

For 2014 I was able to extract a "total overhead allocated to LD trains" number from one of Amtrak's reports -- 507.7 milion. I have been unable to do that for 2015 or 2016 -- the information is too well hidden and too deeply buried -- so I'm still assuming that total overhead is the same as it was in 2014 (a bad assumption). I'm also assuming that the allocation of overhead, percentage-wise, is the same as it was in *2012*, which is actually probably a pretty good assumption given what we know about Amtrak's "do it the same way we did last year" accounting, but probably has some errors. This is because 2012 is the last year we had direct-costs numbers released in any way whatsoever, which is unfortunate.

Anyway, the results, and because of the above, remember these are very approximate:

-- Auto Train: 36.8 million profit (worse than last year, but still good)

-- Silver Star: 15.5 million profit

-- Silver Meteor: 15.1 million profit (these two have "averaged out"; Meteor previously did better than Star).

-- Palmetto: 14.4 million profit

-- LSL: 3.8 million profit

-- Crescent: roughly breakeven (my numbers claim 0.5 million profit)

-- Coast Starlight: roughly breakeven (my numbers claim 1.8 million loss, slightly worse than last year)

-- Cardinal: 3.2 million loss (would be a profit if it were daily -- daily should improve results by about 4.2 million)

-- Empire Builder: 3.5 million loss (slightly worse than last year; I expected this, it's because BNSF is now getting paid for OTP again)

-- CONO: 4.1 million loss

-- CL: 4.7 million loss (those Pennsy-Cap through cars would definitely help, and this probably generates connecting revenue greater than that)

-- TE: 8.7 million loss

-- SWC: 10.2 million loss

-- CZ: 10.4 million loss

-- SL: 13.2 million loss (daily should reduce this to 10.8 million)

It's interesting that the Transcons other than the EB are normalizing, so that the SWC, CZ, and SL are all in the same position more or less.

It is worth noting that every single-level train except the Cardinal is a cash generator, profitable before overhead allocation. The Cardinal would be if it were daily. The Viewliner sleepers will generally benefit the trains which are already performing the best.

This means that it may actually be viable for Amtrak to take out an RRIF or commercial loan to buy more Viewliner sleepers, or buy Viewliner coaches, as they would be incrementally profitable on trains which are already incrementally profitable; it's possible to compute payback periods (and they're short). No such chance for the bilevel trains, where only the Auto Train is really generating cash. (Perhaps the Auto Train could be re-equipped with new equipment through a commercial loan and have its old equipment cascaded to the other trains.)

It will be interesting to see what happens in 2017 and 2018. The Viewliner diners should help the already-doing-well Eastern trains, provided Amtrak isn't as stupid about the food served in them as it has been recently. The completion of a bunch of station & track projects should eventually boost revenues and ridership, particularly on the LSL (Rochester, Schenectady, Albany, Springfield) and CS (Cascades and California improvements). Improvements in Chicago should help everything going through Chicago. New local connecting rail services in Kansas City, Denver, and Fort Worth will help the SWC, CZ, and TE respectively.

I suspect that the Heritage diner maintenance costs are mindlessly allocated to the entire system, so their retirement should really show up as reduced overhead (which is going to be hard to spot). If they're actually allocated to the specific trains, then it'll benefit the numbers of the single-level trains, again.

On the other hand, All Aboard Florida will probably decimate Orlando-Miami traffic on the Silvers. Frankly the Hialeah maintenance site is looking stranded to me. It's threatened by rising sea levels and flooding; it's very remote from the LSL, Cardinal, Crescent, and Palmetto routes which use Viewliner and Amfleet II equipment; and the Silver Star and Silver Meteor are going to be losing business at the Miami end. Long term planning should call for the relocation of heavy maintenance (as opposed to overnight cleaning) much further north, perhaps in the vicinity of Orlando or Jacksonville, or perhaps all the way to Albany NY (which has no flooding risk).

On another topic, the chief mechanical officer's report is always interesting.

-- Bear does excellent ahead-of-schedule work, as always.

-- Beech Grove has caught up after years of being behind.

-- Chicago (mostly LCPM, individual maintenance items rather than total overhauls) is finally catching up after years of being way behind.

-- Albany (mostly LCPM) is still behind.

-- Several additional locations seem to have recently had LCPM rolled out -- LAX and Seattle. They are both substantially behind.

Seems to me like the transition to LCPM is disruptive for the shops and they have trouble getting up to speed; it takes a year or two for them to get used to it.

kmock said:

Since I live along the Keystone route, a couple other things that caught my eye: 130k ridership is 16% better than the same month in FY15 and an increase in ticket revenue of 12%. All while maintaining an on-time percentage of 95, which is one of the best of all the routes.

Click to expand...

Diversion traffic from the Silverliner V fiasco.

You should compare a few months worth of Keystone traffic in the 70s and 89s. The growth has been excellent.

Some consideration of the need for more reliable locos if train lengths are increased. The following additions for more locos probably will be needed.

1. Palmetto, Star, & Meteor all will need 2 locos.

2. Carolinian probably 2 but cannot until Charlotte storage track situation is resolved

3. Crescent 3 locos WASH <> ATLANTA due to the hill and dale profiles.

4. Cardinal 2 ?

5. LSL 3 locos Albany <> CHI if full consists from BOS and NYP

== 18 + 4 reserves ===22 more locos

If one more sold sleeper added to each train set ( highly unlikely ) that would add enough revenue increase to increase the revenue over break even.

Now if congress would just have fixed costs in a separate pile ? ? ?

Why do you need more locomotives? The only reason to add more power is to accelerate faster, which really doesn't matter on long distance trains, considering the length of the schedule and infrequency of stops. The Auto Train uses two locomotives for 50+ cars, which proves that they have no issue with the weight of the train.

keelhauled said:

Why do you need more locomotives? The only reason to add more power is to accelerate faster, which really doesn't matter on long distance trains, considering the length of the schedule and infrequency of stops. The Auto Train uses two locomotives for 50+ cars, which proves that they have no issue with the weight of the train.

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My response would be reliability, but that's just me.

CCC1007 said:

keelhauled said:

Why do you need more locomotives? The only reason to add more power is to accelerate faster, which really doesn't matter on long distance trains, considering the length of the schedule and infrequency of stops. The Auto Train uses two locomotives for 50+ cars, which proves that they have no issue with the weight of the train.

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My response would be reliability, but that's just me.

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Seems like an expensive insurance policy. A lot of overhead and diesel costs. Better value for the money might be to figure out how to successfully perform preventative maintenance so that locomotives are in the shop before they fail en route. If Amtrak can't figure that out, any new locomotives are going to suffer from the exact same problems down the road.

keelhauled said:

CCC1007 said:

keelhauled said:

Why do you need more locomotives? The only reason to add more power is to accelerate faster, which really doesn't matter on long distance trains, considering the length of the schedule and infrequency of stops. The Auto Train uses two locomotives for 50+ cars, which proves that they have no issue with the weight of the train.

Click to expand...

My response would be reliability, but that's just me.

Click to expand...

Seems like an expensive insurance policy. A lot of overhead and diesel costs. Better value for the money might be to figure out how to successfully perform preventative maintenance so that locomotives are in the shop before they fail en route. If Amtrak can't figure that out, any new locomotives are going to suffer from the exact same problems down the road.

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There's also the issue of HEP (head end power) capacity. Adding cars to the existing trains could cause acceleration and top segment speeds to drop. The host railroads might require more power, as BNSF does for the empire builder in the winter.

CCC1007 said:

There's also the issue of HEP (head end power) capacity. Adding cars to the existing trains could cause acceleration and top segment speeds to drop. The host railroads might require more power, as BNSF does for the empire builder in the winter.

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Auto Train runs with what, 18 passenger cars? Nothing else comes close. Unless you're talking about almost doubling train length that won't be an issue. Acceleration is of little consequence on schedules with typically over an hour between stops, and top speed is irrelevant--it takes far less energy to keep the train in motion than it did to get there. And maybe if Amtrak's engines stopped crapping out the host railroads might be inclined to give a little longer leash.

keelhauled said:

CCC1007 said:

keelhauled said:

Why do you need more locomotives? The only reason to add more power is to accelerate faster, which really doesn't matter on long distance trains, considering the length of the schedule and infrequency of stops. The Auto Train uses two locomotives for 50+ cars, which proves that they have no issue with the weight of the train.

Click to expand...

My response would be reliability, but that's just me.

Click to expand...

Seems like an expensive insurance policy. A lot of overhead and diesel costs. Better value for the money might be to figure out how to successfully perform preventative maintenance so that locomotives are in the shop before they fail en route. If Amtrak can't figure that out, any new locomotives are going to suffer from the exact same problems down the road.

Click to expand...

Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM) seems to work well for the Acela trainsets, and if they can manage to keep those things running reliably, new diesels should be no problem at all.

Number of locomotives required depends greatly on individual route and terrain. The Silver Star and Silver Meteor have run full consists (ten or eleven cars) with a single P42, but I doubt the California Zephyr could manage that with any sort of acceptable schedule. Acceleration and top speed absolutely are important in that while a single unit can move even Auto Train, you want to run things at passenger train speeds (79 mph), not slower than the most under powered drag freight on the railroad.

Acceleration is of little consequence on schedules with typically over an hour between stops, and top speed is irrelevant--it takes far less energy to keep the train in motion than it did to get there

Click to expand...

Keep in mind though that long-distance passenger trains very rarely will accelerate to track speed and stay there until the next stop; Rather, the engineer must slow for curves, slow orders, and a myriad of other conditions and then get back up to speed relatively quickly to maintain the schedule. Stops may be hours apart, but how often does the train actually slow down (or stop)?

A Voice said:

Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM) seems to work well for the Acela trainsets, and if they can manage to keep those things running reliably, new diesels should be no problem at all.

Number of locomotives required depends greatly on individual route and terrain. The Silver Star and Silver Meteor have run full consists (ten or eleven cars) with a single P42, but I doubt the California Zephyr could manage that with any sort of acceptable schedule. Acceleration and top speed absolutely are important in that while a single unit can move even Auto Train, you want to run things at passenger train speeds (79 mph), not slower than the most under powered drag freight on the railroad.

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Indeed RCM seems to work quite well. Which goes back to my point about the diesel shops--if the rest of the system doesn't figure out how to use it, then any new locomotives will suffer the same fate as the Genesis units, and if they do adopt it, then the current fleet should be able to handle the daily schedule again and new equipment can be used for expanding service, rather than being dragged around wasting money.

Acceleration is of little consequence on schedules with typically over an hour between stops, and top speed is irrelevant--it takes far less energy to keep the train in motion than it did to get there

Click to expand...

Keep in mind though that long-distance passenger trains very rarely will accelerate to track speed and stay there until the next stop; Rather, the engineer must slow for curves, slow orders, and a myriad of other conditions and then get back up to speed relatively quickly to maintain the schedule. Stops may be hours apart, but how often does the train actually slow down (or stop)?

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Those factors (I guess except for the slow orders) are already accounted for in the schedule. They're more than accounted for, in fact, seeing as in good conditions trains can arrive early if the padding in the schedule isn't needed. And the fact that Amtrak to a certain extent juggles train consists--adding cars in the summer--without correspondingly adjusting the schedule indicates to me that the effect of the added weight is a negligible factor in a schedule that already has what I can only guess is a fair amount of wiggle room.

Acceleration is most important if you have a 10 car train accelerating the loco is moving an equivalent 12 cars + the HEP drain of approximately 500 KW. ( 375 HP ). An 18 car train is close to the 1000KW limit. 2 locos each loco moving equivalent of 7 cars with one at full power without the HEP load. The more slow orders and sections the more you need acceleration. There are too many reports of the Chief, Zephyr, & Builder shutting down HEP when down to 1 operating loco. This poster has first hand experience of that as well.

Also anytime one loco fails on the Crescent north of BHM or ATL effort is made to add a NS loco which limits train to 70 MPH but still make less lost time.

2 locos allow train to acquire MAS twice as fast

3 locos for Crescent for any length that it will achieve in the foreseeable future is an overkill. Of course 5 locos would work even better but with diminishing returns.

Not saying 3 locos for a 9 - 10 car train but for a 16 car train ?

I don't expect to see a 16 car Crescent in any realistic time window from now . It's just fantasy.

And even with 16 cars two P42s with HEP draining say 1,000HP (a generous allocation), the remaining 7400HP should be more than adequate to maintain current schedules.

The LSL fairly often runs loco-loco-bag-sleeper-cafe-coach-coach-coach-coach-cafe-diner-sleeper-sleeper-bag, which is 12 cars + 2 locos, and I've seen it with 5 coaches. It has to accelerate from a dead stop to 79 mph track speed ASAP leaving most of the stations, and eventually 110 mph on portions of the Empire Corridor. The route *is* flat, but I really do think it's going to want two locomotives for the forseeable future, even with the slightly more powerful Chargers.

Speaking of Chargers, I hope Amtrak finds a way to buy some for itself. With California, Washington, and Illinois/Michigan/Missouri all buying Chargers to replace nearly their entire fleet, it would actually make the most sense for Amtrak to deploy Chargers initially on the Coast Starlight and Empire Builder, to avoid handling GE Genesis parts in Seattle, and then on the California Zephyr to avoid handling Genesis parts in Oakland, and then on the Southwest Chief and Sunset Limited to avoid handling Genesis parts in LA. That would require (4 + 5 + 6 + 5 + 4) * 2 = 48 minimum, realistically more like 60. Next would be the Texas Eagle, City of New Orleans, LSL, CL, Cardinal and Hiawathas, which is maybe 25 more, and gets Genesis parts out of Chicago.

Most of the 110mph for the LSL is south of Albany where the New York section gets a single P32ACDM.

These day the LSL is regularly running with a single P42 Albany to Chicago.

A Voice said:

Acceleration is of little consequence on schedules with typically over an hour between stops, and top speed is irrelevant--it takes far less energy to keep the train in motion than it did to get there

Click to expand...

Keep in mind though that long-distance passenger trains very rarely will accelerate to track speed and stay there until the next stop; Rather, the engineer must slow for curves, slow orders, and a myriad of other conditions and then get back up to speed relatively quickly to maintain the schedule. Stops may be hours apart, but how often does the train actually slow down (or stop)?

Click to expand...

Exactly - we speed up and slow down All. The. Time. between scheduled station stops. Temporary speed restrictions, permanent speed restrictions, work authorities, curves, bridges, local ordinances, weather, UEA, cross traffic, medical emergencies, meeting other trains, waiting for other trains, police holds, dispatcher forgot to line the route, etc.

I can't speak to the entire country, but run times in my region are based on a single P42 with 12 single level cars in trail.

jis said:

Most of the 110mph for the LSL is south of Albany where the New York section gets a single P32ACDM.

These day the LSL is regularly running with a single P42 Albany to Chicago.

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The Boston section clearly only needs one locomotive, but the train becomes a behemoth west of Albany, and bluntly, based on current demand, it's going to get even longer.

I am sure it will get a second engine when one is needed.

jis said:

I am sure it will get a second engine when one is needed.

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If there are enough locomotives to go around. Where are those Chargers, anyway?