I will never book a sleeper

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northnorthwest

Service Attendant
Joined
Feb 21, 2013
Messages
158
I am as big a fan as anyone out there of Amtrak. I've been working outside the country for the last 3 years and not following Amtrak updates. I was thinking of booking 2 sleepers for myself and my family on the Capitol Limited. It would have been the first sleeper experience for two members of my family. Then I found out that Amtrak killed the dining car, and, as far as I'm concerned killed the sleeper. I decided not to book the trips, because I see no point in having the comfort of a sleeper if you're not giving me real food and a real dining car. It is just too insulting and miserable. I wrote to Amtrak to tell them as much. Is there any hope of turning things around? All I see from the US and rail is getting worse and worse. It's so depressing. I will never book a long-distance trip on Amtrak without a proper dining car. So sad to see this.
 
Write and call your Congressional reps in addition to Amtrak. Vote for pro-rail reps, as well. (You can check their voting history on their personal webpages.)

Amtrak can only do so much with the money they're given.
 
I still enjoyed my trip on the meteor in a sleeper. It’s not as good but for a single overnight trip it’s ok. May I suggest you book a western trip while you still can, those trips will suffer much more from the lack of full service dining car:
 
Although I very much prefer traditional dining to flexible dining, I still plan on traveling by train and in sleepers. I am quite disappointed that the Silver Meteor, my home train, no longer has traditional dining, but I still enjoyed my 6 trips on that train since October 1st (without traditional dining).
 
crescent-zephyr said:
I still enjoyed my trip on the meteor in a sleeper. It’s not as good but for a single overnight trip it’s ok. May I suggest you book a western trip while you still can, those trips will suffer much more from the lack of full service dining car:
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Is there a plan to also remove the dining on the western trains? Yes, that would ruin those routes as well! I have done the CZ from Chicago to Glenwood Springs and Denver a couple times and the EB from Chicago to Fargo only. Obviously much more to see when I get around to it. I just hope there's a train and a proper diner when that day comes!
 
northnorthwest said:
Is there a plan to also remove the dining on the western trains? Yes, that would ruin those routes as well! I have done the CZ from Chicago to Glenwood Springs and Denver a couple times and the EB from Chicago to Fargo only. Obviously much more to see when I get around to it. I just hope there's a train and a proper diner when that day comes!
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Many of us fear that plan is in place and it’s just a matter of time. There is some hope that select trains may continue with a full service dining car... the zephyr, empire builder, and starlight being the best candidates. Still, I would ride them sooner rather than later. I’m sure glad I rode the starlight as much as I did with the pacific parlor car.
 
While I agree with you about the lack of food on the CL, it’s not so bad that I won’t do a sleeper. Lying flat is better than a seat. And an early dinner in one of the many restaurants at WAS (departs after 4 pm) and breakfast on arrival in CHI (arrives before 9 am) solves the food problem.
 
One of my earliest memories is of my Dad and I riding the Empire Builder from Glasgow MT to Seattle when I was 5 or 6. The sleeping car was so cool, the porter was great, the dome car phenomenal, the views outstanding, but somehow the one thing that seemed coolest at the time was the food. I had a huge, fresh, delicious roasted/baked halibut (?) meal. Just outstanding. Then we had breakfast, piping hot sausage and eggs and potatoes. The food was just so cool and all the passengers we sat with in the diner had great stories.
It is incredibly sad to hear that many of the Amtrak trains are down to pre-packaged food. But just keep the routes going, even if the food is less than perfect. I hope that the diners can come back if the politicians get rid of the Mica rule, and I sincerely hope that THIS is the year they do so.
 
Looking out the window never gets old for me. I eat the same thing for lunch in the dining car every time (veggie burger with cheese), so I don't think a reduced selection would be too difficult to deal with in terms of monotony. I am saddened to see the loss of the dining car tradition and have told my Congress people that I oppose cuts to Amtrak, but a change to dining car service is not a deal breaker for me. The best meal I have ever had on a train was on the Pullman service for London to Penzance, and the food was not cooked on board.
 
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I was hoping that 25 new sleeper cars would increase the supply and thereby decrease the prices a bit. I guess my logic was that the new cars would allow the Cap Limited to be switched from Superliners to Viewliners, with the freed up Superliners being added to the Western routes. 25 sleeper cars is a decent order, even if the Nippon Sharyos are a distant memory. The sad thing is that 50 additional sleepers would still be less than optimal, but I guess I will take whatever Amtrak can get at this point. It isn't like Amtrak is doing great things with the new diners so I imagine they would find a way to not fully utilize the new sleepers, given their past performance.

niemi24s said:
No more sleepers for you? Good!

Maybe that one less booking will keep the sleeper fare from being one bucket higher when I want to take a sleeper somewhere.
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Ziv said:
I was hoping that 25 new sleeper cars would increase the supply and thereby decrease the prices a bit. I guess my logic was that the new cars would allow the Cap Limited to be switched from Superliners to Viewliners, with the freed up Superliners being added to the Western routes. 25 sleeper cars is a decent order, even if the Nippon Sharyos are a distant memory. The sad thing is that 50 additional sleepers would still be less than optimal, but I guess I will take whatever Amtrak can get at this point. It isn't like Amtrak is doing great things with the new diners so I imagine they would find a way to not fully utilize the new sleepers, given their past performance.
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Maybe converting both the CL and CONO to Viewliners would certainly free up Superliner equipment since both these trains are less than 24 hours in length.
 
anumberone said:
I have to agree, meals make the deal. The scenery is great, but the dining car along with the conversations are something special on a train to look forward to. Otherwise looking out the window and checking the schedule to see how late you're running can get old.
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Completely agree with this, the conversations in particular are a major reason for us to take any LD train. We have always felt the dining car was the heart of any LD train, if they are removed it's like ripping the heart out of the journey.
 
v v said:
Completely agree with this, the conversations in particular are a major reason for us to take any LD train. We have always felt the dining car was the heart of any LD train, if they are removed it's like ripping the heart out of the journey.
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I get what you’re saying, I’ve met nice people in dining cars but I think that just fuels the Anderson “it’s just railfans who like it the old fashioned way” statements.

That’s why my biggest complaints after personally experiencing it, the quality of the food, and the limited selection of the food.
 
piedpiper said:
Maybe converting both the CL and CONO to Viewliners would certainly free up Superliner equipment since both these trains are less than 24 hours in length.
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Makes perfect sense with the CL being the only "non-standard" train east of Chicago. I seem to recall reading here or another forum that the CONO is a also used to shuttle Superliners from the Sunset to Chicago for maintenance, so that might be a hurdle. Presumably these single-level consists would be possible when Horizon coaches were freed up by new trainsets arriving in the Midwest?
 
@niemi24s @drdumont
That's a fun thought, but there's a real problem if this is (as many of us suspect) happening on a substantial scale. Cheap fares and readily available seats are all well and good until the train gets cut. Just ask the B&O about that north of Baltimore...
 

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