Amtrak OBS Gone Freight
OBS Chief
- Joined
- May 20, 2005
- Messages
- 576
1) OK I will try to clarify.
2)Regarding the "Meteor." Read the entire statement, not just what was quoted here! It was conveniently abbreviated! It reads this.......... "I'll start with the "Meteor" since it was mentioned (and that is the one I always worked), then talk about the "Starlight." .......... meaning this is in the form of a comparison statement with the "Starlight!"
3)The "obvious reasons left unsaid here" are located in numerous topics all over this forum from various mulititudes of posters who visit this site regularly! If I had listed all of these, the post would be over three pages long! But anyway, the "Starlight" has to use four trainsets with all the padding which has been built into the schedule. The freights (UP, CSX, NS, BNSF, etc) have requirements that Amtrak must follow. Pretty much UP has a major say so in the scheduling of the train over its trackage! And we're still leaving the rest unsaid here!
4)I would hope that no one here is calling you "stupid." This is why this forum is here, and that is to discuss Amtrak. We have to ask questions to get answers, and you are by no means an exception. If you don't understand, you keep asking until you do! And I am happy to oblige with this answer; there are two West Coast OBS crewbases. They are LAX and SEA. SEA staffs the OBS personel for the SEA section of the "Builder." CHI staffs the Porland section of that same train. LAX staffs the "Starlight," the "Southwest Chief," and the "Sunset Limited" as well as some short haul OBS jobs on the other trains. I made a comparison of the "Meteor" route and the "Starlight" route because they are somewhat close in distance between the two endpoints on both routes! The "Meteor" was able to operate on the three day turn from MIA-NYP-MIA with the OBS crews being based out of MIA. Over on the West Coast, the "Starlight" would need to be staffed out of SEA in order to work the OBS crews on a three day turn from SEA-LAX-SEA to keep the crew on the same cycle as the equipment like the East Coast comparison! Amtrak would adjust the job cycles accordingly to be in line with the equipment, if in fact doing do would make it possible to keep the minimum amount of crew cycles for each run. In other words under the current situation with LAX staffing the "Starlight," LAX would have to be used as the turn around station like NYC was used as the same in the East! In the East though, MIA staffed the train, not NYC. That way the OBS crews started out and usually stayed with the same equipment on the return trip. The crew cycles would not work that way being based out of LAX and that location being used as the turn around point! If the "Starlight" was able to operate on a three trainset cycle, the crews would most likely remain in LAX and only the equipment cycle be adjusted, not a big situation at all!
Some extra thoughts.........
When the "Palmetto" was cut back from NYP to SAV in 2004, they went from using four trainsets to two each day! That allowed Amtrak here in the East a little more equipment to play with thus giving the "Meteor" a fourth trainset allowing its equipment an overnight in NYC. More can be accomplished when equipment has a little more deadtime in the yards. Running turn around equipment in the fashion the "Meteor" did, puts a heavy time constraint on the mechanical dept, etc. And it does take its toll on the OBS crews as they do not get as good rest as they can with an overnight layover. And for what it is worth, I am kinda against these job cycles which reflect same day equipment turns (I am OK if the layover has more than six hours), unless it is set up like the the "run-through" operation found at CHI.
Oh and to keep this about "Parlour" cars, the one I was supposed to have on my last "Starlight" trip was not there. So I work for the company, and still haven't been in one! And I guess that will never happen.
OK enough rambling now!!! OBS...
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