Which train(s) would you cut?

[Shawn Ryu]

Well, at least Auto train will always be safe.

 

[AlanB]

While I for one don't like Henry's ideas for the future, I do have to say that based upon my experience riding the Canadian in July 2010 (peak season) that he's not too far off on his coach count. My train only had three, and I just confirmed this by pulling up the spreadsheet that I had created on my iPhone in which I recorded the train's consist. Henry claimed 2 coaches, while other's were claiming 6, which puts Henry much closer to the actual count and in the win column on this one IMHO.

Additionally, while I know that Henry's ideas aren't popular and as noted based upon history probably aren't going to solve the problem, I do want to mention two things. One, he is at least thinking. I haven't really noticed any other plans from anyone, save just killing the Sunset. Two, please remember to attack the ideas and not the person. Thanks!

 

[DET63]

My guess is that if any service is cut, it will be the SL, with the equipment either being spread among the remaining LD trains, or simply mothballed, perhaps even sold off if it's not immediately needed and/or not cost-effective to maintain. The Cardinal, being a non-daily train, might also be a logical candidate for the ax.

I could also see services on all the western LD trains being reduced to 3x or 4x weekly, possibly to be eliminated entirely as well if cutting them results in even greater losses. Politics being what it is, any government-supported entity is at the mercy of politicians, who are not always the most sensible people in the world ― unless they believe being so will help them get re-elected.

 

[afigg]

Additionally, while I know that Henry's ideas aren't popular and as noted based upon history probably aren't going to solve the problem, I do want to mention two things. One, he is at least thinking. I haven't really noticed any other plans from anyone, save just killing the Sunset. Two, please remember to attack the ideas and not the person. Thanks!

The challenge is to discuss how to improve cost recovery and reduce losses with specific changes, many of which are not obvious or visible from the viewpoint of a passenger, rather than the blunt force approach of cutting a daily train to 3 days a week or canceling the service. The PRRIIA reports provide ideas for further incremental improvements in reducing costs and enhancing revenues which could be expanded. Cashless club diners, better food choices, Viewliner sleeping attendents covering 1.5 Viewliner cars, etc.

The PRIIA reports on the LD trains provide insights into where the costs are. The most recent PRIIA reports lists the current (FY10?) direct cost recovery of the Silvers & Palmetto as 85.7%, but the fully allocated cost recovery as 46.3%. Can't run a train without overhead and maintenance, but the overhead costs are pulling the LD trains CR way down. One item that I found interesting in the Capitol Limited report from last year was a table (pg 29) with a breakdown of the annual costs: $40.1 million total with the largest single item $10.9 million for maintenance. Maintenance (which covers a range of costs for rolling stock, not just repair) is over a 1/4 of the cost of running the train. Pretty hefty. Can the maintenance cost be reduced with better equipped facilities, better management, and new equipment?

There should 2 goals for the LD trains: get the direct cost recovery above 100% - more revenue, more capacity per train, trim direct costs. The second is to cut overhead and reduce maintenance costs. The voluntary buyouts are but one step in cutting overhead.

 

[gn2276]

I will give you my 2 cents worth which no one will agree with. There are not enough trains now so I wouldn't cut anything, I would do some layoffs and cost cutting in the high salary management levels and get within my budget. Having said that, rather than eliminate LD trains which would alienate the states that get only LD Service, I would start by totally restructuring Amtrak. Spin off the NEC as a separate entity. Set up separate business units to operate western LD train, eastern LD trains and state supported trains. If that doesn't cut it then start looking at making the western LD trains three times a week as Via does the Canadian. That would free up some LD equipment, reduce staff requirements and concentrate more passengers on fewer trains. The only western train I would keep daily is the Southwest Chief. In the east, the LSL and the Capitol should only require two sets of equipment, not three. Change the schedules appropriately. Something is wrong with the Silver Service if it continues to hemorage money as it is. It needs better marketing or restructuring of equipment and schedules. I would add a restored Pioneer or City of Portland with the spin off equipment from going three times a week and run it opposite the EB. And thats just for starters. All these LD trains are just cruise trains. Hardly anyone really uses them for business transportation, so start thinking and marketing them as such. Next I would start looking at new short distance markets that have potential such as the Texas 'triangle' and work with the states to get these running. Amtrak needs to get out of the 'bunker' mentality and start innovating and marketing. Obviously they are not going to be able to continue feeding at the trough as they have been.

The running most LD train other then daily and the business units ideas have already been tried and where a big failure, that would be one of the worst things to try.

 

[Anderson]

First, a brief thought: If VIA ran the Canadian daily (assume for a moment that they could have consolidated equipment sets with the Super-Continental and had enough equipment to go daily, or that they would distribute tourist demand enough that they could slide a few sleepers around but add some coaches in the process), would its CR improve? Evidence suggests it would, since it could pick up some more non-tourist traffic in the coaches.

Second, I'll offer some other trims that could be done:

1) I know I mentioned it before, but cut service on the Crescent back past Atlanta. Don't necessarily axe it, but reallocate the cars so that you drop a good chunk of the train. Amtrak often ends up charging less to go NYP-NOL than NYP-ATL, so they're losing revenueon taking those folks past Atlanta. Maybe go to all coach, or only take one sleeper past Atlanta (and maybe go back to two once the Viewliner IIs come online). I would, by the way, suggest that if Atlanta proper is insufficient for the "drop", it might be possible to do something in Anniston, albeit with the cars to be dropped "closed" past Atlanta.

2) Cut the Denver-Reno section of the Zephyr to tri-weekly, at least seasonally. This is a real hand-wringer for me, but the Zephyr is dysfunctional for "working" travel past Denver, for the most part. East of and up to Denver, you have a lot of traffic, but once you get past there, things get more complex. If there was a way to stash the train at Glenwood Springs, I'd actually suggest that as a "storage" location for the consist, but I'm not sure if this might "blow out" a good share of your savings. The California-to-Reno market is another market that Amtrak seems to be looking to make work, so I think a "Hoosier State"-type fill in could be made to run on the Zephyr's "off" days if you wanted to truncate the train past somewhere.

3) Though not a trim per se, since they tend to at least break even, I'd suggest pumping up the Thruway links on the Western LD trains as much as possible, and maybe trying to work out some cross-marketing deals with regional bus lines.

4) Another not-a-trim would be a crash expansion of the Club-Diner program and ramming through the Viewliner staffing tweaks.

5) Yet another not-a-trim would be to, if the numbers dictated it, allocate a coach or two to run Miami-Jacksonville on the Silvers. I can't speak to the need of this given the large number of detrainings, but I do put it out there as a possibility if Amtrak is losing enough MIA-JAX traffic to packed trains north of ORL.

6) Moving back to actual cuts, rather than just cost improvements, I'm wondering if axing the BOS-ALB segment of the LSL might not make sense. As it is, that section is a headache for Amtrak; one solution might be to press Massachusetts for some state support for the link and to operate that as a State Corridor (even if it just "happens" to have through cars to CHI as part of the deal). This isn't a pretty move, and I'm actually not sure how much it would do for the operation, but you could both flog a schedule improvement out of it and possibly slide cars around.

Third, let me remind folks that there are the 25 new sleepers coming online, and that Amtrak may be able to add some coaches once the new Midwestern cars come online via some reshuffles (i.e. those displace Horizons, which can in turn displace some Amfleets). The addition of some capacity, at least at peak travel times, should help various trains' bottom lines.

 

[jphjaxfl]

How many places does a train stop and over 100 are waiting to get on?

Orlando and Tampa, to name two (on the Silver Service).

Denver (about 175 boardings/alightings per departure of the Zephyr), Minneapolis (176 boardings/alightings per departure of the Builder), Albuquerque, probably Pittsburgh (either for the Cap or for the Pennsylvanian), frequently Memphis (62,915 transits on one train)...Reno apparently hits this seasonally as well (or is only constrained from this because of booking locks that Amtrak has to employ). Cleveland and Toledo actually generate a good deal of business in spite of awful times as well. Mind you, this is mainly a "one train per day" list of cities. Tuscon actually generates almost 70 boardings/alightings per stop of the Sunset.

Also, let me remind you that thrice-weekly service actually killed a lot of ridership because of the lack of daily options. Remember the trouble back in the 90s...Amtrak actually lost revenue per train by cutting service below daily levels, and I suspect the same would pan out if it were tried again.

Edit: Also, a point on the Canadian: The Canadian was always a thrice-weekly train, IIRC.

The Canadian was daily for many years.

 

[Anderson]

How many places does a train stop and over 100 are waiting to get on?

Orlando and Tampa, to name two (on the Silver Service).

Denver (about 175 boardings/alightings per departure of the Zephyr), Minneapolis (176 boardings/alightings per departure of the Builder), Albuquerque, probably Pittsburgh (either for the Cap or for the Pennsylvanian), frequently Memphis (62,915 transits on one train)...Reno apparently hits this seasonally as well (or is only constrained from this because of booking locks that Amtrak has to employ). Cleveland and Toledo actually generate a good deal of business in spite of awful times as well. Mind you, this is mainly a "one train per day" list of cities. Tuscon actually generates almost 70 boardings/alightings per stop of the Sunset.

Also, let me remind you that thrice-weekly service actually killed a lot of ridership because of the lack of daily options. Remember the trouble back in the 90s...Amtrak actually lost revenue per train by cutting service below daily levels, and I suspect the same would pan out if it were tried again.

Edit: Also, a point on the Canadian: The Canadian was always a thrice-weekly train, IIRC.

The Canadian was daily for many years.

Really? Huh...must have gone to daily sometime after the initial rollout (I believe it was thrice-weekly in the advert in my 1956 Guide).

 

[Ryan]

How many places does a train stop and over 100 are waiting to get on?

Orlando and Tampa, to name two (on the Silver Service).

I can attest to that!!!

These two trains, in the interest of cutting costs, should be combined into just one long one and split at Sanford into the west coast and east coast Meteor as in the old days. Providing rail service between Tampa and Miami is not Amtraks responsibility, it's Florida's problem.

Which of the two routes in the Carolinas are you going to abandon?

You guys keep trying to pick my posts to pieces, yet you have no answers.

You still seem to be ignoring my first post in the thread, in which I provided my answers and explained the rationale behind them. Perhaps you can get past your "Ryan hates Texas" fury, and actually read the whole post?

I believe I have defended my arguments. You guys have not defended yours, actually you haven't even presented any.

You might believe that, but you're mistaken. Simply repeating the same stuff over and over isn't "defending". Contrast that with Trogdor and T29 that have produced actual figures, facts and calculations to show that your "make everything 3x a week" plan is a terrible idea.

While I for one don't like Henry's ideas for the future, I do have to say that based upon my experience riding the Canadian in July 2010 (peak season) that he's not too far off on his coach count. My train only had three, and I just confirmed this by pulling up the spreadsheet that I had created on my iPhone in which I recorded the train's consist. Henry claimed 2 coaches, while other's were claiming 6, which puts Henry much closer to the actual count and in the win column on this one IMHO.

I think that it's pretty obvious that the consist of the Canadian varies widely, so there really isn't a "right" answer. In any event, the point is moot, since Trogdor brought forth the numbers that show that emulating the Canadian is a bad idea from a budgetary standpoint.

Additionally, while I know that Henry's ideas aren't popular and as noted based upon history probably aren't going to solve the problem, I do want to mention two things. One, he is at least thinking. I haven't really noticed any other plans from anyone, save just killing the Sunset. Two, please remember to attack the ideas and not the person. Thanks!

You're right there with Henry in missing my first post where I put the Cardinal on the chopping block as well. Given the constraints of this thread (Which train(s) would you cut), it is any wonder that the worst performing trains are getting almost the entire discussion?

 

[henryj]

Thanks for the Via link. I knew that Via was a poorer performer than Amtrak, but never had seen the details. Now if we only had some on-time type information for them. What we don't know here, or it hasn't been presented, is how much Amtrak has to cut it's losses to make it through 2012. If we had that number then this discussion would be more focused. If they have to find 200-300 million then cutting a train that only loses 39 million won't help much. They will need much more drastic measures which is why I proposed the tri-weekly ideas which I still think would cut Amtrak's losses substantially on the western LD trains. Remember, the EB did not operate for days, even weeks at a time as did the CZ and people still show up to ride them so I don't see any problem with loss of business going tri-weekly. And the corridors that show more demand could be covered with day trains as is mentioned above. Amtrak has published all those pretty slick paper PRIIA's but has done nothing to implement any of them. Most of the Sunset Ltd one could be implemented on the existing tri=weekly train, yet nothing has been done. So I don't believe Amtrak is really serious about making any of those changes. They published these reports because they were mandated to by Congress. I think some good ideas are surfacing in this discussion inspite of all the personal attacks. Keep thinking.

I did find where Via claims an 84% on time record for the western trains which includes the Canadian. I don't remember who posted that it was always tri-weekly, but when it was new the Canadian Pacific ran it daily along with other secondary trains on the route like the Dominion and the National's Super Continental was daily also. when I rode it the first time in 1962 it was still daily and by the way, only had two coaches. They did however run some tourist sleepers on it then which were refurbished section sleepers. I do not know when it went tri-weekly.

 

[jis]

I have always wondered what is the magic with 3 times a week. Why not 2 times a week.That definitely reduces the need for consists dramatically and actually reduces the cost of staffing dramatically too. Yes per train run loss increases, but overall loss decreases. Going to one train a week also keeps service running and make the single train even more non-viable, but overall loss probably decreases.

The questions to ask is should a passenger railroad be in the business of providing a reasonable service or should its only goal be randomly cutting things to ostensibly stay within some some limits. As an extreme question to ask when people insist that the slippery slope of cutting service is the only way to go is, if reduction of loss is so darned important, wouldn't an orderly shutdown of the LD system get us there faster than anything else? Think about it.

Notwithstanding all the huffing and puffing by URPA, there is nothing that suggests that any of their interesting arguments actually hold any water. The world over corridor trains either make make money or are funded by the region served by the corridor, and in general LD trains don't. So the only rational thing to do, though possibly politically untenable is to shut down all LD service except those that can be strung together as a series of corridor services or where the states served are willing to take up the funding such as is the case in Europe. It is quite likely that many of the LD routes will survive under those governing rules, specially along the east coast and eventually if Ohio gets its head out of a dark place even New York/Washington - Chicago. I suspect the builder will survive and possibly even the Zephyr upto Denver and perhaps the SWC, as will the Starlight. Push comes to shove even TE and CONO might survive. I suspect that the Sunset and Cardinal are toast even under that scenario, unless places like Viriginia and West Virginia step forward to do some funding of the Card. In the east, at least one and probably both Silvers will survive as will the Auto Train. The Crescent will definitely survive to Atlanta eventually, but who knows whether it will survive south of there?

The reality in the US is that the funding mechanisms will have to change. Note that this is a very different position from "funding must be reduced or go to zero". It is possible that an outfit like Amtrak should become the provider of a unified reservation and ticketing clearing house and continue to be the service provider of last resort, with the understanding that last resort service by its very nature is not something that makes money, but is provided as a social and economic necessity. It would make sense to at least put together uniform franchising rules which would include governing rules like level of service, fare range and term of franchise spelled out, and there would need to be a franchise coordination bureaucracy like exists in the UK for example.

If we all agree that what is most important is that passengers trains keep running it may be time for us to start thinking out of the box a bit instead of assuming that the setup will remain the same and we are limited to staying within the annual federal grants and as they go down our only conceivable solution os to cut trains first to three times a week and then eventually to0 times a week. To me that is not an acceptable approach.

 

[Ryan]

They will need much more drastic measures which is why I proposed the tri-weekly ideas which I still think would cut Amtrak's losses substantially on the western LD trains.

Why do you keep saying this, when it's been clearly demonstrated to be untrue (on a per passenger basis, which is what is really important)?
Remember, the EB did not operate for days, even weeks at a time as did the CZ and people still show up to ride them so I don't see any problem with loss of business going tri-weekly.

Amtrak has published all those pretty slick paper PRIIA's but has done nothing to implement any of them.

Demonstrably false. Amtrak is proceeding with plans to put a through car/cars from the Pennsy to the Capitol Limited. They have also added checked baggage service to the Cardinal.

I think some good ideas are surfacing in this discussion inspite of all the personal attacks.

What personal attacks?

 

[henryj]

They will need much more drastic measures which is why I proposed the tri-weekly ideas which I still think would cut Amtrak's losses substantially on the western LD trains.

Why do you keep saying this, when it's been clearly demonstrated to be untrue (on a per passenger basis, which is what is really important)?

If it's so clear, then why did the 'for profit' privately owned and operated railroads use this tactic to reduce costs before Amtrak? Why has Amtrak continued the practice off and on since inception? As usual, you are missing the point of this discussion which is to find a way for Amtrak to survive the budget cuts with as much of the system in tact as possible. Per passenger losses don't matter in this scenario, only total system losses.

 

[Ryan]

Because decreasing efficiency isn't the way out of a budget crisis if you want Amtrak to survive. The private roads did it because they didn't want the passenger business to survive.

These two trains, in the interest of cutting costs, should be combined into just one long one and split at Sanford into the west coast and east coast Meteor as in the old days. Providing rail service between Tampa and Miami is not Amtraks responsibility, it's Florida's problem.

Which of the two routes in the Carolinas are you going to abandon?

I think some good ideas are surfacing in this discussion inspite of all the personal attacks.

What personal attacks?

???

 

[AmtrakBlue]

The train I'd like to see cut is the "train of thought" in Congress that Amtrak is not as worthy as the other modes of transportation that receieve $$ from the gov't.

 

[henryj]

The train I'd like to see cut is the "train of thought" in Congress that Amtrak is not as worthy as the other modes of transportation that receieve $$ from the gov't.

Amen!

 

[Devil's Advocate]

The train I'd like to see cut is the "train of thought" in Congress that Amtrak is not as worthy as the other modes of transportation that receieve $$ from the gov't.

I think we'd all agree with you on that. Nobody seemed to care that much about Amtrak until one party made a strong show of support for passengr rail. Almost immediately after that members from the other party began attacking passenger rail as both incredibly wasteful and vaguely socialist. There are several areas where Amtrak could be legitimately criticized, but Amtrak's total cost versus other transportation options and vague accusations of socialism aren't part of that mix in my view. I think that's what bothers me more than anything. That we can't even agree to discuss Amtrak based on the actual merits of the service but are instead forced to waste lots of time defending against accusations that aren't based in reality and make no logical sense.

 

[henryj]

The private roads did it because they didn't want the passenger business to survive.

That of course is the old standby used by all 'foamers'. The private roads did it because these trains were hemoraging huge losses and it was the only thing they could do if the ICC, which regulated the railroads then, would not let them discontinue the service. It was a compromise. And it reduced their losses. Passenger train operation losses were threatning the actual continued existance of the private railroads and forcing some into bankruptcy. That is why Amtrak was formed in the first place, to take this burden off the freight railroads.

Even though Amtrak's mandate was to eventually make money, no one ever really expected it to. So now 40 years later we are still arguing this point. I personally do not have the answer. Should we continue to throw money at Amtrak or try and replace it with something else? It's something for all the 'smart guys' to figure out. Ride em while you can.

 

[henryj]

I have always wondered what is the magic with 3 times a week. Why not 2 times a week.

The Alaska Railroad runs it's winter service Anchorage to Fairbanks weekly. It goes north on Saturday and comes back on Sunday. Via's Churchill train is twice weekly. Several of their other mandated services are tri-weekly.

 

[Ryan]

The private roads did it because they didn't want the passenger business to survive.

That of course is the old standby used by all 'foamers'. The private roads did it because these trains were hemoraging huge losses and it was the only thing they could do if the ICC, which regulated the railroads then, would not let them discontinue the service. It was a compromise. And it reduced their losses. Passenger train operation losses were threatning the actual continued existance of the private railroads and forcing some into bankruptcy. That is why Amtrak was formed in the first place, to take this burden off the freight railroads.

OK, so? Nothing you've said contradicts my statement. Unless you're looking for the end of passenger trains, reducing to 3x weekly service and decreasing efficiency is a terrible idea.

 

[Anderson]

The private roads did it because they didn't want the passenger business to survive.

That of course is the old standby used by all 'foamers'. The private roads did it because these trains were hemoraging huge losses and it was the only thing they could do if the ICC, which regulated the railroads then, would not let them discontinue the service. It was a compromise. And it reduced their losses. Passenger train operation losses were threatning the actual continued existance of the private railroads and forcing some into bankruptcy. That is why Amtrak was formed in the first place, to take this burden off the freight railroads.

Even though Amtrak's mandate was to eventually make money, no one ever really expected it to. So now 40 years later we are still arguing this point. I personally do not have the answer. Should we continue to throw money at Amtrak or try and replace it with something else? It's something for all the 'smart guys' to figure out. Ride em while you can.

I'm going to split the difference here. I think that some railroads were actively trying to bail on the passenger business from fairly early on (SP leaps to mind), but in a lot of cases I think the connectivity collapses were more bungling. Granted, it was the same logic that got us the tri-weeklies in the 1990s (that people would shift their business to the remaining trains), but I think it was unintended bungling and a desperation to close losses in most cases. You've got others that wanted out, so help them, and I'm willing to imply a concerted effort on at least SP's part, but I think most roads were pulling the plug because of honest budget problems (that were killing them elsewhere on the balance sheets...frankly, if a lot of roads were as profitable then as they are today, most of them would likely have just let the passenger business roll).

 

[Anderson]

Thanks for the Via link. I knew that Via was a poorer performer than Amtrak, but never had seen the details. Now if we only had some on-time type information for them. What we don't know here, or it hasn't been presented, is how much Amtrak has to cut it's losses to make it through 2012. If we had that number then this discussion would be more focused. If they have to find 200-300 million then cutting a train that only loses 39 million won't help much. They will need much more drastic measures which is why I proposed the tri-weekly ideas which I still think would cut Amtrak's losses substantially on the western LD trains. Remember, the EB did not operate for days, even weeks at a time as did the CZ and people still show up to ride them so I don't see any problem with loss of business going tri-weekly. And the corridors that show more demand could be covered with day trains as is mentioned above. Amtrak has published all those pretty slick paper PRIIA's but has done nothing to implement any of them. Most of the Sunset Ltd one could be implemented on the existing tri=weekly train, yet nothing has been done. So I don't believe Amtrak is really serious about making any of those changes. They published these reports because they were mandated to by Congress. I think some good ideas are surfacing in this discussion inspite of all the personal attacks. Keep thinking.

I did find where Via claims an 84% on time record for the western trains which includes the Canadian. I don't remember who posted that it was always tri-weekly, but when it was new the Canadian Pacific ran it daily along with other secondary trains on the route like the Dominion and the National's Super Continental was daily also. when I rode it the first time in 1962 it was still daily and by the way, only had two coaches. They did however run some tourist sleepers on it then which were refurbished section sleepers. I do not know when it went tri-weekly.

I'll take a stab at what happened: One of the two probably ran tri-weekly for a few months while CN/CP were getting their consists delivered and tested out. It may well have been the Super Continental (which was slammed together as quickly as possible to compete with The Canadian) that was tri-weekly at first. I'll pull out my old guide and check this just to be safe, but at this point I'm guessing it was a temporary measure.

 

[henryj]

The private roads did it because they didn't want the passenger business to survive.

I'm going to split the difference here. I think that some railroads were actively trying to bail on the passenger business from fairly early on (SP leaps to mind), but in a lot of cases I think the connectivity collapses were more bungling. Granted, it was the same logic that got us the tri-weeklies in the 1990s (that people would shift their business to the remaining trains), but I think it was unintended bungling and a desperation to close losses in most cases. You've got others that wanted out, so help them, and I'm willing to imply a concerted effort on at least SP's part, but I think most roads were pulling the plug because of honest budget problems (that were killing them elsewhere on the balance sheets...frankly, if a lot of roads were as profitable then as they are today, most of them would likely have just let the passenger business roll).

The SP just saw the handwriting on the wall much earlier than some of the other roads and they were burdened with a host of LD trains that were big losers. What got them the bad rep was the manner in which they approached it. But remember, they had to deal with the California PUC. It just turned into a big knock down fight. No other railroad was as exposed to the California PUC as the SP was. And in spite of everything they did, they could never shake off the Sunset Limited which is still with us today. Here in Texas where the law was much different the SP exited the passenger business sooner than anyone else.

 

[jis]

I have always wondered what is the magic with 3 times a week. Why not 2 times a week.

The Alaska Railroad runs it's winter service Anchorage to Fairbanks weekly. It goes north on Saturday and comes back on Sunday. Via's Churchill train is twice weekly. Several of their other mandated services are tri-weekly.

Right mandated service comes with associated targeted subsidies covering the cost of operation, otherwise they don't run. So cost recovery is somewhat of a non-issue.

 

[Anderson]

Henry,

First of all, that manner is a lot of the grudge I have against them (and, these days, UP). It was just bad. Second...California PUC? I'll probably recognize it once I see what the acronym stands for, but I'm missing it right now.