Woo hoo! Wine tasting resuming in the Parlour Car!

[yarrow]

i don't see $7.50 as a modest fee(especially if you then much purchase lounge car cheese and crackers). for a couple that's 30 bucks for both day's tasting without cheese and crackers. we travel on a fairly tight budget and won't be indulging

 

[Texan Eagle]

I'm so glad the wine tasting is back, and for a very modest additional fee. I'll be on the CS next week and I was really bummed that the tasting had gone away. Happy it's back!

This is Amtrak's idea of "tasting the blood". Remove a complimentary amenity, see if the passengers make a fuss about it, slowly re-introduce it as a paid service, see if it placates the crowd. If this experiment of paid wine tasting is successful, I predict in the next couple of years, other complimentary amenities like complimentary meals in dining car, complimentary coffee and juice in sleeper will disappear and re-appear as paid services.

See what the airlines did. Years ago domestic Economy used to get complimentary hot meals, then they took it away and replaced it with paid (mediocre) meals. I will not be surprised if Amtrak goes the same route.

 

[Green Maned Lion]

From an accounting point of view, I think paid meals for sleepers would be disastrous. I think that's safe.

 

[Paulus]

From an accounting point of view, I think paid meals for sleepers would be disastrous. I think that's safe.

Explicitly being looked at in their five year plan. And I rather doubt it would be an accounting disaster given that that's how it used to work anyhow.

 

[jebr]

The most likely outcome, in this political climate, of removing free meals for sleeper car passengers in the diner, would be the death of the diner. I find it extremely hard to see anything else happening if they were to remove free meals.

With the current setup, Amtrak can charge a fair amount more than market value for their meals and you still have a decent amount of people eating, because that cost is considered a part of the fare. That dollar amount can be billed to the sleepers and help the revenue accounting of the diner. If this were removed, some people would eat in the cafe (especially for supper, as supper is quite expensive for what you get, imo,) some would bring their own food, and some would eat in the diner. But Amtrak likely would have to lower prices in order to attract people, and that's the opposite of what Amtrak needs in order for the diner to "turn a profit."

 

[gmushial]

The most likely outcome, in this political climate, of removing free meals for sleeper car passengers in the diner, would be the death of the diner. I find it extremely hard to see anything else happening if they were to remove free meals.

With the current setup, Amtrak can charge a fair amount more than market value for their meals and you still have a decent amount of people eating, because that cost is considered a part of the fare. That dollar amount can be billed to the sleepers and help the revenue accounting of the diner. If this were removed, some people would eat in the cafe (especially for supper, as supper is quite expensive for what you get, imo,) some would bring their own food, and some would eat in the diner. But Amtrak likely would have to lower prices in order to attract people, and that's the opposite of what Amtrak needs in order for the diner to "turn a profit."

But wouldn't this make the Mica's of Congress happy, ie, no dinner, ie, not cost, therefore, it's "breaking even." ... though one wonders if the argument over food services breaking even isn't a red herring, ie, what they really want is the death of Amtrak, but not being able to make that case, they've simply gone after a case they can at least speciously make an argument about/for.

 

[AlanB]

I'm so glad the wine tasting is back, and for a very modest additional fee. I'll be on the CS next week and I was really bummed that the tasting had gone away. Happy it's back!

This is Amtrak's idea of "tasting the blood". Remove a complimentary amenity, see if the passengers make a fuss about it, slowly re-introduce it as a paid service, see if it placates the crowd. If this experiment of paid wine tasting is successful, I predict in the next couple of years, other complimentary amenities like complimentary meals in dining car, complimentary coffee and juice in sleeper will disappear and re-appear as paid services.

See what the airlines did. Years ago domestic Economy used to get complimentary hot meals, then they took it away and replaced it with paid (mediocre) meals. I will not be surprised if Amtrak goes the same route.

And to repeat what Penny said just above, the wine tasting in the Parlour car used to be a paid event when it was first introduced. It cost less for those in a sleeper than it did for those in coach; but it was a fee based event.

Then Amtrak made it free for a few years for sleeper pax, while cutting off coach pax entirely. Now it's back to a paid event.

So, NO, it's not exactly as you suggest.

 

[jis]

From an accounting point of view, I think paid meals for sleepers would be disastrous. I think that's safe.

Explicitly being looked at in their five year plan. And I rather doubt it would be an accounting disaster given that that's how it used to work anyhow.

If you happen to know the history at all.... it was changed to the way it is because the other way was an accounting disaster, and the Dining Cars were on the verge of being discontinued. Not enough Sleeper passengers were using the Diner. They preferred the cheaper cafe afair or picked up food from stops etc.
That is not to say that this time around it won't be any different. But using the argument that it was that way before is not a valid one IMHO, since it did not work the last time around.

 

[Paulus]

If you happen to know the history at all.... it was changed to the way it is because the other way was an accounting disaster, and the Dining Cars were on the verge of being discontinued. Not enough Sleeper passengers were using the Diner. They preferred the cheaper cafe afair or picked up food from stops etc.

That is not to say that this time around it won't be any different. But using the argument that it was that way before is not a valid one IMHO, since it did not work the last time around.

As I understand the term, that's not an accounting disaster, that's simply a financial disaster which isn't much of a change at all

 

[jis]

six or half a dozen

 

[gmushial]

ON

We could go back to the Harvey House approach, ie, the train pulls in, everyone that wants a meal piles off, they have a sit down very high quality meal, and are back on the train 30 minutes later... the dinner cars only came along when the thought crossed peoples minds that just maybe they could have the HH food, but onboard; before that it was what we appear to be heading for: bring your own, or catch what one could at the stops - which was pretty low quality and hence opened the opportunity for Fred Harvey and company. BTW if one is a rail fan, there are multiple excellent books on the evolution, trials and tribulations of Fred Harvey's accomplishments. ... if one eats at the El Tovar on the south rim of the Grand Canyon, one can get a sense of what Fred Harvey had created: a very pleasant experience to say the least.

OFF

 

[neroden]

I read on this forum that meals never used to be included with the sleeper. That was something amtrak started.

Very true and in the pre-Amtrak days this was the case as well. Of course the Menus had a much wider variety then and railroad food was highly regarded.

And they were cheaper relative to "on land" food, too. (You do have to adjust for inflation, but they were still cheaper.)

 

[neroden]

Restaurants have the same core economic issue Amtrak has, to a lesser degree. They thrive on volume.

Most restaurants "on land" are full on Friday and Saturday evening and are half-empty the rest of the week, but opening for the rest of the week and for lunch helps leverage the fixed costs (rent, equipment, taxes, benefits) over a larger sales base, allowing them to break even ore make a little money. I know one restaurant which is full *every day* from lunch right through dinner, and I'm quite sure *they're* making a *lot* of money.

The core reason the dining cars weren't working as paid service in the 1980s was that there were too few people riding the trains, and too few customers, to cover the fixed costs of operation. The operation needs volume to cover its fixed costs. Arguably every kitchen should be handling a second table car as well as the dining car. Dining hours need to be as long as possible. It's also valuable to cut *fixed* costs of running the dining car, such as the paperwork and inventory. Whereas trying to cut variable costs like the actual food quality and selection is a mug's game and will just drive away customers.

But anyway, there are a lot more people riding the trains -- or at least wanting to ride them and being priced out! -- now than there were in the 1980s. There's been a sustained runup in ridership and ticket prices despite very little expansion in service. So the dining cars may be in a different situation now than they were then.

Someone here knows when meals were first included with the sleeping car ticket prices, but I can't find the information. (Anyone care to help?)

I also can't find historic ridership data by line for the lines I'm most interested in (NY-Chicago, NY-Florida). But it is my impression that they are doing well. I did manage to find one data point, for the Southern Crescent immediately before its absorption by Amtrak -- 165,000 passengers. It's roughly doubled since then.

Now, I'm not saying this is true on every service (the CONO seems to have hit some sort of ceiling on ridership), but it does seem that the NY-Florida and NY-Chicago services are constrained by supply of rolling stock; the same is true from Denver to Chicago and from DC to Atlanta; and the Texas Eagle seems to attract huge and ever-increasing numbers of passengers despite its snail-like speeds.

More riders per train == more viable dining car service, as long as Amtrak doesn't do stupid things like raising the food prices way above "land" prices, or cutting quality and selection way below "land" selection.

 

[JayPea]

Take it for what it's worth but a few weeks ago on Trainorders someone had written to complain about amenities cuts and also addresses the rumors about sleeping car passengers paying for meals in the diners. He got a response from Amtrak in which it was explicitly stated there are no plans to have sleeping car passengers pay for meals. Could be a case of famous last words, of course.

 

[gmushial]

Restaurants have the same core economic issue Amtrak has, to a lesser degree. They thrive on volume.

Most restaurants "on land" are full on Friday and Saturday evening and are half-empty the rest of the week, but opening for the rest of the week and for lunch helps leverage the fixed costs (rent, equipment, taxes, benefits) over a larger sales base, allowing them to break even ore make a little money. I know one restaurant which is full *every day* from lunch right through dinner, and I'm quite sure *they're* making a *lot* of money.

The core reason the dining cars weren't working as paid service in the 1980s was that there were too few people riding the trains, and too few customers, to cover the fixed costs of operation. The operation needs volume to cover its fixed costs. Arguably every kitchen should be handling a second table car as well as the dining car. Dining hours need to be as long as possible. It's also valuable to cut *fixed* costs of running the dining car, such as the paperwork and inventory. Whereas trying to cut variable costs like the actual food quality and selection is a mug's game and will just drive away customers.

But anyway, there are a lot more people riding the trains -- or at least wanting to ride them and being priced out! -- now than there were in the 1980s. There's been a sustained runup in ridership and ticket prices despite very little expansion in service. So the dining cars may be in a different situation now than they were then.

Someone here knows when meals were first included with the sleeping car ticket prices, but I can't find the information. (Anyone care to help?)

I also can't find historic ridership data by line for the lines I'm most interested in (NY-Chicago, NY-Florida). But it is my impression that they are doing well. I did manage to find one data point, for the Southern Crescent immediately before its absorption by Amtrak -- 165,000 passengers. It's roughly doubled since then.

Now, I'm not saying this is true on every service (the CONO seems to have hit some sort of ceiling on ridership), but it does seem that the NY-Florida and NY-Chicago services are constrained by supply of rolling stock; the same is true from Denver to Chicago and from DC to Atlanta; and the Texas Eagle seems to attract huge and ever-increasing numbers of passengers despite its snail-like speeds.

More riders per train == more viable dining car service, as long as Amtrak doesn't do stupid things like raising the food prices way above "land" prices, or cutting quality and selection way below "land" selection.

Well written and well argued. But I wonder if there isn't a middle ground or third alternative, and that being the Indian Rail model, ie, not cook on the train, but still feed the passengers well, ie, take the food orders at one station [in today's world, simply radio them ahead], cook the meals at a central kitchen, and deliver them to the passengers at a station a half-hour later - means no need to drag along a dining car and its associated costs, allows one to cook in a much lower cost basis situation, allows the train to not have to stop (Fred Harvey and Harvey House model) and allows the passengers higher quality of food than is available at the smoking stops, eg, Grand Junction? Would also allow for a larger menu without the associated costs of dragging along all the possibles and having to trash those not selected/used. The downside of course is that when a train is late, then meals will be late, ie, the kitchens are only at fixed locations and the trains have to arrive there to on-load the meals. I guess the other downside would be more food mess cleanup in coach - but have to believe that would be small as compared to other savings.

 

[neroden]

Well written and well argued. But I wonder if there isn't a middle ground or third alternative, and that being the Indian Rail model, ie, not cook on the train, but still feed the passengers well, ie, take the food orders at one station [in today's world, simply radio them ahead], cook the meals at a central kitchen, and deliver them to the passengers at a station a half-hour later

I've answered this before. It's a great idea, but you can't do it unless the trains run on time or close to on time.

Period.

When you get stuck in a siding for an hour, your food will get cold before it gets on the train.

The inability of the Class Is to run Amtrak services on time is what prevents this from being a viable business model. If we could get the trains running within 20 minutes of schedule 99% of the time, it would be a fine business model.

I see you've spotted this problem too...

The downside of course is that when a train is late, then meals will be late, ie, the kitchens are only at fixed locations and the trains have to arrive there to on-load the meals.

Which gets me back to "buy the tracks, get the irresponsible freight operators out of the way". A passenger train operator can dispatch freight responsibly, but the last 40 years have shown that a company which conceives of itself as a freight train operator cannot be trusted to dispatch passenger trains responsibly.

 

[Paulus]

The core reason the dining cars weren't working as paid service in the 1980s was that there were too few people riding the trains, and too few customers, to cover the fixed costs of operation. The operation needs volume to cover its fixed costs. Arguably every kitchen should be handling a second table car as well as the dining car. Dining hours need to be as long as possible. It's also valuable to cut *fixed* costs of running the dining car, such as the paperwork and inventory. Whereas trying to cut variable costs like the actual food quality and selection is a mug's game and will just drive away customers.

Do we have any route ridership data from the 1980s to indicate that there are sufficiently more passengers today on the long distance trains to make the dining cars a viable proposition? The last year that I can find a breakdown for is FY1994.

 

[gmushial]

Well written and well argued. But I wonder if there isn't a middle ground or third alternative, and that being the Indian Rail model, ie, not cook on the train, but still feed the passengers well, ie, take the food orders at one station [in today's world, simply radio them ahead], cook the meals at a central kitchen, and deliver them to the passengers at a station a half-hour later

I've answered this before. It's a great idea, but you can't do it unless the trains run on time or close to on time.

Period.

When you get stuck in a siding for an hour, your food will get cold before it gets on the train.

The inability of the Class Is to run Amtrak services on time is what prevents this from being a viable business model. If we could get the trains running within 20 minutes of schedule 99% of the time, it would be a fine business model.

I see you've spotted this problem too...

The downside of course is that when a train is late, then meals will be late, ie, the kitchens are only at fixed locations and the trains have to arrive there to on-load the meals.

Which gets me back to "buy the tracks, get the irresponsible freight operators out of the way". A passenger train operator can dispatch freight responsibly, but the last 40 years have shown that a company which conceives of itself as a freight train operator cannot be trusted to dispatch passenger trains responsibly.

Isn't the exposure of not being on time only twofold: a) if the trail is delayed btwn the time the orders are taken (let's say: 20 minutes out) and the point the cooked meals are to be on-loaded, and b) the fact that dinner might not be at exactly 6:05pm as per the "printed" schedule [which I find to be little of a problem when one compares such to the current situation of taking what's available in terms of a seating reservation in the dining car - which of late has been anywhere from 5:30 until 9pm]? On the plus side I see: lower costs for Amtrak; near-on-the-ground meal pricing for the passengers; and a much larger possible menu.

 

[Ryan]

What happens when you don't get to the dinner stop until 2 in the morning?

 

[Paulus]

What happens when you don't get to the dinner stop until 2 in the morning?

You follow the contingency plans. If you're 9 hours behind schedule, odds are that you're near a lunch stop and can use them, or you simply figure out where it's likely that you'll be and radio in an order ahead of you (as I believe the Empire Builder has been known to do with Subway and which several posters have done here for pizza).

 

[Bob Dylan]

And restaurants won't want to pay overtime to their staff waiting on a late train that may be anywhere from 30 minutes late to 20+ Hours late!

Also instead of steadily raising room prices and fares a surcharge of say $ 20 per sleeper passenger could be added to the ticket price designated towards food service! Maybe a $ 5 charge to Coach tickets!

My favorite biz model is to contract out the food service for onboard consumption !( the food service employees can be moved to much needed OBS crew jobs so none loses their job)

The food is already contracted out ( maybe Coke will out bid Pepsi next time! LOL) so this seems like a viable plan with some fine tuning! ( the contractor would not be paying comparable wages and benefits to their employees/ big savings for Amtrak!)

Perhaps the food service employees could even work like the T&E Crews do and not ride end to end like OBS crews!

I'm.not a biz school grad, food service expert nor an investor/capitalist but I'm sure this could be made to work and the micro managers in Congress could be told " Here you go, private enterprise @ work!How's them apples your Highness!"

 

[jis]

Food Service crew not riding the whole distance brings up the same OTP issues that on shore food service brings up.

So what you are talking off is contracting out the staffing for the delivery of food service. Afterall the food service materials delivery to commissaries are already contracted out.

And where exactly do you propose to absorb the current food service staff? Do you really believe there are enough OBS slots available to absorb them without featherbedding?

 

[gmushial]

What happens when you don't get to the dinner stop until 2 in the morning?

In the case you present: sounds like one is running 6 to 8 hours late, so one uses the nominal lunch or breakfast kitchens to prepare dinners... one assumes a degree of flexibility and pre-planning in the system commensurate with the historic OTP. One might also do a IHOP type menu where any kitchen is capable of producing any meal. ... clearly with the limited LD trains running today, one will have fewer kitchens along the lines; but if one were to increase LD trains, then more kitchens means more options/flexibility. And given deep freezing, food stores stay viable for quite some time (ie, stock for all possibilities, and use according to needs). Beyond that, the exact arrival of any train is clearly only known at the very last minute, but one has hints long before arrival of what to expect and plan for, ie, if a train is 4 hrs late 8 hrs out, then it's pretty safe to plan on it being that or more after 8 more hrs.

 

[FormerOBS]

The idea of having food service personnel work a "step-on/step-off" schedule sounds nice, but I'm skeptical about it on a practical level. The issues of on-time performance are the first stumbling block. But it would still be problematic if everything is on time. If, for example, a food service crew finishes dinner service, including post-dinner cleanup, and gets off the train at a turnaround point at 11:00 pm, what happens if the next train going the opposite direction arrives at 2:30 am? Are they expected to sleep from 11:45 till 1:45, then get up to catch the next train, then sleep from 3:00 till 5:00 am, then open the diner for breakfast at 6 am. This would still require Amtrak to have sleeping quarters for the crew on both trains, plus the turnaround point; and it would guarantee about 4 hours' INTERRUPTED sleep at the turnaround. Try working that schedule.

As for off-train kitchens, I'm also skeptical. If it's decided that a schedule needs to be changed or a new train introduced, what happens if the contracted kitchens don't happen to be located in the right places? On-time performance would be an issue, of course. Amtrak would have to have a guarantee that the kitchen can supply the food at ANY HOUIR OF THE DAY OR NIGHT. And what happens if the train picks up the food and gets underway, and then the crew discovers there is something wrong with the quantity, or quality, or the specific content of the order? It's not likely that the dispatcher would let them go back to correct it.

Greater frequency on LD routes? Don't hold your breath.

Maybe there's a way to do these things, but I haven't figured it out.

 

[neroden]

Do we have any route ridership data from the 1980s to indicate that there are sufficiently more passengers today on the long distance trains to make the dining cars a viable proposition? The last year that I can find a breakdown for is FY1994.

I spent a few hours digging for numbers without much success; I'd need to try to look in offline sources to get further numbers, and that's not practical where I am. I've given you the best I got. It looks like the ridership has very roughly doubled on at least some of the Eastern routes. The sleeper prices have kept pace with inflation and the food prices have exceeded inflation.
Is that enough to make the service viable? I don't know, because I can't find route-level data for the former private railroad operations either!

However, the Southern Crescent provides a valuable data point: the Southern kept running it for years after Amtrak started, with dining car service levels which would be considered seriously over-the-top now (genuine silver flatware), until ridership dropped to about half what it is now.