Parents Travel Free with Prospective College Students
Jan 5, 2007
Amtrak Offers Buy-One-Get-One-Free for Campus Visits
WASHINGTON - Prospective students checking out colleges and universities may take a parent along for free on Amtrak with a new buy-one-get-one-free program announced today. Students traveling on this fare must have a valid student ID in order to qualify for this special offer.
The Campus Visit discount program enables high school juniors and seniors to purchase a ticket on Amtrak at the best available fare and bring a parent or guardian along to campus visits for free. Younger siblings, ages 2-15, can travel for half price using Amtrak’s everyday children’s discount.
To take advantage of the Campus Visit discount, students simply log on to campusvisit.com/amtrak, complete the form and receive the discount code to be used when making travel reservations online at amtrak.com or by calling 1-800-USA-RAIL.
Reservations are required at least seven days prior to travel, and the student and parent or guardian must travel on the same itinerary. Tickets may be upgraded to business class or sleeping accommodations for an additional charge. These special fares are not available on Acela Express, Auto Train or the Canadian portion of joint Amtrak/VIA rail trains. Routes and offers subject to change without notice. Other restrictions may apply. Seats are limited and subject to availability.
Maybe it’s just the way I look at things, but I don’t see many people deciding to ride Amtrak just because of this offer.
After all, you can pile the entire family into the old family clunker for one low price as well. And go when and where you want. As it is, when you get off the train in Tampa, you’re at least a $30 cab ride (one way) from the nearest public college.
I hope Amtrak didn’t devote a lot of staff time to coming up with this “promotion”.
This deal may not be the 8th wonder of the world but it’s a start and it’s something. Who knows? Maybe this idea and it’s response will spur someone to come up with something even better! Isn’t that glass half-full?
My guess is that there will be quite a few people using this promotion in the northeast. The area is dense with colleges, many of them private (which tend to attract out of state students moreso than state schools) - particulary compared to the southeast, many within easy reach of Amtrak stations or with good public transit. In the Phila area alone: Drexel, Penn, Temple, Villanova, Bryn Mawr, St. Joes, Rutgers-Camden and Ursinus.
Sounds like a good way to fill up some seats on the NEC during normally slack times.
Maybe you fellas are right, but I think I could come up with some better promotions. For example, why not have a “1956 fare day” on certain underutilized corridors, where you can travel for the fare that was charged 50 years ago?
The press would certainly cover this event (with promotion) and I don’t think it costs much more to run a two-car train with 91 passengers on it than it does with 35 passengers on it. You’d build awareness of the service.
It certainly is a lot simpler than “One parent rides free (but not the other) if you’re headed to a college (and can prove it) and some people in your family ride for half price, but some don’t and it’s not good on the Acela and…etc, etc.”
First all this is not a new promotion. Two years ago I used it to take my then high school junior son to Washington, DC to look at schools there. It is an excellent way to introduce a student to Amtrak as a possible means of getting home for weekends and holidays.
When taking Amtrak back to school in Indianapolis, my son said there were a bunch of Purdue students that got off at Lafayette.
This thing sounds very similar to other discounts that have always been available; kids ride half off, special student and senior discounts, group discounts, zone discounts, and the list goes on. Just like anything, I don’t think many people will “decide” to ride Amtrak because of these discounts. Most people just continue to do things the way they always have, even if it is more expensive.
The promotion makes sense to me - where I went to college, there were lots of people who would travel by Amtrak. Where I went to law school, also had Amtrak service. Neither school is along the NE Corridor - but both, Amtrak was a highly viable option for student travel.