It was way better back in the days when railroads were owned by independent corporations. I hate these modern stupid silly state owned and government agencies. The state agencies are inconvenient because they can’t even cross state borders without their stupid union agreements, even though they are cheaper than Amtrak in most cases where passenger service does cover commuter rail zones. However what would have happened to our rail infrastructure if Amtrak had not come to the rescue. Anyway our rail system is still dying!!! Even our roads and bridges, buildings are decaying and deteriorating. Eveything’s going down down down, the train? No wait DRAIN!!! What a shame we are behind France, China, and Japan Come On really? How embarrassing! When are we going to wake up, smell the coffee and move along. Long live the Pennsylvania Railroad!!! and The New York Central!!! etc.
and the Atlantic Coast Line!!
I can’t agree with you less, alloboard, especially in this day and age…your statement may have had a ring of truth if not desperation 25 or so years ago but not today. Unions are not standing in the way of progress but are working with rail managment to keep the industry alive and viable. State agencies saved a lot of rail service and have instituted new and more services in many areas. If there has been any problem with American railroads and services it has been in the realm of government, the politicians are the one’s who have acted too little and often too late. Long Live any railroad of the 20th Century be it Class 1 or anyother Class, yes. But in today’s business model, CSX, NS, BNSF, UP, CN, CP, KCS and the shortline conglamorates have kept and imporved the system against many government odds. Nothing is down but a lot is looking up. The old days may have been great in their time, but it ain’t no longer their time!
Your take on government, I agree, they have been a thorn in the backs of railroads for many years and are one of the obvious roots to many past problems and failures to realize future growth.
Teddy Rosevelt created the beginnings of the National Park Service, he never lived long enough to realize the full development of the great thing he created. Politians today demand instant gratification and ignore projects that someday we will again look back on and appreciate a man who had a vision for the future. Transportation unfortunately is a victim of this attitude. Oh, and Teddy didn’t care what his hair looked like.
“The old days may have been great in their time, bit it ain’t no longer their time!” I think the point Alloboard was making is that they did back then what today people are saying we can’t, why are we afraid, if so of what? With the excepiton of railroads, our transportation infastructure is deteriorating.
henry6 wrote the following:
“…I can’t agree with you less, alloboard, especially in this day and age…your statement may have had a ring of truth if not desperation 25 or so years ago but not today…”
Henry6 is spot on. I have no idea how many years you’ve been around, but just on the bais of you’re statement, I guess I’ve probably got you by several years.[sigh]
Brother, These are your good old days ( in 40 or 50 years!) You will remember them for all that is right at that time, anecdotes will be most of what you’ll remember.
To some “those Good Ole Day’s” weren’t! It was the job that was important, and missing digits in many industries were the price men paid for experience., as well as the badge that you had learned what it took to satisfy ‘the boss’. Work rules and the lack there of were the norm back in those good ole days. It was get the job done at whatever cost, rain or shine.
It has been stated in this Forum by several members in reference to the GCOR that it is ‘written in the blood’ o many railroaders, who gave their lives at most, and the bits and pieces of themselves to do their job. Good Ole Days? I think maybe only to us by-standers.
Alloboard, These are Your Good Ole Days! Enjoy them as you can, work sa
Most readers here might not realize that the Original Poster is from the northern New Jersey/ metro New York area, as I understand it - that context is important to understand his lament.
Trains columnist and author John Kneiling said much the same - several times over - in his columns and articles back in the 1970 - 1980 time frame. In particular, I recently re-read his complaint that whereas the PRR used to sell a single ‘through’ ticket from anyplace on its system to anyplace else, then it often took 2 - and sometimes as many as 4 - tickets to between a suburban NYC point and one south of Philadelphia: “The agencies don’t talk to each other, and seemingly don’t recognize that the others exist, what with different and incompatible car types, etc.” is essentially what he wrote.
That said, what we have now is far better than where it was headed circa 1970 - 1975. Read several of Fred Frailey’s blog postings (bottom of this page) to see what I mean.
Granted, LIRR and NJT both essentially end at Penn Station. With the “Change at Jamaica !” that pre-dates even government control of the LIRR, for me to go from Allentown, PA to Montauk, Long Island, NY takes 1 car, 3 trains (NJT commuter - LIRR commuter - LIRR passenger) and a bus or taxi each way. So ? It was that way even when the PRR and/ or the CNJ was running the service - changes at Penn Station and Jamaica.
Let’s be a little more positive and analytical here: Which of the commuter/ passenger agencies in that area does the better job, and why ? Candidates are Amtrak, ConnDOT’s Shore Line East, MetroNorth Commuter, NJT, LIRR, PATH, and the NYC subway system. For starters, I’ll observe that MCNR seems to be able to cross state lines without any problems.
- Paul North.
When people reference “the good old days” they tend to remember the things they liked and forget the rest.
A recession is when the economy gets so bad that you are forced to do without things that your grandparents never dreamed of having.
Remember when the class ones ran those romantic passenger trains of days gone by? Yes I do. I also remember that they weren’t air conditioned and the ride was degraded by the hand laid stick rail. When they were pulled by steam, the open windows of those not air-conditioned cars exposed you to the smoke and soot being manufactured by the engine.
Railroad workers worked harder than most people today would be willing to in conditions that OSHA would never tolerate today. They were among the first industries to unionize, and for good reason. I know that the current crop of politicians are doing their best to vilify unions, but your life would be a lot harder without them, whether you belong to one or not.
Governments at all levels are keeping transit alive. Our world NEEDS transit at all levels.
NJT’s MId Town Direct from Morris County NJ is actually a dream come true for me…almost. As a kid in the 40’s and 50’s in Denville, NJ I always thought how great it would be to board a train there and ride directly to my grandparent’s apartment two blocks from the LIRR station in Jamaica, Queens. I was aboard the very first revenue train from Denville to NYP in 1991(?). Upon arrival at NYP I walked upstairs and across the station, purchased a ticket and rode to Jamaica. Maybe it wasn’t the one seat ride, or even a one ticket ride, but it was almost a dream come true. Today the LIRR and NJT have a one ticket ride to certain events at The Meadowlands and MNRR and NJT have a Meadowlands service of one seat ride from New Haven. NJT and SEPTA do allow joint ticket purchases but not single tickets.
In 1961 railroading was going down the tubes as I saw it from the North Jersey perspective, thus I did not choose it as a vocation. Today is a completely different story.
“When people reference “the good old days” they tend to remember things they liked and forget the rest.” So true, we always seem to forget about the “bad ol’days”.
Here in Ohio we have a union crashing Governor who also balked on federal funding to begin the task of corridor service. So in the scheme of the Midwest Corridor vision, Ohio is a black hole. This in addition to our middle of the night Amtrak service. Paul mentions that things are better today than in the 1970’s, in many locations in the east he is correct, I only wish I could say the same for Ohio.
Unless you live in a parallel universe, freight railroads are not governmental agencies and are still privately owned and operated. On the passenger side, those state agencies which you decry are what’s keeping suburban rail service in existence. Intercity service would have disappeared almost completely if not for Amtrak.
In the Chicago area, the RTA (Metra) has managed to maintain the services that existed prior to 1974 and has expanded those services. Ticketing on various Metra lines is now universal, unlike in the past. The CNW West Line has been extended to Elburn, a completely new line (North Central) operates on the former Soo main line, service on the Southwest line has expanded from one round trip on weekdays to an all-day service on weekdays plus some Saturday service. NICTD in Indiana has managed to re-equip the South Shore passenger service and is now making major infrastructure improvements.
Of course we know that, Ches…but in the terms in which we thought back then trains were passenger trains, not freight. Therefore if a passenger train was to be removed, so was the railroad in so many people’s mind. My mindset, and this was Metropolitan NY 1960, was repeatedly fed by messages that “railroads” and “trains” were in trouble and would be gone. They didn’t differentiate between commuter, long distance and freight, just that railroads and their trains were in trouble. What we didn’t understand was that the railroads were trying scare tactics as best they could about their dire straits in having to run commuter and other passenger services…if those trains went away, so would the public, so then they could run their freight trains unhampered. Worked for a while, too! Then came the PennCentral debacle followed by Conrail. Then followed by today.
Remember that Metro North does cross state lines west of Hudson under contract with NJ Department of Transportation/NJtransit. The Metro north New Haven line works with Connecticut Department of Transportation.
Yes,but that is different than “service” and use in the context of what we are talking. West of Hudson is maintaining the old Erie RR services between Suffern and Port Jervis and on the Erie Pascack Valley line from the state line to Spring Valley. MNRR leases and maintains the tracks from Suffern to Port Jervis from NS, supplies trainsets (locomotives and cars) and then pays NJT to crew and operate. Pascack Valley is owned by NJT with MNRR providing some locomotives and cars, I think owns the track north of the state line, and pays NJT to crew and operate. MNRR also maintains and operates the former NH lines in CT under contract with the State of Connecticut. ConnDot also runs Shore LIne East services out of New Haven.
In the context of what we are talking about MNRR/CONNDOT and NJT runs an NJT trainset from New Haven to NYP to Secaucus Jct. to Trenton. One seat/one ticket service on these trains is from CT points to Sec. Jct. and the Meadowlands Sports Complex for NY Giant and NY Jet football games. (The trains are actually an extensions of already scheduled NJT trains but not sure about MNRR-ConnDot part of the runs.) The LIRR also participates in a marketing program which provides a single ticket purchase from LIRR points to NJT Meadowlands…change a NYP and again at Sec. Jct.).
On the other end of NJT, NJT ticket machines will sell you a ticket from Trenton to Philadelphia as a seperate purchase from your NJT to Trenton ticket. Where NJT stumbles is, aside from the ACE (Atlantic CIty Express) weekend casino trains, you cannot buy a ticket from agent, machine, or aboard, from NJT points to Atlantic CIt
alloboard - Yes, that’s exactly what I had in mind, though the specific details were a little fuzzy in my mind - it’s easy to get confused with the “alphabet soup” of agencies and gazeteer of place names and routes involved unless you’re a local, which I’m not. So with a little research, here are some links to decent maps of those systems:
MTA’s MetroNorth Commuter Rail: http://www.mta.info/mnr/html/mnrmap.htm
Long Island Railroad: http://www.mta.info/lirr/Timetable/lirrmap.htm
Staten Island Railroad: http://www.mta.info/nyct/maps/simap.htm
NJT System: (22" x 34", 2.67 MB in size - love the icons for each route, too !) http://www.njtransit.com/pdf/rail/Rail_System_Map.pdf
Shore Line East (station info only - apparently no map available): http://www.shorelineeast.com/riding_sle/new_rider_guide.php
Single-line sketch map at : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shore_Line_East
See also the more general MTA maps list at: (note - the link for the LIRR appears to be 'broken" - use the one above instead) http://www.mta.info/mta/maps.htm
henry6 - Your suggestions have a lot of merit to functionally and seamlessly integrate the systems, at least at the passenger level. Returning to the theme of this thread: Were any of those connections and easy transfers possible that way ‘back in the day’ when it was
Ha ha…In the 1980s it was still easily possible to meet people who grew up in the dirty 30s. On a train trip across Canada I met one man who went on and on about how great it was to be a kid back then… how kids nowadays have it too easy and don’t know the meaning of family. Its funny how time can change one’s perception…But as a rule the days of our youth are full of promise and potential…and that’s probably why we look back on the years of our youth as the old old days.
Paul…that is what my Ride With Me Henry is all about…join us sometime when I post them or give me a date and routing you want…I get Sr discount so all I look for is my gas money and whatever else comes my way…and it is shared by all who come along for the day…usually one or two others out of BIngahmton then whoever we pick up along the way…Have done all available trips in the NY metro area in and out of GCT and NYP but only SEPTA from Trenton to 30th St. (+PATCO and River LIne back to Trenton)…so there’s a lot more for us to pursue…let me know…
I don’t think that transfers and through ticketing were more common or easier prior to 1958. Not all stations sold through tickets and since commutation tickets were generally cheaper on a per-mile basis than intercity tickets, I would think that through ticketing would have been discouraged.
While you may complain as to the fact that multiple agencies are involved, remember that Metro-North operates former NYC and NH routes; NJT operates former PRR, Erie, DL&W and CNJ routes; SEPTA operates former PRR and RDG routes; etc. Interline ticketing on commuter services didn’t even exist.
Oh, yeah, henry6 - you haven’t even scratched the surface down here. Platform at Jenkintown Jct., single-track running on the suburban Hatboro-Warminster and bucolic Doylestown lines, 4-track main on the Paoli Local line and Amtrak main to Newark, Del., the Airport line roller-coaster over I-95, etc., etc.
Here’s one more in keeping with my version of the theme of this thread about how many older systems have now been pretty much integrated - see the SEPTA “Regional Rail & Rail Transit Map” at: http://www.septa.org/maps/system/ and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SEPTA
- Amtrak or NJT-SEPTA (ex-PRR main) from New York City/ northern New Jersey to 30th St. Station, Philadelphia;
- 30th St. Station (also ex-PRR) to Market East via Regional Rail (heavy commuter rail) through the modern, post-ConRail (1985) Center City Commuter Connection Tunnel - ;
- Ex-Reading RR Norristown Regional Rail Line along the east bank of the Schuylkill River and Manayunk/ Roxborough/ Conshohocken hills to the new Norristown Transportation Center;
- Ex-Philadelphia & Western’s rebuilt Norristown High Speed Line - really a short interurban with 3rd rail - to the 69th Street Transportation Center;
- Ex-Philadelphia Transportation Company’s Route 101 Media Line Suburban Trolley to Media;
- Walk 0.3 mile (about 6 - 7 mins.) from the trolley line southwesterly to the Media Station;
- Ex-PRR Media-Elwyn Regional Rail Line back to 30th St.
There you go - 4 (or 3) previous systems now integrated into one, plus a major connection that never even existed 'back in the good old days" - for an all-electrified trip of about 3 - 4 hours duration, depending on schedules, time of day, connections,
I guess your point is mostly about commuter/transit agencies but you seem to forget themainline railroading in the U.S was one of the first industries to be heavily unionized and was so back in the “Golden Era”…
Unionizing has nothing to do with it. If railroads wanted to or could provide a service, the did. And what is available today has nothing to do with unions either. As for late 20th and contemporary unions, they are working with railroads and agencies to make services, and thus jobs, possible and are not the stumbling blocks implied or of yesterday. There was always interline ticketing on long distance services but not on commuter services; any “blocks” were because of individual railroad bounderies and had nothing to do with unions.
Amtrak is very much part of my mix, too, Paul. For instance, on 5/16 we did NJT from Hackettstown, NJ to NYP, Amtrak to Poughkeepsie, MNRR to GCT, subway to NYP, NJT back to Hac’twn. In the past have also Amtraked from NYP to Stamford and Bridgeport then MNRR’d for the rest of the day. Cost factors of Amtrak vs commuter agency can be a factor for some of us at times…but sometimes can be overcome or needed despite the cost. So far no one has determined ACELA’s cost justifies the need to speed when not warranted or advantagious The most demanding part of working up a day’s schedule is to end up at where you started at a decent enough or reasonable hour!