I believe that Amtrak’s primary function is shifting. It was created to offer a national network of long distance trains. To that end, almost all of the states were provided some degree of passenger rail service. Over the years Amtrak’s emphasis has changed. Today we are not surprised that possible discontinuation of the Southwest Chief or the Sunset Limited can be considered consistent with Amtrak’s current role.
Amtrak is morphing into a corridor carrier to serve the northeast.
I belive that as this trend continues, there will be fewer and fewer votes in Congress to fund a “national” passenger railroad. A financing mechanism will have to the found for operating subsidies to come solely from those who benefit. The northeast corridor will have to stand alone financially. When this happens, California will also be on its own to sponsor passenger trains to serve that great state. Similarly, the Chicago area will have to find a way to stand alone financially, as will Florida.
The rest of us will be without. So sad. Having a national passenger rail system seemed like such a wonderful idea. My opinion is that the horse is leaving the barn and loss of either the Southwest Chief or the Sunset Limited will signal the beginning of the end.
Amtrak’s prime responsibility was set up to relieve private freight railroads of the costs and responsibility of running passenger train. This was done in late 1970 and a date was set whereby railroads could elect to surrender their passenger service to Amtrak or keep operating their own service for at least one year. Roads without passenger service were not required to comply. Amtrak was charged with making agreements with the “member” roads to run passenger service. Included were, and are, corridors, regional services, and longer distance trains, with some crossover of definition and practice resulting.
I believe that Amtrak’s primary function is shifting. It was created to offer a national network of long distance trains. To that end, almost all of the states were provided some degree of passenger rail service. Over the years Amtrak’s emphasis has changed. Today we are not surprised that possible discontinuation of the Southwest Chief or the Sunset Limited can be considered consistent with Amtrak’s current role.
Amtrak is morphing into a corridor carrier to serve the northeast.
I belive that as this trend continues, there will be fewer and fewer votes in Congress to fund a “national” passenger railroad. A financing mechanism will have to the found for operating subsidies to come solely from those who benefit. The northeast corridor will have to stand alone financially. When this happens, California will also be on its own to sponsor passenger trains to serve that great state. Similarly, the Chicago area will have to find a way to stand alone financially, as will Florida.
South Texas: Where have you been the past 44 years? Since its beginning, most of Amtrak’s trains have run on former PC tracks in the NEC. States like Illinois, NY, CA and MI have continued to expand the State Subsidized services, which are basically shorter distance corridor services which have the potential to be very competitive. Long distance trains in the past and today carry only a small fraction of Amtrak’s growing numbers of passengers.
The long distance trains have increasingly become the political price that Amtrak has had to pay to maintain support for the NEC and various other regional services.
The death of one or more LD trains won’t be the end of Amtrak nor the end of LD service. Several LD trains have come and gone in the past. The National LImited, North Coast Limited, Broadway Limited, Floridian, Pioneer, Desert Wind, and Shenandoah.
If the Sunset goes away or the SW Chief gets rerouted it’s not a slippery slope to oblivion. Amtrak has survived over 40 year as a bit of a hot mess. It’s not going way any time soon…
Schlimm…read what I said. My comments pertained to what Amtrak was charged to do on the day they started and its responsibilities to the railroads whose services they assumed on that day. I did not go beyond the purpose and participants after that day.
Must disagree. None of those earlier discontinuances resulted in abandonment of original 1971 end-city pairs. I think abandonment of LA-Chicago, or LA-New Orleans, or both, would be a big deal indeed. Knock those out and the precedent has been set; you can go after any LD routes you want.
I concede the error on the National Limited and probably the South Wind/Floridian, which I do not recall.
BUT: Was not the Broadway replaced by the Lake Shore, preserving the NY-Chi city pairs? And I do not get your assertion that Chi-LA, via connections, would survive, unless you’re talking the Sunset-Texas Eagle, which is a slender reed, since the Sunset is also part of this abandonment scenario.
The Broadway is not preserved. There is a Pennsylvanian from NYP to Pittsburgh which connects with the Capitol there. The Capitol goes to Cleveland and on to Chicago via the NYC’s Water Level route. There is no PRR route west of Pittsburgh.
Right but the Broadway was not replaced by the Lake Shore, the Lake Shore always existed in Amtrak days. And the NY-CHI has three routes: Lake Shore, PNN-Capitol, and Cardinal via connection at Baltimore from NY. So either we be complete and clear or leave the wrong information laying out there for others to learn instead of the truth.
The Southwind (renamed the Floridian) was an original Amtrak train on day 1, which changed routes several times. It lasted only eight years.
The idea others have discussed is run the CZ and let LA passengers transfer to the Coast Starlight (for now, later to the CA HSR)in CA.
Setting the record straight on the Lake Shore: initially on May 1, 1971, an unnamed train ran on the Lake Shore route only from NYC (GCT) to Buffalo. Nine days later on May 10, 1971 it was extended to CHI.
The North Coast Hiawatha also started on June 5, 1971 and was dropped in 1979.
As Don Oltmann said, Amtrak has preserved much and also changed a lot over the 43 years, adding dropping trains and changing track routes. “Amtrak’s original system was made up of 19,233 route miles covering 43 States and the District of Columbia. By the end of 1971, the system had grown to 21,528 miles. In 2006 Amtrak had a system of 21,157 miles, in 46 States. Since 1971, Amtrak has abandoned a total of 14,075 miles,” http://cs.trains.com/trn/f/507/t/57085.aspx
Not so. Somebody’s got to come up with the money either to preserve it on its original route or pay for additional capacity to switch it onto the Transcon in New Mexico. Absent this, it goes.
The Chief does much better at staying close to its timetable than either the Zephyr (over the BNSF portion) or the Builder does. This leads me to believe capacity is not as tight on that route as it is on the other two. I’ve seen discussions of raising money to maintain the Raton Pass money for Amtrak, but I’m not aware BNSF is asking for anything substantial to switch that portion over to the Transcon.
I may be remembering incorrectly, but I thought BNSF, while not naming a figure, indicated at one time that it would take some substantial money to make room for the Chief over that portion of the Transcon.
Whenever politicians are involved in decision making about the distribution of a limited pile of money they will distribute it to provide minimum service to the largest number of voters. The result is a service that is of little value. In the case of Amtrak, that results in one train a day service to as many cities as possible. One train a day often going through town in the middle of the night, is NOT useful transportation. Thus, few people use it.