"CRH5E, China’s first highspeed train with sleeper cars, was unveiled in Changchun, Jilinprovince on Nov. 11. The train can travel at
The UK/France Eurostar services through the Channel Tunnel was intended to include some Nightstar sleepers for services beyond London and Paris, but was ultimately dropped as economically not viable.
High speed sleeper services might make some sense on longer routes, but where are the longer high-speed lines in the US?
HSR sleeper service would appear to be the wrong question.
Experience in Europe was that the nightline sleepers seem to have worked until the HSR service cut travel time between destinations. now most previous overnight sleeper service has shrunk or been completely lost.
An exception is the UK service from London to northern Scotland which takes about 9 hours.
So a question would be is the China HSR sleeper service mainly overnight ? Of course there might be a two night service.
Agree that the overnight Amtrak service BOS <> NYP <> WASH. did work before the sidelining of Heritage sleepers discontinued the service. “IF” the new V-2 sleepers come on line it will be interesting to see if BOS <> WASH sleeper service will work as enroute time has decreased.
The 9-14 hour Amtrak sleepers appear to still attract a lot of sleeper passengers. LSL, Capitol, Crescent. Florida service is almost all tourist. We need to look at western PRIIA reports to see average sleeper traveled distance.
The Crescent has only needed 1 sleeper ATL <> NOL and many of those sleeper passengers are thru passengers ATL > BHM.
Be interesting to bring back the executive sleeper. Nyp to was. Rode it a few times. The last of the set out sleepers.
We have the opinion that there will not be any HrSR sleeper route for at least 30 - 40 years to justify a HSR sleeper. 900 - 1200 miles averaging 100 MPH. The probable first route may be NYP - CHI ? It may be CHI - DEN will be a distant second.
And if we were to get TRUE HSR - 200 MPH - 15 Hours NY - LA, might be open to sleeper service.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUERtAe73NI
Supertrain! Anyone remember Supertrain? Anyone?
The episode that I really remember had the announcement that the Silver Meteor was arriving in Grand Central Station before Supertrain departed.
I was not surprised that someone thought that a train from the South came into that station.
The old Official Guides list many overnight runs. Railroad advertising would often tout these runs to the business traveler. Leave after work. Arrive at your destination at the start of business hours.
In the 1930’s and 40’s long distance schedules were shortened with diesel streamliners. The overnight market figured large. Far more comfortable sleeping accomadations were made available.
16 hours New York to Chicago. The Denver Zephyr appeared. After World War II air service was greatly improved. The overnight rail passenger market began to disappear.
HSR rail would extend rails reach of overnight points. Would that extended reach make any difference in attracting market share, or would it be 1950 all over again?
Is the China - Tibet train considered a high speed train? It does have sleeper accomodations. Per wikipedia Fifty-three are luxury sleeper carriages for tourist services.
I hate to say it, but I wonder if one of the big disincentives wouldn’t be donation of the business employee’s overnight “down time.” Vs. the company picking up the cost of his daytime airline travel as part of his salaried day.
I say this as one whose dad caught an overnighter many times in the 1950s to a place like Chicago or New York. And he was working for the aerospace industry, loved airplanes and later helped design fuel systems on several Boeing jets.
But it was a whole different world, not to mention mindset – of employees and their companies – back then.
I would think it would be almost the other way round; you have the same ‘business incentive’ that was operative on the old Century/Broadway of being able to put in a full day’s work, get to the train and board, have dinner and evening work time on the train, get a reasonably good night’s sleep, get ready the next morning and be immediately ready for morning meetings or work – a full day’s work at the destination. It helps if the train can access stations close to where the business is to be done, whether downtown stations or ‘Metropark’/Rt.128 centers, even if the last miles have to be done at slower speed as per many LGV routes.
As opposed to scrambling through checkpoints, riding the alloy tube, and arriving in a welter of traffic later in the day.
The potential difference with HSR is that the effective ‘reach’ of travel distance that can be covered between business days is increased, and it is further increased if part of the daytime riding is also included in the allowable trip time. Just as there are ‘corridors’ representing the longest practical business-class riding time, there will be corridors representing “acceptable departure window, one night en route, acceptable arrival window” … and at least theoretically a solution to pickup in the wee hours at some of the intermediate service points.
Might be interesting to see what destination pairs are ‘a day and a night’ separate at various HSR speeds. Note that as with the California Zephyr it may be expedient to use somewhat lower speeds, different tilt metrics, etc. for the nighttime portion of a HSR sleeper run, since actual restful sleep on high-speed trains is known to be iffy sometimes…
Between major commercial centers that were the backbone of the Pullman overnight operations - in today’s world, you get a early flight to the city of your choice, do your days business and get a late dinner hour flight home and sleep in you own bed.
Pullman overnight services thrived because there were no competing methods of transportation.
I began my NYC based business career in 1961. Between then and 1967 I rode the Broadway Limited from New York to Chicago twice for business meetings.
In 1967 I got married. By then I could fly on a United 727 from Newark to Chicago and back in one day. I could be back in my Brooklyn apartment with my bride by 7 to 8 p.m. My bed was better than anything that the Pullman Company had to offer. Taking the plane was a no brainer.
There are very few business people, at least among my peers, who have the time to spend a night on a train to get to meetings and another night to get back home.
Those of us who like trains need to be realistic. The future for passenger rail is quick, frequent, economical service in 350 mile or less corridors.
It could be a matter of choice. We lived in Cleveland oh. My father who was also in the the industry, would monthly board a set out sleeper in cut for his trip to Chicago. Perhaps he like the train and a good breakfast in the dinner. He would do the same in the evening and be back in town to work the next day.
When the service was discontinued, he be up very early in the morning and drive to the airport, fly to Chicago. Then an hour trek down town. He would either fly home on a very late flight or be home the next night.
It could personal choice. Apparently more people choose to fly. I wonder how many might choose a sleeper over the hassles of flying post 911.
Those Northstar trainsets keep bouncing around the aftermarket looking for a new owner. Who needs to sleep when the trip is 6 hours or less?
Even more surprising when you realize it’s actually named Grand Central Terminal.
I believe all 139 cars have belonged to VIA since 2000. They didn’t bounce around for long.
VIA uses the NightStar equipment on the ‘Ocean’ between Montreal and Halifax and has since around 2004, They are referred to as the Renaissance fleet.
ViA also used the NightStar equipment on an overnight train between Toronto and Montreal from 2002 to 2005…and VIA can’t be faulted on this one for not trying!
The ‘Enterprise’ was extensively marketed but there just didn’t seem to be a market for an overnight train in the corridor anymore. With several fast day trains each-way…people just wanted to be home in their own beds at night. Not in a hotel room…let alone a sleeper.
I received numerous discount coupons in VIA-1 (daytime First Class) for a sleeper one-way and return by fast afternoon train but it just didn’t work. The only times the trains were full was on Fri and Sun evenings and this was in coach. On days the Enterprise connected with the Canadian…you did have a few more in the sleepers, but not many.
On the ‘Ocean’…VIA attaches a Budd Dome Park Observation on the rear of the NightStars… Sure makes for an interesting transition!
