Well I’m back (not that I see any topics asking where I’ve been…oh, well) from my annual trip from Milwaukee to San Francisco. FWIW, a few things that crossed my mind while on board.
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Late again, as always-but usually we don’t lose time until west of Denver. This time we were already an hour or so late by the time we arrived. I will put it down to ongoing BNSF track work and try not to think about a future of their timekeeping being as bad as UP’s.
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Equipment Question #1: This trip westbound we had an extra locomotive, which was set aside at Denver. I have seen an extra there on trips past. Is this protection power? Do any of the other western trains (the Empire Builder or the Southwest Chief) have extra power on standby along their runs?
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Equipment Question #2: We had (on both legs of the trip) a Sightseer Lounge car in the 32000 series with a new-to-me arrangement of additional tables in half of the upper lounge area. Is this a new type of car? A new assignment for existing ones? A random chance?
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Equipment Question #3: Does any train ever use the upper level bar in the Sightseer Lounge cars? Since the CZ is my only long distance train experience in years, I don’t have anything to compare it to but I’ve never seen the upper level bar in use, ever.
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This year, Denver Union Station has streetcars (I know, I know-“Light Rail Vehicles” but I can’t stop myself from calling them streetcars) stopping at the station. This year, Sacramento has streetcars stopping at the station. San Jose has streetcars stopping at the station. San Francisco has streetcars stopping at the station (and everywhere else, to boot). Salt Lake City does have streetcars-but not at the station.
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Salt Lake City has a nice bus/transit center right next to the Amtrak station but an equally nice fence between the two. When, oh when, will they let Amtrak in? Or are they trying to beat Saint Louis for the o
Kevin
On the reconfiguration of the Sightseer Lounge. I was at the “Open House” showing off the refurbished Empire Builder a couple of years ago and the first of the reconfigured Lounges were assigned to the EB pool. A couple of things were in play on the change. The tables were considered as good to provide additional table top seating for eating/drinking the lounge car offerings, for conversation or playing table games, or a place to set the lap top. In addition, even as early as the time of reconfiguration, thought was being given to eventually making the Sightseer a combination lounge and dining car for the trains that have lower regular dining car patronage.
During a visit, I told Dave Gunn that I liked the change and he said that the refurbishing was a very low cost project.
I don’t know anything about how many of the Sightseer cars have gone through the project, but both legs of my trip last week on the Capitol Limited had the modified cars.
On the use of the upstairs serving station. After the open house for the EB, I rode the train to Milwaukee and on that trip they had a lounge attendant serving drinks from that station. I’ll find out in a couple of weeks, but I suspect that the effort to reduce the labor cost for the on-board crew may have eliminated that service. That was the only time I ever saw that station in use. Perhaps in the early days of the Super Liner equipment service from that station was more common.
I think you are correct about the unit being left at Denver as protection power. The current issue of Trains notes that the Genisis engines are experience “premature” failure of the traction motors. GE and Amtrak are working on determining the cause. Given the fact that engine fleet is quite a bit larger than necessary to cover the current trains, it seems reasonable that Amtrak would try to mitigate the impact of power failures on train performance.
Thanks. But how was the CZ food? Cleanliness?
Food: I don’t use the diner-the portions have been larger than I’m hungry for. The snack car food is good and I usually bring some apples, oranges, etc. when I leave. There is also a fruit stand at the Grand Junction depot that I restock at.
Cleanliness: Overall pretty good. Rest rooms were OK. The crew seemed to be making more reminders than I remember in the past to pick up after yourself. The lounge car was actually in pretty good shape but there were a few seats in the coaches that obviously didn’t get the message. We also had our usual character or two that can’t quite wrap their head around the concept of “non smoking train”.
Regarding the refurbished lounge, I read recently (somewhere…tho I can’t recall where) that some of the Empire Builder cars or trainsets were being pooled to the CZ and maybe one other train. I can’t recall why, but someone was on the EB recently and had to settle for a regular Sightseer Lounge and maybe a regular sleeper, as the EB’s equipment was on another train.
The station in the upstairs level of the lounge was a wetbar, but was cut pretty early on, IIRC. It wasn’t worth paying an extra crewmember to simply serve drinks upstairs, a task that is pretty easily accomplished by the downstairs attendant.
Thanks again for the report. Even if one plans on using the diner (or airline meals for that matter) wusdin syggests always havbe emergdncy rations.