Looks like the approach to the bridge in St. Louis over the Mississippi River.
Looking good.
What trains will they be assigned to?
Not crazy about the fading stripes. Looked weird on the first P40s and it looks weird on these. Something about solid stripes + train.
Well all I know is Chicago to Milwaukee is down for one full trainset plus three new cab cars. Currently they use three trainsets so I expect Midwest or Amtrak will probably order more cars for more trainsets and that the current order is not enough. From what I heard the second Empire Builder will use the new trainset if the funding from MN goes through. Otherwise it will just fill the slot Chicago to Milwaukee.
Funny, the video makes the scene look like a model railroad layout.
I thought the same thing. Next time I’ll use steel benchwork.
I don’t know for certain but I would guess Midwest will use on the main corridors: CHI - DET; CHI-StL and CHI -MKE.
Was Amtrak so short of crew that UP had to forward the cars to CHI ?
Which is cheaper for Amtrak - Paying for a Amtrak crewed ‘SPECIAL EXTRA TRAIN’ between the points or paying freight charges for the cars between the points?
I suspect that Amtrak is charged a hefty price for operating ‘extra trains’ over and above the scheduled trains the freight carriers have contracted to haul.
As opposed to the common-sense expedient of adding them to an Amtrak consist already scheduled… like most of the Amtrak equipment moves I’ve seen documented?
I am pretty sure there’s a reason the cars were moved as observed. Might be plant access; might be some liability concern. I doubt it’s the private-railroad concern with avoiding local taxes at the point of ‘acceptance of delivery’… but I don’t know.
Adding 8 cars to an existing train would likely require additional power to maintain schedule.
Moving the cars in freight service also puts the liability on the freight carriers while the cars are in their hands.
My suspicion is Siemens is paying for delivery not Amtrak. The reason I say that is they are going to Beach Grove shops first so a presumption on my part is they have not been fully accepted or adapted for Amtrak service yet. One has to wonder why an Amtrak coach yard location in California was not chosen but I think that might have to do with them being “Amtrak Midwest” cars and internal cost allocations.
Which is all well and good - but why werer the SuperSteel bags and others sent from Schenectady to Miami for acceptance??? Why weren’t they sent to Beech Grove?
Other posts made me realize that it may have to do with sales tax. My airline never took delivery of airplanes in Seattle or Southern California but in a no sales tax state. Since Amtrak is not going to own these cars the state agencys may not be exempt ? As well Illinois aggency taking delivery in Illinois. -
I believe nearly all states have enacted laws that require the collection and remittance of Sale Tax for things purchased ‘out of state’.
There may be other applicable taxes beyond sales tax that are involved.
State agencies and entities have exemption certificates.
I had one, once upon a time when I had my restaurant and it allowed me to purchase food anywhere in the state, sales tax exempt…because I had to resell the food after prep into sandwiches and then charge a state sales tax. So it was the point of distribution of the final product which determined where the sales tax would be assessed…that was for restaurants (BTW, non-profits get them too).
I would guess the same holds true for manufactured products and I would think a manufacturer could declare that the item was not complete when shipped and so was not a saleable item yet. Item arrives in state where they want to deliver it and they finish assembly and charge the tax on the finished item. Still speculating here but I would also guess that manufacturers can get away with this since the sales tax is a fixed tax and not a value added tax. If it were value added then you would pay sales tax on the incomplete item shipped and then incremental tax on the items you add on the state where delivered.
It is a common balance sheet / accounting trick in this country for a manufacturing company to ship it’s various inventories among various subsidiaries to move the cost from one area of the company to another to inflate profits in one but not the other OR to deliberately let raw materials inventory fall to levels that will not sustain operations at year end to get it off the books and report a higher profit. I think they can also work tricks with their other two classes of inventory (Work-In-Process and Finished Goods Inventory) to accomplish the same goal of manipulating profits.
See 49 USC 24301 (l). [That’s a lowercase letter “L”]
Subsection (k) applies to other forms of business tax on acquisition of real property.
Do all states view Amtrak in the same manner as being public or private. After all the enabling legislation for Amtrak marks it as a ‘for profit’ entity.