Supposedly, Amtrak’s bread and butter is the line between Washington, DC. and Boston, MA.
In the 1990s, I lived in the northeast, in a few different cities, and had friends in every city between Boston and DC. I used to take Amtrak quite a bit when I would visit them. During rush hour trips, this train was packed to the gills with professionals.
What was it like pre-Amtrak? I know that the Pennsylvania Railroad had a passenger train called The Senator that linked these two cities. What about other railroads? I’m no expert, but it seems that much of the northeastern passenger service linked northeast cities to points further west.
I’m just curious how many options were available to a traveler going between DC and Boston. I’m also curious if Amtrak’s current route includes any track that the PRR would have used for The Senator.
Well, the PRR and NH had three day trains, complete with coach, dining, and parlor car service, and one overnight train, complete with coaches. sleeping accommodations, and breakfast service that ran over the same route that Amtrak now uses between Washington and Boston. There was no service like the business class that Amtrak offers.
As to Northeast-Midwest service, both the PRR and NYC had through trains between New York and Chicago, St. Louis, and Cincinnati, with at least one NYC train to Chicago routed through
If I remember corrrectly the Metroliner equipment was first delivered in PRR emblems and lettering, then Penn Central, the Amtrak. PRR was really the one pushing for the Corridor to get DOT funds to upgrade it’s infrastructure. That’s where it started from my recollection.
I remember riding between NYP and WAS in the early 60s when I was a little kid - about 5 years old. Very nice. Clean coach seats. Very smooth (especially compared to Ping Pong coaches on the Long Island). They even had a snack cart come by a few times. I remember them adding and dropping a few P70s with those green mohair seats in Phila.
In the late 60s and early 70s I rode a bit between Phila and NYP as a young teen. Metroliners were rough and fast - and very cool! Conventional trains were tired and dirty by then and AC and heating were spotty.
In the early years of Amtrak, I traveled a good bit on the NEC and from NYG to Albany-Rensselaer. New upholstery and a bit cleaner than PC, but rough ride and many hot cars in the summer. It was almost always worth the extra buck or two to upgrade to Metroliner on teh south end of the corridor.
Time keeping was good south of NYP and lousy north of there to Boston.
The other cool thing about the corridor was the through trains from the south. The SCL trains powered by GG1s and the through sleepers on the Crescent.
Don’t leave out the UA Turbotrain, which up to the oil crisis in '73 was being positioned as the Amtrak counterpart to the Metroliners north of New York. It’s interesting to consider what might have happened if improvement of track comparable to PRR’s between NYP and Washington had been done north of New Haven, as was expected (to 150mph standards) starting in the mid-Seventies. I do not know if there were across-the-platform timed transfers between the two high-speed services, but it was certainly possible, and further saved the time of a power or train change at New Haven that would still be required even if Metroliners ran through.
Johnny, I thought we were discussing Amtrak operations. Under NH and then PC, the TurboTrain ran into Grand Central. But by the time I was riding it the train ran over Hell Gate and into Penn Station. Someone will be able to find out the shoe modifications required. I never connected through to a Metroliner but I read that some sort of coordination was intended.
The RTL TurboLINERS of course ran up the Hudson out of Grand Central for about 15 years … but then they too went into Penn, over the Empire Connection.
Overmod, thanks for correcting my memory. Perhaps after my trip from Back Bay to New York in 1969 I did not pay much attention to the Turbotrain operation. I did see one set in Tuscaloosa when it was touring the country.
I just now looked in my copy of the last real Guide (April 1971)*–*and, Lo and Behold, there were connections, except Saturday and Sunday, between the Turboliner and a Metroliner. By then the Turboliner ran from and to South Station. The Turbotliner ran week days only.
“PRR” never went all the way from Boston to DC; even the dedicated trains like the Senator were handed over to NH at some point, just as the trains out of GCT went onto the New Haven at Woodlawn to travel by way of New Rochelle, and NH didn’t become ‘part’ of a single Northeast Corridor entity until it was folded into PC at the eleventh hour. Only under PC did the GG1s start being run through under the electrification. I believe there was one Metroliner trip that ran straight through to New Haven under the electrification (arranged in Amtrak’s first year, I think November 1971), but I think all the other sets were reserved for trips in the ‘principal’ corridor between New York and Washington which had been rebuilt to handle the appropriate high speeds and relatively low track impacts necessary for the Metroliners to operate properly.
There was a “Metroliner” service that ran through to Boston in the early '80s, but this was with Amfleet and more conventional power, including of course an engine change at New Haven.
All the other operations from either north or south terminated in the New York region, the PRR/PC being the only railroad with an effective passenger connection across the Hudson anywhere south of Albany. While NYC had plenty of Chicago to Boston trains, they were split from the New York part at Albany and to my knowledge no ex-Great Steel Fleet trains from New York had a direct section going to Boston; they only received cars from there to go west. NYC certainly had no run-through from the east side of the Hudson, and the Empire Connection (which would require a reversing move in Penn Station to continue south anyway; it runs right over the top of the North River bores at virtually a right angle as it enters the station trackage) was not completed until the late '80s.
Overmod, I cannot give you the time span except that it was after the War and the NYC had many new lightweight cars, but there was a time when Boston had its own train to Chicago, the New England States.
My understanding has been that the NH was not electified to Boston. The electrification from New York all the way to Boston was done under Amtrak ownership.
I remember the New England States being introduced in 1938 as the connection to the new Century. What you are thinking of was the 1949 establishment of this as ‘its own train’, direct between Boston and Chicago with no splitting off New York cars. I think the train lost its name very late, in 1967, and the service persisted under PC, I think right up to Amtrak day.
You would be correct: the New Haven electrification only went as far east as New Haven, where engines had to be changed to continue to Boston or Springfield. There was no real point in extending the electrification in the early ‘lack of money’ Amtrak days, and only Federal money could justify the full electrification (which as I recall came with a very expensive realignment for higher speed that revealed an even more expensive (to deal with) line of stone monuments marking the center line of double track. The only real justification for electrification was the absence of practical high-speed self-contained locomotives at the time 150mph service was being planned, any turbine power being understood to be too wasteful of fuel and difficult to use on some of the electrified trackage (see the TurboTrain and what would have to be done to a JetTrain for some instructive examples)
i still find it interesting there was so little practical interest in electrified commuter service in Boston, as there was in Philadelphia and to a lesser extent the feeder services to New York. Was this a Mellen by-product?
EDIT: I did not mention this but it may be important here: starting as early as the mid-Seventies Amtrak started running “Metroliners” that did not use the MP-85 style MUs. One amusing consequence was the attempt to use rebuilt GG1s with Amfleet equipment first at 110 and then prospectively at 120mph to substitute for MUs that needed extensive “rework” to run. This worked quite well… just as with early Audi Quattros… until the time came to stop. Then the limited weight of the consist and the very substantial mass of the GG1 threw a substantial load on the twelve driver… tires. Some of which then decided to go on strike, sometimes at speed. Exit the planned higher-speed G rebuilds; enter the Rc-4 design…
The ‘Metroliners’ in the '80s that went through to Boston were this kind of train, likely run behind the e
As I recall, except for the Riley, the NYC names for trains vanished in 1968. Also, three trains were combined between Rensselaer and Buffalo–the former Century, Wolverine, and New England States. I rode from New York to Chicago via Detroit in the spring of 1969, using a Slumbercoach to Detroit. The next year, I rode from Boston to Chicago via Cleveland, changing in Rensselaer because there was no longer a through Slumbercoach, though there were still.through coaches and a sleeper.
You are right about the earlier beginning of the New England States, I just looked in a 1943 Guide that I have handy (most of my Guides are in boxes which I have difficulty in looking through because they are heavy and I need to be careful in handling the)m.
According to my PRR 1957 Passenger Train Schedule, the PRR/New Haven had four daily trains between Boston and Washington, one daily except Saturday train between Boston and Philadelphia, another Boston to Philadelphia train that ran except on Friday and Saturday, and one Providence to Washington train with a different schedule on Saturdays and Sundays.
The PRR had 16 daily trains – includes the Boston/Washington offerings - between New York and Washington in both directions. Another 3 trains ran on a six day a week schedule, which changed for the seventh day, between New York and Washington. It had one train that ran only on Sunday night, and it had a train that ran from 30th Street Philadelphia to Washington except on Saturday and Sunday.
Between Washington and New York it one train that was carded for daily operation, with no service on Saturday and Sunday. Another train ran on Mondays only; two others ran every day but Sunday, but they were covered by other trains that ran on Sundays with different schedules.
The premier offerings between New York and Washington were the Morning, Afternoon, and Evening Congressional. These trains were still running when I moved to New York in 1961. I rode them frequently on business trips to Washington and back. The quickest time was 3 hours and 35 minutes. They were equipped with coaches, parlor (bar lounge) and dining cars. As I recall it they were very nice rides.
[quote user=“Overmod”]
“PRR” never went all the way from Boston to DC; even the dedicated trains like the Senator were handed over to NH at some point, just as the trains out of GCT went onto the New Haven at Woodlawn to travel by way of New Rochelle, and NH didn’t become ‘part’ of a single Northeast Corridor entity until it was folded into PC at the eleventh hour. Only under PC did the GG1s start being run through under the electrification. I believe there was one Metroliner trip that ran straight through to New Haven under the electrification (arranged in Amtrak’s first year, I think November 1971), but I think all the other sets were reserved for trips in the ‘principal’ corridor between New York and Washington which had been rebuilt to handle the appropriate high speeds and relatively low track impacts necessary for the Metroliners to operate properly.
There was a “Metroliner” service that ran through to Boston in the early '80s, but this was with Amfleet and more conventional power, including of course an engine change at New Haven.
All the other operations from either north or south terminated in the New York region, the PRR/PC being the only railroad with an effective passenger connection across the Hudson anywhere south of Albany. While NYC had plenty of Chicago to Boston trains, they were split from the New York part at Albany and to my knowledge no ex-Great Steel Fleet trains from New York had a direct section going to Boston; they only received cars from there to go west. NYC certainly had no run-through from the east side of the Hudson, and the Empire Connection (which would require a reversing move in Penn Station to continue south anyway; it runs right over the top of the North River bores at virtually a right angle as it enters the station trackage) was not completed until the late '80s.
The only possible alternative would be to use the Poughkeepsie bridge, connecting ultimately