When Amtrak first came into existence, the blunt offer was extended to all existing railroads to transfer their intercity and interstate passenger operations to Amtrak, or forever be required to operate them separately. AT&SF agonized over that ultimatum, eventually deciding to allow Amtrak to take over its passenger operations.
Recently, I read that “Southern declined to join Amtrak at its formation in 1971, and until it did so in February 1979, the Southern Crescent stood as one of the last privately operated long-distance passenger trains in the land.” Quote is from Steel Wheels Rolling: A Personal Journey of Railroad Photography, by J. Parker Lamb, 2001, p 111.
Several questions arise from that quotation:
If the ultimatum was not truly an ultimatum, AT&SF would have persevered with its passenger operations. IIRC, those operations were still profitable, though declining rapidly. I vaguely recall AT&SF also had new hi-level trainsets on order at the time, so committed it was to its passenger service.
If the Southern Crescent was ONE of the last privately operated long-distance trains, what were the others that chose not to be included in Amtrak and kept running on their own?
How did Southern and/or others get an exemption to be later included in Amtrak?
The other operators of long-distance trains that chose not to join were Rock Island and Denver & Rio Grande Western.
There was no ultimatum to join nor any obligation on the part of any railroad to join, only an offer. The offer was that a railroad that joined was freed of its common-carrier obligations to offer passenger service. The price was a cash payment by the railroad of 2 or 3 years (I cannot remember which) of its avoidable losses it would have incurred if it had continued to run its passenger service, the losses figured over a specified period prior to the institution of Amtrak. Railroads that had just prior to Amtrak been able to discontinue substantial passenger service were at a disadvantage as their cash payment would have a higher base than the avoidable losses going forward.
On an avoidable-cost basis Santa Fe and SCL were not major money losers. If one considered capital costs, however – and ultimately the equipment would have to be replaced – they were both highly negative. Santa Fe’s Jack Barriger did an in-depth study demonstrating this to Mr. Reed. Mr. Reed discussed with me on several occasions that as much as he valued the legacy of Santa Fe passenger service and the corporation’s public responsibility, after reading Jack’s report there was no longer any question in his mind that the only fair decision for the railroad’s shippers, investors, employees, passengers, and the public was to join Amtrak as the Santa Fe’s passenger service was unsustainable.
There was no exemption to join Amtrak later. The offer was one-time. Southern and Rio Grande both joined at a later date with a separate negotiation with separate terms and conditions.
I am not sure about the report of a Santa Fe order for new equipment in the late 1960s; that’s the first I’ve heard of that and I don’t see any records of i
The Alaska Railroad still runs their long distance trains. The Georgia Railroad ran their mixed trains for several years, I believe for tax purposes. Soo Line had passenger service using cabooses continuing for several years as well.
I’m surprised that the Rock didn’t join. They were in dire financial straits. I would have thought they would have jumped at the chance of off loading their money-losing passenger operations and been first in line.
Georgia Railroad and Soo Line were not intercity long-distance services, but local services, and thus ineligible. Alaska Railroad was then federally owned and its losses were covered out of the federal treasury already. Categories are never 100% fits-all, are they!
SP&S and UP offered mixed-train or caboose-only passenger service until what, 1970?
I believe the last order of hi level chair cars came in '64. This is when they got the convertible step-up cars. I also believe it was just for chair cars (no lounges or diners). I would have to verify this when I get home, unless someone else can confirm this.
My memory on this point is foggy as well, and I too don’t have ready access to my reference material. IIRC, at the time of the Amtrak decision, AT&SF was ordering (or about to order) new hi-level cars for its transcontinental runs (ostensibly only the El Cap) while transferring the older rolling stock to its other Chiefs and trains. If new hi-level cars were already on order, it could well be AT&SF cancelled them with the decision to transfer all passenger assets to Amtrak. I also seem to recall at some point the San Francisco Chief was to be made into a hi-level train as well while still under control by the AT&SF.
Rock Island didn’t join based in part on the fact that the buy-in would have cost more than absorbing the losses on the remaining trains (Chicago-Peoria & Chicago-Rock Island). This was due to the fact that a Chicago-Omaha train and a Minneapolis-Kansas City train were discontinued just prior to the passage of the Rail Passenger Service Act and their operating expenses were factored to Rock Island’s buy-in price.
That sounds reasonable. I know that the last order that was actually delivered was in the mid '60s. If business was good enough, I can see where they may have either ordered more towards “the end”, and then cancelled the order, or considered another order.
The San Francisco Chief, and the Texas Chief did use hi level chair cars. I don’t believe that either train ever had the lounges or diners (only enough of them to operate the El Cap and El Cap/Super Chief). They Texas and San Fran used the “Big Domes” and standard diners.
I had no doubt you would top it by thinking of other railroads. I can’t hold a candle to your knowledge of such things.
What I though you might, however, do is call on your impressive encyclopedia-like knowledge of trains to know that, in answering his question, I was plagarizing someone. I thought the quote was particularly effective in that it made me remember that the Rio Grande opted out of Amtrak.
I enjoyed riding the Southern Crescent several times during its “twilight” in the Seventies. It was a nicely restored (or is rehabbed a better word) train with the best equipment Southern had on its roster. The paint scheme was green and cream throughout the train, and the diner was a real starched-napery restaurant where patrons wrote down their orders on a pad, “old school.” The Southern had gone to ribbon-rail on that line already, and the ride was quiet and rather soft, with a slight tendency to jounce, probably due to older springs.
In fact, Southern even ran local newspaper advertisements urging people to try the train, with an especial emphasis on the overnight D.C. - Atlanta leg. Who else was doing that in the middle 1970s?
I’m sure many of you know that W. Graham Claytor was president of Southern Rwy at the time and he took it as a matter of professional pride that the train be run as well as possible. This is one of the many reasons his reputation as a “good guy” railroader endures.
I have only two regrets: I couldn’t afford a sleeper and I didn’t clip those newspapers ads! - a.s.
After AMTRAK started up rode Southern Wash - Charlottesville on its toonerville trolley (Wash - Lybchburg) A FP7 and one pullman standard light wt coach. Crew very nice. Several days later rode Cresent Charlottesville - ATL. Heard the train approaching so went on platform 4 E units but it didn"t stop(oh no !!!) then noticed it had about 18 - 20 heavy weight 1000 series coach cars. Agent forgot to say first train was a safety patrol train. About 5 minutes later Cresent stopped with 4 E units and 16 cars as I was still trying to get my heart out of my throat. We passed the heavy safety patrol train about Monroe, Va. Crew was great, ride great and on time Atlanta, Safety patrol about 1 hour behind us on time that Sou had published to parents.
What was the purpose of the safety train? If there was a potential problem lurking somewhere, maybe no trains should have been running until a work train and crews cleared the track for traffic.
Last time I recall a safety train running ahead of a passenger train was when Nikita Khrushchev was traveling on the PRR’s Northeast Corridor in 1960 from Washington, DC, enroute to the United Nations in New York City. The powers-that-be had a similar GG1 and trainset run ahead of Khrushchev’s train to draw out any bombs or assassination attempts.
No service on D&H lines was included in the Amtrak system of 1971, though D&H joined just like everyone else that wanted to get rid of the long-distance passenger train burden. The D&H service that began post-Amtrak was a New York State-supported train.
The revived Adirondak in 1974 (or late 73?) was some good looking train! It ran with those D&H PAs north of Albany Rensselaer and a solid consist of D&H equipment. There were a couple thru coaches to/from GCT. NY even paid to have the PAs reengined with 251 by MK. They added an Amtrak dome car for a while and then it all went away when the Turboliners arrived and they used them on the Adirondak. …about the only downside to the Turboliner’s arrival…