I just got off the coast starlight this morning, and I was surprised… pulling into Emeryville - ON TIME! I take Amtrak all the time, and for the first time my train has arrived on time (Not including amtrak california trains).
Even on my trip out to the northwest, we were only … about 20 minutes late… I think.
Has anything happened recently that is keeping amtrak trains on time? Because I still see lots of freight trains, although now they are the ones that are stopping…
I may be going out on a limb here, but I don’t think the Christmas rush and “rush of presents” has had much effect on railways since they got out of the less-than-carload business.
I have been trying to take pics of Amtrak 19 (Crescent southbound) north of Atlanta for several weeks. In winter, it goes through here right before there is enough good light so I have been looking for one that is running late. At least since Thanksgiving, they have all been on time. I am sure once I lose interest they will start running late again. [:D]
A couple years ago, the I-5 corridor was full of trains bringing lumber down to the Southwest to build cheap housing for all those house flippers to invest in. Well, those trains are gone, as well as the empties returning to the PNW.
Also, UP recently rerouted the Portland empties (MWCPD) from the Coast Line out of LA to the Valley Line, and there are fewer baretables moving south on the Coast Line as the result of fewer intermodal shipments.
My first reaction would be that even a stopped clock has the correct time twice daily.
However, the 2006 to 2007 performance reports indicate improving trends. I’d guess that in addition to a reduction to some freight train movements, better track conditions due to heavier maintenance levels and maybe some capacity improvements come into play. There was probably some more slack built into some schedules and maybe just a greater attention to the problem by the host railroads.
All that, but if I had to be somewhere by a certain date and time, I would still leave a day early.
Heck, I do that when I’m flying. I never try to fly to a meeting the same day as the meeting. Too much stress, too tired, too much risk. If I can afford to miss the meeting because my flight is late, I really don’t need to go at all. Amtrak corridor service, on the other hand, I have no compunction against using for same-day arrival.
At the current rate of flight cancellations, you may soon have to start your trips two days early. (Does anybody wonder why corporate jets are so popular?)
Railroads haven’t been in the L-C-L buisness for quite a while, but I meant intermodel traffic, where there’s containers or trailers filled with toys bound for toy stores and distrabution centers.
Way back when (sometime in the last century), Amtrak and the SP got in a legal hassle over the performance of the Sunset Limited. Sometime this year, the UP and Amtrak got together on a plan to better deal with maintenance of way schedules and other issue, but no law suit was involved.
The Xmas rush to distro centres happens in July-August, even so, it represents such a small percentage of total intermodal traffic that there isn’t going to be a noticeable increase in freight volume because of toy shipments. There aren’t any 120 car unit trains of ‘Tickle-Me-Elmos’ out there.
Well. “peak season” for UPS traffic is the middle of November to just before Christmas. Many UPS trains run in more than one section for that time period.
Luck and improved performance probably had something to do with the Coast Starlight being on time.
For the fiscal year ended September 30, 2007, which is the latest complete on-time performance information on Amtrak’s web site, the Coast Starlight’s on-time percentage at its end points averaged 22.1. This is a significant improvement over FFY 2006, when the average was 3.9.
The average on-time percentage for Amtrak’s long distance trains in FFY 2007 was 41.6, up from 30 in FFY 2006. The worst on time percentage for end point arrivals was turned in by the California Zephyr. It was 10.2 in FFY 2007.
The best on time percentages were turned in by the Acela Express (87.8) followed by the Keystone and Regional corridor trains at 85.4 and 78.0.
Overall, the minutes of delay per 10,000 train miles on BNSF, CN, CPR, CSX, NS, and UP were down in 2007 compared to 2006 for most of the year. They exceed FFYs 2001 through 2005 for most of the year, although the gap appears to have closed significantly near the end of the year, and they dropped below FFY 2004 and 2005 during September 2007.
Other than to indicate that the host railroad or Amtrak or both were responsible for the delays, the report does not provide any insight into the root cause of the problem and what the host railroads were doing to address the problem.
Speaking of Amtrak and timeliness, here are two questions:
Both the westbound and eastbound California Zephyr almost always lose about 10 to 25 minutes during their station stop in Omaha. Yesterday evening, the westbound Zephyr sat at the station for an entire hour. Why might this be?
The westbound Zephyr originates in Chicago. For this reason, it almost always used to depart Chicago right on time. However, it has recently become a fairly common occurrence for it to depart up to 45 minutes late. This evening, it departed 7 hours and 2 minutes late. I just don’t see how they can consistently depart late when this is their origination point. Any ideas?
I’m not bashing Amtrak for their lateness, I’m just wondering why these two things are happening.