Passenger Trains > Orange County Rail Line To Be Closed.

For those of you who have not as of yet been informed. On 11/15/2014 the Orange County Line will be closed for track work. There will not be any Amtrak BNSF or Metrolink Service on that day according to the North County Transit District website. Many thanks to NCTD for doing Amtrak Caltrans and Metrolinks job in informing the public.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/28/14 15:05 by msdgbar.

It's nice to see Amtrak is still selling tickets on Nov. 15 for the Surfliner service.

Revenues are important!

Perhaps buses will operate.

Will the SW Chief be affected? Detour via Metrolink San Bernardino line?

Posted from iPhone

Someone needs to advise NCTD of this little secret:

"Maintenance of Way track work can be performed in the wee hours of the morning and passenger schedules don't have to be annulled."

Could someone please pass this memo along to them? They obviously have not yet received it.

CA_Sou_MA_Agent Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Someone needs to advise NCTD of this little
> secret:
>
> "Maintenance of Way track work can be performed in
> the wee hours of the morning and passenger
> schedules don't have to be annulled."
>
> Could someone please pass this memo along to them?
> They obviously have not yet received it.


They received it and decided that they didn't want to pay the overtime for the contractors to work at night!

PHall Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> They received it and decided that they didn't want
> to pay the overtime for the contractors to work at
> night!

So after they chase away all the passengers because the schedules are so unreliable, they'll at least have a well-manicured, smooth railroad.

BNSF and Pacific Sun will appreciate it if no one else.

rms492 Wrote:
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> Will the SW Chief be affected? Detour via
> Metrolink San Bernardino line?
>
> Posted from iPhone


Unless the SW Chief goes near Oceanside. I do not think it will be affected

Jerry Martin
Los Angeles, CA
Central Coast Railroad Festival

CA_Sou_MA_Agent Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Someone needs to advise NCTD of this little
> secret:
>
> "Maintenance of Way track work can be performed in
> the wee hours of the morning and passenger
> schedules don't have to be annulled."
>
> Could someone please pass this memo along to them?
> They obviously have not yet received it.

This has become standard operating procedure on the Surfline, close the line on weekends to do major work. Remember that from Fullerton to San Diego, the line is owned by transportation agencies more interested in commuter operation than Amtrak service.

The complete shut down of the line for construction is more efficient for those doing the work and should result in lower cost and faster work. However, it does make the service provided less reliable to the weekend users.

Cliff

Everyone seems to have a different agenda.

Canceling all the COASTERS on the weekends doesn't win friends.

The story I heard is that, being a government agency that accepts taxpayer funds, NCTD doesn't want to upset all those taxpayers / voters who live near the track and who would be highly offended having to listen to ballast regulators and tampers at three in the morning.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/29/14 08:56 by CA_Sou_MA_Agent.

CA_Sou_MA_Agent Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "Maintenance of Way track work can be performed in
> the wee hours of the morning and passenger
> schedules don't have to be annulled."

There is only about a 7 hour window each night at Oceanside (down to about 6 hours at Sorrento Valley). This is plenty of time for routine track maintenance but when it comes time for major work like cutting in new track, bridge replacement and things like that, 6 hours can be tight and if there are complications then you are faced with turning passengers away the next morning. Finding out two weeks ahead of time a train is available that day isn't the best but finding out THAT MORNING when I go to the train station would piss me off a LOT more.