Passenger Trains > #49 report and commentary

A friend who was riding LAKE SHORE LIMITED reported that he was 15 min early into Toledo and 1 hr 25 min LT into Chicago. 
This morning it appears that NS' Toledo West Dispatcher was the bench warmer who tripped the ball carrier.  He said the train was running right along until it got to Bryan, OH and started following freights, stopping several times.  He said last night's supper on the diner lite was somewhat disappointing and that breakfast was better, but OK - nothing to write home about.
Doing a little research, I see that CAPITOL LIMITED #29 left TOL 57 min ahead of #49 and arrived CHI 18 min" before #49 got there.
Here's a thought: with two passenger trains carrying perhaps 400-500 people between them, some of these patrons might have jobs that influence mode choice in moving freight.  When Amtrak crawls along because a freight is ahead, might some of these passengers who chose carriers in their line of work gain a negative impression of the freight railroad?  Wouldn't some think "if a freight train moves that slowly, it's going to take forever for my freight to get there"?  "If a drag freight holds me up an hour-and-a-half how do I know the railroad would ran an intermodal any better?"
This did not happen on a bad weather day.  No info on M/W activities on the Toledo West Dist.; however, one wonders that what the DS was faced with that resulted in such poor handling of two Amtraks.  If delays of this magnitude occured one a month or less, I would not post this.
Andy

Those whom are in a business position to ship freight don't ride Amtrak. 

Those whom are in a business position to ship freight don't ride Amtrak. 

Perhaps in large measure because it's so often late.

It has more to do with the fact that there aren't at least a dozen daily trains operating at speeds of 210mph.

You'd have to be at the dispatcher's desk to know all
​that was going on.  There are many factors beyond
his/her control that can cause delays.

Unfortunately in the year 2017 it is extremely difficult to run a scheduled, precision passenger rail service on mixed use rights of way. All redundancy and extra capacity is long gone gone as are the necessary manpower to make it work.

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SpeederDriver Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Those whom are in a business position to ship
> freight don't ride Amtrak. 
>
> Perhaps in large measure because it's so often
> late

NO, it's because business people don't ride trains.  I worked in a business environment for many years.  No one would even think about riding even in a sleeper and being jostled all night with a tiny community shower down the hall and a diner serving the same old generic food.  Business people rode trains before jet planes because that is all there was.  Now they fly there in a couple of hours, check into a nice hotel with a real bath and have a nice meal at a fine restaurant probably long with a few drinks and get a good nights sleep.  End of story.  People that ride the likes of the Capitol or Lake Shore Ltd are railfans, old, scared of flying and in coach, Greyhound bus people.  Late really has nothing to do with it.

What did you expect the dispatcher to do with the freight trains? It's not like (s)he can waive a magic wand and make them disappear...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/16/17 18:35 by DevalDragon.

Back when shipping executives rode overnight trains, the railroads offered a lot of sleeper combinations which seem odd today.

(New York Central, P&LE) Pittsburgh to Massena NY (Alcoa's HQ in one place, one of their main plants in the other)

(Erie) Jersey City to Jamestown NY (furniture buyers in JC and NYC area, furniture makers in Jamestown)

are two off the top of my head.  The book Night Trains has many examples.


My company made it clear to me that if I wanted to spend a day traveling somewhere that I could get to in a few hours by air, I'd take the train on their dime but use vacation time.