Railroaders' Nostalgia > The first Superliner to the West Coast...

To all on TO,

I have debated sharing some of my railroading "adventures" here on TO, but after reading those of KeyRouteKen and others, and since it is Amtrak's birthday, I decided I would do so... Back on May 1, 1979, Amtrak's 8th birthday, I gave a slide show about the history of passenger trains in the west in the morning, and as I was heading to my office in downtown Los Angeles I was in for a big surprise. As I drove over the former Santa Fe 8th Street Coach Yard along the concrete Los Angeles "River," I looked down as I always did to see what was in the yard and had a nice Amtrak's birthday surprise. Sitting in the yard, having just arrived that day (probably on the "Southwest Limited") was the first Superliner car to come to the west coast! As explanation, Superliners had been sent to the DOT Test Track near Pueblo prior to this, but this was the first one to come all the way west.

I quickly turned off the freeway and made my way to the yard where I joined dozens of yard employees looking at and through this unheated, unpowered car. The car was in town for the 40th anniversary celebration for the Los Angeles Union Passenger Terminal (Union Station today), and it was displayed there over that weekend, again with no power. (Fortunately it was a cold, foggy May at that time...) The car was Superliner coach 34035, a car I would see often and also ride aboard numerous times in my more than two decades with the company. To my knowledge this car is still at work out there today.

My early impressions of the first Superliner coach I was ever aboard are as follows:

A) The larger windows were a big improvement over regular 44-seat conventional coaches or the ex-Santa Fe Hi-Level coaches then in service, however, that tall headrests did much to block that view.
B) The seats did not recline nearly as far back as did existing conventional coach equipment and thus were not nearly as good for overnight travel.
C) The restrooms were airplane-style and much smaller and more cramped that the older pre-Amtrak cars.
D) Nice, large overhead luggage racks above the seats.
E) Overhead lights were too bright for night-time viewing or sleep. (I discovered this when aboard the new cars when equipped with power a few months later...)

Overall, very nice cars and visually impressive, but definitely a comedown in overall comfort for passengers compared to the older conventional equipment - assuming that older equipment was fully functional. Setting aside the mechanical problems and translucent lexan windows of the older equipment at the time, the first years of Amtrak had some pretty good trains that served good food - particularly here in the west. Little did I think on that cold, foggy morning in southern California that I would travel well over 500,000 miles aboard Superliners, and that the cars would still be running more than four decades later.

My concern today is how much longer can these now very old cars continue serving Amtrak and its long-distance trains, having survived more than a quarter century of neglect, poor maintenance, and intentional management opposition to them and the trains they are assigned to? Even Superliner II cars from the early 1990's are now very "long-in-the-tooth..." Consider how old the oldest cars inherited by Amtrak were in 1971 and compare that to today's operational fleet...

Ride the long distance trains while you can...

I hope this memory will spur others from those of you old enough to remember Amtrak's early days...

Best wishes,

ShastaDaylight

These cars were delivered before the P-S strike

Posted from iPhone

ShastaDaylight --
Thanbk you very much for that fascinating memory of the
very first Superliner to come out West.

I, too, find that they are not nearly as comfortable and
roomy as the pre-Amntrak streamliner-era coaches.

Here is my list of things I do not like about Superliners:

1. Spiral staircase is too narrow
2. Seats do not recline enough
3. Plastic strip between the 2 seat cushions
4. Doors cannot be train-lined
5. Too little legroom, compared to streamliner-era coaches

Pullman-Standard should have designed the stairways to be just
like the ones in the California cars that were designed in the
late 1980 -- they are wide enough for two people, and have a
landing halfway up.

Ride the coaches when coming back from Eugene, Or on 11.
Thing that bugs me at night, the interior lighting is too bright to see out the windows.
Looks like they could be turn off with just the aisle lights and blue overhead lights used.
Always wondered if it was an AMTRAK rule to leave them one. They will cut them back around 10pm.

Steve Panzik
Chiloquin, Or

Margaret_SP_fan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ShastaDaylight --
> Thanbk you very much for that fascinating memory
> of the
> very first Superliner to come out West.
>
> I, too, find that they are not nearly as
> comfortable and
> roomy as the pre-Amntrak streamliner-era coaches.
>
> Here is my list of things I do not like about
> Superliners:
>
> 1. Spiral staircase is too narrow
> 2. Seats do not recline enough
> 3. Plastic strip between the 2 seat cushions
> 4. Doors cannot be train-lined
> 5. Too little legroom, compared to
> streamliner-era coaches
>
> Pullman-Standard should have designed the
> stairways to be just
> like the ones in the California cars that were
> designed in the
> late 1980 -- they are wide enough for two people,
> and have a
> landing halfway up.

Well, the cars redone for Business Class service fixed a couple of your problems.
The leg rest seats recline almost all the way to flat and there is a lot of legroom now too.
Rode one yesterday from LA to San Jose and it was very nice. Worth every cent of the $29 extra fare for Business Class.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/03/17 23:51 by PHall.