Passenger Trains > Cardinal Bus Bridge

In reference to the two threads relating to the Cardinal and the bridge collapse on the Indianapolis Sub.

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?2,2508740

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?4,2508820

The Cardinal will operate from Cincinnati to Chicago using a bus bridge until Tuesday. One bus will serve Indianapolis and Connersville while the other buses will operate to Chicago direct. After Tuesday no alternate transportation between Chicago and Cincinnati will be provided by Amtrak. This is at least until August. The Cardinal will operate as a New York to Cincinnati only train but with it's full consist including sleeper and baggage car. It will still be fueled and watered at Russel and looks like the onboard crews may be doing the light cleaning at Cincinnati. The Cardinal is expected to be turned on the wye in Latonia then stored at the piggy back ramp near CUT.

Jim

Bus Bridge this early morning

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Baggage will only be checked to Cincinnati and must be claimed to be placed on the buses.

Before the buses showed up I spotted a cat and tried some night photography with him in it. He didn't do too bad for a thirty second exposure although the whole scene looks surreal.

Jim

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Woah, that cat does not look real AT ALL! It's a ghost kitty!

Cool. Thanks for posting. Guess 29/30 and 48/49 will be picking up a lot of the slack.

No. 50's on-time performance out of Cincinnati should be vastly improved. ;)

I'd still be willing to bet a sack of White Castles (with onion chips) that the Hamilton - Indianapolis line won't be re-opened for a long time, if ever.

timecruncher

CUT is still one good lookng station!

santafedan Wrote:
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> CUT is still one good lookng station!
That she is, that she is, one of the pluses of riding the Cardinal is to walk through the front doors at CUT and gaze up into the beauty of the rotunda, I'll never get tired of doing that.

Does this mean the Hoosier State will run daily between Indy and Chicago until the Cardinal is returned? BTW, nice pix. That is an eerie picture of that cat, perhaps its the ghost of Chessie.

timecruncher Wrote:
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> I'd still be willing to bet a sack of White
> Castles (with onion chips) that the Hamilton -
> Indianapolis line won't be re-opened for a long
> time, if ever.
>
> timecruncher

There's a White Castle across the street from the Indy Amtrak station....

cashfare Wrote:
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> Cool. Thanks for posting. Guess 29/30 and 48/49
> will be picking up a lot of the slack.


Looks like Amtrak is falling apart! A good year to consider air travel.

I don't believe CSX has any plans to shut down the line. They have a repair plan and it will take a month to replace the bridge. While the line is not a high density freight line, it has healthy traffic. There is no easy reroute for the traffic on that line. I think it survives.

F40PHR231 Wrote:
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> Woah, that cat does not look real AT ALL! It's a
> ghost kitty!

Ghost of Chessie maybe?

Dave

timecruncher Wrote:
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> I'd still be willing to bet a sack of White
> Castles (with onion chips) that the Hamilton -
> Indianapolis line won't be re-opened for a long
> time, if ever.
>
> timecruncher


you will lose that bet....

reindeerflame Wrote:
>
> Looks like Amtrak is falling apart! A good year
> to consider air travel.


Nice encouraging news, how long would security lines be with displaced Amtrak passengers havin' to show up at certain airports at least 2 hours before take off!

ProAmtrak Wrote:
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> Nice encouraging news, how long would security lines be with displaced Amtrak passengers havin'
> to show up at certain airports at least 2 hours before take off!

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With ALL the displaced passengers from the Cardinal out of Chicago?

About a minute or three. And only three days a week.

At other airports along the route, hardly any effect at all. And the closer you get to Cincinnati, the more
people will be driving.

I'll take that bet. Target date for line reopening is July 17th.

timecruncher Wrote:
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> I'd still be willing to bet a sack of White
> Castles (with onion chips) that the Hamilton -
> Indianapolis line won't be re-opened for a long
> time, if ever.
>
> timecruncher

Of course anyone traveling from the east will take the Capitol Limited or lake Shore Limited like Cashfare said. For Cincinnati alone my guess is the displaced passengers Cincinnati to Chicago passengers will take Megabus, Drive, Not take the trip at all, fly, or other (including Greyhound). Yes Megabus has become that popular here in Cincinnati and beats the pants off of Amtrak in speed and schedule and does alright on pricing if purchased early enough. Busloads of people waiting in Fourth Street prove it every day. Outside of Cincinnati passengers going to Chicago that would normally take the Cardinal will likely drive or not take the trip. These are all guesswork of course but would be interesting to see how close to reality they are. The area served by the Cardinal in West Virginia is not overly accommodating to airline travel although it can be done at a price. Surprisingly the area is also not a Greyhound hotspot with only two trips per day from Charleston, Huntington, Ashland, to Columbus and connections from there to beyond. Not many trips north, south or southeast out of Charleston. What is fascinating is how many nooks and crannies, and that takes in much of the state of West Virginia, are reached by rural intercounty transit systems, maybe only a trip or two per day but look at www.apta.com/ and find the links to West Virginia Transit systems, you'll be amazed. The West Virginia highway system of today is nothing to laugh at either. Speeds are at 70 or 75 on the interstate and 65 on many dual US routes. And the roadways are better than what we find in Ohio.

So the sad truth is we CAN survive without the Cardinal, and without Amtrak for that matter, but if it died a little piece of me would die with it. With the way things are going into the toilet in general my suggestion is to ride as many Amtrak trains as you can as soon you can.

Oh, I am glad everybody liked seeing the little ghost kitty.

Jim

Edit: I see that the line is slated to reopen by July 17th. That saves me from having to tie the rope around the light in the kitchen for you know what if Amtrak stopped running here. At least I can use the bleach I bought for clothes too. But seriously though...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/09/11 20:04 by tq-07fan.

Everybody should be thankful that the bridge incident didn't happen with Amtrak.

ats90mph Wrote:
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> Everybody should be thankful that the bridge
> incident didn't happen with Amtrak.


Yes, we don't want other Sunset Limited like in 1994 that killed 47 people off of bridge.