Passenger Trains > Check baggage on Amtrak & connections

FACT PATTERN:

Passenger holds a ticket from Emeryville to Albuquerque on San Joaquin #712, with the bus bridge and then eastward on #4. Passenger checks two bags in Emeryville and departs on #712.

Passenger arrived in Los Angeles at proper time in the evening and gets on #4 which leaves on time and he has a steak for dinner.

QUESTION: Does the bag magically make its way from #712 to the bus to #4 and appear in ABQ for pickup or does the passenger have to schlep the bags at Bakersfield and then again in Los Angeles?

John Gezelius
Tustin, CA

It may go by the Starlight to LA and be a day late.
I checked in at Jack London (Oakland) for a trip to Kansas City routed via the Zepher to Omaha and the bus to KC. My bag went to LA and then on No. 4 to KC, arriving one day later.
Not exactly your situation, and a few years ago, so be guided by newer information.
My wife once read (and believes in) advice to never travel with more baggage than you can run through an airport of station with and we have had to do that once or twice.

I did something similar to this but in reverse last September. I arrived in Los Angeles on #1 in a sleeper. I checked my 2 bags at LAUPT for Emeryville using the bus bridge to Bakersfield then San Joaquin train #715 to Emeryville. After checking my bags, I enjoyed an oven-fried chicken sub at Subway for BREAKFAST (my brain clock, stuck in the eastern time zone said it was lunch time!), then eventually went out side to board one of 3 buses (my luggage was not on the bus I was riding), once I got to Bakersfield, the luggage was loaded onto the Coach/Baggage car of the train, I didn't see this myself. Once I arrived in Emeryville, I walked outside the station where a large chunk of the baggage from my train was being loaded onto another bus, I gave my claim checks to the baggage handler and retrieved my bags, no issues.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/22/12 11:37 by Amtrak288.

See, it is apparently very important what you eat and not the route you take. We have a lot of bags with us this summer so I will remember to stay away from the steak. : )

I have checked my bags through to Fresno, from points east, via Los Angeles and the bus bridge to Bakersfield, connecting to the San Joaquin without problems. When you leave Los Angeles, there are usually multiple buses headed for Bakersfield, each one making different stops at intermediate places along the way between LA and Bakersfield to discharge or pick up passengers. Your luggage might be on a different bus than you, but all of the buses go to the same final destination.

Baggage checked through from points before you board the bus in LA (from another train) to points after you board the train in Bakersfield are handled by Amtrak. You do not need to collect your baggage at Los Angeles for the bus ride to Bakersfield if it is checked through to a stop further north on the San Joaquin train.

dcfbalcoS1 Wrote:
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> See, it is apparently very important what you eat and not the route you take. We have a lot of bags
> with us this summer so I will remember to stay away from the steak. : )

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No, stay away from the fish. EVERYBODY who has ever watched the movie, "Airplane!" knows that you should never order the fish.

The movie,"Airplane!" made its debut shortly before the introduction of the infamous Seafood Americana in Amtrak dining cars. There has to
be some ironic reason for that...

And on 2(20) one of my tablemates ordered the "crab enchilada" (a.k.a. the Seafood Special) for dinner, and throughout the meal I heard her mumbling to herself, "What IS this? Where's the crab?". I took the flank steak as the safe bet and well done as a second safe bet -- there was so much fat on my piece of meat that anything less than well done would have been inedible for this palate.
<signed>
"Jack Sprat"

When you check a bag to your destination, the carrier handles the bag all the way to that destination. If that is not possible -- for example, a non-code-shared connection is involved -- then the company accepting the baggage will only allow you to check it to the point where you would be required to handle it for transfer.

Long, long ago, I made a cross-country journey on Amtrak from Connecticut to Seattle via the Northeast Corridor, the Broadway Limited, and the Pioneer. I carried my own bags as far as New York, then checked everything but one bag (a few changes of clothes, toiletries, etc.) at New York. When I got to Seattle, the bags I had checked weren't in the Pioneer's baggage car! The baggage clerk checked inside the station's baggage room, and that's where the checked bags were -- they had been sent to Seattle on the Empire Builder, arriving before I did.