Passenger Trains > Thanksgiving Ridership Snapshot

Here is look at a few trains around the East and Midwest. Let me know if you would like to see a certain train. For space reasons not all info is shown.

Train 94 Newport News-Boston

195 on in Newport News
233 on in Williamsburg
88 on in RVM
122 on in Richmond-Staples Mill (605 on the train at this point)
144 OFF in Alexandria (!)
432 on in Washington DC
201 on in Philadelphia (819 passengers on the train at this point, the high water mark for the trip)
497 on in NYP

Total passengers handled during trip: 2063, or about 5 747-400's

Train 176 Lynchburg-Boston

149 on in Lynchburg
376 on in Charlottesville
290 on in Washington DC
136 on in Philadelphia (692 on the train at this point)
353 on in NYP

Total passengers handled during trip: 1566

Train 49 NYP-CHI

270 on in NYP
210 on in ABL (501 on the train at this point)

Total passengers handled during trip: 827

Train 851 Indianapolis-Chicago (must be more than the normal 2 coaches!)

69 on in IND
176 on in Lafayette (241 on train at this point)

Total passengers handled during trip: 247. A lot for this train.

Train 305 Chicago-St. Louis

343 on in CHI
12 on in Joliet (352 on train at this point)
123 OFF in BNL
51 OFF in SPI
143 OFF in St. Louis

Total passengers handled during trip: 383. This was typical of most the Chi-STL corridor trains.

Most of the Chicago corridor trains seem to max out at under 400 passengers. Interestingly the numbers, sold out as they are, are not any higher than any given average weekend. The added service trains to Ann Arbor did well, topping out at around 250 passengers. Not sure how many cars they are running with. Other than the Hoosier State, it does not seem that cars were added to Midwest corridor trains in the numbers they have been in the past. But then, added service trains to Kalamazoo, Ann Arbor and Quincy help add capacity. And perhaps most equipment was kept in the NEC where the highest revenue can be generated. After all, train 94 with 800 plus passengers needs about 12 coaches alone! Hope you all enjoyed the snap shot.

Did you get any numbers from the West Coast Trains yet?

Jerry Martin
Los Angeles, CA
Central Coast Railroad Festival

One of my sons came in on 91 from WAS to RMT last night (Tuesday). Train was absolutely full. The Wednesday NEC-Carolina and Sunday Carolina-NEC trains sold out long ago.

And at high fares, too! My one-way WAS -- PHL trip last Friday (the 16th) was priced at $64.80. Cheapest one-way bucket is $35. However, it all worked out for the best. The conductor on 136 never made any attempt to lift tickets. Now, prior to e-ticketing that would have made no difference, since I would have paid for the ticket in advance. Of course, I could turn in the coupon for a refund if I thought of it.

But with Amtrak's "e-vouchers", guess what? I now have an e-voucher for $64.80, which I'll use toward another PHL-WAS round trip in the future. And of course, the rest of my itinerary was canceled, but so what? All I was doing was making the one-way trip WAS-PHL.

How did today's 69 look?

shoretower Wrote:
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> The conductor on 136
> never made any attempt to lift tickets. Now,
> prior to e-ticketing that would have made no
> difference, since I would have paid for the ticket
> in advance. Of course, I could turn in the coupon
> for a refund if I thought of it.
>
> But with Amtrak's "e-vouchers", guess what? I now
> have an e-voucher for $64.80, which I'll use
> toward another PHL-WAS round trip in the future.
> And of course, the rest of my itinerary was
> canceled, but so what? All I was doing was making
> the one-way trip WAS-PHL.


Wait a minute. You're proud of not getting your ticket lifted, resulting in a free ride?

The Alexandria, VA Amtrak station is a short walk from a D.C. Metro station, so many folks will detrain there instead of Washington Union Station to get more quickly onto the Metro to their final destination in the D.C. area.

shoretower Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> And at high fares, too! My one-way WAS -- PHL
> trip last Friday (the 16th) was priced at $64.80.
> Cheapest one-way bucket is $35. However, it all
> worked out for the best. The conductor on 136
> never made any attempt to lift tickets. Now,
> prior to e-ticketing that would have made no
> difference, since I would have paid for the ticket
> in advance. Of course, I could turn in the coupon
> for a refund if I thought of it.
>
> But with Amtrak's "e-vouchers", guess what? I now
> have an e-voucher for $64.80, which I'll use
> toward another PHL-WAS round trip in the future.
> And of course, the rest of my itinerary was
> canceled, but so what? All I was doing was making
> the one-way trip WAS-PHL.


Did you bring it to the conductor's attention that your ticket wasn't lifted? Was he working alone? Did he lift tickets in the other coaches? Did he call operations and do a complete force lift of all tickets? Maybe before you throw this conductor under the bus, you should get all the facts. There could be a good explanation

On many of the crowded NEC trains, tickets don't get collected. I've had several "free rides" to NY Penn from Newark when the trains are jammed around the holidays. It's true on NJ Transit, too.

The conductor is asked to do a lot of things, and with some stations just a few minutes apart, you can't be in the middle of the car making change when you should be opening doors, helping people down the stairs or out over the gap, etc.

I'd think that some really busy stations should use the British system, and punch tickets on the platform, or use a magic marker to mark the ticket before boarding the train, etc. Do it once in a while to mix things up, and get the revenue the company should get.

I have watched many times at the Solano Beach station in CA on the Surfliner route, conductors collecting fares on the platform prior to the northbound train arrivals. Doesn't seem like a big deal!

Left Albany northbound with 196 passengers in Budd style! By the time it reached Montreal, only 84 passengers were on board.


march_hare Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> How did today's 69 look?

Easy explanation for the Lafayette loading: Purdue U. went home for the holiday weekend! - Jerry

cashfare Wrote:
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> Train 851 Indianapolis-Chicago (must be more than
> the normal 2 coaches!)
>
> 69 on in IND
> 176 on in Lafayette (241 on train at this point)