Passenger Trains > LD train arrivals at Chicago today.

Long Distance trains arrived at Chicago Union Station today, August 30, as follows:

#4 - 4 mins late.
#6 - 2 hrs, 10 mins late. Left Emeryville 21 mins late.
#8 – Left Wisconsin Dells 7 hrs, 22 mins late. Left Seattle 3 hrs, 30 mins late.
#22 - 45 mins late.
#29 - 1 hr, 3 mins late.
#49 - 1 hr, 53 mins late.
#851 - 24 mins early.
#58 - 14 mins early.

John Webb
Trinidad, CA

#8(28) arr Chicago 7 hrs 20 mins late at 11:15 p.m. (No connections held)

Had Cascades F59PHI #465 leading.

So what exactly is the problem with the Builder? It used to be a top performer when it came to keeping schedule. I know there are track issues near Grand Forks where the water is high. But that's a 7 hour delay? And occasionally the train itself craps out. But not every day. BN has a responsibility to get the train over the line in a timely manner. There are people on the train. Not oil or cars from Japan. BN used to treat Amtrak well. What happened? Now UP seems to be doing better. BN shouldn't run more trains on their lines than they have capacity or crews to do so.

andersonb109 Wrote:
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> . . . I know there are track issues near Grand Forks where the water is high. But
> that's a 7 hour delay?

This particular train was 3 hrs 30 mins late out of Seattle: delayed 3 hrs 50 mins enroute. So far in August, #8 has averaged 4 hrs, 2 mins late into Chicago. About 40 minutes of this is accounted for by late Seattle departures; all the rest occurs between Havre, MT and Fargo, ND where extensive track maintenance and construction is underway this summer. The train is basically on-time from Seattle to Havre (average 4 mins delay), and Fargo to Chicago (average 1 min delay). Once #8(31) arrives on 9/2, I'll publish more complete delay statistics by line segment.