Passenger Trains > Sacramento Report: Thanksgiving Eve

It's time for the annual midday visit to the Sacramento station, to take stock of the situation on what is one of the busiest travel days of the year, at least for Amtrak, despite recent mutterings in airline circles that certain Fridays and Sundays in August now rival Thanksgiving Eve and Sunday as peak days in the travel industry.

The station at 11:00am has the buzz of a happening place. There's a line of cars attempting to enter the parking lot. People on bicycles ride up to the front door. There's lots of people in the waiting room, but the long ticket lines appear to be a thing of the past, as most passengers appear to be holding either a printout from their home computer or a smart phone. The reorganized rehabilitated station looks great -- windows out toward the tracks, with the ticket office off to the left. Amtrak people are deployed in various locations and are answering passengers' questions. The big clock over the mural, unlike last year, appears to be working and shows the correct time.

Out at the tracks, the morning direct San Joaquin (701) has already arrived, albeit at 1142, 22 minutes late. It's a single-level consist with mismatched locomotives at either end. Baggage is being claimed on the airport-style carousel.

The next train out is Capitol Corridor No. 537. Passengers are streaming out of the Steve Cohn Tunnel and people needing a little or a lot of assistance are arriving via golf cart. Things look good. A closer examination reveals a few inadequacies of the old Amtrak: the signs on the California cars indicate that the train being boarded is No. 524, headed to Sacramento. Fortunately, several of the signs are so dirty or otherwise illegible that it's virtually impossible to tell what message is being conveyed. I can't resist pointing out the error to a trainman, but as I get ready to assert myself, I notice that the sign on the car in front of me has been adjusted with 3 minutes to go before departure. Just as well. It appears that the train may be held for a few stragglers. Come on! Let's get this show on the road. Fortunately, any delay appears to be just momentary...at 1211, the train is on its way.

Meanwhile, where's the incoming train from the Bay Area, No. 528? It appears to be running 40 minutes or more late at Suisun-Fairfield. Instead of an arrival at 1218 or so, it looks like it will be 1245. The scheduled time, with normally adequate recovery time between Davis and Sacramento, is 1232. A quick check of other Capitol frequencies suggests that more than one Capitol is running significantly late today. Today's Train 5, in contrast, looks like it will be arriving and departing ahead of schedule -- amazing! A later check confirmed that it departed Sacramento at 148pm, 37 minutes early.

Now we have a few minutes to wander over to Amtrak's bus business, a big operation with its own canopy. Like elsewhere, there's plenty of Amtrak staff working to assist. One man is offering to check bags -- for free -- and a few passengers take him up on the offer. He has a box of color-coded luggage tags. Another fellow is using clips to attach some clarifying printed information to the bus bay signs: today, there will be two buses on the Reno line, one stopping at Colfax, Truckee, and Sparks, with the other one going to other Placer County points and Reno. A sizeable crowd is already waiting, likely from the San Joaquin arrival. Amtrak does a good job at keeping passengers informed...the departure will be delayed about 15 minutes due to the late arriving 528. There will also be two buses for Stockton and San Joaquin Train 714, and there is one bus for Chico and Redding and points north. All in all, everything seems well-managed and under control.

So now, with 1245pm approaching, it's time to head back to Track 6 to witness the arrival of Capitol 728. It pulls in at 1248pm, and disgorges 301 passengers just here in Sacramento...imagine what it carried on its total journey. An impressive crowd, although it seems slightly smaller than in the last year or two.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 11/22/17 14:25 by reindeerflame.

The Capital Corridor folks said that a one minute station was enough.

Will in Europe and Japan yes, but here in the USA, forget it. Passengers and crews can not move that fast!

According to a Capitol Corridor email notice, 528 was amongst trains delayed by a "vehicle strike" between Oakland and Hayward this morning. 528 was delayed 28 minutes leaving San Jose due to inbound equipment delay. Apparently a big mess. 521 was the first train delayed (possibly involved in the strike) at 6:55. Eventually 521 was cancelled due to the accident. 523 and 524 experienced delays of around 50 minutes. It was an unfortunate beginning to a busy day.

Capitol 521 struck a minivan in San Leandro this morning. All occupants survived, and the car looked to be mostly intact. The train was taken out of service at Hayward. This 521 equipment usually turns as 528 out of San Jose, but the 523 equipment was used instead. 523 was late to San Jose because it was stuck behind 521.

I was on 524 which had a decent crowd, but not as many people as the other trains. I rode 537 home from work, and the conductor said that 574 people boarded the train. There were people sitting downstairs on the floor and standing in the aisles. This was an expanded six-car consist as well.

Thank you for the great report. You know that I could visualize what you said!
Thank you!

That's a good report, thank you.

The issue of customers bringing their own printouts of tickets, and tickets on smart phones rings true. So far, the scanning of these products tends to be a little slower in Broadway theaters. Phone scanning in airports also tends to be a little slower than traditional printouts, which replaced the even more traditional tickets.