Passenger Trains > Another view on snow cancellations

A lot of discussion on a previous thread about Amtrak cancellations due to bad weather.
I agree that it is not the way it used to be done or should be done.

Looking at if from the reality of today I can see why the host railroad might tell Amtrak not to run.
Right or wrong the freight roads have cut everything to the bone.
The last thing they need is an Amtrak train out in the middle of nowhere with engine failure.
Amtrak engine failure is not a rare thing when the weather is 70 degrees and sunny.
A dead unit leaving passengers without life support in a blizzard becomes a possible human
tragedy.  All sorts of public agencies swarming over the property on a 
rescue mission is not something a railroad wants.  The company would become the lead story on national news due to Amtrak
state of good repair.  Not something anyone needs.

Questions.
Does Amtrak put a second unit on normally single unit trains during blizzard conditions?
Is extra food stocked on board in case the trip becomes 24 hours longer than planned?

I think I already know the answer.  Surprise me!
 

But Amtrak would also get good press if it were shown they were able to meet transportation needs for those who's flights were canceled. Sadly, airlines seem to be doing the same thing. Canceling flights scheduled to go before the bad weather even hits. 

andersonb109 Wrote:
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> But Amtrak would also get good press if it were
> shown they were able to meet transportation needs
> for those who's flights were canceled. Sadly,
> airlines seem to be doing the same thing.
> Canceling flights scheduled to go before the bad
> weather even hits. 

Other TO members have shared their wisdom on this issue. Instead of using a bit more resources to get things done, we wimp out and do less and less. Some of it might be due to aversion to risk taking, thanks to the over-bearing mother called the insurance industry. Some of it due to obsession to penny pinching, where saving money is more important than moving people. Penny-pinching (the word "cost cutting" is too politically correct for me) can lead to fewer employees, which means we are forced to do less.... pound foolish.

I'm not criticizing all such "cancellations" as people do need to worry about safety. While I'm not old enough to appreciate "the way things were," I'm old enough to have seen our process of "wimping out."

Using the wimpy modern society logic, no passenger trains should be allowed to traverse Donner Pass, after SP's "City of San Francisco" got stuck in 1952. Proper way to address this issue, for example is to improve snow fighting methods, better weather forecasting, and dig another longer tunnel (Stevens Pass, Washington... oh my god, we have to DO MORE?), not just simply wimp out. 

I'm sure the airline industry experts can comment on how we allow 2 engined jets to fly long distances now (over oceans, for example), while in the past, that required 3 or 4 engined jets.

Folks, honestly, it's not wimping out.  These big corporations owned by large shareholders like a hedge fund, they absolutely want more profit any way they can get it.  They have cut the number of employees everywhere to make more money.  In the old days companies were satisfied with a reasonable profit.  Not anymore and so they cut every thing to the bare bone.  Thus they (the freight railroads) do not have the man power for these situations and they absolutely do NOT want to have to go to court for any reason, thus they will NOT take any chances with weather.  Just don't operate in severe weather which is snow and/or ice, or major rain storms such as a hurricane.
John in White Marsh, Maryland

ClubCar Wrote:
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> Folks, honestly, it's not wimping out.  These big
> corporations owned by large shareholders like a
> hedge fund, they absolutely want more profit any
> way they can get it.  They have cut the number of
> employees everywhere to make more money.  In the

Here in Canada, we say "squeezing a nickel til the beaver poops." I guess in the US you could say "squeezing a nickel til the buffalo poops."
(you can insert another word for poops ....)

 

Will MacKenzie
Dundas, ON

andersonb109 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> But Amtrak would also get good press if it were
> shown they were able to meet transportation needs
> for those who's flights were canceled. Sadly,
> airlines seem to be doing the same thing.
> Canceling flights scheduled to go before the bad
> weather even hits. 

Ah, but Anderson says LD trains are for "experiential" purposes. IOW, plz stay home or take some other means when it's nasty out. 

Last winter, Amtrak overdid it with Empire Builder cancellations for a blizzard. Various portions of the route for 3 days should have been shut down, but not suspend the whole thing, (or was it west of MSP ?). Instead, they ran the California Zephyr, even though that blizzard hit Nebraska, and it was stranded for 12 hours.

ClubCar Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Folks, honestly, it's not wimping out.  These big
> corporations owned by large shareholders like a
> hedge fund, they absolutely want more profit any
> way they can get it.  They have cut the number of
> employees everywhere to make more money.  In the
> old days companies were satisfied with a
> reasonable profit.  Not anymore and so they cut
> every thing to the bare bone.  Thus they (the
> freight railroads) do not have the man power for
> these situations and they absolutely do NOT want
> to have to go to court for any reason, thus they
> will NOT take any chances with weather.  Just
> don't operate in severe weather which is snow
> and/or ice, or major rain storms such as a
> hurricane.
> John in White Marsh, Maryland

i hate to ruin a good rant, but it has often been reported in the past that Amtrak has cancelled trains while the host railroad has continued to operate.  I am not aware, though open to correction, of cases where this was by direction of the host railroad.  I have photos I took a few years ago looking down on Virginia Avenue Tower in DC with the tracks leading to Union Station covered with snow while those leading to Va Ave Tunnel were well-polished.  It was a weekend and it looked that way until Monday morning when VRE operated though Amtrak still did not.  

Gordon

ClubCar Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Folks, honestly, it's not wimping out.  

I'll have to disagree. Doing less for penny pinching sounds like wimping out.

I brought up the jet engine example for a reason. On the surface, the airline industry used technological advances to determine that flying 2 engined jets over oceans was viable. Someone made the effort (research) to make that possible. If jet engine makers were purely focused on penny pinching, then I doubt increased reliability and efficiency would have happened, so we'd be stuck with 3/4 engined jets for long distant travel, because it would have been too "risky" otherwise. In fact, we might still be making hops on propeller-engined planes? :-)

I've mocked the shareholders and hedge funds in other threads for their scheming way to pinch pennies - they are one of the reasons why we've become wimps.

ClubCar Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>...In the
> old days companies were satisfied with a
> reasonable profit.  Not anymore...

I'm thinking you have never owned a company. A union man?

joemvcnj Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> andersonb109 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > But Amtrak would also get good press if it were
> > shown they were able to meet transportation
> needs
> > for those who's flights were canceled. Sadly,
> > airlines seem to be doing the same thing.
> > Canceling flights scheduled to go before the
> bad
> > weather even hits. 
>
> Ah, but Anderson says LD trains are for
> "experiential" purposes. IOW, plz stay home or
> take some other means when it's nasty out. 
>

How does the term "experiential" lead to that conclusion? I'm missing the nexus, help me out.

Duna Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> joemvcnj Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > andersonb109 Wrote:
> >
> --------------------------------------------------
>
> > -----
> > > But Amtrak would also get good press if it
> were
> > > shown they were able to meet transportation
> > needs
> > > for those who's flights were canceled. Sadly,
> > > airlines seem to be doing the same thing.
> > > Canceling flights scheduled to go before the
> > bad
> > > weather even hits. 
> >
> > Ah, but Anderson says LD trains are for
> > "experiential" purposes. IOW, plz stay home or
> > take some other means when it's nasty out. 
> >
>
> How does the term "experiential" lead to that
> conclusion? I'm missing the nexus, help me out.

IOW, You have replaced Reindeerflame as the most annoying respondant to honest to goodness pro LD train comments!

Duna Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> joemvcnj Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > andersonb109 Wrote:
> >
> --------------------------------------------------
>
> > -----
> > > But Amtrak would also get good press if it
> were
> > > shown they were able to meet transportation
> > needs
> > > for those who's flights were canceled. Sadly,
> > > airlines seem to be doing the same thing.
> > > Canceling flights scheduled to go before the
> > bad
> > > weather even hits. 
> >
> > Ah, but Anderson says LD trains are for
> > "experiential" purposes. IOW, plz stay home or
> > take some other means when it's nasty out. 
> >
>
> How does the term " lead to that
> conclusion? I'm missing the nexus, help me out.

"experiential" means they are out for a joy ride, not for basic transportation needs. 

joemvcnj Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Duna Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > joemvcnj Wrote:
> >
> --------------------------------------------------
>
> > -----
> > > andersonb109 Wrote:
> > >
> >
> --------------------------------------------------
>
> >
> > > -----
> > > > But Amtrak would also get good press if it
> > were
> > > > shown they were able to meet transportation
> > > needs
> > > > for those who's flights were canceled.
> Sadly,
> > > > airlines seem to be doing the same thing.
> > > > Canceling flights scheduled to go before
> the
> > > bad
> > > > weather even hits. 
> > >
> > > Ah, but Anderson says LD trains are for
> > > "experiential" purposes. IOW, plz stay home
> or
> > > take some other means when it's nasty out. 
> > >
> >
> > How does the term " lead to that
> > conclusion? I'm missing the nexus, help me out.
>
> "experiential" means they are out for a joy ride,
> not for basic transportation needs. 

Amtrak has promoted itself as such for years. Saying things like “getting there is half the journey” lead to that impression.  

"Basic Transportation" is a very slippery slope for Amtrak.

Greyhound on steel rails, no lounge, no diner, no sleeper.

Posted from Android

Lackawanna484 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "Basic Transportation" is a very slippery slope
> for Amtrak.
>
> Greyhound on steel rails, no lounge, no diner, no
> sleeper.

It also insinuates that travelling for fun is somehow morally wrong.

There definitely are "land yachters" onboard the LD trains - retired folks enjoying their free time, foreign tourists wanting to see the "rest of" America, and so forth. However, many of the college students I've met are using LD trains as basic transportation. I've also met quite a few individuals who found LD trains to be the most viable option for a given city pair, for many reasons. Some of those reasons might not fit the "mainstream" narrative, so I don't want to piss off the closet believers of collectivism here. :-)

I suppose all that won't matter since I'm not an "expert," "pundit," or some other self-proclaimed mouthpiece of false importance, but I'll say in vain that my observations (shared by other LD train riders) are not done from an ideological armchair, but from personal experience.

Uh, doesn't VIA RAIL promote their cross-country trains as experiential? And didn't WP do the same with the CalZephyr?
How about the trains that meet tour ships in Alaska and elsewhere?
My wife and I did not ride Cumbres and Toltec and Durango and Southern NG to get someplace, we rode it for the superb experience it was.
Same for when we rode trains in Switzerland, the UK, etc, which served we tourists and people going from Point A to Point B on business, etc.
What is wrong with what seems to me a great way to get folks who would never ride a train to ride one in addition to people riding between places for basic transportation.
One of the biggest problems in promoting HSR these days is that most people have never ridden any kind of train!
Sounds to me like smart marketing...

Bill Deaver
Tehachapi, CA

VIA Rail's Canadian runs twice a week, is very expensive, has much more than 14% of people in sleepers, has many foreign tourists, and is a cross between a land cruise and transportation, but more like the former, nothing like the Empire Builder.

Marketing is one thing, which Amtrak doesn't do much of, but Anderson stereotyping its users as "experiential" is simply inaccurate and shows he doesn't know his business.

Posted from Android

Interesting conversations but my two questions in the original post have not been answered.
Anybody know?
While thinking of being marooned in the woods of Georgia behind a dead engine I am reminded of the
Thanksgiving weekend story of the Amtrak train stranded for six hours next to Sunnyside.  The incident 
where passengers were forced to take a dump in a cardboard box.

If they let a train sit for six hours in NYC how much help is a LD train going to receive in a blizzard?

In all fairness, that Acela sat on the Hell Gate line because it snagged the catenary. It would have been difficult to get it moved and power restored under any circumstance, even if they called upon the LIRR  to get a Super Steel over from Morris Park, Queens to haul it out of there to Hunterspoint Avenue (which I don't think anyone thought of anyway).

Duna Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ClubCar Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> >...In the
> > old days companies were satisfied with a
> > reasonable profit.  Not anymore...
>
> I'm thinking you have never owned a company. A
> union man?

Stockholders and Wall Street have for many years are more focused on share prices then on long term profitability. Just the way it is I suppose.

Major corporate executives now earn thousands of times more $$ then  workers, while 50 years ago they earned only hundred's of times more $$. Even worse, you can screw up really badly at a company, and still get paid handsomely when you are shown the door. (HP for example). 50 years ago such a screw-up could end your career. 

But then who is really to blame? Example: Corporations send jobs overseas. Why? Because WE voted with our wallets that price was the most important consideration, and corporations merely answered our concerns. We are the ones who embraced Walmart and the "cheap plastic stuff" made in China. Did we really think there would be no consequences? Corporations need to sell stuff at competative prices that will make enough profits to keep shareholders interested in supporting their company. Making (or importing) them at the most competative price, and selling at the highest possible price is just how our economic system works. Follow the money.