Passenger Trains > Private Car Ownership

I'm curious about Private Car (Private Varnish-PV) ownership. Just how expensive is it really to rebuild a car into useful status. Two questions really. How expensive for an older car with steam heat (requiring full HEP/27pin) versus the expense for a newer car (lightweight) perhaps already having been HEPed and cabled by someone but still requiring PC-2 or other work?

I've been told that such work can be very expensive. There do seem to be a number of former Amtrak cars available which would seem to make good candidates for such use as they are already HEP/27pin equipped.

Comments on car types, costs, feasibility and shops handling this sort of work requested. Thanks

LE

It's everyones dream to own their own private car.

Cars are both very expensive and very time consuming to bring upto current Amtrak standards. Then after this, they are very costly to maintain and run.

I found this link:
http://www.cozx.com/carstory.html
Its a guy that's restoring his own car. I emailed him, and he said the project costs about the same amount as a nice house.

You might also want to check out this link:
http://www.iltransit.com/advice.html
This site states that the actual purchase of the car is the smallest investment.

No doubt about it, ownership is a dream, for now. Thanks for pointing me to those pages. The one on the former L&N Section Sleeper was impressive. Scary part is they haven't even done much on the really BIG ticket items (as they point out in work under 2001) such as PC-2 40 year truck rebuilds and HEP cabling. The interesting thing is though that they started from an older car and have done quite a lot of work based upon conversion from steam heat etc. That answers part of my question.

Second part however, is what if I were to go the route of buying a car relatively fresh from Amtrak service such as one of the Slumber Coaches advertised by Illinois Transit Assembly? They seem to have HEP, 27 pin, emergency windows and at least some of the BIG stuff done. Of course, I'm sure they still need PC-2/40 year truck work which would top $50K, but that's a lot better than $200K... Comments?

LE

new laws come into effect all the time, such as the collision post , retention, 40 yr thing, HEP-trainline req, glazing . Collision posts is a thing which I don't understand. Then say u get your car running say atk goes belly up then what? Hope we never loose any more service than we have today. I am going into debt to finance a PV , I think, if I get caught up with my life in other areas then you will have no time for a life probably; yes I am retarded..................You need to have a generator too , what does a good Stadco unit go for, Insurance for a 250k car, how much? maybe lease?

locoengineer wrote:
> Second part however, is what if I were to go the route of
> buying a car relatively fresh from Amtrak service such as one
> of the Slumber Coaches advertised by Illinois Transit Assembly?

According to Illinois Transit's 'Shop News' (http://www.iltransit.com/sn.html) section of the web-site:
(under 'other neat items') These cars have been stripped, and require lots of work to bring back up to Amtrak standards.

Not knowing the Amtrak/FRA requirements, would they let you run a generator that was hooked up to the wheels? Then when the train moved it would generate and could store some in a battery for use while not in motion.

DO NOT EVEN CONSIDER IT!

There is only one venue to really run an AMTRAK compatable car; that's AMTRAK. A close friend of mine who owns a car has not run it in years because of AMTRAK's anti-private car attitudes. A substantial number of former car owners have left the hobby solely due to AMTRAK's hostility. Indifference would not be bad compared to the actual hostility that the bureaucrats show when you try to arrange a trip. Very few trains can haul a private car due to the maiul and express business as well as AMTRAK's refusal to double switch a train or switch you at at anyplace but a end point.

Last year AMTRAK lost (as they acknowledge) $7.5 mil on express and will delay a train one hours to switch the express. PV business is all profit to them and they will not take a 10 minute delay to add or drop a car. It is just their lazy management and the reluctance of yard crews to handle the equipment as they see it as "extra work" that takes time from the "siesta".

Special Trains are no more. The recent AAPRCO midwest trip had to be cancelled because AMTRAK did not have the testosterone to face the freights who are obligated by law to haul AMTRAK trains on established routes or in the case of special trains other routes were they can be considered subordinate to normal traffic.

Buy are car? Are you nuts! If you want heartburn then do it!, if your want mild discomfort try the Stock Market.

George Warrington and his clones in Chicago, with the help of Ed Ellis and his anti-AAPRCO attitudes, have killed any opportunity to even consider ownership a semi-rational investment on, if not money, your time and energy!

Ed Ellis will spend tens of thousands of AMTRAK PR dollars hosting a RPCA convention made up of mostly non- AMTRAK compatable car owners and yet will do nothing to change corporate attitudes to improve accessibility to AMTRAK trains.

The real scandal is that no one will challange AMTRAK to improve PV accessibility.

I realize that retention systems are required, but I was of the understanding that collision posts and other major upgrades were not required in older cars (In effect they are grandfathered under FRA regs)

LE

Interesting. I hadn't considered that Mail and Express was such a challenge. I am not surprised about the switching attitude, but I am surprised that Amtrak Management would take such an attitude. last I looked into this it seemed quite the opposite.

LE

If management would exhibit positive attitudes and leadership, then the crews in the yards would not be a problem. The problem with the people who do the actual work is that they are so abused by middle mangement that they have developed a public be damned attitude which is most easily expressed against the PV owner.

Leadership should come from Warrington and permiate middle mangement.

Warrington should get out from under the covers with his bud Tommy the Tompson and do what he is getting paid to do: LEAD!

There is no leadership except when it comes to sticking it to the PV owner!

Why ruin a beautiful Easter Sunday with this thread!

The old axiom about boats ....."a hole in the water into which you pour money" .....is totally applicable to "'PV's" in addition to the other pleasantries mentioned above.

It's much cheaper to rent someone else's.

RailNet 802 out

As far as I can tell, the only thing "grandfathered" into a PV mechanicalrequirement is exemption from ADA which occurred several years ago.

Most other inspection requirements exceed Amtrak's own. This comes under "arbitrary and capricious" -- with no notice, these requirements may change, and if it cancels an already scheduled big $$ charter, which all goes to Amtrak's bottom line, they don't care.

Any little weasel in management that gets a bug up his/her a** about anything can interfere with the trip, even after it is confirmed. No one will override or is willing to help. There is no incentive and no strong organization to represent the group anymore. Presently, if you want to schedule a move, there is no one who will talk to you or return calls.

Any inspector can down your car or cause expensive repairs -- and if you want to know why, it is taken personally as challenging their expertise and then watch what happens! Reprisals and any evidence supporting the owner will vanish.

A few years ago, PVs were welcome on Amtrak and just as the business began to pick up, a new management team stopped responding to the market -- much more revenue could be achieved losing money on mail and express rather than could be made money moving PVs, or for that matter, passengers. Revenues and profits are not related in the Amtrak business model.

They don't want PVs around, and the PV owners have become to old and tired to do anything about it. You may be jealous of them, but many of them have busted their &&&es in the past to support Amtrak, only to have to fight for reasonable access later.

Amtrak is a corrupt incompetant organization of self serving bureaucrats who are only interested in collecting their pay, enlarging their powerbase, and securing their future. While a few are trying, the overriding culture is against the customer, especially the PV. No airline in the world would retain an employee who knowingly drove away clients capable of providing tens of thousands of PROFITABLE revenue each year -- at Amtrak, they get promoted.

Like the carman overheard at Chicago said "I ain't doin' nothin' for these rich m------------s" -- Amtrak will do nothing to foster the PV business.

Wheelset you are the man. Keep on rolling.

How about some more responses from those who "know"?

This is a perfect time to let it hang out without tripping the "dragging equipment detector". Those who say AMTRAK's PV relationship
is the equivalent of "No Defects" either do not own or operate a car or are too cowardly to tell the truth for fear of retribution!

Wheelset stated:

<<
Amtrak is a corrupt incompetant organization of self serving bureaucrats who are only interested in collecting their pay, enlarging their powerbase, and securing their future. While a few are trying, the overriding culture is against the customer, especially the PV. No airline in the world would retain an employee who knowingly drove away clients capable of providing tens of thousands of PROFITABLE revenue each year -- at Amtrak, they get promoted
>>

WS-

This is certainly troubling. I admit I haven't followed the PV situation for a few years. What are the real revenue figures for PVs on Amtrak?

LE

Unfortunately, they will not divulge this information ... if they showed it over the last 10 years, it would really be interesting.

Ten years ago the Private Car Business generated almost $5 Mil and was handled by an administrative staff of three,(Sherbeny, Allen, Word). Today it is believed to be around $1 Mil with staffs in CHI, LAX, PHL, and WAS. The staff is believed to be close to 20 and they handle charter business also, but so did the old crew.

The buddy system is alive and well and "Empire Building" has reached a new level!

The amount of money AMTRAK could save by eliminating croonyism and empiure building would boogle the imagination. Coupled with a user friendly attitude and some flexibility the business could be built back.

Rationalize the express business and stop those losses which really are believe to be almost $40 MILL if all costs were allocated and the PV business could be significant.

Remember PVs using line space that is really spoilage. If the line space is not sold then there is NO income so all the PV income is found money.

HumbuG!

Several years ago a PV owner spoke at our local NRHS meeting about the trials and tribulations of owning, restoring, and operating a private rail car. In answer to a question concerning Amtrak’s helpfulness toward movements of private cars, he told an amusing story.

His car was chartered for a private group and was enroute from St Albans, VT to DC on the back end of the old Montrealer. All went well until the early morning arrival at Penn Station NY when the local Am-goons announced that his car was coming off and would not go to DC. They gave some lame operational reason that the car owner knew was bunk (you don’t own a rail car without knowing something about railroads). No amount of protesting could persuade the Amtrak crews otherwise. The switcher arrived, and the car was hauled off. The charter group was left standing on the platform.

Now the punch line. The car had been chartered by Amtrak. It was returning a group of congress-person type folks from an Amtrak boondoggle to Bombardier in Vermont. The move had been planned for weeks. Amtrak’s NY crew had stranded the very folks who vote on their appropriation bill each year. They knew that, and had said that they didn’t care if the President himself was on that car, it was coming off. And off it came.

The car owner strolled upstairs and called an Amtrak VP in DC (getting him out of bed) and told him what had just happened. He then went and got a cup of coffee and strolled back downstairs and by the time he reached the platform his car was coming back up the track to be re-coupled to the Montrealer. He and his guests could only shake their heads in pure wonder at the stupidity of it all.

Interesting indeed. I never realized the Amtrak staff for PVs/Charters was so large these days. The experience I have had with Amtrak involving private cars has been quite positive. This has generally been from the standpoint of a railroad manager dealing with Amtrak from the outside. Of course, I deal with the issue for others and we usually have enough leverage (political and financial, so it hasn't been a problem so far.) Nonetheless, I can see that dealing from a PV owners perspective could be less than pleasurable. Having been in the industry a few years I know well how the rank and file will look for a quit wherever possible. Of course, outside of the short lines there is essentially no service culture on the rails.

What does AAPRCO do about these issues? I had thought they were capable of accessing the proper people. Also, it was always my impression that many were persons of wealth and at least some influence. It would seem that pressure exerted on the proper representatives might bring results especially now with Amtrak struggling for its life politically...

LE

Until recently AAPRCO has been torn apart by humongous battles in the board room between those who wanted to make things better and a lunitic fringe centered in Orange County CA. The lunitics have all quit and maybe the energy can now be channeled into exercising some political muscle to try to get things on a better footing with AMTRAK. The problem is that for too long a period nothing has been done and no one wanted to sound the battle cry for the fear of retribution. Maybe with the demise of the lunitic fringe some of the old stalwart members will rejoin and participate in formulating a plan to save PV operations. AAPRCO must rebell against the current pattern of appessement and actively represent the interests of the car owners.

The battle must be joined at or above Warrington and will require adverse testimony by car owners before Congress and the "Reform Board".

If not, the carowners will be paid lip service, nothing will change, and appessement will reign.

AMTRAK is just out of control and does not want the business. Warrington and Thompson are only interested in operating money-loosing local trains to politically sensitive locations under the guise of "express". Warrington sees curriny political capital as a way to preserve his position.

Look at the hours that have been added to long haul train schedules as a result of the express business and the abysmal on-time record that has resulted as result of that business. Lengthened schedules add to transportation costs, but those costs are not reflected in the $ 7.5 mil express LOSS.

It is time for honesty and a real house cleaning.

Thank you to everyone who has replied to this thread. You have all added to my store of knowledge concerning PVs and the current relationships with Amtrak. A shame that it is what it is now. I hope that the AARPCO and others will make their needs known to their representatives and especially how much revenue Amtrak turns away. With a Republican in the White House, hey, who knows...

LE