Passenger Trains > 58 (18) at HMW Behind 301

N/B City of New Orleans Sunday morning at Homewood, IL.  They had a Horizon in the consist besides the usual 7 Superliners.

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During Gunn's term in office at Amtrak, they did this in summer and early fall one year on City of New Orleans and Texas Eagle to meet demand-capacity issues after some unexpected wrecks sending some Superliner Coaches to the RIP line. It was during peak summer early fall period. Gunn and the train ops folks put Horizon or Amfleets in front of the Superliner Trans-Dorm Sleeper for "short" - those riding between say St. Louis and Chicago and Carbondale and Chicago while some Superliner coaches were diverted to other consists. But overall, the capacity was NOT reduced, just a more interesting arrangement to even out demand with the capacity needed. It worked. People were accommodated. 

Not sure what's going on with this arrangement though as 7 Superliners would seem more than adequate for a train like the City of New Orleans in March. Axle count? Any reason why they'd be using a Horizon when Horizons seem to be in demand right now, not only in Midwest but to augment service in the Pacific Northwest Corridor......

Shouldn’t there be a surplus of single level since CN makes them run Superliners on the 39X trains on this line?

Horizons have been going to NOL for PM and have been used on the Mobile test trains. 58/59 does not have any axle count cars right now, both sleepers and all 3 coaches are regularly sold out, even in March.

Posted from iPhone

2904 Wrote:
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> Horizons have been going to NOL for PM and have
> been used on the Mobile test trains. 58/59 does
> not have any axle count cars right now, both
> sleepers and all 3 coaches are regularly sold out,
> even in March.
>
> Posted from iPhone

Thanks for the insight! I don't doubt nor surprised to hear about the sell-out in the least! Capitol Limited is coming up VERY tight in coach through March. Would imagine the Texas Eagle is under a similar circumstance. All three of these Superliner LD trains have been cut back from their prime capacity from "what was" in the 2000's. 

Sleeper behind Horizon coach black with diesel smoke. Awful to ride in that environment.

That was the horizon coach that has been used in the test train for the NOL-MOB service heading back to Chicago. Not sure if they're done with the test trains or switching it out for another one. Amtrak has stated in reports the new train will use horizon equipment.