If you could restore a defunct Amtrak route

gokeefe wrote: Perhaps that really is the "big answer", time for Amtrak to restore service on the Inland corridor in order to better serve the Northeast Corridor travel market. The other limitation worth remembering is that for the moment Amtrak cannot service trains beyond 9 cars long at Southhampton shops in Boston. Consequently the long distance options are very limited out of BOS.

We all know about the through cars of the Lake Shore Limited and Empire Builder. It may sound stupid but couldn't Amtrak take the trains they need off the Silver Star or Silver Meteor and run them to Boston and just leave the remaining trains in NYP? If you can do it in Albany and Spokane, why not in New York?

Technically this could work in some other routes as well where there isn't any LD service facilities? They can run a through car branch LAX-San Diego off either the Coast Starlight or Southwest Chief or an Emeryville-San Jose branch off the California Zephyr. If you can split a train where one part goes one direction and the other goes another, why not one part goes one direction and the other just stays put?

They try to avoid it in order to have fewer missed connections and consequently fewer problems with timeliness. It absolutely could be done but there are a lot of risks and not many rewards. One thing Amtrak has learned is the importance and utility of running "block" trains. The run through cars of yesteryear, in particular multi-line arrangements "through sleeper to St. Louis" etc. simply don't work anymore.

LONE STAR: Chicago, KC, Wichita, OKC, FtW, Houston. First of all it would provide a 2nd daily Chicago-KC. But ultimately it solves the OKC connection to KC and provides additional opportunities to the underserved Houston market.

Amtrak is taking a serious look at realigning service in Texas. I just caught this in the FY '16 Budget, Business Plan, and FY '17 Budget Justification and Five Year Plan (See PDF Page 62 of 164)

In addition to driving savings through efficiencies, Long Distance is also exploring how to increase revenue, in ways that result in improved gross margin to the business line. One option under consideration is a reconfiguration of existing service to serve a wider area in Texas and across the southern states.

Another interesting note from the Business Plan referenced above. This one on PDF Page 59 of 164:

Amtrak’s Long Distance routes are the backbone of our national system. They provide the only Amtrak service to more than half of the States and stations we serve. They connect the nation’s major regions, provide a foundation of intercity passenger rail service, and preserve intercity mobility for underserved communities and populations. These trains are heavily patronized, and increasingly important to the communities and people along their routes that have been losing bus and air services. Since 1998, long distance ridership has grown by approximately 20%, without the introduction of any new services, frequencies, or equipment. Average load factors on Long Distance trains are higher on the peak leg of their trips than on the Acela Express services on the NEC.

This is a very interesting point of view on the Long Distance service. I have to wonder how the old railroads would have felt if they could have achieved 20% growth from 1948 to 1966. The passenger trains of that era would probably still be with us today.

20% growth on essentially what is the same LD trains. Wonder what will be the growth if Amtrak can get enough equipment on just the existing routes ?
+ maybe some routes able to add another train or Cardinal and Sunset go daily ?
Then slowly add new routes.

east point wrote:20% growth on essentially what is the same LD trains.

Not even the same. Fewer trains and fewer miles than before. Imagine how much growth there would've been if it was the same # of trains/miles.

After further consideration if NARP would compare the number of Passenger miles that would give a truer picture. Always feel that number of passengers does not tell full story. Example is the Crescent. Number of passengers slightly higher but with Lynchburg SD service average trip length longer since before CVS - WASH would often sell out..

east point wrote:... if NARP would compare the number of Passenger Miles, that would give a truer picture. Always feel that the number of passengers does not tell full story. Example is the Crescent. Number of passengers slightly higher, but [since Lynchburger added], average Crescent trip length is longer [with better revenue], because before, Charlottesville - WASH would often sell out [blocking out buyers of higher priced tickets from Atlanta, Spartanburg, Charlotte, etc].

Your point that Passenger Miles is a more sophisticated measure of performance is surely true. And NARP surely knows it. But Amtrak's world is full of unsophisticated Congresscritters, TV talking heads, radio talk show hosts, underpaid reporters, and others. In order to 'Keep It Simple for Stupid', NARP reports the rising number of passengers, a simple measure that doesn't have to be explained to anyone.

The most (and simultaneously the least) sophisticated measure of performance is revenue. Passenger-miles doesn't in any way speak to the importance of the service being provided to the riders (and also, at least at the margin, encourages running trains over longer routes (in essentially the same way that PRIIA's 750-mile rule does), though moving to net passenger-miles (e.g. use the straight-line distance between origin and destination cities for every passenger). Indeed, I'd actually probably place linked passenger trips ahead of passenger-miles but way behind revenue as metrics for quality/quantity of service.

Can you try this again? I feel words are missing. Anyway, I'm not quite getting your point, and I want to understand it. Also I'm not sure what you mean by "linked trips" or where to find such numbers if published.

Thanks for the requested do-over.

And it also, at least at the margin, encourages running trains over longer routes (in essentially the same way that PRIIA's 750-mile rule does)

Consider a service in the 600-mile range that should get good ridership due to being a strong corridor etc. One of the states along the route is unwilling to subsidize. PRIIA encourages Amtrak to add enough miles to the route to get it classed as an LD, even if those 150 miles make the service perform worse.

By the same token, if the view is that passenger miles are the important metric, then rerouting the train to take a longer route (especially over higher ridership portions), even if that longer route hurts the financial/on-time/speed performance of the train, becomes tempting.

Revenue as a metric doesn't have that problem to anywhere near the same extent.

In transit measurement, "unlinked trips" means counting each leg of a journey as one trip. "Linked trips" means counting all the legs together as one trip. The distinction is more relevant for local/regional transit (where questions of transfers vs. one-seat rides matter, and things like the National Transit Database generally only record unlinked trips because before the advent of various levels of electronic fare collection, unlinked was basically all you could get). For Amtrak, it's not as meaningful a distinction, since the legs are separately ticketed and priced, but consider things like the Springfield Shuttle, where the difference between someone doing NYP-SPG (counting as one passenger) and someone doing NYP-NHV-SPG (counting as two passengers).

The problem with passenger miles is that a trip being longer does not make it more important or more deserving of public subsidy.

You're confusing passenger miles vs train miles.

I believe the simplest statistic to use determining the worth of any service or business is the bottom line, with revenues hopefully greater than expenses.

How am I confusing passenger miles with train miles?