by Rockingham Racer
Which portion of the would you like to ride backwards? Or is there a way to turn the train in Washington?
Railroad Forums
Moderators: GirlOnTheTrain, mtuandrew, Tadman
east point wrote:I'm not sure if you mean "new" Superliner cars or cars relieved of duty from other services, but I can say that the Superliners as we know them are on their way out no matter what. Anderson's people looked over doing a rebuild of the cars, but discovered that they would need a frame-up rebuild and it would be more cost-effective to just purchase new cars. As far as I can tell from details available, everyone is getting single-leveled eventually.mtuandrew wrote:East point: I bet the Capitol Limited is the next to get single-leveled. If it were up to me, the Cap would become a CHI-WAS-NYP train and the Cardinal would be CHI-WAS with Superliners, but it isn’t up to me.
Agree about Capital but not Cardinal. Until Amtrak gets more Superliner type cars ( 10+ years IMHO ) some Superliner trains will only get single leveled as SL equipment gets sidelined for what ever reason.. It might be CNO and Eagle and Sunset single leveled to make a daily Sunset. NOL and SAS maybe FTW and single level Heartland.could then ship sparse spare parts to other locations. Spare parts for the older SLs are getting slim and concentrating into fewer locations would appear important.
tomj wrote:I have just skimmed through this thread and am wondering, if the Siemens order works out and they finish their merge with Alstom (Assuming it hasn't happened, I wanted to type while the iron was hot and didn't google anything) if Siemens then has the bi level designs, could the option to buy be used and California and Illinois trade the used Siemens cars for bi levels and hand the single levels over to replace Amfleet or at least start replacing them? As for the Horizon cars, I say get creative.The SIemens / Alstom merger is being investigated by the Europeans as they feel it will harm European railways with reduced competition in both the rolling stock and signalling markets.
Rockingham Racer wrote:Which portion of the would you like to ride backwards? Or is there a way to turn the train in Washington?Sure, I’d wye the train at Ivy City coming in from the west and make a reverse move into Washington Union Station. It’d be the opposite in reverse, and powered by diesel regardless.
east point wrote:In our opinions there is one basic fault of design for the Superliners. That is they are not tall enough. If they were as tall as say the Alaska cars are then head room would equal the single level Viewliners especially the top bunk in roomettes.. That height is not useable now except for Sunset and Coast starlight routes. The problem is that CHI station roof cannot clear higher cars . Appears to not be feasible to lower track or raise roof. /?How much taller are the Alaska cars (Stadler are building some new ones too) compared to Superliner ?
frequentflyer wrote:Too tall to feel comfortable in 'em at 79 or 90 mph! Leave the top heavy cars to the Alaska tourist trains I say.
How much taller are the Alaska cars (Stadler are building some new ones too) compared to Superliner ?
frequentflyer wrote:How much taller are the Alaska cars (Stadler are building some new ones too) compared to Superliner ?Wiki can be your friend, per Wiki:
frequentflyer wrote:Just for kicks it would be interesting to see what a BBD multilevel sleeper would look like.It would, but that’s for a different thread. (We have been discussing concepts like that in the Overnight Coach thread for instance.)
Matt Johnson wrote:Has anyone rode them at that speed? They could plausibly make 79 on some of the Rocky Mountaineer's Vancouver Seattle runsfrequentflyer wrote:Too tall to feel comfortable in 'em at 79 or 90 mph! Leave the top heavy cars to the Alaska tourist trains I say.
How much taller are the Alaska cars (Stadler are building some new ones too) compared to Superliner ?
mtuandrew wrote:Ancient means very expensive to operate. The heat and light bills at places like that are obscene. Labor issues do not always mean underpaid. Labor issues often don't have anything to do with pay rates, they have a lot to do with work rules, IE "that's not my job". I spend a lot of time in union shops in the upper midwest, it's a real thing.Tadman wrote:Don't you think that will go to Fort Worth? Fort Worth is a nice new facility while Erie is ancient and has labor issues.Ancient often means capable, and labor issues often means underpaid for their expertise. It won’t happen, if anything MPI will close Boise as well as Erie and move everything to Texas, but one can hope.
east point wrote:dpAs far as I'm aware Amtrak hasn't done a 1 to 1 replacement of any of its equipment in its history. Since I have no steak in what happens to the Amfleet, since I live in California, I would expect Amtrak to phase in the new single level cars and slowly phase out the Amfleet over time. I honestly would rather than get pushed into some other sort of service, but that is me. But if the Viaggio cars are coming, the Northeast always gets dibbs on new equipment unless the states pay for it. So if Amtrak does an order for them, I'd expect the Amfleet cars to disappear on the Northeast Corridor over time.tomj wrote:I if Siemens then has the bi level designs, could the option to buy be used and California and Illinois trade the used Siemens cars for bi levels and hand the single levels over to replace Amfleet or at least start replacing them? As for the Horizon cars, I say get creative.Do not replace Amfleets except for those few that are basket cases. Instead first expand capacity on present routes by adding freed up Amfleet cars onto present trains. Then as enough Siemens cars come available make a couple Superliner trains single level allowing for strenghtened western trains. Then if some Amfleets become surplus to rush season demand park them as surge capacity and charter work ?