Amtrak New Gulf Coast Service - New Orleans to Mobile AL

Why can't Amtrak at least park a trailer for an office? Or is Mobile be an unstaffed station? Of course, a trailer would mean bathroom facilities might be needed??

west point wrote: ↑Wed Apr 03, 2024 1:15 pm Why can't Amtrak at least park a trailer for an office? Or is Mobile be an unstaffed station? Of course, a trailer would mean bathroom facilities might be needed??

Just use the one that was at BWI Airport for a while, hire a vendor for the news stand, and have porta-potties.

But yeah, I kinda wonder why there wasn't a station building in Mobile...

Mr. Wolf, the relatively new L&N station at Mobile was chopped down after Sunset East "sunsetted". The G,M,&O station stands, but is now headquarters for the Mobile municipal mass transit agency, i.e. busses.

The GM&O and Southern stations, side by side, are built to receive trains from the north. If you look at the map, the Southern comes right down the River and US 43 from the due north. The GM&O comes in from the northwest and has a junction by I-65 where a belt line goes around town in both directions. Passenger trains would come in on the northern leg of the belt around the northern half of town until they looped to the east side on the river, where it would parallel I-165 and drop down to the adjacent GM&O station. Serving either station would require monumental track building. It would also require trains to go through a very busy yard or around the belt line, which could add an hour in either case.

The best option is to build a small station either downtown or Brookley airport and get it over with.

Skepticism: Fox10TV.com

Amtrak plans to return to Mobile, but will there be enough passengers?

Skeptics point to company’s own ridership projections for proposed Gulf Coast rail service: 37 riders per train, per day


MOBILE, Ala. (WALA) - If all goes according to plan, Amtrak trains will begin rolling from here to New Orleans in October, but the passenger rail company’s own projections indicate the trains will have lots of empty seats.

The route between Mobile and New Orleans would become one of nearly 30 “state-supported” lines operated by Amtrak across the country with the help of state and local government subsidies. But Bill Stephens, a columnist with Trains Magazine, pointed to projections produced a couple years ago that anticipated anemic ridership along the Gulf Coast.

“My concern with the Mobile service is that the operating loss per passenger is projected to be almost four times more than any other state supported route,” he told FOX10 News.
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Schedules: Fox10TV.com

Amtrak lays out arrival, departure times for planned train service in Mobile

Filing with Board of Zoning Adjustment also includes new details of temporary train station

MOBILE, Ala. (WALA) - In a filing with the city’s Board of Zoning Adjustment, Amtrak lays out new details of its planned passenger train service between the Port City and New Orleans, including the times.

The Board of Zoning Adjustment on May 6 will take up Amtrak’s request for a “special exception” to zoning regulations that would allow construction of a temporary train station on Water Street next to Cooper Riverside Park. In documents made public Monday, Amtrak indicated that it plans for trains to leave Mobile at 6:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m., with trains returning 11:18 a.m. and 9:14 p.m.

That is consistent with the long-stated plan of running one westbound train in the morning and one in the afternoon, and a pair of trains headed in the opposite direction. But this is the first time the company has published specific times.
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Jeff Smith wrote: ↑Thu Apr 11, 2024 3:04 pm Skepticism: Fox10TV.com

Amtrak plans to return to Mobile, but will there be enough passengers?

Skeptics point to company’s own ridership projections for proposed Gulf Coast rail service: 37 riders per train, per day

Lease the operation out to Megabus. 37 pax doesn’t even fill a UP or ATSF 44 seat coach.

Sounds perfect for a RDC. Oh, wait.

There are already multiple bus services between Mobile and New Orleans. Note also that NC stopped supporting the Carolinian at one point due to low use, but that is now one of the more successful state supported routes (and it may be better for Amtrak to broadcast its low ridership estimates and "under promise and over perform" instead of broadcasting its high estimate and "over promise and under perform").

RandallW wrote: ↑Thu Apr 25, 2024 7:40 am There are already multiple bus services between Mobile and New Orleans.

There are ? Far as I can tell there are 3x/day Greyhound and thats it. Lot of folks would ride Amtrak that would not ride Greyhound. It is slow and unpleasant.