Amtrak California buying 27 coach cars, 2 engines

Amtrak California will add double-deck coach cars on two of its passenger train lines, including the San Joaquin line that runs through the Valley, with a $100 million federal grant announced Wednesday.

The Federal Railroad Administration is awarding the money to the California Department of Transportation, which funds Amtrak service in the state, for 27 coach cars and two diesel-electric locomotives.

Eight cars will add capacity to the San Joaquin trains, which run six times daily in each direction between Bakersfield and Oakland or Sacramento.

...

Nine of the new bi-level cars will replace older single-level cars on the Pacific Surfliner line, which runs between San Diego and San Luis Obispo. The remaining cars will be used to increase capacity of the Pacific Surfliner trains, said Debbie Mullins, a spokeswoman for Caltrans' Division of Rail.

The two new locomotives will replace a pair of aging engines that are part of Amtrak California's fleet in Oakland and will serve either the Capitol Corridor or San Joaquin lines.

...

The federal grant will cover 80% of the estimated $125 million total for the new equipment. Under the terms of the grant agreement, Caltrans will pitch in $25 million, expected to come from Proposition 1B, a $20 billion transportation bond measure approved by California voters in 2006.

Federal Railroad Administrator Joseph Szabo said the grant will allow California to place the first order for new cars and locomotives under new federal Next Generation design standards. The standards are intended to promote uniformity of passenger train systems and technology across the country.

Read more: http://www.fresnobee.com/2011/04/27/236 ... z1KqmtxWPY


More trains are always good news. Perhaps the San Joaquin can get it's 7th daily run?

With the F59's out of production, are they looking at MPI diesels?

Matt Johnson wrote:With the F59's out of production, are they looking at MPI diesels?

Possibly Brookville's new passenger locomotives..

Must meet or follow the following specs - local deviations are authorized (mentioned in the specs):

AASHTO - High Speed Rail - Documents/Specifications
http://www.highspeed-rail.org/Pages/DocsSpecs.aspx

Some heavy reading in those specs.

Gil, known as Bill somedays ...

I'm surprised Amtrak needs a new diesel locomotive with a top speed of 125 mph in California?

lirr415 wrote:

Matt Johnson wrote:With the F59's out of production, are they looking at MPI diesels?

Possibly Brookville's new passenger locomotives..

Unless I'm forgetting something, the only options would be:
-Brookville BL36PH
-MPI MPExpress Series
-MPI HSP-46

Unless another builder steps up with a new model, the choices are limited.


And I assume that the two locomotives would be to replace the pair of B32-8WH's, no?

electricron wrote:I'm surprised Amtrak needs a new diesel locomotive with a top speed of 125 mph in California?

How so?

Pacific Surfliner goes at 110mph. Makes sense to get something that can go a bit faster.

jamesinclair wrote:

electricron wrote:I'm surprised Amtrak needs a new diesel locomotive with a top speed of 125 mph in California?

How so?

Pacific Surfliner goes at 110mph. Makes sense to get something that can go a bit faster.

It does?To the best of my knowledge, and Im not qualified out there on this territory, but the fastest any Amtrak train goes in California is 90 mph. Am I mistaken?

Who buys 2 engines ???

David Benton wrote:Who buys 2 engines ???

I agree. The whole order is small and will not attract competition. It needs to be combined with some other equipment. I'm not sure about the motive power needs, but here are a few suggestions for bi-level passenger equipment to add to the order:

• 5 sightseer lounges to replace the aging Pacific Parlour cars

• an extra bi-level coach for Illinois to run on the Eagle north on Fridays and south on Sundays

• sleepers to add to the Texas Eagle on the four weekly round trips that end at San Antonio

• extra sleepers to add to each of the California Zephyrs during summer and ski seasons and extra coaches to add one to each consist all year

• sleepers and coaches to add one of each to the Empire Builders during summer and holidays

• extra coaches to add to the Southwest Chiefs between Chicago and Kansas City

jstolberg wrote:

David Benton wrote:Who buys 2 engines ???

I agree. The whole order is small and will not attract competition. It needs to be combined with some other equipment. I'm not sure about the motive power needs, but here are a few suggestions for bi-level passenger equipment to add to the order:

It should be mentioned that the $100 million is not a new grant or award or has anything to do with the $2 billion of Florida HSR funds to be re-allocated, this is the obligation of a FY2010 HSIPR grant announced last fall.

With regards to the equipment order, I suspect this is likely the first announced part of a larger combined order. Illinois has funding in the $1.1+ billion Chicago-St Louis corridor grant to buy rolling stock, IIRC calls for 30 passenger cars and up to 12 locomotives for 6 new train sets. Iowa has funding in the new Iowa City service FY10 grant to buy rolling stock, but that project is in partial limbo the last I heard. There is also the $806 million joint state application for the FL HSR funds for 100 bi-levels and 30 some locomotives for the mid-West. That application is very unlikely to get fully funded because of the many requests for the available funds, but the FRA could possibly grant funding for a partial order of new bi-levels.

Amtrak in the Version 2 of the Fleet Strategy Plan discusses the near term plans to start buying Superliner I replacements. The plan document raises the prospects of funding equipment purchases, if capital funding is not available, through the RRIF federal loan program.

It is not just the 2 locos, an order of only 27 bi-levels is also very small for someone to start a production run of new bi-levels which meet the PRIIA specification. That is why I suspect IL and maybe Amtrak will be announcing some bi-level orders or bids in coordination with Caltrans in the coming months. The actual CA locomotive order may wait until Amtrak is ready to purchase a new batch of diesel locomotives.

afiggatt wrote:It is not just the 2 locos, an order of only 27 bi-levels is also very small for someone to start a production run of new bi-levels which meet the PRIIA specification. That is why I suspect IL and maybe Amtrak will be announcing some bi-level orders or bids in coordination with Caltrans in the coming months. The actual CA locomotive order may wait until Amtrak is ready to purchase a new batch of diesel locomotives.

Agreed. IIRC, there have been on-going discussions among various states about pooling their orders to leverage a better deal. The economics of this order just would not make sense otherwise, especially with regard to the locomotives.

MPI just got another order for 20 MP40PH-3Cs from GO and is still servicing the VRE order so they would be in a position to serve up another 2 MP36s or 40s without much fuss. Buying MPIs would provide commonality with the large fleet of existing EMD units already in service with Amtrak California, Metrolink, Coaster, ACE and Caltrain. Re the bi-levels isn't Alstom still in a position to produce more Superliner pattern cars as were delivered in the last order to Amtrak California?

Who buys 2 engines ???

I believe that West Coast Express in Vancouver bought a single MP36 so buying two would not be without precedent.

BuddSilverliner269 wrote:To the best of my knowledge, and Im not qualified out there on this territory, but the fastest any Amtrak train goes in California is 90 mph. Am I mistaken?

No one here is qualified, but I'll bet nobody can find a timetable allowing more than 90 mph. (Except before 1960.)

I can remember the one time I rode to San Diego, 1990, southbound the engineer kept the cab car's door open and mentioned to a kid "see the speedometer, we're going 90" and all parties, even me from the 100mph Northeast, thought it was a big deal. And that was on single track through the sand dunes and surfers walking across the tracks going to the beach.