Bar cars: end of an era?

The August 19 timetable thread mentions that bar service is absent from the new schedule. Is this the end?

Anything's possible, but it seems unlikely to me that they'd try to sneak through a big change like that without any prior notice.

Tired of the Fri and Sat night stumbling drunks?

CarterB wrote:Tired of the Fri and Sat night stumbling drunks?

That's more the 1:47 a.m. to New Haven-- a/k/a the Vomit Comet. From personal experience the rush-hour bar car patrons (self included ) tend to be a pretty well-behaved bunch. Businessmen going home to Darien, Westport or New Canaan aren't usually drinking like fraternity boys on spring break.

Just a thought - maybe someone got lazy with these "emergency" timetables and forgot to add the icons?

The 12:07 (the first weekday trip with bar service) did not have a bar car today.

The few bar cars that MN has are pretty well worn out and I think they're a waste. They have only a few seats and I think it sucks that so many people have to stand so a few can get drunk.

Clean Cab wrote:The few bar cars that MN has are pretty well worn out and I think they're a waste. They have only a few seats and I think it sucks that so many people have to stand so a few can get drunk.

Given that they're worn out and it's not worth the expense of converting the unpowered singlet option orders into bar cars, do the M8's (or M7's) have the capability of interfacing with a generic coach if it's sandwiched between MU's? I would think propulsion would not be an issue for one unpowered outlier sandwiched on a longer consist driven by, like, 3 powered pairs since they are capable of trainlining with singlets. But are the MU's capable of providing compatible hotel power for a "foreign" car and otherwise keeping the consist in systems sync through a foreign car? Because if they can do that with unpowered MU singlets it would seem like an unnecessary design compromise to totally preclude coupling, system compatibility, and communication pass-thru with just one generic sandwiched in the set. You know, like a private car for special runs. Unless there's something that special about the MU's design requiring a fully custom singlet.


There is definitely no shortage whatsoever of cheap, rehabbable surplus blind coaches available with NJT having so many mothballed Comets on the property, the MBTA ditching huge numbers of its pending-retirement single levels, and many other operators overturning their single-levels for bi-levels. If it were technically possible the costs for refreshing a few cheap, largely disposable generic blind coaches would be totally negligible.

^^^ No that's not possible.

What a lot of people do not understand is bar cars are underutilized money loosing cars.
yes bar service is profitable, but the bar car is NOT, so both MTA and CDOT are seeing less and less need for bar cars.
Converting a coach to work with MU's would require a complete electrical revamp, a different brake system, a hep source trough control wiring, pantograph/third rail gear etc etc
and only for a car that carries only 25% of passenger capacity of regular car and is only used in Bar service one out of 4 trips.

Every seat counts. I cannot see a clear enough reason to give up seats to sell drinks on board the train when there are dozens of bartenders selling their products in GCT.

Replacement/s trains will become the 'brown bag specials' and the 'carry out ltd's'!!! Martinis and Manhattans in 'sip'n'staw' boxes!!

nothing so sinister, the bar carts in GCT openly sell same stuff for you to carry to your seat at a much higher profit but at same price.
A bar cart sells 10 times amount of Alcohol of a Bar car, but with very little down time and no expensive railcar to maintain.

DutchRailnut wrote:What a lot of people do not understand is bar cars are underutilized money loosing cars.

Start serving breakfast & lunch on those things sell a contract to Dunkin Doughnuts etc I am sure someone will buy out the space outside evening rush hour. Their can definitely be a profit for the bar cars.

impossble to do, US health code could never be satisfied.
No wash facility, no bathroom with proper facilities for food establishment etc etc etc