Traditional Dining returning 6/23 to West Coast routes

https://media.amtrak.com/2021/06/amtrak ... ce-routes/

California Zephyr, Coast Starlight, Empire Builder, Southwest Chief, Sunset Limited, and Texas Eagle will all see service restored and enhanced, with passengers now getting a free drink and the return of white table cloths and glasswear!

Make that "sleeping car passengers". Coach passengers are relegated to ordering from the cafe car, at least for the foreseeable future.

As it should be. First class deserves some service differentiation from coach. If you want the high end meal, get the sleeper or roomette.

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Thinking about dining cars and restricting them to sleeper only vs. allowing coach passengers.

For now let's just look at the Superliners as traditional dining will be on those trains only.

A Superliner sleeper has 14 roomettes, 5 bedrooms, an accessible bedroom and a family bedroom. If it were maxed out (2 in each roomette, 2 in bedrooms and accessible, 4 in the family room) that would be 44 people. Let's assume half the roomettes have one person so that makes 37 people.

So a train with 2 sleepers has 74 1st class passengers, and 3 sleepers is 111 passengers.

A SL dining car has 18 tables for 4 which adds up to 72 spaces total. Even if you seat strangers together as in the old days you can't fit all the passengers for 2 sleepers in one seating. Of course some people may not use the dining car although unlikely since it is "free" i.e. they already paid for it with their ticket. With 3 sleepers you definitely need 2 seatings to handle everyone.

So it seems to me there wouldn't be a lot of excess capacity for adding coach passengers. Maybe a 2 sleeper train with 2 seatings for dinner might have some room if you pack everyone in like sardines.

jonnhrr wrote: ↑Tue Jun 08, 2021 11:05 am Thinking about dining cars and restricting them to sleeper only vs. allowing coach passengers.

For now let's just look at the Superliners as traditional dining will be on those trains only.

A Superliner sleeper has 14 roomettes, 5 bedrooms, an accessible bedroom and a family bedroom. If it were maxed out (2 in each roomette, 2 in bedrooms and accessible, 4 in the family room) that would be 44 people. Let's assume half the roomettes have one person so that makes 37 people.

So a train with 2 sleepers has 74 1st class passengers, and 3 sleepers is 111 passengers.

A SL dining car has 18 tables for 4 which adds up to 72 spaces total. Even if you seat strangers together as in the old days you can't fit all the passengers for 2 sleepers in one seating. Of course some people may not use the dining car although unlikely since it is "free" i.e. they already paid for it with their ticket. With 3 sleepers you definitely need 2 seatings to handle everyone.

So it seems to me there wouldn't be a lot of excess capacity for adding coach passengers. Maybe a 2 sleeper train with 2 seatings for dinner might have some room if you pack everyone in like sardines.

While I don't have the data, it seems likely to me that coach passengers on some of those Western long-hauls aren't riding as far as the sleeper passengers. Coach passenger on the Builder might only be riding from Williston, ND to St. Paul, vs a sleeper passenger travelling from Chicago to East Glacier Park, MT.

In that case, it makes sense to reserve dining car space for the passengers on the train for 24+ hours.

If capacity is available, restricting coach passengers from the dining car seems unfair and probably counterprductive. Sleepers are vastly more expensive - when my girlfriend and I took the CS from Oakland to Portland in 2019 (an 18-hour trip), it would have been $500+ for a sleeper versus less than $200 combined for coach. Not getting to enjoy that sit-down breakfast wouldn't have made us any more likely to blow out our budget for a sleeper, but it might have tipped us towards flying.

I'll be on the Coast Starlight the end of July as part of my honeymoon and even though I'll be ordering a kosher meal I'm still excited to see this.

I too feel it is operationally and economically feasible to allow coach passengers to use the diner on space-available basis after sleeper passengers.

It worked great in the past...what has changed? On my first cross country trip as a college student in the 80s, I couldn't afford a sleeper but definitely wanted to experience the diner. CZ staff went through the train handing out little colored tags with seating time to those who wanted. They presumedly went through the sleepers first, since I seem to remember being offered 'early seating' 4:30 or later seating after 7 pm. No problem. PA announcement "those holding blue 6:45 dinner reservations, please make your way to the diner now."

Sleeper passengers deserve priority, sure, but they're getting top accomodations, first choice reservations, and free food for their $$ fare. Letting coach passengers intermingle is not diminishing their experience. Moreover, Amtrak making incremental money from the captive market of coach passengers helps spread costs and enhance the travel experience "for the masses."

Nope. If Amtrak is going to be experiential, they have to offer distinct and sometimes exclusive product features.

Letting coach customers intermingle with sleeper (or first class) means the staff's ability to pay attention to the higher class customers gets diminished. It's the difference of being in a restaurant where each server has three tables versus six...

It also has the potential to cause the kitchen to run out of items that a late dining sleeper customer might order. From a service perspective, I'd rather see one or two meals go to spoilage than be unable to allow a sleeper customer their first choice.

When you fly a full service airline, the coach or even premium economy folks can't just ask for a business class or first class entree, even if there are surplus.

Even as a million mile status card customer in the top 5% of AA's customer base, I couldn't do that if I was seated in coach.



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@eolesen Most nice hotels have a nice restaurant and bar. Those are not reserved for only the penthouse-booking crowd, nor are they even reserved for guests only. They are very nice amenties for guests which generate more profit by welcoming the public as well. Guests may get preferential reservations. Same thing.

And you really think that Amtrak is going to leave half or more of the diner tables empty just so sleeper passengers get more of their server's attention?? That's ridiculous.

I cannot really picture many sleeper passengers being put off by having to share the diner with (Horrors!) coach passengers.

I CAN picture a multitude of coach passengers being put off by missing out on one of the real pleasures of train travel, a real meal in the diner.

It's still an uphill battle to convince Amtrak and its funders that full service diners belong on LD trains. As long as you are going to tow along the diner, why not maximize its revenue potential? That means not locking out half your captive customer base, not leaving half the tables empty, not restricting hours.

If you want to give a more exclusive experience to the sleeper customers, bring back Pacific Parlor Cars or the equivalent on all long distance routes! I'd be all in favor of that.

rohr turbo wrote:@eolesen Most nice hotels have a nice restaurant and bar. Those are not reserved for only the penthouse-booking crowd, nor are they even reserved for guests only.

Many of those same upscale hotels have concierge lounges which are for certain guests only, and the food there is usually as good if not better than the public restaurant since it comes from the same kichen.

I lived on the road for ten years, most of it internationally. What passes for service in the US would be a college dorm experience overseas...

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Amtrak is saying eventually they’ll offer something for coach passengers to use the dining experience - but it sounds like it will be more akin to a first class upgrade charge type thing where you’d pay for it with your ticket and get full access to the diner for your whole trip. Sounds like they are still working out how they’d want to do that. Don’t expect anything until Covid is pretty much in the rear view mirror and there are no more restrictions on board.

rohr turbo wrote: ↑Tue Jun 08, 2021 5:09 pm [...]

When I'm a sleeper passenger, I loved sitting with folks from coach. For one thing, on a longer trip, you'd meet more people. Some great conversations.

And yes, as a coach passenger, I'm put off from travelling if I can't use the diner.

That said, if they go to a flat fee "upgrade" I'd certainly consider that as an option. But at this time, I will be avoiding any coach trips on long distance trains until I can use the diner again.