Amtrak Crescent Discussion

The interior of the A2 cafe's are much nicer(if it is a A2 that has been through the capstone refurb) the interior of the horizon cafe is bland and inferior eclectically to the a2 cafe. Personally I would rather have an a1 cafe than a horizon cafe.

Can you give me an idea of what the interior of an A2 lounge looks like? How is it different than a diner lite car?

Just out of curiosity, how many A1 cafes does Amtrak have? Are they all in use or are there extras in storage somewhere?

I'm sure if there were extras they might go to Keystone trains which don't operate with them and probably should get some.

Negative. Keystone trains will never have cafe or food service because then thats more money to spend to have onboard services work those trains plus Harrisburg isnt set up for food service such as restocking the trains. Neither is Philly.I would love to see it to but it wont happen, at least not at this time.

Your right forgot about the no foodservice in Harrisburg. To bad this won't change anytime soon.

I don't recall observing Horizon cars on the Silver Service trains in New Jersey.

SecaucusJunction wrote:Can you give me an idea of what the interior of an A2 lounge looks like? How is it different than a diner lite car?

The 2 cars are the same except in the diner lite car the middle part is equipped to prepare food differently than a a2 cafe. The seating are is the same, except the bathrooms are closed on the diner lite car.

I personally saw 91 pass through Folkston, GA Friday morning and it did not have any Horizon cars that day. That would have been the Thursday departure out of New York.
I also saw the southbound Auto Train a few minutes behind 91 with 2 engines, 16 passenger carrying cars and 22 auto carriers a really nice looking train.
Noel Weaver

I counted four cafe cars in storage at Wilmington recently. Others have noted there are some even witht the old lava lamp paint scheme in Ivy City at Washington DC. So most definitely, there are Amfleet cafe cars in storage. It would be nice to have these cars converted to cafe/lounges for use on the single level long distance trains. There's also business/cafe cars operating solely on the route between Albany and NYP where food service is not offered. Should Amtrak look into better utilization of its cafe cars on its single level corridor and long distance trains? A Horizon Dinette is a poor substitute for a cafe/lounge car on a long distance single level train set.

I've said this before that the single level Amtrak trains lack a descent distance cafe/lounge car for long distance service equivalent to that of the Superliner Sightseer Lounge.

The Crescent was deadheading a Heritage Diner? Sure it wasn't a refurbished Heritage Crew Car for the Inspector General's office - the same Heritage Crew Cars Amtrak withdrew from service because they claimed they were beyond servicing and operation? Amtrak's not known to keep "protect" Heritage Diners at various terminals, other than where all single level long distance trains converge - at Sunnyside Yard.

hi55us wrote:

SecaucusJunction wrote:Can you give me an idea of what the interior of an A2 lounge looks like? How is it different than a diner lite car?

The 2 cars are the same except in the diner lite car the middle part is equipped to prepare food differently than a a2 cafe. The seating are is the same, except the bathrooms are closed on the diner lite car.

Actually the seating is very different, including tables with just one bench and tables that have no windows. Additionally while it's not a huge difference, a regular AMF II cafe seats 48 while a Diner-Lite seats 49. And while I'll be honest and say that I didn't go looking for it, I was under the impression that the bathroom had been removed. I thought that was how they achived the extra space for the new freezer and other items added to the car.

jp1822 wrote:Uh-oh - Amtrak converting more Amfleet II Lounge/Cafe cars into Amfleet Diner Lite cars?

Yes, the conversions continue. Six were scheduled for the fiscal year just ended in September, with 5 released from Bear as of August.

Murjax wrote: Just out of curiosity, how many A1 cafes does Amtrak have? Are they all in use or are there extras in storage somewhere?

There are 82 AMF I cafe cars of various types listed active as of October 26th, including the full dinette and club-dinette styles. And if I counted right, 3 cars were stored dead at Bear in 2006 along witha bunch of AMF I coaches, 46 cars in total. Some of those cars are now slowly being returned to service, and I think that I recall seeing that at least one of those was a cafe car, but I won't swear to that.

AlanB wrote: Yes, the conversions continue. Six were scheduled for the fiscal year just ended in September, with 5 released from Bear as of August.

Is Amtrak still doing any Heritage diner refurbishment?

Matt Johnson wrote: Is Amtrak still doing any Heritage diner refurbishment?

Yes, eight refurbishments were scheduled for last fiscal year. As of August BEE had only released six cars and I don't believe that they actually got out two in September. At present I don't even know if they got out one in September.

BEE seems to be running behind on this program simply because they aren't getting enough cars at one time to actually do the required work. It's kind of a catch 22, Amtrak is having so many issues with the cars that they need more spares in the yards and therefore can't send more to BEE so as to get them overhauled and stop the unreliability issues.