Return of Daily LD Service

Woot!! What were the consists before the pandemic?

That, as immediately reported, plus one Coach.

How much space in the T-Dorm is soid as revenue, I know not. I'm guessing some, but limited as to avoid assigning an additional Attendant.

Has Anyone heard what they are carrying for OBS crew? I heard a trip report where it seemed they’ve started to bring back some of the dining car crew on some trains even though they haven’t started serving the traditional meals yet. Unclear as to how many but it sounded like more than what is needed for flexible dining.

News article about return to daily service for the Empire Builder
https://us.yahoo.com/news/amtrak-loses- ... 00962.html

Some interesting data presented within the story,
"In 2018, Amtrak accounted for 6.4 billion passenger-miles, a measure equal to one passenger traveling one mile. In comparison, domestic air travel generated 730 billion passenger-miles, over 100 times more. Even that didn't come close to highway users, who generated an estimated 5.6 trillion that same year, according to the Congressional Research Service."
Math they did not do for you, 5,600,000,000,000 / 6,400,000,000 = 875
Yes, highways miles were 875 times more than Amtrak passenger miles.

Numbers sometimes get lost in the math, so let's look at it a different way.
For every single passenger mile ride on Amtrak, there are 114 passenger miles flying on planes, and 875 passenger miles driving by car.

Sum 875, 114, and 1 your total would be 990 miles, almost a thousand. So Amtrak market share in the passenger miles statistic is slightly more than 0.1%, airlines 1.14%, and highways 98.75%. Why are so many suggesting we should more than 1% of the USDOT budget on passenger trains when about 0.1% of total passenger miles uses rail?

electricron wrote: ↑Wed May 26, 2021 10:38 amSum 875, 114, and 1 your total would be 990 miles, almost a thousand. So Amtrak market share in the passenger miles statistic is slightly more than 0.1%, airlines 1.14%, and highways 98.75%. Why are so many suggesting we should more than 1% of the USDOT budget on passenger trains when about 0.1% of total passenger miles uses rail?

Now factor in the number of Amtrak stations vs the number of airports with scheduled domestic flights vs the number of destinations reachable by car. Then factor in scheduling, how often trains travel between Amtrak stations vs how many flights between airports vs how many trips by automobile.

Certain modes of transportation have a greater availability. It makes sense that they have a greater raw usage.

Observed:

#6(24) - first Eastward Zephyr frequency increase:

2 P-43
V-Bagg
T-Dorm
2 Sleeper
Diner
Lounge
2 Coach

30ML @ MP18

electricron wrote: ↑Wed May 26, 2021 10:38 am News article about return to daily service for the Empire Builder
https://us.yahoo.com/news/amtrak-loses- ... 00962.html

Some interesting data presented within the story,
"In 2018, Amtrak accounted for 6.4 billion passenger-miles, a measure equal to one passenger traveling one mile. In comparison, domestic air travel generated 730 billion passenger-miles, over 100 times more. Even that didn't come close to highway users, who generated an estimated 5.6 trillion that same year, according to the Congressional Research Service."
Math they did not do for you, 5,600,000,000,000 / 6,400,000,000 = 875
Yes, highways miles were 875 times more than Amtrak passenger miles.

Numbers sometimes get lost in the math, so let's look at it a different way.
For every single passenger mile ride on Amtrak, there are 114 passenger miles flying on planes, and 875 passenger miles driving by car.

Sum 875, 114, and 1 your total would be 990 miles, almost a thousand. So Amtrak market share in the passenger miles statistic is slightly more than 0.1%, airlines 1.14%, and highways 98.75%. Why are so many suggesting we should more than 1% of the USDOT budget on passenger trains when about 0.1% of total passenger miles uses rail?

With respect - that isn't a totally fair comparison. First of all you are comparing just Amtrak to all airlines and all highway usage. Highways is going to include all freight over highway, all private passenger cars, and all bussing - while for rail you are just looking at Amtrak ridership which is just intercity passenger rail (not including commuter rail, transit, etc.). Not all passenger rail/transit money in the DOT budget goes to Amtrak. Money also goes to transit and commuter rail. If you want to make a fairer comparison look at Amtrak vs. Airlines vs. Intercity Bus. Or ALL rail vs. other modes. Not arguing that Amtrak has this huge market share - I am aware it doesn't - but that comparison depresses it even further because you're including truck traffic on highways but not freight (or any other type of) rail. If you did the same thing with intercity bus (which a lot of people against passenger rail support) intercity bus would have a similarly pitiful market share.

duplicate

Instead of taking national figures why don't you study those places where there is heavy rail use. Take New Haven line, Albany, NEC , Separate NEC WASH - Richmond. PHL - Harrisburg might give some idea of what interior routes would do. Now also study the LAX basin, Nor Cal, and Chicago. Quit making comparisons of whole country a straw dog,

At the end of the day , it doesn't really matter. What matters is the need to move from present energy inefficient transport methods to more efficient ones. Amtrak may not be that efficient at the moment , it just proves the need to spend billions more to make rail more attractive and efficient.

west point wrote: ↑Wed May 26, 2021 4:38 pm Instead of taking national figures why don't you study those places where there is heavy rail use. Take New Haven line, Albany, NEC , Separate NEC WASH - Richmond. PHL - Harrisburg might give some idea of what interior routes would do. Now also study the LAX basin, Nor Cal, and Chicago. Quit making comparisons of whole country a straw dog,

I have done that, it got few, if any, responses, so I added this new article a day later. Check out my May 25 post in this very thread, just one day earlier. It compared CA 99 vs the San Joaquin trains - sorry no data for airlines on that one. 1 million passengers per year on the San Joaquin trains, not bad considering nationally the ridership data that year was slightly more than 30 million passengers. So it is a frequent train service as far as Amtrak is concerned. One train route, one highway route was all that was compared, yet the market share results were not that much better than the national statistics results.

Amtrak is not, I repeat, not funded on a per route basis, it is funded on a national basis. So is Federal funding for highways. Additionally, the two different posts were comparing different statistics, one was total ridership on the train vs the average daily traffic at various points along the one highway, the other was comparing passenger miles. Passenger miles do not include freight traffic even one little bit. Passenger miles is one passenger carried one mile - does not matter by which mode of transport.

It would be interesting to compare the amount of capital expenditure and maintenance on CA99 vs the San Joaquin railroad route over the last 50 years.

David Benton wrote: ↑Wed May 26, 2021 10:09 pm It would be interesting to compare the amount of capital expenditure and maintenance on CA99 vs the San Joaquin railroad route over the last 50 years.

Yes, it would. If you can find the data for the last 50 years, I am willing to discuss it. Good luck finding it! Finding that data is hard work.

Caltrans has definitely invested in CA 99, turning into into a full freeway south of Sacramento (last cross
intersections at grade eliminated by 2015), between Merced and Chowchilla. This now makes two
north-south inland freeway routes. Coastal route 101 is windier and not full freeway in various
segments.

99 once ran through from the Mexican border to British Columbia, still active as BC 99 from the border
through downtown Vancouver and north through Whistler to Cache Creek.

electricron wrote: ↑Wed May 26, 2021 10:38 am News article about return to daily service for the Empire Builder
https://us.yahoo.com/news/amtrak-loses- ... 00962.html

Some interesting data presented within the story,
"In 2018, Amtrak accounted for 6.4 billion passenger-miles, a measure equal to one passenger traveling one mile. In comparison, domestic air travel generated 730 billion passenger-miles, over 100 times more. Even that didn't come close to highway users, who generated an estimated 5.6 trillion that same year, according to the Congressional Research Service."
Math they did not do for you, 5,600,000,000,000 / 6,400,000,000 = 875
Yes, highways miles were 875 times more than Amtrak passenger miles.

Numbers sometimes get lost in the math, so let's look at it a different way.
For every single passenger mile ride on Amtrak, there are 114 passenger miles flying on planes, and 875 passenger miles driving by car.

Sum 875, 114, and 1 your total would be 990 miles, almost a thousand. So Amtrak market share in the passenger miles statistic is slightly more than 0.1%, airlines 1.14%, and highways 98.75%. Why are so many suggesting we should more than 1% of the USDOT budget on passenger trains when about 0.1% of total passenger miles uses rail?

So basically, "it goes nowhere so we shouldn't expand it to actually go somewhere?" I see this all the time around Atlanta talking about expanding MARTA: "MARTA is useless, it goes nowhere!" "So let's spend money to make it go somewhere" "NO! Didn't you hear me? It GOES NOWHERE!!!"