The "Top 10" least-used Amtrak Stations

Why even serve them?

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/arti ... lways.html

THE 10 LEAST-USED AMTRAK STATIONS IN THE USA


1. Sanderson, Texas – 247 riders per year

2. Montgomery (MNG), West Virginia – 266

3. Alderson (ALD), West Virginia - 399

4. Thurmond (THN), West Virginia - 466

5. Rensselaer (REN), Indiana - 509

6. Connersville (COI), Indiana - 528

7. Lordsburg (LDB), New Mexico - 688

8. South Shore-South Portsmouth (SPM), Kentucky - 870

9. Schriever (SCH), Louisiana - 912

10. Browning (BRO), Montana - 935

Source: Amtrak, using 2023 data.

...and all of these are served by (drum roll please)... Long Distance Service trains!

If these were served by more frequent service, maybe. But this is LD service. It's forgivable.

Why even serve them?

Good question. Recall the Beeching cuts in the UK. While most of us that are aware of such cuts recall them primarily as a branch line passenger affair, the real work was done on the freight side. At the time, (1960ish) most British freight at LCL in extremely small and erratic volumes. Dr. Beeching found that there were perhaps 100 stations out of 500 that shipped less than five percent of all volume on the rails, and cut them. Perhaps a similar move would be useful on our long distance routes? Dump the bottom twenty stations?

Side note, "The Rise and Fall of British Railways: Goods & Freight by John Vaughan " is a very interesting book. It is incredible how British industry wasn't utterly strangled during the war because most freight trains were 20ish cars of four-wheel open wagons with no brakes. How do you move enough tonnage to defeat the Blitz with a bunch of tank engines??? By our standards this was 1890's railroading at best.

STrRedWolf wrote: ↑Wed Oct 23, 2024 6:50 pm ...and all of these are served by (drum roll please)... Long Distance Service trains!

If these were served by more frequent service, maybe. But this is LD service. It's forgivable.

And all but the one in Montana are being served by a total, meaning in both directions, of SIX trains per WEEK. I wonder how much better some of them would do with 14 trains per week?
Additionally, the Empire Builder only stops in Browning, Montana during the months of October to April. That means half the year Browning is serviced by zero trains.
And you expect them to compete with train stations that are scheduled to be serviced by Amtrak twice a day or more?

Also worth asking, "what is the potential ridership here?". Thurmond is population 5, Browning is 1,000, Sanderson is 650.

To make these stations worthwhile, you'd have to load everybody on the train multiple times per year. Take Jackson MS for example - 35,000/year. That means everybody in Browing rides the train every week January through August.

Yazoo City sees 3,000 passengers per year, or everybody in Browning rides 3x/year.

Any way you look at it, there's not a lot of potential in some of these cities in WV, NM, TX, etc... and it exposes the "essential transportation" myth for what it is. You could run daily or 2x/day trains and Lordsburg and Browning wouldnt match Yazoo City MS. It would literally be cheaper to run a Sprinter van along the SAA-TUS Sunset route.

Tadman wrote: ↑Thu Oct 24, 2024 8:02 am Also worth asking, "what is the potential ridership here?". Thurmond is population 5, Browning is 1,000, Sanderson is 650.

These train station do not exist to service these small towns alone. Browning is located within Glacier National Park and has a ski resort. Does the ever popular Rocking Mountain Express run every day? Sanderson services the nearby Big Bend National Park. Thurmond is located in the New River Gorge valley, with zero highway or road access. Hikers, white water rafters, and skiers are serviced by this station more so than the inhabitants. Probably more inhabitants of New York City visit these stations than the locals.

So population alone does not make a station viable. Frequency of the trains and users intent do.

Read Rensselaer and thought, 'no f---ing way!', then read Indiana and thought, 'checks out' lol

I'm pretty sure those are all flag stops, and I recall at least one of them is simply a concrete platform that the town put in.

So the overall cost to Amtrak is probably zero.

That said, it would be interesting to find ways to say double the ridership of them!

(that said, last time this came up, I did make a goal of getting off (and then on) the Texas one.).

Greg Moore wrote: ↑Mon Oct 28, 2024 12:59 pm I'm pretty sure those are all flag stops, and I recall at least one of them is simply a concrete platform that the town put in.

So the overall cost to Amtrak is probably zero.

That said, it would be interesting to find ways to say double the ridership of them!

(that said, last time this came up, I did make a goal of getting off (and then on) the Texas one.).

This makes me wonder if there's sufficient local transport to experience Big Bend NP without a private vehicle.

Although, I just looked, and the real gateway to BBNP is Marathon, which is closer to the station in Alpine than it is Sanderson . Google says there's no transit available from San Antonio to the park in any event.

EDIT: The official BBNP site does mention Alpine for Amtrak and Greyhound, but it also says there's no public transportation to get you to, or around in, the park.

markhb wrote: ↑Thu Oct 31, 2024 10:58 am This makes me wonder if there's sufficient local transport to experience Big Bend NP without a private vehicle.

Although, I just looked, and the real gateway to BBNP is Marathon, which is closer to the station in Alpine than it is Sanderson . Google says there's no transit available from San Antonio to the park in any event.

Thanks for the correction, I did confuse the two west Texas stations.
Which brings up the question, why does Amtrak stop in Sanderson?
What I found was, per Wiki,
"After regulations changed in 1995, the Southern Pacific ended the practice of changing train crews (and overnighting them) in Sanderson."
Since the Sunset Limited is the oldest "named" passenger train still running on Amtrak, hence the #1 and #2 rating, it is safe to assume this "railroad" town was an important stop on the Sunset Limited train up to and including 1995 - as far as crews were concerned.
It is difficult to add stations to Amtrak's list of stations, it is just as difficult politically to remove them.
Therefore Amtrak still stops there after almost 30 years.

Since the Sunset Limited is the oldest "named" passenger train still running on Amtrak, hence the #1 and #2 rating,

I don't think that's why it's 1 & 2. If you look they trains are numbered geographically out west from south to north.

1/2 Sunset
3/4 Chief
5/6 Zehpyr
7/8 Builder

Also, 1/2 were the numbers on SP for many years, which made it a good starting point.

ExCon90 wrote: ↑Fri Nov 01, 2024 7:33 pm Also, 1/2 were the numbers on SP for many years, which made it a good starting point.

In later years of the SOU Crescent its numbers were also 1 & 2 for the connecting pullman NYP - NOL - LAX.

It all depends on which Congress Critters Amtrak needs to please for funding. That's likely many of these stops real purpose, since they don't move very many people.

ExCon90 wrote: ↑Fri Nov 01, 2024 7:33 pm Also, 1/2 were the numbers on SP for many years, which made it a good starting point.

Somehow SP got both of their trains to keep the numbers - wasn't the starlight 11/14 before Amtrak?