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  • North Carolina NCDOT-Amtrak Piedmont Service

  • Discussion related to Amtrak also known as the National Railroad Passenger Corp.
Discussion related to Amtrak also known as the National Railroad Passenger Corp.

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 #1589186  by eolesen
 
orulz wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 6:48 am Similarly, I believe there would easily be demand for hourly service between Milwaukee and Chicago. This would be around 18 round trips per day. Maybe even two trains per hour! The limiting factor is not demand. Everywhere in the US, I believe ridership is essentially limited by service, and service is limited by capacity in some way: whether it's "capacity" in terms of what the freight RRs will allow, "capacity" in terms of congestion on the NEC, or "capacity" in terms of the funding to run service.
I think what you'd wind up seeing by adding frequencies is more cannibalization of the existing frequencies than you'd see in stimulating new demand. There's a saturation point you can't ignore, especially if there's limited purpose for people to be traveling between two cities, and I just don't see seven day a week 365 days per year demand there.

CHI-MKE are close enough to be a commuter market. RDU-CLT isn't. You might be able to argue RDU-GSO is, but GSO-CLT is well beyond the edge of what most people tolerate.
 #1589191  by orulz
 
eolesen wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 11:25 am I think what you'd wind up seeing by adding frequencies is more cannibalization of the existing frequencies than you'd see in stimulating new demand. There's a saturation point you can't ignore, especially if there's limited purpose for people to be traveling between two cities, and I just don't see seven day a week 365 days per year demand there.

CHI-MKE are close enough to be a commuter market. RDU-CLT isn't. You might be able to argue RDU-GSO is, but GSO-CLT is well beyond the edge of what most people tolerate.
You don't have to serve only daily commuters to justify frequent service. There are very few daily commuters between Raleigh and Washington, and yet there are 15 nonstop flights every day from RDU airport to Washington-area airports. A significant portion - probably the majority, in my experience as a semi-frequent traveler on this route - is O/D traffic, not connecting traffic.

The thing is, though, you don't have to really understand exactly what's going on or who's riding and for what reason; this is helpful data, but just measuring how sensitive ridership is to service increases is enough to show that ridership, at least on the Piedmont, is highly elastic, and there is likely room for a great deal more frequency than is run on the corridor today.

When they bumped the Piedmont corridor frequency from 2->3 per day, the new frequency cannibalized exactly ZERO of the ridership from the existing scheduled trains. Ridership *per train* went from 68k to 70k - 3% higher after the frequency increase compared with before. It actually made the existing scheduled services *MORE* popular! Counterintuitive? Perhaps, but then again, maybe not. A train that runs three times a day is a LOT more convenient than one that one that only runs twice; the number of people willing to consider it goes up significantly as a result of that added convenience.

Similarly, when they went from 3->4 round trips per day, ridership per train did decrease, but barely: from 74k to 71k: Ridership of each previously scheduled train was 96% of what it was before adding the new scheduled train. So the new train basically only cannibalized 4% of the ridership of existing services. You'd be quite hard-pressed to find anybody who would look at cannibalization rates in the range of four percent or negative three percent and say "Mhm, demand's all tapped out, more service would be wasteful." Especially when it's all happening with a backdrop of rapid population growth, densification, increasing traffic congestion, and steady investment in improved tracks and stations that can help to backfill any cannibalization that does occur, with future natural growth of ridership.

You're right, though, there is a saturation point somewhere, but the numbers clearly demonstrate that four round trips per day is barely scratching the surface. What is that saturation point? A train every 2 hours, or roughly 8-10 per day? Every hour, or roughly 16-20 per day? Can't say. All I can say with absolute conviction and certainty, backed up by data, 4 trains per day ain't it.

----

Without similar analysis on the Hiawatha Service, I can't say for sure, but given the population of Milwaukee and Chicago, and especially given Chicago traffic, I find it likely that 7 trains per day doesn't even come close to satisfying the demand that exists there, either.
Last edited by orulz on Wed Jan 12, 2022 1:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.
 #1589192  by orulz
 
MattW wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 11:03 am Why was CSX granted dispatching rights? Of the three major users (NCDOT, NS, CSX) they seem to be the one that would use that trackage the least given that it's almost at the end of their line in that area.
The segment from Raleigh to Cary is part of the CSX S-line - the former Seaboard Air Line mainline, which was signalized with centralized train control decades ago (probably in the 1950s or 60s?) back when it was a more important through route than it is today.

The the Raleigh-Greensboro segment of the NCRR/Norfolk Southern H-line was not centrally dispatched until NCDOT and NCRR completed installation of a signal system sometime around the 1999-2001 timeframe. So basically, CSX got there first - so they get to dispatch it.
 #1589195  by kitchin
 
Orulz, thanks for compiling all this info. What do you think accounts for the slow times? I'm going to guess dispatching or speed limits favorable to freight. And how has the state's spending on projects that have a benefit to NS and CSX compared to Virginia's, if you know? Finally, what would be a wild guess on start of construction for rebuilding the S-line and enhancing the connecting rail from Raleigh to Richmond?

It seems to me Richmond is really going to slow down the S-line project (physically, but perhaps also politically). The reconfiguration there is a major project, and will probably be scheduled first.

The amount of political grease on Brightline is impressive, along with the efficient track work. As a private equity company, we don't really know if the motivation is a good railroad or other interests like real estate. Or if it needs to be profitable as a railroad.
 #1589197  by orulz
 
kitchin wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 1:51 pm Orulz, thanks for compiling all this info. What do you think accounts for the slow times? I'm going to guess dispatching or speed limits favorable to freight.
The lowest hanging fruit as far as slow average speeds and poor reliability are concerned are, as far as I'm concerned:
1. Conflicts with freight (and the schedule padding intended to mitigate it)
2. Long dwell times due to low platforms and the requisite single-file boarding practices
3. Inability to boost the speed limit to 90mph in spite of the recent, new signal system and trackwork that should make it possible
4. The trains, especially the locomotives, are old, and just plain slow. They don't accelerate quickly. Replacing them with new trains (which is already funded) would help.
kitchin wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 1:51 pm And how has the state's spending on projects that have a benefit to NS and CSX compared to Virginia's, if you know?
I'm not quite sure how to answer this, only that it *appears* that nearly all of the benefits of the half-billion in ARRA Stimulus funding that was spent on this corridor (sidings, double track, etc) have accrued to Norfolk Southern. We got a 4th frequency in the corridor, yes, but on-time performance and trip times haven't improved at all compared with the pre-ARRA status quo. On the flipside, it's likely that the completed double track between Greensboro and Charlotte has had an enormous impact with regards to smoothing Norfolk Southern's operations in the state.
kitchin wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 1:51 pm Finally, what would be a wild guess on start of construction for rebuilding the S-line and enhancing the connecting rail from Raleigh to Richmond?
I am quite optimistic that this corridor will receive a significant infusion from the Infrastructure Bill, possibly to the tune of several $billion. I have discouragingly heard that they have considered dialing back their ambitions, and instead of building it as a "high speed railroad" with a bunch of realignments and the ability to support 110+mph service from day 1, restoring it exactly as it was when it was shuttered in the 1980s, and incrementally upgrading it from there. I am hoping that they will get a big enough infusion from the Infrastructure Bill to render this approach unnecessary.
Last edited by orulz on Wed Jan 12, 2022 3:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.
 #1589198  by jthomas
 
kitchin wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 1:51 pm What do you think accounts for the slow times?
Part of the problem is the route between Greensboro and Raleigh - it has many speed-restricted curves, and several single-track bottlenecks. For example, one of these single-track segments is immediately east of the station in Greensboro. Trains are schedule such that the southbound (to Charlotte) trains arrive in Greensboro 20-30 minutes before the northbound (to Raleigh trains), so that the meet between the two takes place on the double track between Greensboro and High Point. But if the southbound is late, the northbound is held in the station at Greensboro until the southbound arrives.

As orulz mentioned, the low platforms don't help, nor does Amtrak's practice of typically only boarding/detraining at 1 or 2 doors. This creates long dwell times, especially when there are heavy passenger loads. I would guess that 10-20 minutes could be shaved off the schedule, and reliability increased, simply through better boarding procedures.
 #1592136  by Bob Roberts
 
Not really Piedmont related but an observation from the NCRR. The last two times I have departed Raleigh (headed West) the Northbound Star has been about an hour late. As I left town on the Piedmont I would see the Carolinian stopped at NCSU waiting for a platform to open in Raleigh. So it looks like there are many mornings where the Northbound Carolinian makes it's run to NYP in the Star's marker lights. Hopefully the S-Line opening and smart scheduling will reduce the route duplication of these two trains North of Cary.
 #1593313  by Bob Roberts
 
an as yet undetermined number of the Barnum and Bailey Circus cars that NCDOT had planned to refurbish for Piedmont service have burned. They were being stored "out in the woods" on state owned track waiting to be auctioned since NCDOT recieved a grant for new equipment after these were purchased. The remoteness of the tracks prevented fire crews from reaching the cars.

https://www.newsobserver.com/news/local ... 66829.html
 #1593414  by scratchyX1
 
STrRedWolf wrote: Thu Mar 10, 2022 4:23 pm Sad, very sad. Getting the consist and rebuilding it would of been best... but now...

It's probably mostly scrap now.
And some of the gear had very intricate animal graffiti on the side , too.
It amazes me that such out of the way gear is able to attract taggers. Reminds me of the Ex SF doubledeckers out in the desert that got hit really bad.
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