AMTRAK SYSTEM TIMETABLE DISCONTINUED

[mmi16]

I think that's how Amtrak sees it right now. Anything more than a million or two in savings really does have the potential to allow Amtrak to restore additional service. Interesting to note that we've gotten to the point were Amtrak really can make these kinds of decisions.

And it has only taken 45 years!

[gokeefe]

I think that's related to more than just Amtrak's own efforts at reorganizing U.S. passenger rail.

[Noel Weaver]

Producing a booklet of the nature of the system timetable is not cheap and I guess they can get along without it. They did 300 thousand copies of the current one according to the information in the timetable and the printing costs are not cheap for something like this. I would like to seem them do something of this nature and charge a couple of dollars each for a copy but I think they nixed this because of a lack of demand and that probably makes sense. Folks like us would pony up for them but most people would probably not pay anything for a copy. What we need is for something like they had in Switzerland back in 1970 and maybe still have a book showing every single passenger train in the country for a set price available at railroad stations, stores and elsewhere. Don't know if something of this nature would work as well here because even the Official Guide did not call all the commuter train timetables way back when it was doing well. We have reached a point where we are way too depended on computers and the internet for just about everything.
Noel Weaver

[gokeefe]

Dependence on computers is indeed bad. Interesting to note thought that unlike 40 years ago you could send the timetable to a printing press from virtually any computer in the world using Adobe Publisher or similar programs. You could even operate the printing press using the same computer. The ubiquity of computers is a weakness but their universality is a far greater strength.

[leviramsey]

The timetables (for Amtrak and the various commuter rail operators) are presumably not copyrighted (further they may not even be copyrightable: I doubt the courts would hold that a statement along the lines of "such and such a train is due at such and such a place at these times" to be copyrightable). Most if not all of them are available in some machine-readable form online: it's not that hard for someone with a little programming and design ability to collect the timetable information, automatically lay them out into a unified PDF and use a print-on-demand service to print the PDFs and ship them out. Maybe even include some pictures from Wikipedia to liven it up.

Print-on-demand for such a publication might cost $10, including shipping to anywhere in the US. Sell it for $15 a copy, or maybe $12 a copy if the subscriber has enough for the next edition at full-price (so if you wanted three editions, you'd send $39 (effectively giving whoever did this a $29 interest-free loan) to open your account). Probably only railfans would subscribe, but it still might be worth it for someone to do as a sideline.

[gokeefe]

As long as the schedule information was recompiled into new formatting I think you could do this. Interesting to wonder if the Official Guide ever paid royalties to the railroads. Can't imagine they did.

[electricron]

Dependence on computers is indeed bad. Interesting to note thought that unlike 40 years ago you could send the timetable to a printing press from virtually any computer in the world using Adobe Publisher or similar programs. You could even operate the printing press using the same computer. The ubiquity of computers is a weakness but their universality is a far greater strength.

PDFs aren't limited to just computers, most smart phones can view them as well.
Amtrak's online booking site works on both computers and smart phones.
You can even pay the bill with a smart phone. Try doing that with a printed timetable book, no way!

[JimBoylan]

Interesting to wonder if the Official Guide ever paid royalties to the railroads. Can't imagine they did.

When I worked for the railroads starting in 1975, the listings were Paid Ads! The station indexes were free editorial content. Since not all roads paid to put their complete schedules in the book, the station index included a footnote something like "on the road indicated, but not listed in any schedule."

[gokeefe]

Very interesting to note. I'm assuming most of the listings you were working with must have been Penn Central commuter trains? If I recall correctly by that time the only remaining service would have been the Southern Crescent and the Rio Grande Zephyr(?).

[ExCon90]

Interesting to wonder if the Official Guide ever paid royalties to the railroads. Can't imagine they did.

When I worked for the railroads starting in 1975, the listings were Paid Ads! The station indexes were free editorial content. Since not all roads paid to put their complete schedules in the book, the station index included a footnote something like "on the road indicated, but not listed in any schedule."

Correct--the railroads paid by the page to be in the Guide. That's why there is virtually no white space in any of the Guides; the railroads filled up every page, even to the extent of printing explanations of reference marks sideways and sticking random reference marks wherever they would fit (even in the unused part of a column of an entirely unrelated train) rather than spring for the cost of another page. You also find sections underneath a timetable, in paragraph form, headed "Additional trains"; it saved having to start a new page for trains that would otherwise have taken only a small part of a column. In more lavish days, railroads like the New Haven, New York Central, and Pennsylvania devoted pages to detailed commuter schedules (the New Haven and B&M even put them in their System timetables); as austerity set in they cut back, and Penn Central published only stations and mileages for each line, with a recommendation to consult individual timetable folders. A number of Western roads never did (at least in memory) publish commuter schedules in the Guide, notable examples being the C&NW, CB&Q, and IC (I believe the SP published their San Francisco "commute" services to the end).

I had occasion to visit the Official Guide offices numerous times in the 1970's; it was a classic letterpress printing operation, essentially unchanged since the 19th century. Typesetters picked individual pieces of type out of a rack (upper case above and lower case below) and placed them individually into a frame, from which a casting would then be made. The frames were preserved as is so that any change for next month could be made just by taking out (say) a 5 and replacing it with a 7 to accommodate a 2-minute change in a train time. Later they changed to (I believe) offset. At the height of passenger service in the U. S. each monthly issue could easily run to 1200 pages; the frames for each page had to be stored until it was time to do the next month's issue (the deadline was the 20th of the preceding month).

[ExCon90]

Very interesting to note. I'm assuming most of the listings you were working with must have been Penn Central commuter trains? If I recall correctly by that time the only remaining service would have been the Southern Crescent and the Rio Grande Zephyr(?).

As I recall, Amtrak listed its services in the Guide for some years after 1971 (I suspect because that's where people were accustomed to looking); I don't remember when they stopped. Later the Guide transformed itself into strictly a freight-services guide; maybe Amtrak stayed in until then.

[gokeefe]

Interesting I never realized Amtrak and the Official Guide overlapped.

[Amtk30]

After reading through this thread, I pulled out my copy of the March 1978 Guide - North American passenger travel edition United States, Canada, and Mexico. Purchased it at the NRPC offices then on 33rd Street, NYC. Cover highlights include: additional San Diegan, Champion resumes services, USA Rail Pass prices down, something about those turbos in NY, and LSL slated for refurbished "electric" cars(!). Not sure how much longer the Guide lasted for passenger listings through the Amtrak era.

Amtk30

[bdawe]

Who was running passenger operations in 1978? Amtrak, VIA , CP, Southern, Rio Grande, NdeM, Rock Island, BC Rail, Ontario Northland, SAL (ex Georgia), QNS&L, various commuter operations? Am I missing any?

[David Benton]

The Thomas Cook Overseas timetable, had listings of most American trains , buses and ferries.It was discontinued in 2010. It appears Amtrak was the inspiration for adding the "rest of the world", to the European timetable. It was then split to a seperate overseas Timetable in 1983, which I relied on a lot for my travel in the late eighties/ early nineties.
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