Railroad Forums 

  • Cascades 501 Wreck 18 December 17

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

Moderators: GirlOnTheTrain, mtuandrew, Tadman

 #1489681  by AdvancedApproach1991
 
ApproachMedium wrote:Amazed that happened yet the 601 and 627 still sit on the property.

Maybe cause the 601 and 627 are owned outright by Amtrak and the 1402 was owned by ODOT/WSDOT, so they had alot of say with Siemens on what they wanted t they wanted to do. Just an educated guess?

To me, the 1402 looked decent post-accident considering the thing fell down a 20ft embankment, didn't notice too much frame damage if any at all
 #1489723  by ApproachMedium
 
That entire thing was shot. The body is the frame, so in that kind of a mess its all pretty much done. The 601 and 627 are both stored in different locations now which leads me to believe theres intentions to do different things with one and the other. One is stored in a line with stuff thats set to be sold/scrapped and the other is set in the "I dont care zone" where the aem=7s went and had all of their horns and numberboards stolen.
 #1491817  by eolesen
 
Without prejudice towards the admins, does this topic deserve to be stickied/pinned now that it's almost a year ago and there's no activity?

Feel free to delete after you reconsider it's importance... ;)
 #1507313  by glennk419
 
My apology if this was already asked / answered somewhere but has traffic resumed on the bypass or are they still using the original route?
 #1507362  by Vincent
 
Cascades trains are still running along the shore route. There are 4 roundtrips a day plus the Starlight. I heard that the service will stay at 4x a day once the route is switched back to the Bypass because there aren't enough trainsets available to cover the 6x a day schedule.
 #1507692  by wigwagfan
 
Vincent wrote:Cascades trains are still running along the shore route. There are 4 roundtrips a day plus the Starlight. I heard that the service will stay at 4x a day once the route is switched back to the Bypass because there aren't enough trainsets available to cover the 6x a day schedule.
If Trains 511/513 and train 508 (PDX-EUG) were cancelled, that would free up a trainset that could potentially make two PDX-SEA round-trips and make an insane amount of money, but instead it sits in a yard in Eugene for over five hours a day, not making a single penny nor carrying a single passenger. On top of being an already very poor performing train with miserable ridership.

There's other ways Amtrak/WSDOT/ODOT could dramatically improve these trains but there seems to be no real desire to. A good example is the southbound train 501 arriving at PDX just before 11:00 AM, and sits around doing nothing (costing money but not making money) until 3:00 PM. That's plenty of time for another revenue, money making, passenger hauling trip back to Seattle with just a 30 minute layover in Portland to kick the riders off, board the new riders, a quick top off of the gas tank, maybe a squeegy on the loco windows, and highball it. 280 passengers at $40 = $11,200 in revenue for virtually zero additional cost. $4 million a year. Enough to pay for a replacement 1402 in just over a year.
 #1507699  by Backshophoss
 
The Quick fix is the 2 unused WI Taglo sets at Beech Grove,need to moved west and put in service!
Reported hangup is the FRA wavier to use the sets "as is",without the Door interlock trainline that's now required.
(ie Door open,loco cannot move)
 #1507741  by ApproachMedium
 
wigwagfan wrote:
Vincent wrote:Cascades trains are still running along the shore route. There are 4 roundtrips a day plus the Starlight. I heard that the service will stay at 4x a day once the route is switched back to the Bypass because there aren't enough trainsets available to cover the 6x a day schedule.
If Trains 511/513 and train 508 (PDX-EUG) were cancelled, that would free up a trainset that could potentially make two PDX-SEA round-trips and make an insane amount of money, but instead it sits in a yard in Eugene for over five hours a day, not making a single penny nor carrying a single passenger. On top of being an already very poor performing train with miserable ridership.

There's other ways Amtrak/WSDOT/ODOT could dramatically improve these trains but there seems to be no real desire to. A good example is the southbound train 501 arriving at PDX just before 11:00 AM, and sits around doing nothing (costing money but not making money) until 3:00 PM. That's plenty of time for another revenue, money making, passenger hauling trip back to Seattle with just a 30 minute layover in Portland to kick the riders off, board the new riders, a quick top off of the gas tank, maybe a squeegy on the loco windows, and highball it. 280 passengers at $40 = $11,200 in revenue for virtually zero additional cost. $4 million a year. Enough to pay for a replacement 1402 in just over a year.

It isnt that simple. Trains need to be serviced. And only having 30 minutes means if there IS any delays or snags enroute that will end up making a cascade of delays for any trains later in the day the set would use. At some point trains need interiors cleaned between runs. i dont know the distance/time these trains are running but nothing on the NEC gets a 30 minute turn except maybe a Keystone set and that continues to prove to be a problem because the bathrooms run out of water and the trash bins fill up. And the toilets start to nearly overflow.
 #1507747  by mtuandrew
 
wigwag: it sounds like you’re saying, dump the Eugene-Seattle-Vancouver Talgo turns and either use a dedicated, smaller trainset that only runs in the Willamette Valley, or abandon all Eugene service but for buses and LD service. How close am I to the mark?
 #1508015  by daybeers
 
I know a lot is involved in turning a train, but I have an inkling that, in true Amtrak fashion, the way it's done is very inefficient. I could be way off the mark here though, so please correct me if otherwise. What really gets me is the idling of the locomotives while laying over! An absolutely terrible contributor to pollution.
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