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Re: Does Amtrak prefer to operate on some host railroads lines as opposed to others???
Author: Jason Kuehn
Date: 10-24-2007 - 09:40
Coleman,
I don't know who you are, but you sure seem to rile up the gallery. Anyway in response to your question, Amtrak does clearly work better with some railroads than with others, although all the freight carriers can be difficult to work with because they all have some congestion issues and passenger trains operating with higher priorities and at faster track speeds can cause lots of congestion especially on single track lines.
Generally Amtrak gets much better results working with BNSF and NS as they tend to be much more disciplined with operations. They also get pretty good results from CP, but aside from the Empire Builder between Chicago and the Twin Cities and Albany to Montreal they don't have many trains on CP.
Amtrak uses the routes they use, largely because of trying to route through as many population centers as possible and hit places where there are stations. Specifically:
The San Joaquin trains use the BNSF because the ATSF (and now BNSF) was passenger friendly. UP, BNSF, and Amtrak have discussed directional running in the valley to reduce train congestion on what are two single track lines (BNSF even exercises trackage rights in the Valley over UP to reduce congestion on their line), but this has proved difficult do to station locations, and access to yard facilities by the freight carriers and these issues have not been easily resolved. Directional running would require Amtrak to either relocate stations, or open two stations in each town in the Valley which they would prefer not to do. However, they have done it in Texas to accommodate UP's directional running between St. Louis and Dallas I believe. Detouring over the UP does not make a lot of sense with short haul trains in the Valley as buses would have to be hired anyway just to take people from the UP line to the stations, and there may not be safe platforms for detraining people without risking turned ankles etc. on the UP. Detours tend to occur mostly on the long haul trains, not short haul corridor trains.
The Coast Starlate stays on UP because there are almost no intermediate population centers on the BNSF Inside Gateway lines. While the I-5 corridor might be a good candidate from double tracking, the geography makes that a very expensive and unlikely proposition.
The Cal Zephyr uses BNSF largely as a matter of history, but also they get pretty good service from BNSF. There is little incentive for Amtrak to switch between lines - UP doesn't really want them and UP also misses the other key population centers such as the Quad Cities just like BNSF. Amtrak has used the UP line for detours through Nebraska. Amtrak has looked several times at the IAIS through Iowa to Council Bluffs as the line serves more population centers, but the funding for rehabilitating the line for passenger trains has not been found thus far.
BNSF does a good job on the Southwest Chief, but has two advantages. The Raton Pass route is nearly devoid of other traffic and the Transcon has double track which offers a lot more flexibility for accommodating fast trains around slower trains. UP's routes for the Sunset, Coast Starlate, Cal Zephyr are largely single track routes. The Heartland Flyer route on the other hand is on single track BNSF lines, but seems to perform pretty well.
NS tends to do a pretty good job for Amtrak and VRE but, does not have a lot of Amtrak routes compared to CSX. And NS is not begging for more Amtrak trains. CSX's route network serves more of the East Coast population centers which is a curse for them on freight traffic given a largely single track railroad and interference from several commuter territories and numerous Amtrak routes. I thought the FRA imposed 10 mph speed restrictions on the former SAL from Raleigh south would be the kiss of death for that Amtrak route, but CSX has upgraded the line, I suspect largely because they really did not want an additional pair of Amtrak trains on the former ACL freight route. One big benefit of the NS east coast north-south route is that it stays inland from most of the major cities and serves them through "branch" lines (Salvannah, Charteston, Wilmington, Norfolk, Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and North Jersey. This avoids terminal congestion and commuter lines.
Amtrak will tend to gravitate to routes which serve more population centers and where there is double track as double track is increasingly necessary as freight traffic rises to ensure reliability of passenger train performance. CSX in particular will increasingly put pressure on government agencies such as MBTA, VRE, MARC, Septa, and Amtrak to build double track if they want to add passenger trains.
Jason Kuehn
I don't know who you are, but you sure seem to rile up the gallery. Anyway in response to your question, Amtrak does clearly work better with some railroads than with others, although all the freight carriers can be difficult to work with because they all have some congestion issues and passenger trains operating with higher priorities and at faster track speeds can cause lots of congestion especially on single track lines.
Generally Amtrak gets much better results working with BNSF and NS as they tend to be much more disciplined with operations. They also get pretty good results from CP, but aside from the Empire Builder between Chicago and the Twin Cities and Albany to Montreal they don't have many trains on CP.
Amtrak uses the routes they use, largely because of trying to route through as many population centers as possible and hit places where there are stations. Specifically:
The San Joaquin trains use the BNSF because the ATSF (and now BNSF) was passenger friendly. UP, BNSF, and Amtrak have discussed directional running in the valley to reduce train congestion on what are two single track lines (BNSF even exercises trackage rights in the Valley over UP to reduce congestion on their line), but this has proved difficult do to station locations, and access to yard facilities by the freight carriers and these issues have not been easily resolved. Directional running would require Amtrak to either relocate stations, or open two stations in each town in the Valley which they would prefer not to do. However, they have done it in Texas to accommodate UP's directional running between St. Louis and Dallas I believe. Detouring over the UP does not make a lot of sense with short haul trains in the Valley as buses would have to be hired anyway just to take people from the UP line to the stations, and there may not be safe platforms for detraining people without risking turned ankles etc. on the UP. Detours tend to occur mostly on the long haul trains, not short haul corridor trains.
The Coast Starlate stays on UP because there are almost no intermediate population centers on the BNSF Inside Gateway lines. While the I-5 corridor might be a good candidate from double tracking, the geography makes that a very expensive and unlikely proposition.
The Cal Zephyr uses BNSF largely as a matter of history, but also they get pretty good service from BNSF. There is little incentive for Amtrak to switch between lines - UP doesn't really want them and UP also misses the other key population centers such as the Quad Cities just like BNSF. Amtrak has used the UP line for detours through Nebraska. Amtrak has looked several times at the IAIS through Iowa to Council Bluffs as the line serves more population centers, but the funding for rehabilitating the line for passenger trains has not been found thus far.
BNSF does a good job on the Southwest Chief, but has two advantages. The Raton Pass route is nearly devoid of other traffic and the Transcon has double track which offers a lot more flexibility for accommodating fast trains around slower trains. UP's routes for the Sunset, Coast Starlate, Cal Zephyr are largely single track routes. The Heartland Flyer route on the other hand is on single track BNSF lines, but seems to perform pretty well.
NS tends to do a pretty good job for Amtrak and VRE but, does not have a lot of Amtrak routes compared to CSX. And NS is not begging for more Amtrak trains. CSX's route network serves more of the East Coast population centers which is a curse for them on freight traffic given a largely single track railroad and interference from several commuter territories and numerous Amtrak routes. I thought the FRA imposed 10 mph speed restrictions on the former SAL from Raleigh south would be the kiss of death for that Amtrak route, but CSX has upgraded the line, I suspect largely because they really did not want an additional pair of Amtrak trains on the former ACL freight route. One big benefit of the NS east coast north-south route is that it stays inland from most of the major cities and serves them through "branch" lines (Salvannah, Charteston, Wilmington, Norfolk, Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and North Jersey. This avoids terminal congestion and commuter lines.
Amtrak will tend to gravitate to routes which serve more population centers and where there is double track as double track is increasingly necessary as freight traffic rises to ensure reliability of passenger train performance. CSX in particular will increasingly put pressure on government agencies such as MBTA, VRE, MARC, Septa, and Amtrak to build double track if they want to add passenger trains.
Jason Kuehn
