Amtrak test train passing through Ocean Springs, MS last year on the route for service between Mobile and New Orleans. It's still waiting on key approvals for needed infrastructure.
As a Rail Evangelist for Solutionary Rail, a supporter of the Climate Rail Alliance, a member of the Empire State Passengers Association (ESPA), and a member of the Rail Passengers Association (RPA), I try to keep an eye on what’s happening with railroads in America. I’m passing on some recent passenger news and commentary of interest.
Location, Location, Location
With plans for Amtrak expansion across the country thanks to Amtrak Joe and the Infrastructure Act, a lot of things are in motion. Part of the struggle to improve passenger service in America often turns on seemingly small choices and interactions between government at local, state and federal level.
Take Portland, Maine. There’s currently an ongoing effort to decide where to locate a new station for the Downeaster. The current stop takes the train onto a branch line to the Portland Transportation Center at Thompson’s Point. To get back to the main line requires a back-up move and about 15 minutes of time. This has larger effects than might be obvious at first glance.
...Gordon Edington, project manager at VHB, said the “cumulative operational impacts” during the five daily round-trips require 20 additional train movements to enter and leave the Portland Transportation Center. Northbound and southbound delays add 2½ hours a day “just to make this reverse move.”
“That additional time makes the Downeaster travel less competitive with other modes of transportation,” such as cars or buses, he said.
...The Northern New England Passenger Rail Authority served 600,000 passengers in 2023, and 125,000 were affected by the reverse move, Edington said. It required 3,600 hours of crew overtime, trains used 8,600 gallons of fuel, and time spent by passengers cost nearly $1 million in additional costs last year, Edington said.
Moving the station to the main line would result in a two-minute station stop instead of the 15 minutes now required, he said.
Three sites are being considered. The investment will be several million dollars, and one concern is to get it right not just for immediate needs but also the long term future of the region.
Gulf Rail Wars
Restoring Amtrak service on the Gulf Coast between Mobile and New Orleans has been held up for months. Negotiations between Amtrak, CSX, Norfolk Southern, and the Port of Alabama have been deadlocking over things like effects on freight movements in the port, sidings that are not long enough to let freight trains get out of the way of passenger trains, and other issues. The Surface Transportation Board (STB) had to step in and demand the parties detail just what the hangups were that were derailing progress.
The latest development is getting approval from Mobile’s Zoning Board of Adjustment to build a passenger train platform that will be ADA compliant and will have parking.
...That means the trickiest part for launching the new New Orleans-Mobile daily train is just ahead: getting the Mobile City Council to vote in favor of the City’s lease agreement for the property where the platform-station will sit, and to re-approve the Federal Restoration and Enhancement Grant matching funding the previous Council approved a couple of years ago.
There are seven voting members on the City Council. The last time this issue came up for a vote, the Council voted 5 to 2 in favor, and the hope is that the upcoming vote will turn out the same way. There’s strong public and civic support for the Gulf Coast service restoration, and a group of local advocates in Mobile – Friends of Amtrak-Mobile – has now grown to some 600 members working to create the political environment to push this project over the finish line. They’re doing a fantastic job, and they deserve your support!
This is not a new problem. The Historic Buffalo Central Terminal has had a love-hate relationship with the city because city leaders wanted a downtown location for obvious reasons, but putting a station there would have meant backing trains in and out across multiple street level crossings, a far worse case than in Portland, Maine. So, it was built further east of the city center.
As it was, the New York Central built an incredible landmark of a station comparable to Grand Central in NYC. It was a huge station with multiple platforms — if anything it proved larger than was eventually needed. With the collapse of passenger service in the 1960’s and the bankruptcy of the Penn-Central, the terminal fell into disuse. Buffalo City Government and various owners allowed serious deterioration and outright vandalism to take place.
There are efforts to restore the complex and adapt it for reuse, but there’s much work yet to do. (The Michigan Central Station story shows what is possible.) Buffalo has a new Amtrak station at Exchange Street, which replaced an earlier structure at the same location. The days are long gone it seems when railroads built what were America’s answer to the great cathedrals of Europe. That any of them remain is as much a matter of luck as anything.
Growing Interest
Now picture the kind of complicated interaction between parties with competing agendas in Portland and Mobile all over the place, and you can begin to appreciate how hard it is to get even basic rail passenger service upgraded at the modest levels we are trying to achieve today.
Add in the fact that passenger rail has been gone from some areas for decades and the way society has been built around personal cars, it’s a wonder there isn’t more resistance to bringing back rail service. Include the understandable perception that active railroads mean derailments and massive toxic waste/bomb train disasters, and it’s no wonder the rail trail movement is having so much success persuading communities to rip up rails everywhere.
That being said, there is a growing interest in seeing passenger rail return, and not just because of climate concerns. This 2017 article shows one reason for pursuing Brightline service in Florida is because highway congestion is only getting worse.
It’s also seen as a way of boosting regional economies. Amtrak has announced another season of service from New York City to the Berkshires of Massachusetts. The Berkshire Flyer is a weekend service aimed at drawing travelers from NYC and several stops in the Hudson Valley up to Western Massachusetts.
Northeastern Pennsylvania is looking to restore passenger service to the Lehigh Valley that has been gone since the 1980s. This would restore connections to NYC and New Jersey. The study is still looking at basic options and routes, but it would be a BFD for the region if it goes forward.
It’s not just about restoring passenger service — it’s also about expanding existing service with more trains and more options. The Borealis Service is seeing cooperation between Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Illinois to make more Amtrak trains available for more travel choices.
Tickets are now available for a second daily Amtrak service between the Twin Cities and Chicago, via Milwaukee: new state-sponsored Borealis trains originate from St. Paul at midday and from Chicago in the late morning. Travelers seeking a more comfortable, sustainable and productive choice than driving will have double the current rail options, starting May 21, 2024.
Amtrak Borealis coach fares start at $41 each way between St. Paul and Chicago for adults, with everyday discounts for children ages 2-12, students, seniors, veterans, military personnel and families, groups, and others.
Amtrak Borealis trains will offer Coach and Business Class in addition to a café car featuring regional items. Customers will enjoy wide reclining seats with ample legroom, no middle seats, free Wi-Fi, and views of the Mississippi River between St. Paul and La Crosse, Wisc., in daylight in both directions across Wisconsin.
The trains will make the current Empire Builder stops between St. Paul and Milwaukee and Hiawatha stops between Milwaukee and Chicago (see schedule). Another benefit of the Amtrak Borealis service is a new eastbound Amtrak origination from Ramsey County’s Union Depot in St. Paul.
There’s another way to improve passenger rail: make the freight railroads whose track Amtrak has to use live up to their statutory obligations to give Amtrak trains priority.
The Sunset Limited had some of the worst on-time performance of all Amtrak routes; it’s now one of the most improved. What made the difference? Amtrak’s lawyers went to the Surface Transportation Board (STB) and asked Union Pacific Railroad be held to account. From 2022:
...It's the first formal complaint under the Federal Railroad Administration’s new passenger-rail metrics and standards, which took effect two years ago, and as a result Amtrak made a separate motion to the Boardoutlining how Amtrak thinks STB should carry out its first-ever Section 213 investigation.
“The Board should ... investigate whether and how UP’s corporate strategies and objectives drive substandard Amtrak on-time performance,” Amtrak said in its motion. “The Board should examine corporate plans, policies, and protocols, as well as other documents and information concerning how UP dispatchers are trained, directed, evaluated, and compensated; how UP dispatching algorithms are programmed; how UP trains and dispatching centers are staffed; how UP seeks to ensure that Amtrak’s statutory right to preference is effectuated; and how UP has reconciled its decision to implement Precision Scheduled Railroading (‘PSR’) with its obligations to host intercity passenger trains operating over the UP network.”
In its complaint, Amtrak accuses UP of “routinely” prioritizing freight trains over passenger trains, despite the long-standing legal requirement to give passenger trains preference. Whether resolving meets and passes, determining access to main lines, or otherwise failing to ensure that tracks are available for the scheduled and infrequent transit of Sunset Limited trains, UP is doing a “clearly substandard” and “abysmal” job, Amtrak says.
Freight railroads could better serve the public interest and not just Wall Street hedge funds if the Federal Railway Administration, the STB, and Congress addressed the need to regulate the rail industry more effectively. It’s not just about passenger rail either; East Palestine, OH showed how critical this is.
New Allies
With the investment in passenger rail that’s now taking place thanks to the Infrastructure Act, we’re starting to see corporate allies getting on board. RPA president and CEO Jim Matthews had observations from a recent Railway Interior Innovation Summit in which he found companies are realizing they have to help advance rail if they want to boost their bottom dollar:
...The Railway Interior Innovation Summit, organized by Germany-based Red Cabin, attracted high-level delegates from across the rail industry. I was excited and honored when Red Cabin asked me to Chair the event and guide the three days of tours and sessions. A large fraction of those executives came from outside the U.S. and Canada, and to be sure the gathered delegates – among them many CEOs, executive VPs, and even a Chair or two – were here to do serious business.
But as the conversations unfolded beginning Monday night, one by one the executives also discovered that if they really WANT to do business here and want to see the North American market grow to meet its incredible potential, they’ll have to do a lot more than just refining specifications for coatings or streamlining ways of responding to requests-for-proposal.
...But as one of the VIA Rail managers pointed out during Thursday’s sessions, in Europe trains are a fact of life while in North America “cars are a fact of life.” In his view, which I share, industry entering the North American market has a special responsibility to help us show policymakers, legislators, and elected and appointed officials why it makes sense to keep investing in passenger rail, how passenger-rail can make a difference in economic and climate goals, and where those investments could prove to be the most transformative.
It all comes down to people
A lot is starting to happen with passenger rail in America, but it’s going to take a determined effort over the long haul. Take nothing for granted. If we want better passenger service, and more of it, we need to make sure our elected officials at all levels know it and make it a priority. It’s fun to look at route maps and possible schedules, but Joe Aiello, Director of Community Engagement & Organizing at RPA had this to say in a commentary: MAPS, DAMNNED MAPS, AND PASSENGERS. Here’s an excerpt:
...A lot of pretty colors, arrows pointing in all directions, online armchair planners, and so much commentary - both positive and negative. It’s been fun to talk to riders and advocates of all levels, to jump into a long social media thread about what all of these maps, grants, and studies will mean for the future. However, there is one aspect of these maps that I really haven't heard much in all this discourse…
Under all those lines and routes are PEOPLE.
People of all colors, races, creeds, orientations, and abilities. People who don’t drive, can’t drive, or just want better options. People in urban, rural, and tribal areas. People who want to travel in more environmentally friendly ways. People who simply don't want to sit in ever worsening traffic. People who want to see more of the country they call home from a different perspective.
All these new potential routes, corridors, and projects aren’t just about connecting city pairs and figuring out the best revenue service. It’s about giving PEOPLE better access to different regions of the country that they wouldn’t have normally. Better access to jobs, hospitals, education, national parks, and more. It’s about providing more opportunity.
If this is what we want, we’ll have to work to get it. Consider joining the RPA. Find organizations like ESPA where you live. If you want to get on board with Solutionary Rail and the Climate Rail Alliance, so much the better. Look for opportunities to provide public input where rail is involved — or should be. (Here’s an opportunity for those who want Washington State DOT to pursue real Amtrak Cascades service.)
Meanwhile, pass on the good news that there IS good news for passenger rail in America.
