Passenger train consists

[Anonymous]

I am aware that railroads generally place baggage and RPO cars at the “head end” of a passenger train and the observation car last, but Is there any methodology for the placement of the diner, coaches, sleepers, and lounge cars? Paticularly the diner.

[TheS.P.caboose]

My understanding is that the diner is in the middle of the train as is the lounge car. Some trains will have the coach cars on the head end behind the baggage and RPO cars and others will have the sleepers behind the baggage and RPO.

[Anonymous]

Depends on their demographics, assuming we're not talking about the 60's. On many trains, the full diner got put in the middle of the Pullmans and the coaches got a lounge/snack car, plus news butcher/sandwich man service. This was done on the basis that many coach pax were short hauls and/or did not have the budget to eat in the diner. The proliferation of lunch counter cars and "budget diners" on a lot of coach trains and in the middle of coach consists reflected that demographic. Even the hot coach streamliners like the early (pre-hilevel) ElCap, Challenger and Jeffersonian offered lunch counter and/or reduced price diners rather than the full monte.

Of course, other routes plunked the diner right in between the chair cars and the sleepers, particularly into the late 50's and 60's, as marketing targeted families with more disposable income for coach rides.

On all-coach and all-Pullman trains, the diner/food service car(s) could be anywhere in the consist. On the original Rockets and the little Zephyrs, the food service was generally in the first car, behind the baggage compartment. On the M-10000 it was a walk-up buffet dead in the rear of the train (no obs area) and you took the food back to your seat. A number of name trains had round end diner-obs and diner-lounge-parlor obs cars at the rear, including the Sunbeam/Hustler, Zephyr Rocket and original Choctaw Rocket, 1948 Frisco Meteor, and 1940 Texas Zephyr; the coach pax had to walk through the first class cars to get there (again, the marketing assumption at the time was that very few would do that--that's why a high-end businessman's train like the DAL-HOU nonstop Sunbeam could run with 4-5 chair cars and a full-length parlor car, but just a 24 seat diner-lounge obs, or the ZR would run with 3-4 chair cars, 2 Pullmans and a 24 seat diner-lounge obs).

Of course, on the really deluxe trains like the Super, Panama, Broadway and Century, there were more than an ample number of onboard locations to get sated and/or soused, should the inclination arise--this includes room service and private dining rooms like the Turquoise. And a lot of the better runs still operated 2 diners on some routes (either back-to-back or 1 coach/1 Pullman) on heavy periods into the 50's and 60's. Of course, the Super/El Cap did that even into ATK (and ATSF yanked rights to the "Chief" name when ATK wanted to change that and replace all those diner seats with a single 36 seat car in 1974).

By the 1960's when a lot of roads either didn't care or couldn't afford more (or both), the diner got put in the most convenient place (like on Amtrak). If it got cut in and out enroute (and a lot of them did, even in the better days), it was likely that it wound up on the rear or in the front, depending on where the switching took place. Only the diehards with $$, like ATSF and UP, would "pay" to break the train in the middle and insert the diner in a less operationally convenient place.

The best bet is find a consist from the period you are interested in and use it for guidance.

[Hugh Jampton]

A typical place for the diner / buffet is between first & second class. That way the rich don't have to schlep through second class & theydon't get disturbed by the underclasses trapsing through first class.

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

Rule of thumb for car placement is RPO/Mail, baggage, coach, diner, lounge, sleepers or parlors, observation car. As mentioned above, there are many variations. The "Silver Meteor" carried its sleepers up front it was originally a coach streamliner and the observation car was designed for that. Mail-express was occasionally placed on the rear end if it simplified a switching move. On the Flambeau 400, excess mail was placed on the rear since the mail cars were not equipped for HEP like the rest of the train, including the RPO/lounge.

[passengerfan]

Any particular train you are interested in?

[BR60103]

The Canadian (nowadays) is usually baggage, coaches, dome, sleepers, diner, sleepers, dome-obs.
The dome has a snack bar for coach passengers.
In high season it gets longer and more domes are added, and sometimes a diner or two (might even get one for coach class!).
If a train has to be broken or combined en route, there may be two sections, each with its own sequence.