Passenger trains from Chicago to Florida.

[NP Eddie]

All:

This post is regarding passenger trains from Chicago to Florida.

A 1948 OG shows at least two all coach streamliners operating. One moved via the CEI to Evansville and was forwarded to other roads while the other one started on the IC for movement to Florida.

How many various trains were involved and why were they only every third day?

I have a feeling that the Chicago to Florida service was a complicated piece of routing involving three of four railroads and not the easy one from New York to Florida. In addition, the passenger traffic between Chicago and Florida was probably not profitable as the New York-Florida trains were.

Ed Burns

[KCSfan]

Ed, in 1948 there were three Chicago - Florida streamliners running on essentially the same schedule, leaving Chicago in the morning and arriving in Miami the next afternoon. They were quickly turned around and left Miami in the late afternoon or early evening and arrived in Chicago the next evening. The trains and their routes were:

1. The City of Miami: IC Chicago-Birmingham, CofG Birmingham-Albany, ACL Albany-Jacksonville and FEC Jacksonville-Miami.

2. The Southwind: PRR Chicago-Louisville, L&N Louisville-Montgomery, ACL Montgomery-Jacksonville and FEC Jacksonville to Miami.

3. The Dixie Flagler: C&EI Chicago-Evansville, L&N Evansville-Nashville, NC&StL Nashville-Atlanta, ACL Atlanta-Jacksonville and FEC Jacksonville to Miami.

The reason they ran every third day was because there was there was only one trainset for each of the three trains so, for example, the Cof M would leave Chicago on day1, the SW on day 2 and the DF on day 3. Returning the CofM would leave Miami on day 2, the SW on day 3 and the DF on day 4 thus resulting in daily service from each city.

In addition to the streamliners there was daily heavyweight coach and Pullman service between Chicago and Florida provided by the IC's Seminole, the C&EI's Dixie Flyer and Dixie Limited and the PRR's Southland (which ran via Cincinnati and Atlanta). Additionally there was through sleeping car service via the Big Four (NYC) between Chicago and Cincinnati and the Southern's Royal Palm and Ponce de Leon between Cincy and Florida. The year round service was supplemented by winter season only trains running on each of the routes.

I can't speak to their profitability but the sheer number of trains attested to the popularity of Chicago to Florida train travel.

Mark

[NP Eddie]

Mark:

Thanks for the info!!!  I have looked in Wayner's "Car Names, Numbers, and Consists" and it seems like all three trains were almost identical.

This leads me to ask if there was some deadheading of crews back to their home terminals due to the non-daily operation of the three trains.

As information, I retired from the NP-BN-BNSF in 2004 after 38 years of service. In March of 1970, I started my second shift job as a clerk on the NP and ended some hours after midnight as a BN clerk. There were so many changes in the Twin Cities as this was one of two places the combined roads operated. Yes, I was there before the Hump Yard. The NP had a series of three flat switching yards. One was eastbound, the second one was westbound, and the third was a storage and transfer yard.

I can answer most questions about the Twin Cities and the various railroads operating in it. There are two rail related issues in Minneapolis/St. Paul now. One involves the proposed "Southwest Corridor" light rail project in western Minneapolis and the second one is in St. Paul where the UP,CP, Amtrak, and BNSF are working to complete a connection from the newly re-opened St. Paul Union Depot to the BNSF/CP at the east end said depot to the BNSF's St. Paul Sub with the BNSF controlling the switches and signals. .  Before Amtrak, CBQ (BN)  passenger trains would pull by the St. Paul Union Depot and back in in order to be properly pointed for movement to St. Paul or Chicago respectively.  The new control points are tentatively to be names SPUD East, SPUD West, and SPUD Central or Middle.

Ed Burns

763-234-9306

[e-mail]

[daveklepper]

Trains on the NY - Florida run.   In 1948 even the Southern had one through Pullman to Jacksoville, if memory is correct, although I may be wrong at it may have started  from Washington.   The Big Players had the East Coast Champion, the West  Coast Champion, the Everglades, the Havana Special, and the Palmetto.   Silver Meteor, the Sunland, and the   Palmland.  I think the Silver Star was added later.   During the winter, the Florida Special and the Orange Blossom Special (or was this year-round) were added, all Pullman.    Certainn of these trains did at times require changing trains in Washington for  coach passengers.    The Silver Meteor and the two Champions always had through coaches and were started as coach-only streamliners.  In 1948 all ran dailly,  if my meory is correct.

[ACY Tom]

Regarding deadheading of crews, I would guess the operating crew, which means Train & Engine (T&E) service on the Chicago - Miami runs probably had to do some deadheading.  I'm guessing the service crews (diners, sleepers, lounges) were probably based in Chicago and stayed with their consist all the way to Miami and back.  I wasn't around at the time so I could be wrong, but this would be consistent with operations of the time, as I understand them.  It's also possible that they were based in Miami, but Chicago seems more likely.  Maybe the Pullman staffing info exists someplace, but the staffing info for the individual operating railroads would probably be harder to find.  The old "Google it" answer might be useful, but some info is too obscure for that, so I don't know 

[ZephyrOverland]

NP Eddie

All:

This post is regarding passenger trains from Chicago to Florida.

A 1948 OG shows at least two all coach streamliners operating. One moved via the CEI to Evansville and was forwarded to other roads while the other one started on the IC for movement to Florida.

How many various trains were involved and why were they only every third day?

I have a feeling that the Chicago to Florida service was a complicated piece of routing involving three of four railroads and not the easy one from New York to Florida. In addition, the passenger traffic between Chicago and Florida was probably not profitable as the New York-Florida trains were.

Ed Burns

The major reason there were every third day services such as the coach streamliners is because of the number of railroads involved in light of Chicago-Florida traffic levels.  On the east coast, you had primarily two main New York-Florida routes, ACL and SAL (a third route, Southern Railway, had their own New York-Florida services from the 1890's to 1914).  The PRR, RFP and FEC were primarily supporting roads in this service.  Running trains from Chicago and the Midwest to Florida involved numerous railroads with numerous possible routings.  For the every third day coach streamliners, nine railroads were originally involved.  Also, by that time, the primary Chicago-Florida routes were pretty much defined.  From the 1880's to the 1930's there were a number of through train and sleeping car routes that were utilized which were abandoned or eventually morphed into the routes that were being operated by 1940.  Of course, all these railroads had to contend with competition with each other in light of smaller traffic potential as compared to East Coast-Florida traffic.

Also keep in mind that with the ACL and SAL, Florida was their major traffic and revenue source.  Railroads that operated Midwest-Florida services saw a smaller take from operating Florida trains and Pullman car lines.  At one time the Dixie Route controlled half of Chicago-Florida traffic, but at the same time, since there were 4 to 6 railroads operating trains on that line, each lines revenue from the Dixie Flagler and other Dixie trains was pretty evenly split up.  One line, the C&EI, saw a majority of its passenger revenues derive from its participation in the Dixie Route, whereas the L&N derived Florida train revenues from a number of Florida services they were involved in (Dixie Route, South Wind and services from Cincinnati to Florida come to mind), which was nice but they had contend with higher overhead costs from operating the various Florida routes.

The idea of running a Florida service via different routes was a way for the involved railroads to split the pie more evenly.  Such operations go back to 1901, with the Chicago & Florida Limited running between Chicago and Cincinnati on three different routes (Big 4, PRR, and Monon/CH&D), each route handling the train two days a week.  From Cincinnati to Jacksonville the train ran via the Q&C/SR six days a week.  Another example occurred during the depression years, when the Dixie Limited and Floridan operated only three days per week, running on alternate days, giving Chicagoans the almost equivalent of one daily all-Pullman Florida train.  So by the time the coach streamliners were introduced, the idea of every third day trains on three routes was old hat to the railroads involved. 

-> Shameless plug ->  There is a publication currently in development focusing on Midwest-Florida passenger rail services that will be published by the PRR Technical and Historical Society.  For more info check out their website.