Was in Orlando a few weeks ago and made some completely unscientific surveys at several locations of tourists and Florida residents.
The results were mixed but imformative.
At the Auto-train depot in Sanford the reason that most people were taking it was the ability to sleep while they traveled to Lorton. Biggest complaint: The train has a too slow schedule. When asked if they arrived on time most said yes or as much as 2 hours earlier. Checked some times and they were correct. The earlier arrival times really appealed to them. I mentioned that if stimulus money is used for ROW and rolling stock ( a change to the auto carriers to increase their 70 MPH present limit; High speed trucks, ECP braking, etc) for improvements that reliable 14 Hr service could be possible instead of the scheduled 17-1/2 hr. Without exception the persons who were hesitant to use AT again said they would use it again at those times When mentioned that these improvements would allow a possible WASH - ORL time of 14 Hr in stead of 19 Hr for conventional trainns they were also interested in coming more often.
Asked these same questions at one of the theme parks. Without fail those that would even consider a train answered 1. Too slow or too much enroute time. 2. Could not connect (midwestern answer) 3. Trains don't come to my town. Other than only finding 1 couple who had ridden a conventional train whose answers were much the same as the auto train answers
Asked some Orlando residents same questions ---Train takes too long. Not insterested in Auto train.
unscientific conclusions??
1. Since The incremental approach (going to 110 MPH) that the government has mentioned; it may attract a lot of passengers. Why the enroute time is so important is only a guess and I'll leave it to you posters.
2. Auto - Train may well have a very large future and equipment capacity may well be a constraint for years.
3. Until AMTRAK can equal or be less (including boarding and transportation to stations) time than auto will AMTRAK.really attrack a lot of passengers.
Any thoughts??
In my opinion, the general public is good for about four hours on a train for a day trip. Longer trips appeal to a narrower market, but overnight trips around 16 hours could become popular.
For example, board a train in Lorton after a leisurley journey to the station around 4 or 5 pm, have dinner and breakfast on the train (861 miles), have time to wake up before arrival in Sanford at 9 am, then have a whole day for whatever. This works. (Tightening the schedule to move deadline later than 3 pm would help...)
Seattle to San Francisco (921 miles) will never be as popular with current schedules. The train leaves Seattle at 10 am, missing connections from the North and East. It's hard to drive to the station in time for the train unless you live close to (or south of) Seattle. An evening departure time would make it a two-night journey to LA and give inconvenient times at other cities; the train is just too slow.
"Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men's blood." Daniel Burnham
Maglev In my opinion, the general public is good for about four hours on a train for a day trip. Longer trips appeal to a narrower market, but overnight trips around 16 hours could become popular. For example, board a train in Lorton after a leisurley journey to the station around 4 or 5 pm, have dinner and breakfast on the train (861 miles), have time to wake up before arrival in Sanford at 9 am, then have a whole day for whatever. This works. (Tightening the schedule to move deadline later than 3 pm would help...) Seattle to San Francisco (921 miles) will never be as popular with current schedules. The train leaves Seattle at 10 am, missing connections from the North and East. It's hard to drive to the station in time for the train unless you live close to (or south of) Seattle. An evening departure time would make it a two-night journey to LA and give inconvenient times at other cities; the train is just too slow.
One could leave from Vancouver on GN Morning International train 355 at 8:25 AM and arrive in Seattle at 12:15 PM board NP 408 that departed at 12:30 PM for Portland. At one time this train carried through sleeping cars for Oakland. If you travelled coach you had to change trains in Portland. NP 408 arrived in Portland at 4:30 PM and one departed on SP11 the Cascade for Oakland arriving the next morning at 8:25 AM. If one wished to go to LA you gat off the Cascade in Martinez at 6:58 AM and departed on the San Joaquin Daylight at 7:53 AM arriving in LA at 6:30 PM.
Connections to San Francisco and Los Angeles were made in Seattle and Portland with the GN Empire Builder, Western Star, NP North Coast Limited, Mainstreeter and UP City of Portland or Portland Rose. And if one had a little additional time you could travel overnight from Vancouver on the CPR Princess Elizebeth or Princess Joan and connecting service was provided from the CPR pier in Seattle to King Street Station. Actually that was a rather civilized way to travel if one had the time. So todays Coast Starlight is slower between the Northwest and Los Angeles and San Francisco that trains were forty and fifty years ago. And there were much better connections. And in those days for the most part they held the connecting train for a late arriving train.
Remember an incident in the 1960's where the Twin Star Rocket from Minneapolis arrived in Kansas City to see the Golden State bound for Los Angeles pulling out on an adjoining track. There was an entire travel group that were transferring from one train to the other and all they could do was spend an extra day in Kansas City or take the Santa Fe. I am sure the Santa Fe was able to accomodate those passengers as they had extra sleeping cars in Kansas City. I guess it was the difference between a RR that cared and one that didn't. The passengers on the Rock Island train traveled from Minneapolis to Kansas City by Coach and from there to LA they were travelling first class. I was always proud of myself for mentioning the Santa Fe to the passengers that looked so disappointed when the Golden State left them stranded. Later the next day I was happy to see that the Santa Fe had accomodated them on the Super Chief the train I was travelling on to LA myself. It was a much better trip than they would have had on the Golden State anyway.
Al - in - Stockton
A Talgo sleeper train from Washington, DC to Sanford, FL probably could take most curves at 110 mph without batting an eye and make a 10-hr schedule. Extending Talgos into New York City seems too problematic.
A 21-car Talgo sleeper train, under 900 feet long, with 12 economy room & 6 deluxe room units would have a total of 252 spaces double occupancy. A kitchen and two dining units would be necessary for three meal seatings with 95% occupancy and sharing tables. How important is it to move a small number of passengers given the impact on railroad capacity?
The 14-hr Autotrain schedule may be realistic with the curvature and the power needed to accelerate back to 110 mph after 60-80 mph curve restrictions. The Superliners and auto carriers are both high center of gravity cars; and the train is over a half mile long in addition to the length of the curves themselves.
I would not presume the check-in and drive-off times can be improved much. Even a 9 am arrival in Sanford doesn't get you to check-in before lunch at Disney World. All I know, which isn't much, is stopping to take pictures once and the Trains or Model Railroader article some years back.
The three keys to getting passengers to use trains are Fast, Frequent, and On Time.
Dave
Lackawanna Route of the Phoebe Snow
Well, in my view, having flown from Washington DC to Orlando, after getting the rental and checking in it's a total waste of money to visit Walt Disney World on the travel day no matter how early you arrive. I don't think anyone but the hard-core Mouse House nuts would be travelling this kind of distance and wasting a full day of WDW admission fee on less-than-half day they've got on travel day.
My thread here was never meant to be a post just about NEC - FLA. All I wanted to give was an unscientific survey of what people in Florida said. To expand this to other routes I will cite the Keystone services.
At one time it had about 6 trains a day each way and about 25,000+ passengers per month ( 67/day per train). With the rebuilding of the ROW (still under construction) of the route a total of 13 trains on weekdays and 7 on weekends has pushed the number of passengers to 100,000+ for May 2009 ( approximately 606 trains / month or 1 65 passengers/ train/day. The increase of frequencys (a factor that is not being considered) and rebuilding of this route from an average of 45 MPH with 10 stops to close to 65 MPH (electric motors) with the same 10 stops that is now the operation.
The Pennsylvanian is a diesel operation from 30th St Station with fewer stop so also averages almost 65MPH but has a total ridership of 281/train/day but the longer route and multiple riders make adding this factor into the above not have meaning.
Another comparsion is the Piedmont from Charlotte to Raleigh. The 173 miles has an average of 94.3 passengers//train/day. Its average speed is 50+MPH including its 7 station stops and the route has increased its ridership (Carolinian as well but it goes further to WASH-NYP) as the average speed has increased from 42MPH to the present 50MPH. Since the passage of the PTC legislation the NC DOT now plans to increase most top speeds to 90MPH with some thought to going to 110MPH where track separated from NS.
Conclusion once again is the incremental approach to increasing speeds will show a increase in ridership. There however will be routes that do not show an increase and these flat ridership routes should be passed by when the next increment of HSR regional building is started.
Another consideration is the on time performance and any schedule ( the 85% legislated item) should also be required because US citizens now expect puntuality. (Japanese more so)
A British Rail official said their experience back the the early 1970's was for every one mile per hour of increased speed, ridership rose roughly one percent following improvements to the West Coast Mainline and other services.
The faster the train, the more time for cleaning and re-stocking before returning.
A couple things Blue Streak 1 wrote still bother me: riders/train and passing by flat ridership routes.
67 riders per train, little more than a busload, was horrible productivity for the Florida trains. Unfortunately, the Iowa City-Quad Cities train may be falling into this category given a preliminary estimate. I would hope ridership turns out to be at least twice as much; but that still is sad for a train.
The 165 riders/train seems hardly worth the track time even though it meets a previous, and somewhat arbitrary, short-haul criteria of 150 passengers. Even the Acelas and Hiawathas don't impress me with a capacity for only twice that. Worse, average ridership was only in the 90's for the latter despite a couple full trains. Why should freight and 1,000 passenger commuter trains get out of the way?
For comparison purposes, my experience in Europe in 1974 was that many intercity trains carried around 600 passengers. Now this is a more respectable load level. The fourth section of a normally hourly train to Exeter and crowded with standees must have had over 1,000 passengers for a British bank holiday. Some people were standing in the corridors on a Cologne-Paris Intercity train as well.
So much goes into flat ridership that a route should not be dismissed out of hand. Furthermore, I'm not sure about the point being ridership staying flat after service is accelerated with route and equipment improvements. No change in ridership could result, among other things, from an ill-considered change in arrival and departure times, higher fares, or increased delay and unreliability. In any event, further high speed improvements including more frequent service may attract riders and meet goals.
HarveyK400The faster the train, the more time for cleaning and re-stocking before returning
Johnny
Harvey: As far as I can see it is not the speed that is important but the average speed. At Many locations just getting rid of slow orders can dramatically increase the average speed. Using 60MPH as a baseline and not counting acceleration or slowing; 10 miles changing to 120MPH from 60MPH saves 5 minutes. taking 10 miles of 30MPH to 60 mph saves 10 minutes with the increase to 120 saving a total of 15 minutes. Adding speed up and slow down times the 30 to 60 saves even more time than 60 to 120. The main point is that your money is probably going to go farther.
For a non stop station distance of 60 miles track speed 60MPH but 10 miles of 30 MPH running means an average speed of 51.42MPH and for a 60MPH 60 mile run but with 10 miles at 120 means an average speed of 65.45MPH again not counting speed up and slow down.
As far as a route showing no growth; with the conversion of a route to an emerging HSR that has a lower growth it is just economics with the faster growing routes calling for the first investment of capital for moving to HSR regional. This statment goes on the assumption that arrival and departure times reasonable. The flat ridership routes may just have to wait on funds.
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