TRAINS MAG. and Amtrak

[mnwestern]

Todd,
All you missed at Mardi Gras was two days of Hurricanes (the drink), bare bodies on the balconies and pick pockets by the score. Seems like God was trying to tell you something.

[Paul3]

>All I can say about Amtrak is "Never again".

Todd, if you had driven, had a breakdown and lost the same two days, would you never drive your car again? If the same ice storm had grounded your plane, and you lost a day, would you never fly again? But Amtrak gets delayed (usually not by their own making) by clogged freight roads or bad weather, and it's "Amtrak: Never Again!"

We all have travel horror stories of all modes (my friend's mom was flying from London to Boston, and got diverted to Chicago for a few days), but to never travel by Amtrak again because of one bad trip is a little extreme, don't you think?

BTW, how does "6 or 7" hours equal on whole day? You lost 24 hours in Chicago, but were there more delays than the 6 or 7 hours the ice storm caused? After all, you are putting Amtrak on the hook for 2 whole days of missed Mardi Gras.

Also, how was the trip back?

Paul A. Cutler III
******************
"No, no. If you shoot him, you'll just make him mad." - the Waco Kid
******************

[Anonymous]

Kalmbach has started the Classic Trains magazine which is a great publication which does cover the old passenger trains of the Illinois Central, Santa Fe, NYC, etc. which I am interested in. I think Trains should start an Amtrak and transit magazine on current passenger operations which I am not interested in. The readers in the Northeast and California and anyone else interested could buy this magazine. The current Trains is trying to cover too many subjects.
The federal government may take care of this problem in the meantime by cutting Amtrak back to a transit operation which I definitely agree with.

[Anonymous]

Sorry to put a "damper" on things folks, but Amtrak is nothing more than a bad joke. Sure, you can still ride the rails, (I do on occasion), but the last time I took Amtrak on a long trip, it was a nightmare! I lost 2 days out of a one week vacation to New Orleans due to Amtrak screw-ups. First, I missed my connection in Chicago by about 30 minutes, because of two "emergency applications of the brakes", Amtrak would not hold the "City of New Orleans" for connecting passengers, instead gave me a voucher for a hotel room in Chicago. There was one day lost. The next day, ALL the stranded travellers, which by the way, had "reserved accommodations" on the previous day's train, were forced onto a short consist train. Damned near "standing-room-only"!
But, the "fun" had only just begun. Upon arrival in Memphis Tenn., we were delayed another 6 or 7n hours because of an ice storm in Mississippi. To make a long story short, "Amtrak" cost me 2 days of "Mardi-Gras" that I had been planning on for a year. What consolation did I recieve?, I was subjected to a hostile on-board staff, who, were, undoubtedly as upset as I was over the delay, but took it out on the passengers. All I can say about Amtrak is "Never again".
Todd C.

[Anonymous]

Well put Terry, lets keep Trains the way it is. I think that some of have forgotten that this is just a hobby, have some fun with it. If Trains isn't your cup of tea, don't buy it.

[mnwestern]

Dear Soo: I understand the work thing. I put in my 45-50 hours per week whether I want to or not. But the point is that Trains, and most other railfan and model railroad magazines rely on submissions for a lot of their content. Their limited staff can't possibly cover everything going on in the world of railroading.I've sent in submissions, not always used, but some have been. These forums are always long on complaining, short on doing anything to help the situation.

[Anonymous]

Have you seen the high speed rail network's map. It might not be long before the track takes off from Tulsa to Kansas CIty.....THROUGH SE KANSAS! A high speed railroad through Kansas? You gotta be kidding!

[Anonymous]

I get three weeks of vacation a year, but I like to ride Amtrak for a week. Nothing like riding the rails to see what makes all of these small towns tink. Along the railroad right of way are most of the industries and agriculture structures which made these small towns economically tick.....

Amtraks cars are clean, as clean as any airliner, and the food is great! One can rest very well, read a book, and enjoy the solitude of his sleeper accomadation, or mix socially in the Diner and Lounge cars....

While one can see all of this from the highways, one does not get any rest at all driving an automobile......

[Anonymous]

HOW DOES ANYONE EXPECT A PASSENGER RAILROAD TO TURN A PROFIT WITH AGEING CARS AND SLOW TRAINS?

Most of the Superliners are over 30 years old, the trains on the east coast except for the Viewliner sleepers and Acela Express are even older.....

All of you need to take a ride on a high speed train in France, Italy, Spain, or Germany to see what a railroad could be! It is fun to blitz the road traffic on the autobahns traveling at 186 mph. It is even more fun when you beat your competitor to another city riding the trains when the competitor flew....

[Anonymous]

How close do you live to a large airport, with at least a Boeing 737 service? The feds spent some $11 billion last year for new terminals and runways, and Amtrak cannot even get $55 million to repair much needed damaged cars, cars that have been damaged since the Arizona derailment several years ago.......

[Anonymous]

Wrong again, I see. Amtrak passengers buy a ticket, from which Amtrak pays the railroads for right of way on their track. Since the goverment does not own the track, most of it anyway, why should Amtraks passengers pay a tax to support a non government owned railroad track?

Now, if the government build a new high speed rail network along new right of ways, then the Amtrak's passengers should pay a tax reflected in their ticket.

You see, Amtrak's passengers are paying their way to ride the rails........

[Anonymous]

Amtak might turn a profit if the Union Pacific gave its trains priority! Pulling into Los Angeles 12 hours late does not make for happy campers. Amtrak's schedule for the Texas Eagle averages 30 mph from Dallas to San Antonio, yet, on UP track, the Eagle pulls into San Antonio some 8 hours late, meaning that the train actually averaged 15 mph.....The question remains who is at fault, Amtrak or the UP.........

TXU, the largest utility company in Texas has such bad luck receiving its Powder River coal on time, they changed railroads and went back to the Burlington Northern. Power companies like to have coal on hand to generate electricity.......Like I said before, you cannot spell stupid without a U and a P.......

[Anonymous]

The second largest state in the union in population is Texas. Amtrak offers only one daily train, the north south Texas Eagle, and another trice weekly train, the east west Sunset Limited. While the lines drawn on a map might look pretty good, keep in mind that the connection in San Antonio is in the wee hours of the morning. Amtrak switches a sleeper and a coach car westbound, but wakes its riders up and throws its passengers off the train eastbound with no cover in case of bad weather and with the station closed.... If it wasn't for the efforts of our lady senator, Kay Bailey Hutchinson, Texans would still be thrown off the train going westbound, which they have been for over 35 years..... It is a wonder anybody rides with such pitiful service.

We need to copy the Europeans, and study, design, and build a high speed rail network. Amtrak has to do better than averaging 30 mph in Texas is they want to increase ridership and turn a profit...... For starters, Amtrak needs to get off freight railroads right of way. The ongoing joke in Texas is you cannot spell stupid without a U and a P.

[Soo2610]

Terry, Valid point. However it also assumes that one has available time and writing talent. I have neither. My writing ability leaves a lot to be desired and I work retail which means I have to ask permission to go to the bathroom all for the honor of earning slightly over minimum wage. Ah, the joys of retail greed disguised as better serving the customer. Doesn't matter that their employees aren't allowed to have a life. I won't be able to see the 261 this weekend because some idiot might have to have the flat tire on his lawnmower repaired.

[mnwestern]

The same advice you give to me, could be given to Dru. If he wants to learn more about the Missabe, why not take I-35 north to the Duluth area to see the ore docks, Proctor Hill, the Proctor yard, etc., especially before more ore lines shut down. (We already lost one ore hauling railroad because of cheap imported steel and old plant technology.)
I don't mind reading about Amtrak every so often. I've taken the Empire Builder to Chicago twice, Milwaukee once, and the Capital Limited to Washington, D.C., twice. Had a great experience each time — much better than my flight was to D.C. I can't begrudge them coverage of Amtrak at this watershed time in its history.
As for the other types of stories, they've been there — the how-to stories, the crew perspective stories. Look back in your collection. They are there, and there will likely be more in the future.
Trains, like its sister publication Model Railroader, gets blasted because it is too generalized for readers looking only for specific things. That is why the magazine industry is so compartmentalized now. So many magazines cover such a narrow field and suffer from look circulation and poor advertising support.
If Trains and Model Railroader were to become some little narrow-focused publication, it is unlikely they'd been successful enough to support such a great Web and forum site as this. Not many of those narrow focus magazines have as popular as this on the Web.
As for submissions, I've found through my own experience that you are most successful submitting photos (and articles) on specific newsworthy events (crashes, new shortlines, special movements, etc.), a well-balanced photo story showing a variety of scenes with a variety of photo techniques (wide-angle, telephoto, day/night, unusual angles), or some other indepth piece on a timely topic. And it must be timely. Sitting on photos for two months after the event is not timely.

[Anonymous]

Terry-Not only do I totally agree with Dru on the overkill Amtrak coverage, but I am also a resident of the fine state of Kansas where, gosh, we have hot and cold running water and everything!(Enough with the Dorothy references, please!) We are very fortunate to have the great train watching opportunities that we do have, my suggestion is come here and experience it yourself. Trains touched on BNSF news in KC but rarely has done anything on UP here(they did do a much appreciated feature on the Golden State Route I'll admit). I've submitted several high quality(and I'm my harshest critic) photos to Trains of KC and Kansas shots, but since they were all freight action, they probably didn't have room amongst all the tourist line, Amtrak, and ever tiring night time-lapse photos to publi***hem. OK, maybe that's too harsh, but it did used to be a better magazine with more variety.

[Anonymous]

Dru, I could not agree with you more. I discovered Trains magazine last month and bought the June issue. I loved reading it. The July issue looks like "The Amtrack Gazzette". I put it back. I am new to the railfan scene and I want to see articles on how railroads and railroad equipment(especialy engines and rolling stock)work. I want to see articles on what rail crews do. Throw me an article on laying track or something similar and I'll bite. I believe that railroading is about moving frieght and I don't care about Amtrack. By the way I live in South East Kansas near Joplin Mo. Thanks, Ron

[mnwestern]

Right! Wasn't the point of this whole monster thread Dru's dissatisfaction with the variety in Trains magazine? I'd appreciate him writing about the UP action in Kansas he seems to know about so well. That would be a change of pace from the Amtrak stories he abhors.

[mnwestern]

Dru:
You seem to be an expert on UP activities in your home state of Kansas. I know little about Kansas except that Dorothy came from there. Why don't you write an article for Trains magazine on the rail action in your neck of the woods and send in some fine photos to go with it. After all, didn't you really want to comment on the last of variety in Trains. I'd appreciate reading more about Kansas.

[mnwestern]

Dru:
I thought your beef was the lack of variety in Trains? Try writing an article, you seem to enjoy seeing your name in print.

[mnwestern]

Amen!

[mnwestern]

Dru:
You don't like the variety in Trains? Push yourself away from your computer, grab your camera, note pad and pen, and get out there and write something about something you want to read about. Trains, like most railfan magazines has limited staff and appreciates well-written, thorough and accurate stories submitted by readers. Put you energy into resolving the issue instead of complaining.

[mnwestern]

Have you checked out the staff listing near the front of the magazine? There aren't a lot of people listed there as writers (or editors). Like many magazines, Trains relies on stories submitted by contributors (readers, usually). If there is something you feel especially knowledgeable about, or maybe there is something you would like to know more about, contact the magazine, run the idea past an editor, then go out and do the leg work, interview the people in the story, and write it. If more of us did that, the variety in the paper who grow.

[Anonymous]

Steve,

Pardon me if I seem obtuse but I am curious which part of what I said you agree with. Do you think I should have to pay for an Amtrak system which doesn't go anywhere I am interested in going?

I would like there to be a national passenger rail system but I don't think I would like to pay my share of what it would cost. When I say 'national' system, I mean that every city and suburb should have fairly uniform access and service. I think this would cost a staggering amount of money. I also don't think a majority of US citizens would be willing to pay their share either. It seems to me that if the system doesn't serve most citizens, it isn't serving as much of a function supporting the nation. In which case, it isn't providing an adequate alternative to the nations transportation needs and not supplementing the nation in case of a disaster.

In this case, I think the people served by the system should bear the costs. I don't understand why it should be any more complicated than that.

Let me know what you think and where we agree. Thanks - Ed

[Anonymous]

Now THAT sounds interesting! I would love to see articles like that, now all we have to do is find someone that will write one who has visited there.

[Anonymous]

British Airways, Air France, JAL, Swissair, Lufthansa, and Aeroflot fly here too. What's your point???

[Anonymous]

To run slightly with the foreign idea, it would be good to write about foreign railroads and then make comparisons - i.e. everyday practices, regulations, numbers - to those of U.S. railways.

For example, I would love to see a feature that compares the railroads of US and ex-USSR (mostly Russia). Why Russia?? Well, the railroading practices there are very similar to the practices here - great freight tonnage, universal four-axle freight cars, and use of automatic couplings (although of a different type). The twist lies in the fact that Russia is an electric motive power fan's paradise, and long-distance passenger service is as extensive as elsewhere in Europe - but hey, that's where comparisons get interesting.

Comments??

[Anonymous]

Actually, Amtrak has package deals available where you can ride Amtrak, fly over to Europe, then ride the rails over there. They also have a code-share agreement with Continental Airlines. So, in a way, Amtrak can go to Europe.

[Anonymous]

True, an airline can go to Japan and Europe while Amtrak cant, what is your point?

[Anonymous]

I guess more people woants to fly than ride.Airlines can go to Europe Japan and anywhere overseas Amtrak cant.This is my opinion also.