Phoebe Vet wrote:... So ... I wish Amtrak had a route from Charlotte to Chicago. I haven't been to the Museum of Science & Industry since 1966.
I wish they did too! Can we blame the Appalachians for part of the lack of a direct route? IIRC the best way before the very late Sixties to get from Memphis to Knoxville, TN by rail was to route it though Chattanooga, like a huge "U" bend. That's the way the river systems flowed and thus the major valleys. So I suppose in the Sixties to get to get from Chi to Atlanta I could have taken IC from Chgo to Memphis, change to a train heading to Birmingham, then change for Atlanta, and then double-back to Charlotte. Better-informed rail history buffs than I might know the status of any through cars.
That dip around the Appalachians had to be accommodated, until Eye-forty was completed around 1970 and helped tie the "Three Tennessees" into one for highway traffic. Even now, I can't think of any purely E-W RR line that connects Knoxville with Nashville and then Memphis, though of course truckers make great use of the Interstate route.
There were other ways to get by rail from Chi to Atlanta, but all of them that I know of that accommodated l-d varnish pre-Amtrak (C&O thru Charlottesville, N&W thru Roanoke, VA) have in common running over or though the Cumberland/Allegheny system or the Appalachians, or both. (Many people define the "Appalachian Mountains" as including the Cumberlands and Alleghenys.)
It's also worth recalling that the lines that accommodated Chicago - Florida passenger trains (like the old South Wind) were never in any respect high-speed lines. Trains like the Wind didn't even break 40 mph on average speed. So it isn't like we lost Altoona or Carbondale type service. Today on an all-passenger routing I'd have to get from Chi to D.C. (the "Capitol Limited", isn't it?) and then take the Crescent on down to Atlanta. Thlat's a huge double-back too, using Washington D.C. as the pivot.
BTW everyone I know, railfan or not, who has visited our Museum of Science and Industry has LOVED the Zephyr tour. Other great things too, of course. Trouble is, it's located kind of out of the way unless one lives or works in the adjacent Hyde Park area, home to the Univ. of Chicago.
[Here's a pathetic attempt to get back to topic]: I wonder whether, if I were to take Amtrak to D.C. and then change for the Crescent to Atlanta -- would I have to reclaim my checked luggage and go thru security all over again??
Tallly ho!
Best, al
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