MidlandMikeWhen I travel by train, my (and apparently other people's) expectation is that there will be reasonable baggage service. Apparently Amtrak understands this.
Recently Amtrak has imposed restrictions on baggage. However, I think their policies are still pretty generous. Now you can carry on two bags and if checked baggage service is offered you can check 2 bags, all free. You can check 2 more bags by paying $20 each. There are a few prohibited items (such as wet cell batteries where the acid can spill). Usually you can take "Special items" such a bicycles, golf clubs or skis but there are special rules and usually special fees but the fees are not very high. You can also store your bags at a station for $4 to $5 a day. You can even check firearms. Amtrak seems to go out of its way to accommodate passenger needs.
Here is a link to their policies: http://www.amtrak.com/baggage-policy
schlimm: Again, the large bulk of travelers on most Amtrak trains do not have 4-5 30" suitcases or steamer trunks. There should be provision at the end of the car for oversized pieces of luggage. Otherwise most travelers in 2013 use the overhead rack, just as they do of flights. Buying new non-revenue cars and then hauling them around is a misuse of limited resources. Midland Mike: While many business travelers on airlines will carry-on their luggage for short trips, many vacationers will check baggage and then carry more in whatever carry-on they can fit in the overhead compartment. I don't know what you are quantifying by "most travelers", but I still see plenty of baggage carried in airplanes in 2013. When I travel by train, my (and apparently other people's) expectation is that there will be reasonable baggage service. Apparently Amtrak understands this.
I never suggested travelers have no luggage. Most air travelers limit themselves to one bag that fits in an overhead bin. Any extra bags have to be checked in, usually at $25 each. The majority of rail travelers should be able to manage a bag overhead and one at bins at the end of the car. If they are carrying trunks or 3-4 bags, perhaps there could be a dormitory-baggage car, but charge a fee $25 per checked bag to cover the costs.
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
If you want to see a view of a proper station platform, look at "A Crazy Wide View of Amtrak Number Six in Denver" in General Discussion.
Johnny
John WR I searched Google to try to find articles about the new cars Amtrak is purchasing. The articles are not new but they are the most recent ones I encountered: http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-01-12/local/35439210_1_high-speed-rail-northeast-corridor-rail-cars http://www.examiner.com/article/amtrak-to-receive-new-cars-2012
I searched Google to try to find articles about the new cars Amtrak is purchasing. The articles are not new but they are the most recent ones I encountered:
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-01-12/local/35439210_1_high-speed-rail-northeast-corridor-rail-cars
http://www.examiner.com/article/amtrak-to-receive-new-cars-2012
schlimm Again, the large bulk of travelers on most Amtrak trains do not have 4-5 30" suitcases or steamer trunks. There should be provision at the end of the car for oversized pieces of luggage. Otherwise most travelers in 2013 use the overhead rack, just as they do of flights. Buying new non-revenue cars and then hauling them around is a misuse of limited resources.
Again, the large bulk of travelers on most Amtrak trains do not have 4-5 30" suitcases or steamer trunks. There should be provision at the end of the car for oversized pieces of luggage. Otherwise most travelers in 2013 use the overhead rack, just as they do of flights. Buying new non-revenue cars and then hauling them around is a misuse of limited resources.
While many business travelers on airlines will carry-on their luggage for short trips, many vacationers will check baggage and then carry more in whatever carry-on they can fit in the overhead compartment. I don't know what you are quantifying by "most travelers", but I still see plenty of baggage carried in airplanes in 2013. When I travel by train, my (and apparently other people's) expectation is that there will be reasonable baggage service. Apparently Amtrak understands this.
I do not remember what year the Peachtree Station (known as Brookwood to Atlanteans) was built. It was originally used as a suburban stop, and it was the Atlanta stop for the Birmingham Special (which originally ran into Atlanta and then bypassed the Terminal Station after the Peachtree Station was built; many of us know the Birmingham Special as going through Roanoke and Chattanooga, but its original route was through Atlanta. For about ten years after it was inaugurated, the Southerner did not stop here, but breezed on through, making use of a backup move in connection with using the Terminal Station. In the last two or three years of its operation into the Terminal Station, the Southerner/Southern Crescent had the coach seats turned around and the engine moved to the other end in Atlanta.
The poiintof this post is that the station was not designed to be THE stop for Atlanta, and thus was not built to handle the number of people who use it now.
imagine a commuter RR suburban station, narrow center platform, 30 ft + of steep steps only at one end. ADA passengers have to cross 1 track to reach elevator that only has space for 1 baggage cart. that is atlanta. upgrade? that is nuts new station nearby will only cost some what more.
I've never seen the Atlanta station, but everything I've heard or read about it seems to indicate that it is sorely in need of an upgrade, especially for a city as large as Atlanta. Ironic, too, that a city that began its life mainly as a railroad city has only the one passenger train left.
_____________
"A stranger's just a friend you ain't met yet." --- Dave Gardner
Deggesty And, people who ride the Crescent, particularly sb to Atlanta check quite a bit of baggage. All who say that the baggage cars are not utilized should take the Crescent southbound out of Atlanta. You have to wait until the baggage carts have brought the checked baggage to the station before you may go down to the train--and it is a long wait because the platform is not wide enough for both passengers and checked baggage to use it at the same time. I
And, people who ride the Crescent, particularly sb to Atlanta check quite a bit of baggage. All who say that the baggage cars are not utilized should take the Crescent southbound out of Atlanta. You have to wait until the baggage carts have brought the checked baggage to the station before you may go down to the train--and it is a long wait because the platform is not wide enough for both passengers and checked baggage to use it at the same time.
I
Deggesty is very correct but it can be very more worse. Have seen as many as 3 carts on and off at ATLANTA. Last tiime wife rode it was 15 min early into ATL and departed 20 min late. Just one more reason to replace the ATL station.
Another poster mentions that the bag - dorms are non revenue. Not exactly ---
1. That car enables the train not to add a car which at present train lengths may require another loco or a significant reduction in acceleration. about 1 minute loost for each 20 - 79 mph change.
2. The dorm alows sale of crew space allocated to a sleeper to go to revenue passengers instead.
If we are going to have passenger trains it does make sense to have them do things passenger trains can do easily and well. And carrying baggage is one of those things.
In Salt Lake City, there is usually a cartful of baggage going on and a cartful coming off the California Zephyr.
While the choir sings:
"This train is bound for glory this train
This trains is bound for glory this train
This train is bound for glory
Don't carry no one but the righteous and holy
This train is bound for glory this train."
John WRI suggest it be set on fire on Track 14 in the Hoboken Terminal. They it would be promptly be rolled onto a car float (as trains were in the old days) and pulled out to sea to perish beneath the waves.
No, refloat the Binghamton, roll it on there, and take the whole thing out to sea to sink beneath the waves in glory.
Paul MilenkovicSo would the locomotive unit be sent along some abandoned branch line in this process?
I suggest it be set on fire on Track 14 in the Hoboken Terminal. They it would be promptly be rolled onto a car float (as trains were in the old days) and pulled out to sea to perish beneath the waves.
Overmod John WRAnyway, the thought occurs to me that when I die I would like my coffin to be put on an Amtrak baggage car and sent around the country forever. Do you think that can be arranged? A noble thought. You might actually be able to manage something like that if you were cremated and somebody slipped the 'cremains' into some location on the baggage car where they would stay undisturbed. I'd rather have a Viking funeral: when I die, strap me to the next GE with broken turbocharger lube lines and notch her up...
John WRAnyway, the thought occurs to me that when I die I would like my coffin to be put on an Amtrak baggage car and sent around the country forever. Do you think that can be arranged?
A noble thought. You might actually be able to manage something like that if you were cremated and somebody slipped the 'cremains' into some location on the baggage car where they would stay undisturbed.
I'd rather have a Viking funeral: when I die, strap me to the next GE with broken turbocharger lube lines and notch her up...
I nominate this as the best post on this forum, ever.
I can just picture an aging railfan having finally come to their last "fan trip", laid to rest on top of the hood next to the exhaust stack. Wearing, what? A suit and tie? A kind of old-fashioned train-engineer Oshkosh overalls, engineer hat, festooned with pins and other memorabilia?
A bag piper trackside sounding out New Britain (Amazing Grace)? The burble of the idling FDL in the background? The order given to notch-er-up, followed by the billowing of black clouds of Diesel smoke out the stack? Followed by a pause of, dunno, 10 minutes for the unit "to load up." With curling of the paint of the locomotive in one of the "Heritage color schemes" from the flames building up inside?
And doesn't a proper Viking funeral involve not only setting the Dragon Ship on fire, but setting it out to sea? So would the locomotive unit be sent along some abandoned branch line in this process?
So much food for the imagination . . .
If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?
art11758 or how about a McCulloch chainsaw? I just figured I would keep with the underlying topic at hand. Where is my real simulated indian jewelry anyways?
or how about a McCulloch chainsaw?
I just figured I would keep with the underlying topic at hand.
Where is my real simulated indian jewelry anyways?
Right next to the Gucci shoe tree....
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
John WR Paul, Please excuse my earlier post. I must have been distracted. Anyway, the thought occurs to me that when I die I would like my coffin to be put on an Amtrak baggage car and sent around the country forever. Do you think that can be arranged? John
Paul,
Please excuse my earlier post. I must have been distracted.
Anyway, the thought occurs to me that when I die I would like my coffin to be put on an Amtrak baggage car and sent around the country forever. Do you think that can be arranged?
John
Sure. Gotta put something in those brand new baggage cars....
art11758or how about a McCulloch chainsaw?
(Cue obligatory Jackyl sound bite)
Thanks for calling my omission to my attention Bob. Now I've redone the post.
Paul what, John?
The Aero Train had bus bodies (including the under-floor baggage storage), and I agree, it should be done, but the conversion would probably cost more than Amtrak can afford. On the other hand, the Viewliner II orders include baggage-dorms to reduce expenses (hopefully).
Blue Alert! We're at Blue Alert! Aw crap, it's a nondescript GEVO... Cancel Blue Alert!
As long as we're wandering around the subject, I just thought of something and figured I'd better get it out of my head before it died of loneliness: Back in the '60's, if someone died and the services were to be held some distance away, for the price of a train ticket, the coffin could be shipped to the desired destination. Do they still do that? Going back to the original subject, it might be a little awkward shoving a coffin into the space under a coach or in a compartment at the end of the car.
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