Amtrak Diner and Food Service Discussion

The organization formerly known as NARP, the Rail Passengers Association, has a campaign going where they ask people who live in cities served by Amtrak to contact their mayors asking them to support long distance trains, and to criticize this move related to the diners. That campaign is here: https://www.railpassengers.org/happenin ... r-onboard/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;. I personally feel funny contacting my mayor about this issue in this city, which is struggling with poverty. But I guess the idea is that there is a lot of power in numbers.

There may be something to that. I've read in numerous posts that people who have dealt with present and former staffers of legislators say that little or no attention is paid to a lengthy letter or email, but they do keep a "box score" of pro and con communications, so even a short phone call or email saying simply for or against will help strengthen the numbers.

Congressional lobbying organizations that I've worked with (as a concerned citizen on my own time- I am not a paid lobbyist) told me that calling or faxing (if anyone does that these days) or, better yet, an in-person visit, is much more effective than an email.

The Orwellian part is posing this downgrade as an improvement. They could at least be honest about it, and say, "We need to cut costs, so that is what we are doing." People could respect that. People do not appreciate being told down is up and other clear falsehoods - they feel their intelligence has been insulted.

SouthernRailway wrote:Congressional lobbying organizations that I've worked with (as a concerned citizen on my own time- I am not a paid lobbyist) told me that calling or faxing (if anyone does that these days) or, better yet, an in-person visit, is much more effective than an email.

Fair points.

If I had more time I'd definitely do that.

Maybe they want to break the ¨chefs union¨?

Time for a bag of pretzels - pay extra for the 2nd bag!

Morning Zephyr wrote:The Orwellian part is posing this downgrade as an improvement. They could at least be honest about it, and say, "We need to cut costs, so that is what we are doing." People could respect that. People do not appreciate being told down is up and other clear falsehoods - they feel their intelligence has been insulted.

Yeah, I mean I think that's a big part of why I'm not inclined to give the benefit of the doubt. I guess maybe calling it "contemporary dining" implies crappier dining since it seems everything is perpetually getting worse for the American middle class. I suppose this is destined to be a relic of a bygone era...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5nhyFFSweU" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

When was the last time you dined at a TexMex restaurant and had cold tortillas served? Didn't they arrive at the table warm in a plastic tray with a cover? When was the last time the fajitas stuffing arrive at the table cold? Didn't they arrive at the table in a sizzling hot skillet?

And Amtrak thinks cold wraps are acceptable?

This is a loss of an amenity/service onboard the train and artificial increase of the sleeping car fare. And for a measily savings of $1.5M per train (CL and LSL). Not worth it, but unfortunately it speaks to more changes coming to the operation of long distance trains - if Andersen can continue to pull it off!

There are plenty of LD train changes that I wouldn't mind. Even having all food prepared offsite is fine--as long as it's heated.

I'd think that Amtrak would do better by adding an "Economy Minus" coach or two to the LD trains, at budget ticket prices, to sop up some of the Greyhound crowd.

I don't think that's a good idea for LD trains. You'll just end up pulling people out of the regular coach cars in the end making less money. I think it would work better on the NEC where there's a huge market for travel at all price ranges and you can have separate trains that are a low cost service like Ouigo in France. Then again that's limited by tunnel capacity in New York.

SouthernRailway wrote:There are plenty of LD train changes that I wouldn't mind. Even having all food prepared offsite is fine--as long as it's heated.

I'd think that Amtrak would do better by adding an "Economy Minus" coach or two to the LD trains, at budget ticket prices, to sop up some of the Greyhound crowd.

Been saying that for years now. They could literally add a commuter gallery car WAS-CHI or ALB-CHI and I’d consider riding. The excess demand is there.

trainbrain wrote:I don't think that's a good idea for LD trains. You'll just end up pulling people out of the regular coach cars in the end making less money. I think it would work better on the NEC where there's a huge market for travel at all price ranges and you can have separate trains that are a low cost service like Ouigo in France. Then again that's limited by tunnel capacity in New York.

Fair point. I don't think that there are enough slots into NY Penn to add many additional Amtrak trains, but I agree that there is a market for "Economy Minus" in the Northeast Corridor.

For the LD trains, if you could sell a high-density coach car and generate the same revenues as a lower-density coach car, I think it would improve overall revenues and ridership, but you're right--it would be necessary to avoid shifting people from regular coach to "Economy Minus" if ridership stayed the same.

I can't think of anything worse than an intercity bus trip.

If Amtrak set up a similar service to Ouigo on the NEC they could offer it at night time only, as they don't run any other Acelas too late or early. The earliest Acela from Boston is 5 am and the latest is 5:20 PM, if they filled these twelve hours that don't have an Acela with a discount service that has economy only seating they wouldn't have to worry about congestion at NYP.