Non-Amtrak passenger routes after Amtrak creation

Also eligible to join Amtrak was Canadian Pacific’s Atlantic Limited operating on nearly 200 miles of CP track across the State of Maine between Montreal, Quebec and Saint John, New Brunswick as it provided a local service in Maine at six stops. Train included coaches, sleepers and New England’s only Dome car.

The Atlantic was eventually taken over by VIA and lasted until December 1994 (Discontinued in Nov 1981 but reinstated June 1985)

Amtrak's Share Holders
1. Burlington Northern
2. Milwaukee Road
3. Grand Trunk
4. I forgot

#4 Penn Central, now held, I believe, by a private investor named Carl H. Lindner. However, we should be mindful that shareholder lists, unless required by law to be disclosed, are proprietary information.

This is a long time ago, but if I remember reading correctly, RI wanted to join Amtrak at the time, assuming it would not have a contract to run any trains, but it could not come up with the cash required to join.

Considering that between the calendar 1969 measuring period and A-Day, The Rock got rid of the Twin Star Rocket, Rocky Mtn Rocket, and the Golden State, I find that difficult to believe, Mr. Aggie.

If their objective was simply to have their road passenger train free, then i believe such is a fair statement.

There are other heart warming mother lode stories about, such as the one saying the Southern stayed out simply for corporate pride. There is only one story out there; dollars and sense.

A few comments about Southern. When A-day arrived, they were still running a train to Asheville (a connection at Salisbury with a through train to Atlanta), and the "Birmingham Special" to Birmingham via the N&W. They ended up having to run the Southern Crescent, the Asheville train, and a stub WAS - Lynchburg train for a few years, but quickly got rid of the stub and the Asheville train.

Rock Island was still running dining cars on the trains to Peoria and Rock Island in the early 1970s, along with Ben Butterworth's ex-DRGW dome-obs "Big Ben". The diners went in 1975 -- I remember because, in the summer of 1976, I worked for the Rock and we were still drinking the inventory of dining-car coffee. It was a special blend for the RI and it was delicious. Although I worked for the Rock, for a variety of reasons I never managed to ride either passenger train before they were discontinued in the late 1970s.

The RDG was still running trains to Pottsville (about 100 miles from PHL), Allentown, and of course Newark in the late 1970s. The "Crusader/Wall Street", which ran with ex-B&M RDCs, lasted until a big New Jersey cutback in 1982 that also saw the elimination of service to Phillipsburg over the CNJ (the "Queen of the Valley" train carried the ex-Blue Comet open-platform obs) and to Atlantic City, Ocean City, and Cape May from Lindenwold. The other RDG trains lasted until the Center City tunnel entered service in 1983. The tunnel was not designed for the operation of diesel equipment, so service to Pottsville and Allentown was ended.

Interestingly, the extension to Allentown from Bethlehem was funded by the local transit authority in the Allentown/Bethlehem area, and used the former Lehigh Valley (still used as a bypass around Allentown Yard by NS). The train stopped at the RDG station in Bethlehem, ran through the connecting track onto the LV, and terminated at a gravel platform within sight of the vandalized wreckage of the former Allentown passenger station.

Allow me to note Ms. Bly, I "helped pay your salary" with rides on the "Quad City Rocket", both supporting the dePorter Butterworth Tours "Big Ben" (ex C&O, D&RGW) parlor obs, and Rock's Dining Car. Hopefully, my dinners at Track One before "RC Squared" (or Railroad Club of Chicago) meetings during the 70's also helped "the cause".

I still think that nothing has been put "on the table" here at the Forum other than to suggest that the roads that had succeeded in "getting rid" of trains during the "interregnum" between the measuring period and A-Day were simply the roads that could have potentially joined Amtrak, yet declined to do so.

Ms. Bly,
Then right before the end wasn't it down to a E9, Diner and 1-2 Coaches?

crazy_nip wrote:the georgia railroad also ran a passenger train until 1983 or 1984

it was a once a day mixed train which was really just one coach on the back of a freight

I rode 2 of the Georgia RR mixed trains in the summer of 1977 while attending the Navy Supply Corps School in Athens, Georgia.

The first was the branch line mixed between Athens and the junction (High Point ?) with the main line. Accomodations were some reclining seats in a large Georgia RR caboose. The business car GEORGA 300 was deadheading at the rear of our consist, on the way home to Atlanta from a special event in Athens.

The second was the so called "super-mixed" between Augusta and Atlanta; I rode from the junction with the Athens branch all the way to Atlanta. The Budd coach (one of which is now CSXT track inspection car 318) was not in the consist that day; sleeper ALABAMA RIVER was substituting. Thus I had bedroom A in ALABAMA RIVER, with a Georgia RR cash fare receipt as a memento of the trip. I recall this lightweight 10 & 6 sleeper was lettered WESTERN RAILWAY OF ALABAMA on one side and something else (ATLANTA & WEST POINT ROUTE ?) on the other side of the car. Thus the last 3 cars of the long super-mixed were ALABAMA RIVER, the caboose and the deadheading GEORGIA 300.

Regarding the Southern: On A-Day, they ran the following:
#1 & 2 - Southern Crescent, daily Washington-Birmingham, tri-weekly Birmingham-New Orleans with through sleeping car for Los Angeles via Sunset Limited.
#3 & 4 - triweekly unnamed Asheville-Salisbury train connecting to the Piedmont Limited
#5 & 6 - Piedmont Limited, daily Washington-Atlanta, later truncated to Washington-Charlotte
#7 & 8 - remnant of Birmingham Special, daily Washington - Lynchburg.

#7 & 8 were the first to go, sometime around 1974.

#3 & 4 and #7 & 8 lasted into late 1975. I rode #3 & 4 in June of that year and photographed #5 at Greensboro.

Sometime in the late 1970s, Southern converted the Atlanta-Birmingham leg to triweekly service. In March 1978, Southern announced plans to abandon the Southern Crescent (I rode from Atlanta to Greenville the day of the announcement) and the following February Amtrak took over the operation, renamed the train the Crescent and extended daily service to New Orleans.

A final note about #5&6 and #7&8: They operated as mixed trains south of Alexandria, VA, where several flatcars with piggyback trailers were added to the consists. This helped defray costs, but not enough to keep the trains in business.

One thing about the Georgia Railroad(not to be confused with Central of Georgia) mixed is that it was not meant to be a serious passenger train service.

The one time I rode it, I did so as a deliberate "mood" thing, not expecting any service at all. I enjoyed it immensely, though once was enough. Took about ten hours for what the bus did in just over three.

But again, as a railfan I knew exactly what I was in for. That budd coach often used was from the original 1949 streamlined version of the Crescent, an Atlanta and West Point Route car. (The Crescent then took a different route from what it does today).

I brought my own food, the crew did let me ride in the caboose for awhile. Sometimes we made stops where the train was longer than the town. We were just out in the fields so far as I could tell, until we started moving again and lo!! there is a town!!. I remember I had to keep a friendly dog from boarding. I was the only passenger by the way. I termed it a "Ghost Train from Hell" NOT because of bad service (I expected that) but because it gave off no light. No lights in the coach or anywhere else except the engine and that was 100 cars away. So, going around curves at dusk and later, without light is why I called it that, like something at a Halloween Show.

One fnal thought---compare it with going camping. When you go camping you are CHOOSING to be without certain amenities, and if you are in the mood for it, it is in fact fun. No comparison with a luxury hotel but it depends on what you are in the mood for. I would never used it for serious transportation. Just rode it for a lark, as they say.

On by the way---not only could it be several hours late, it could also be several hours early. I was instructed to call the dispatcher the morning of my trip to get a reliable estimate.

The low fare was evidently "frozen in time", it must have been what the Ga. Railrod was charging when it was making a serious attempt to run trains, before Amtrak.

I always wondered how different a passenger system we might have today, if Conrail once it became profitable was forced to take over the un-profitable Amtrak??

What better system could the government have than the ability to subsidize passenger service with their profitable freight service - just as the private RR's did.

Any thoughts on this?? Was it ever even considered??

I still hate the fact that Conrail was sold off, as well as the disabling and tearing down of all the catenary on their lines.

Well, like it or not Mr. Drew, that Conrail was to be out of the passenger business, intercity and commuter, was one of the provisions of its enabling legislation, The RailRoad Reorganization Act of 1973, often known as the "3R Act".

I simply do not think it fair that the shippers would have been asked to cross-subsidize passenger service losses. Evidently their lobbying group, the National Industrial Traffic League, agreed, and so it was.

The CP route of the Atlantic Limited was a US subsidiary named Canadian Pacific-Maine.

I concur they would have been eligible to join. Nothing has come to my attention that they did. I likely would have learned of such when I learned about the Northwestern Pacific that I noted earlier.

Mr. Norman's comment about CPR's International of Maine Division (which had boxcars so lettered, although no locomotives) reminded me that there was another Canadian-operated passenger train that crossed the border into the Amtrak era. Canadian National ran a triweekly RDC service between Thunder Bay and Winnipeg that crossed a corner of Minnesota between Baudette and Warroad. This was run as a “real” CN line, not a subsidiary like the Grand Trunk, Central Vermont, or Grand Trunk Western, although for legal purposes it may have had its own corporate identity. My guess is that since CN was still running "socially necessary" services (as they were termed) in the early 1970s, the subject of Amtrak membership on the basis of this obscure branch never really came up. This passenger service lasted until 1977.

I guess there was also the White Pass & Yukon out of Skagway, Alaska... I *think* they were still running scheduled passenger trains in 1971, although they did shut down in the 1980s (and later started up again as the current tourist operation). The concept of a three-foot-gauge Amtrak service is really amusing.