Does Amtrak have a "hub"?

Does Amtrak have a "hub" like airlines have where all schedules depend on a central station? What would be the closest thing to a "hub" on Amtrak?

-otto-

I think..........Chicago. That's their main hub, I guess. Another hub is NYP, plus not to mention, LAX.

It would seem to me (in personal opinion)....that DC or NYP would qualify as AMTRAK's Hub....

Better question: What's so great about hubs?

Chicago, New York and Los Angeles just happen to be the three largest metro areas in the nation. Washington is about #6. Each is a gateway for every form of transportation simply because of the high volume of origination/destination traffic these markets generate.

The hub is a fairly recent invention, circa 1978. It reflects the economics of airline travel in the post-deregulation period and the composition of the post-deregulation fleet. The idea was to collect passengers from hither and yon as cheaply as possible, pack big jets as full as possible and fly them on segments as long as possible. Because hub-and-spoke operations don't depend on O/D traffic, you can put them anywhere there's sufficient runway and terminal capacity. That's why Northwest has a hub in Memphis, Delta in Salt Lake, US Airways in Charlotte.

But trains are not planes.

Any train, particularly a long-distance train, functions much like a hub all by itself: It collects passengers from a variety of locations and distributes them to a variety of locations. Trains can function this way because the cost of a train stop is relatively small. Hub-and-spoke operation reflects the high cost of takeoff and landings.

And even in the airline business, the hub as we've come to understand it is about as cutting-edge as that other great traffic aggregator, the regional shopping mall. Southwest NEVER bought into the hub-and-spoke model; its service has always been pooled around large O/D sources like Houston. (And by the way, that's why it's coming to Philly, apparently in force.) US has cut its Pittsburgh hub way back, and American has done the same in St. Louis. Quite a few cities that were once hubs (Syracuse, Dayton, Nashville, Raleigh-Durham) aren't anymore. And then there's the regional jet, a class of commercial airfcraft that didn't exist when hub-and-spoke networks were first mapped out. Cheaper to fly and easier to fill, the RJ has a whole different set of economies of scale, so it's forcing a serious rethink of the network carriers' network structure. Call it the Kohl's or Best Buy of air travel.

Does Amtrak have hubs? Not in the airline sense. Does Amtrak need hubs? No.

I think that CHI, NYP and WAS all qualify as major hubs, with LAX and NOL being 'small hubs'.

But I think that 'what constitutes a hub?' comes down to ones yardstick of measurement. To me, a true hub, be it an airline, a shopping mall or Amtrak, is based on the number of -choices- offered.

For example, Pittsburgh is a major US Airways hub. At any 'meeting' time (about once every 2-3 hrs), 50-100 planes converge, serving practically all destinations available on US Airways, they swap passengers, and fly away. Typically, most of an airlines planes 'overnight' at cities away from the hub, thus their unreasonable AM departure times back to the hub.

A shopping mall has lots and lots of choices...I live 15 miles from the biggest shopping mall in New England and there's perhaps 100 or more stores there. Yes, it's not Mall of America or Gurnee Mills near Chicago, but it's big.

So, based on number of 'choices', what would really qualify as a hub on Amtrak? Since we are talking here about AMTRAK hubs, the coincidence of commuter RR hubs at the same station is not under consideration.

I would have to say that only Chicago qualifies as a true hub. Why? Because the list of on-line destinations, both intermediate and endpoint is the largest. CHI has routes fanning out covering the entire country. And, like the airlines, most of the trains 'overnight' either en-route or at a short-haul endpoint such as Milwaukee or Pontiac.

By my measure, NYP comes in 2nd place, with routes to places like Toronto, Montreal, Boston, Florida (2 routes), Chicago (3 routes), and a couple of short-hauls.

Washington and Los Angeles are both a 'distant 3rd' as hubs. They only have 3-4 routes radiating from each, and only minimal short-haul routes. Remember, we are counting only Amtrak routes!

However, another measure could be number of Amtrak passengers served at each hub. I don't have any numbers, but I'd guess NYP and WAS both have significantly more Amtrak passengers than CHI. LAX is far behind.

Yet another measure could be number of Amtrak trains originating at a hub city. With the high volume of NEC trains, it's probably NYP & WAS again.

So, like the government's inconsistent 'profitability' (avoidable loss) measures of Amtrak, how and or what one measures can skew the results in different ways.

Does Amtrak have hubs? Not in the airline sense. Does Amtrak need hubs? No.

Agreed.

Connectivity, however, remains important. Opportunities for improvement exist.

The measure of a hub or gateway is the number of boardings. The busiest nodes on the Amtrak network are, in this order, New York Penn, Philadelphia 30th Street, Washington Union, and Chicago Union. Top 20 are listed here.

Conncectivity is important. But connectivity is not the same thing as hub-and-spoke, just as trains are not planes. Chicago O'Hare draws from a broader area than Chicago Union Station because you can't put satellite airports in Joliet, La Grange, Summit, Naperville, Glenview, Hammond, Dyer and Homewood. It's way too limiting to insist that Amtrak build its network the way some airlines do. Or rather did.

I always thought that Philadelphia was a "hub" of sorts. If you're a contractor, wanting to bid on Amtrak jobs....Philadelphia's the place to send your bid.

There is a major rail yard there, plus major maintenance facilities just below Philly at Wilmington, Delaware.

Trains run North, South and West from Philly.

Disagree, Mr. Fels--

Get out your Sep 28, 1947 United Air Lines timetable, and you will note that there was clearly a "hub" at MDW where you could connect from your overnight non-stop from SFO on a "SIX" and connect to a "THREE" to go onward to CLE.

Oh, and need more info? "In Chicago please call FRanklin 4900"

As an aside, you'all should seen a "fiftysomething' UA Flight Attendant's eyes pop out when I had that laying on my coffee table. Lest we forget, away from the railfan or other hobby community, how often does one see a document relating to their profession older than they are themselves?

Hub and Spoke is a tool. For railroads, pre-Amtrak, interline connections and Mississippi River gateway cities were what mattered. Chicago still matters ... but it's also the rail node of the Nation even now.

Prior to A-day (like 15 years prior), the railroads had a similar way to connect people: Through service.

Suppose you want to go from Los Angeles to Boise ID: You could do it in the 50s. Sometimes it would be "never leave your seat" because your car was switched from train to train at Ogden... other times, you might have to change trains along the way.

The Mississippi River seemed to be the breakpoint between Eastern and Western US continental services pre A-day. A passenger could get from the Eastern Seaboard to either Chicago, Saint Louis, or New Orleans. From there, they could get just about anyplace in the west.

Thoughts.

John

Mr. Fels is exactly correct that the reason airlines have hubs is the high cost of takeoffs and landings. Trains have very low stopping costs, and so there's no real need to funnel passengers through major cities. Generally multiple through trains with different intermediate cites are a better idea than shuttle services to one mainline. The problem with the current funding system is that it encourages hub-and-spoke service versus multiple mainlines (states prefer having their own train to having trains running through). An example is that for marginally more cost, the Lone Star could be revived to replace the Heartland Flyer, and the market served would dramatically expand. However since the train's funding is Oklahoman not national, such an expansion is unlikely. Another example is commuter service on the NEC. It would be much more efficient to run through local trains New York-Washington or even Boston-Washington than the current hodgepodge of systems which are only partially interconnected. The tracks are there. Why don't trains run through? Because of the way they're funded Such is the result when trains are thought about in airline terms, where the endpoints are the only things that matter.

Here's some more on US Airways' hub at Pittsburgh, from the Tribune-Review:

"Each year an estimated 700,000 passengers living in this area drive to alternate airports in Cleveland, Akron or Columbus to get lower air fares, according to a study done for the Allegheny County Airport Authority."

"Total traffic at Pittsburgh International last year fell roughly 21 percent to 14,266,984 passengers. Most of the drop came mainly from a drop in connecting traffic on US Airways, whose passenger count plunged 26 percent last year from 2002. US Airways' average number of daily flights fell to 358 in 2003, versus an average of 447 the year earlier."

Here's a catch phrase to start watching for: "focus city."

Full text

Hubs versus connections , it seems is the question .
If you talk of hubs , as in all trains arrive at a station , such as Chicago , within say and hour of each other , and the passengers destined for other than Chicago change trains to continue their journey . in chicago's case probably workable , as cross Chicago traffic is suited to this arrangement . ( Im not aware of any train that continues through Chicago to other destinations ) .
but take New York ,Passengers travelling Washington - Boston would not want to change trains at NY . much less travellers from intermediate points on both sides of NY . In New Yorks case the hub concept would not work . Trains continue through , with connections avaliable at NY for the hudson valley line . this is a big advantage trains have over planes .

My rank

4. LAX- California corridor service. Shame the San Joaquins or the Pacific Surfliner dont connect to each other. You see a gap in service in California. Metrolink commuter rail. LA Metro Transit and other transit agencies. Popular vacation destination

3. Tie: CHI and WAS
CHI: Metra commuter rail. Union Station has got to be the busiest place in CHI. A lot of Metra trains and Amtrak trains. Very bus, but not as busy as WAS
WAS: A lot of NEC trains and long-distance trains plus two commuter rail services. MARc (Maryland Commuter Rail) and VRE (Virginia Rail Express). You have 3 MARC lines and 2 VRE lines. Florida service and South service and trains to CHI. Plus, WMATA MetroRail and MEtroBus and lot of government workers. A busy hub indeed.
1.NYP: By far the busiest in the country. You have 3 or 4 NJT rail lines, LIRR, NEC trains, long-distance trains and A LOT of commuters taking the bus or the Subway. Plus the station is dead in the center of the finacial district and Midtown. Booming businesses and lot of commerce. NYP got it topped. Plus, there is about 20 different ways to get into NYC. Most accesible city in America.

My uneducated guess: I think Chicago acts most like Amtrak's hub. Does Amtrak need hubs or use hubs in the sense a commercial airline does? Dunno, I was just thinking of there seemed to be a nerve center for the national network (at least as far as transcontinental services are involved). Interesting discussion, though.

-otto-