Noticed/Questioned Major Delays, Annulments, Reroutes

ahh ok Thanks for the info. that's crazy

CHTT1 wrote:Unfortunately, NS has been melting down every day for months. I'm surprised nothing has been done to relieve the problems.

Here I was hoping that the delay was construction related to remove the diamonds at Englewood and could be resolved in a few days.

Was train 5 cancelled yesterday (Sept 29 from Chi to Oakland) ? I see no tracking information anywhere. Nothing posted on service disruptions (but thats not unusual).

448 was cancelled again yesterday.

And 48 is off to a great start today.

Left Chi just before midnight 2 hours late then lost another 4.5 hours between there and South Bend! Currently 6.5 hours late out of Waterloo, IN

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The NS meltdown continues today. Amtrak is not informing passengers of this situation nor attempting to find alternatives. We need to call them out about their lack of honesty. It has been suggested that we need a rail passengers bill of rights similiar to the airline bill.

I sent this to Amtrak today via the Amtrak website. :

"I have a trip scheduled that I already paid for. Your service in to Chicago from the east is a wreck and you have not informed passengers what terrible delays they face. Be honest, tell the truth or I will go to congress. Please send this to Mr. Boardman."

I too am amazed that Amtrak hasn't posted a service advisory for passengers traveling on the Lake Shore and Capitol, given that both trains in both directions have been running several hours late virtually every day for months now with no apparent end in sight. I'm also curious what accommodation is being made for passengers on #448 on nights when it arrives in Boston well after midnight, after the MBTA has shut down, which has been happening with distressing frequency. I assume that locals who were planning on taking the T home have a choice of paying for an expensive cab ride or camping at South Station until the transit system opens up in the morning.

It seems that South Bend - Chicago has been the problem recently.
This is only 83 miles of railroad.
Are there reasons for this, i.e. construction, rehabilitation, signal problems, etc?
Or is it the same old freight interference and lousy dispatching?
I also have a cross country trip scheduled for the 14th (WAS - 29 - CHI - 3 - LAX) and am
beginning to feel it was a mistake.
Unless due to some natural disaster, eight to ten hour delays on this route is unforgivable
and an insult to passengers which purchase transportation in good faith.

mike253 wrote:Five hours to travel 85 miles is pathetic, too bad the South Shore doesn't run to
the Amtrak station any longer. The passengers could have transferred and saved three and a half hours.
NS meltdown to be sure - all too often.

It's a short cab ride to the South Shore terminal at the airport.
It's too bad there's no way for 29/30/48/49 to use the SS from South Bend to someplace closer to the city where they could return to NS trackage to get to their home station.

I suspect Amtrak is loath to issue an advisory for what may be a temporary situation. As recently as two weeks ago the Capitol Limited was hitting DC two hours late which, while a significant degradation in service, isn't cataclysmic. As I understand it the problems on the NS are congestion, aggravated by crew shortages (please someone with actual facts feel free to correct me). I also understand NS is hiring more crews, as is Amtrak. Track work projects are in progress in Northern Indiana. It's entirely possible that the steps already being taken will relieve the situation in the next week or two. Meanwhile there's already a posted advisory for the Lake Shore Limited relating to the track work in western New York.

Amtrak doesn't really have any options. There are not reasonable alternative routes. There isn't as far as I know a connection to the South Shore at South Bend, and even if there were from personal experience the problems start east of Elkhart anyways. The Michigan Line isn't an improvement because Detroit-Toledo is slow and would require a track pilot and then you still have to get through Hammond. You also don't get the benefit of 110 MPH running because of the limited number of ITCS-equipped P42s. There are no other mains between Cleveland and Chicago suitable for these trains and Amtrak crews aren't qualified on them. Canceling either train (or both) effectively cuts the East Coast off from the rest of the country (no, the Cardinal doesn't count) which causes all kinds of problems.

There is an interchange track between the Westbound Norfolk Southern and the South Shore West of Bendix where Amtrak makes its South Bend stop. Amtrak did use it once. Why return to Norfolk Southern anywhere? The Lake Shore and Capitol Ltds. make no local stops after South Bend, no Gary, Hammond-Whiting, or Englewood any more for them. Just stay on the South Shore route all the way to the St. Charles Air Line, which is already used by downstate Illinois trains.

Train 141(2) suffered at least 3 power outages before hitting in Trenton (where we sat for about 10 minutes before they did their magic and got motive power and HEP back.)

We're estimated to be about 30 minutes behind schedule.

(I'm wondering we're on an ACS-64 I'll check when I get off at Philly.

I may be missing something, but it seems as long as the primary means of transporting Baaken ND crude is rail, we will continue to have these chronic bottleneck delays on the LSL AND NS. The sooner an additional track or tracks are added at the very least between Toledo and South Bend the better. Big picture funding for this by public (Fed) and private (NS) should trump any short term fiscal austerity as this would be a wise infrastructure investment to increase the flow of passenger and freight traffic.

NRGeep wrote:I may be missing something, but it seems as long as the primary means of transporting Baaken ND crude is rail, we will continue to have these chronic bottleneck delays. The sooner an additional track or tracks are added at the very least between Toledo and South Bend the better. Big picture funding for this by public (Fed) and private (NS) should trump any short term fiscal austerity as this would be a wise infrastructure investment to increase the flow of passenger and freight traffic.

If a pipeline was built to be the primary carrier of Baaken crude oil, then it wouldn't be necessary to add rail capacity to every rail choke point in the country.

Greg Moore wrote:Train 141(2) suffered at least 3 power outages before hitting in Trenton (where we sat for about 10 minutes before they did their magic and got motive power and HEP back.)

We're estimated to be about 30 minutes behind schedule.

(I'm wondering we're on an ACS-64 I'll check when I get off at Philly.

Ayup, it was an ACS-64. Thought the horn sounded different.

JimBoylan wrote:There is an interchange track between the Westbound Norfolk Southern and the South Shore West of Bendix where Amtrak makes its South Bend stop.

No, there isn't. It was pulled out by NS several years ago. The first NS to NICTD connection would require a reverse move in Burns Harbor.