Station agents

What do the agents at stations where one daily train do the rest of the day? Just wonderin'

If you check station listings and service hours, many once daily stations are only open a few hours a day, usually around the time of a scheduled train. Others are staffed volunteer "train hosts" or a local "caretaker".

At times the agents sell tickets,check baggage,answer phone(s),and open or close the station building,staying until a late train shows up as needed.
Also work as a baggage handler with the train crew,and tends to Express packages as needed.

20 years ago when I lived in Champaign-Urbana (2 trains each way in those days) the station was staffed from about 5 am to midnight. I bought most of my tickets from the agent there, or reserved them over the phone and picked them up there, and I often saw someone else buying a ticket at the same time. I collected express packages there once, picked up delayed luggage once, and checked bags early once (when that was still allowed). I think the agent also printed out last-minute phone-order tickets and handed them to the conductor to have them for passengers with reserved tickets boarding at unstaffed stations further down the line. Just before I moved away, I think, Amtrak cut one of the agent shifts (the evening one), so there is now only checked baggage heading north, not coming south.

Handling baggage and express is still important. Marshalling 80 or 100 people onto the Illini, Saluki, or City of New Orleans, and getting two or three carts of checked bags out to the platform and onto the train, is not trivial work. Even at a one-each-way station, getting a bunch of people and their bags off and on might still be worth it. Some people probably still buy tix in person. But I assume that pdf printable tickets and smartphones have made agents a lot less necessary.

Answering passenger questions and assisting passengers with mobility problems are also important. Also accommodating passengers that have already arrived when unexpected delays/cancellations occur is useful. Yes 1800 number and online can also handle it, but when you are already at the station I always find it preferable dealing with a live person. Volunteers/caretakers can help with the first two things and I know of some stations where they do (Essex Jct. VT comes to mind), but not the third. At Essex Jct volunteers lock/unlock the waiting room during the hours around the times the Vermonter comes through. The station also has an information window (which I assume was at one point a ticket window) which the volunteers usually man while they are present in the station until they close the waiting room and leave. Passengers can go to the window and ask questions about train status, destinations, etc. as well as get boarding assistance I believe. An "unofficially-manned" station I guess.

Some of the smaller station were/are one person stations. The agent sells tickets, opens up and closes up the building, acts as janitor and takes care of virtually everything locally at that location. I think there are still some one person stations here and there.
Noel Weaver

Those potential passengers who are not computer-literate or people that need help with boarding (such as baggage and wheelchair use) are not Amtrak's target market. I used to work in Berlin CT and had a number if assistance requests while there plus many regular customers who made reservations and purchased long distance tickets. Some started using Hartford after Berlin ticket was closed, others stopped travelling by Amtrak. We never had a self service ticket machine there so that didn't cut down sales - it was mail-out then e-ticketing that did us in.

There was recently a sign at the Niles, Michigan, station that stated it has become un-manned but volunteers were being sought for agent-like duties. The volunteer working when I was waiting for my train a week ago had a radio, not sure if it was his or company-issue, and he appeared to be a senior citizen with railfan-like tendencies.

This was interesting because Niles sees 4x/day each way, which strikes me as a bit busy of a station to de-staff. It's adjacent to South Bend, which is a decent-sized market as well.

Are the station agent positions covered by a TCU/Amtrak agreement? If so, then I wonder if TCU is filing claims against Amtrak at every location where unpaid volunteers are now performing what remains of agreement-covered duties.