DreamStar Lines - New Private Overnight Passenger Service LA - SF

"The last overnight train between L.A. and S.F. ran in 1968": actually, in the early 1980s Amtrak ran the state-subsidized Spirit of California overnight between San Francisco and Los Angeles.

https://www.railwayage.com/passenger/in ... he-future/

Dreamstar Lines: Back to the Future?

During the “Golden Age of Railroading” in the middle of the past century, the Southern Pacific’s Lark was the train to take between Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area, at least for folks who could afford it. The train was one of the great “streamliners” of the era, and it carried only sleeping cars; 13 of them in 1946 plus two more to Oakland on the line that now hosts Capitol Corridor trains. There was a triple-unit food service car with diner and lounge, but no coaches. Even after coaches were introduced into the train’s consist in the 1950s, the dining car served only sleeping car passengers. Running a roughly twelve-hour schedule for the entire route, the old Lark was luxury on rails. It was discontinued on April 8, 1968, more than 55 years ago.

Today, a private-sector entity wants to start a train on the same route that will give contemporary sleeping car passengers a similar experience on equipment that originally ran during that time. Dreamstar Lines, based in Newport Beach in Orange County, Calif., is the company working on putting the proposed train on the rails. The company’s website, www.dreamstarlines.com, is not long on details yet, but conveys a vision of bringing back the feel of the luxurious trains of the past. It says: “Dreamstar Lines is preparing a premium overnight ‘hotel train’ passenger train service. Board our trains in a city center or convenient suburban station … fall asleep in a private room … and wake up at your destination.” Dreamstar’s slogan is “Go to bed. Wake up there.”
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The last mention of this idea in the public press, as collected by Mr. Google, was in mid May. So, is this an idea being worked by the business group, or is this an idea that has been swatted down by the bankers?

They have a website where you can submit your email to be notified of updates: https://dreamstarlines.com

No further info at this point.

Almost 6 months on…

The watch this space website has no tag to investors, no tags for RFP to procure cars from existing private owners, in other words, not a damn thing.

Anyone care to bet this is the 2023-25 version of the “Marlboro Unlimited?”

Well, their LinkedIn profile stopped posting six months ago…

Coincidental time to resurrect the thread: Trains

Plans for private San Francisco-Los Angeles overnight sleeping car service revived

Dreamstar says service could begin in summer of 2025

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. — The company seeking to start a luxury sleeping car train between downtown San Francisco and Los Angeles Union station says it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Union Pacific “formalizing the parties’ negotiations toward a comprehensive final agreement” to begin operations by 2025.

A press release issued by Dreamstar Lines Inc. on March 23 says “the service will feature state-of-the-art sleeping cars with private rooms with lie-flat beds, en-suite showers, high-speed internet connectivity, on-board food, beverage, and hospitality services and “last mile” transportation, ensuring a seamless, peaceful, and hassle-free passenger experience.”
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By 2025? That gives at most 21 months to get started. Yeah, lots of luck!

Isn't there a successful sleeper bus on this route? I wonder how they are doing in terms of profit and boardings.

Also I love the idea, but how are they going to get Amtrak to play ball? This isn't UK, where there is a network company that will take money from anybody to operate a train. Here you have to get Amtrak's blessing to us LAUPT and Caltrain for San Francisco. Plus UP is going to want market rate for the track slot, not the Amtrak blue light special.

Remember the Hoosier State debacle? It was the perfect storm of problems. Amtrak hated private trains, Ed Ellis was a nut, and CSX skewered them all.

I wish them well but the hurdles are bureaucratic, not just money.

LAUPT is owned by LACMTA, not sure why Amtrak would be involved. Caltrain has a farebox recovery ratio of 22% and would be wise to accept pretty much anything in return for funding given their approved 2025 budget is expecting a deficit of 36M.

... and a sleeper to LA is in no sense a competitor of CalTrain -- rather a possible feeder if there's a scheduled stop at San Jose Diridon, as there should be in any case. Maybe also in Palo Alto? The main issue would be slotting the northbound into the AM rush hour, particularly if the overtakes at Lawrence and Bayshore are already being used for Caltrain traffic. In fact, all three host railroads will (rightly) want just compensation -- although as lensovet points out, every little bit helps.

Caltrain presently has no more than 4 trains per hour per direction at SJ. Don't think there's going to be much of an issue slotting another train in there.

True, but it doesn't take long for a nonstop (except for Palo Alto?) to catch up with a local with only one track for each direction. Maybe put in a few additional stops to discharge passengers (Redwood City, Hillsdale, Burlingame?) to avoid hitting yellow blocks at a steady 30 mph -- bad practice in any case -- while passengers are looking at their watches and wondering why are we crawling?

lensovet wrote: ↑Thu Apr 04, 2024 6:33 pm LAUPT is owned by LACMTA,

There's probably a deeper analysis required on this issue. LAUPT may be owned locally but Amtrak probably has a contract saying they manage certain aspects of the operation that might include veto power over certain issues. Do they control the tower and thus the traffic in? Perhaps they own the tracks and LACMTA owns the ground underneath? They definitely own the yard and shops down the river a bit.

I don't know the answer to any of the above questions but they are worth asking. Even if political will was in favor of this operation, then you have some degree of pushing parties together including AMtrak, LACMTA, Caltrans, JPB/Caltrain, Metrolink, Union Pacific, etc... to get this rolling and any one of those groups might decide they don't want this.

I'm pretty sure Metrolink dispatches everything from a control center somewhere around Pomona (used to be in Glendale), and at one time BNSF and UP each had a dispatcher sitting in so that everyone knew what was coming at them; I'm not sure whether that's still the practice. In any event, all parties will have to be together in a room to work out the details of a through move that involves all of them. (And apparently it's now LAUS since the change in ownership -- at least that's what's been printed on the tickets.)