Thanksgiving Week Extras

3143 at Frankford Junction
3154
3057 at Frankford Junction

I purposely booked the Empire Builder such that I would be on board, all day, Thanksgiving day, just to see what if was like, and because I figured it would be better than spending T-day alone (this was after taking Amtrak from La Crosse, WI to Toronto (via Chicago and DePew), and the VIA Canadian to Vancouver, BC, and Amtrak to Salem/Portland, OR).

The best part was that they served “Turkey Dinner” in the dining car, and was it ever good. As far as I could tell, it was all “home made” or looked as much; the turkey, the dressing, the mashed potatoes and gravy, the cranberry sauce (well I’m sure that came ready made), and the vegetables, and of course, the Pumpkin Pie. The turkey was real turkey breast slices, not some kind of “loaf” thing - whether it was a whole turkey (didn’t see any dark meat) or just whole breasts, or something else, I don’t know, but it looked and tasted like the real thing. DEEEEEEElicious!!!

Also interesting was the changes in the load: I was in the “E” bedroom, of the # 28, out of Portland (the day before Thanksgiving) and most of the rooms of the (single) sleeper were full. On our way to Vancouver, WA, the PA voice, was scolding those passengers in coach who had their belongings piled on the open seat next to them, and there were major crowds at that and the remaining stops before bedtime. However, the next morning, after we left Whitefish, the train had nearly emptied out - only my bedroom, and two roomettes were occupied, in the # 2830, and the coaches were a ghost town. After we left Havre, MT, I walked to the dining car for the wine tasting, and counted 46 people total in the four coach cars (this is what I expected Thanksgiving day on the train would be).

However the next morning, the day after T-day, when we left the Twin Cities station, my Portland sleeper was two rooms short of full, and they had added a coach car. When I got off in La Crosse there was a huge crowd waiting to board. Very interesting and instructional experience. I ate lunch with a man, a businessman, whose only experience with train travel prior was the Keystone service. He had flown to the west coast on business (arranged by his client), but the client had booked his return trip to PA on Amtrak because, of flight unavailability. The guy was having a great time and singing the train’s praises - I hope the Cap. Ltd. treated him as well.

Sounds like a better Thanksgiving than I had. Next year on the Builder!

-otto-

Any other reports of Thanksgiving food service?

My Christmas experience on 3/4 a few years back was "same old menu."

I did catch a glimpse of 3143 in Delaware on Sunday, but didn't get any pictures. But why would NJT offer the Arrows instead of some Comets for the holiday extras?

Enhanced Empire Builder = turkey for Thanksgiving dinner? Just a thought.

Scoring Guy, I hope you paused to send Amtrak a note about the service you enjoyed.

=otto=

NJT is running extra trains too, & they've just expanded their service. Besides METRA-ish logistical problems (i.e. getting trainsets too & from yards located @ endpoints, etc.), they probably don't have many trainsets to spare. And even if they do, do you think they want to hand over brand new ALP-46's & Comet V's or VI's to Amtrak?

acs85 wrote:NJT is running extra trains too, & they've just expanded their service. Besides METRA-ish logistical problems (i.e. getting trainsets too & from yards located @ endpoints, etc.), they probably don't have many trainsets to spare. And even if they do, do you think they want to hand over brand new ALP-46's & Comet V's or VI's to Amtrak?

I'm thinking why would Amtrak want a set that only goes 85 mph and gunk up the corridor on your busiest travel days? Aren't the ALP/Comets rated for 95? Or why not take everything MARC has, since they don't have Sunday service, and they're rated for 125 mph? Besides, if I paid for an Amtrak ticket, even at a discount (aren't the holiday specials cheaper than the regionals?) and a set of Arrows pulled up, I'd ask for my money back. I'll deal with those God-awful seats for an hour or so in Jersey, but for a long distance for a couple of hours? Forget it. I'd rather take Greyhound or Peter Pan.

You fail to realize that difference betweeen 85 mph and 125 mph is only
28 sec mile vs 42 sec per mile. so one needs to run continuous at those speeds for 36 miles to gain 10 minutes, that is continouos without speed restrictions.

The Arrows are time table allowed to Washington are the Comet V's ????

Was it something like this?

http://downloads.raileurope.com/holiday ... _card.html

The ALP powered trainsets are more flexible for NJT, and can be shifted around from line to line, while the MU's that were borrowed by Amtrak were taken out of the NJT "NEC Pool (Morrisville/County Yard)" basically and were replaced by push pull sets operating from Dover/Long Branch/Great Notch whereever.

I still don't understand where NJT comes up with these cars to lend to Amtrak every year, its not like ridership goes down on NJT trains during this period.......instead anything that rolls comes out of the shops and gets put in revenue service to make up for the shortage of cars....

IIRC, the Comet 5's are allowed 90mph west/south of Philly, but 100mph east of Philly, while the MU's are only 80mph, not 85mph.

I can't imagine riding in an MU as a passenger to Washington, nor as an engineer running it from NY to Washington.......oy vey!!!!!!!

As a side note, there were A LOT of speed restrictions on the Northeast Divison-West (Holmes to NYP basically) for the past few weeks, including over the holiday - mostly 60mph for very long stretches - more than 15 miles on track 1 combined inbetween Trenton and Newark of 60mph running. (regular 100mph or 90mph track)

I spent the Sunday after Thanksgiving at Eddington and Cornwells Heights stations between 7:30am and 8:15pm. Just a few highlights that may have been missed...

All but one of the Keystone sets I saw had 6 or 7 cars; only one was at its normal 5-car consist. Three of the sets had a cab car at both ends of the train as well.

No, the one SEPTA Bomber set did not get used; but it was on standby just in case.

The evening MARC set (northbound) was running with an Amtrak AEM-7, coupled against the cab car. After looping at Sunnyside, that set would be pointing the 'usual' way (cab car at the Washington end) unlike the earlier MARC set which would have needed to be wyed at Ivy City to get re-oriented.

The poor folks on the northbound Arrow set out of Philly just after 6pm had a slow boat ride between Holmes and Trenton. Thanks to a bit of a delay, it got routed from #2 to #1 track at Holmes. And his headlight was coming round the curve west of Cornwells Heights at restricted speed, because he'd caught up with the SEPTA local that had just completed station work there; he was likely stuck behind the SEPTA train at restricted speed all the way to Trenton. The reason he got routed to #1 showed up as he was creeping through the station when a Regional overtook him right there, and another NY-bound train went through 3 minutes later...

Arrows vs. Comets: more Amtrak personnel are qualified on the Arrows than on the ALP's and Comet coaches; thus use of the MU's instead. Despite that, one six-car ALP/Comet set was rumored to have been on standby just in case (and to answer an earlier question, the Comet V's are okayed all the way to Washington, D.C. Three of them were on the rear of the NJ Chamber of Commerce train early this year...

I am planning a possible trip from NY to Iowa over the Thanksgiving weekend and with Amtrak being about half the price of flying during that time, I might endure the slow service and constant delays to save the money. My question is, what are the chances I will be able to connect the Lake Shore Limited to the California Zephyr in Chicago with no problems? I know trains get delayed and am not sure how often the delays are bad enough to miss the connection, making the trip impossible to do. The good thing is, that around the holiday, freight traffic is probably almost nonexistant, minimizing the delays of Amtrak on that trip. Are these pleasant trains to take even in coach class? I was hoping to use my Amtrak guest reward points to upgrade to a sleeper, but looking at the fine print, I dont think that is possible on those days. I have never taken Amtrak long distance but it seems to make some sense in this situation. Would this be a good idea?

49-CHI-5 is a guaranteed connection, which means if there is a misconnect, Amtrak will provide you with a bus ticket to continue your journey to the "undisclosed destination" in Iowa.

Unfortunately, if you are a regular NEC rider, and i think you are already aware of such, forget the "more or less on-time' performance of the Corridor. Get ready for inexplicable stops (no doubt freight traffic), and like you find on the Corridor over ThanX every seat taken. Since you clearly have a "handle" on what you can and what you can't afford (and have enough stuff inside that light bulb to avoid falling into the "Oh, I just charged it" trap), I'll forgo my usual litany regarding Coach v. Sleeper.

While I'm inclined to think you will be riding the "Masochist Express", make the best of it.