MARC Trains to add weekend service

[davinp]

MARC expanding its Baltimore-to-Washington service to seven days a week via the Penn Line

No word on when service will begin.

http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local ... 46881.html

[realtype]

There's already been some discussion on this topic (including the new proposal) in this thread: http://railroad.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=64&t=68530p

[Bobby S]

This is great and all... But what about weekend service from PERRYVILLE MD to DC on the weekend? I mean... I like to go to DC / Baltimore also... There are football and baseball games...even hockey. Museums with the kids..etc..etc... Does the Governor and Transportation President forget that people in Cecil County also like to take trains too? In fact many areas in Cecil are building up for BRAC re-location and many home developments are being built. Isn't this a chance to make it right?...Or Is this just possibly a first step to see if it can go further based on need? Or did someone forget about Cecil County altogether???

[mmi16]

This is great and all... But what about weekend service from PERRYVILLE MD to DC on the weekend? I mean... I like to go to DC / Baltimore also... There are football and baseball games...even hockey. Museums with the kids..etc..etc... Does the Governor and Transportation President forget that people in Cecil County also like to take trains too? In fact many areas in Cecil are building up for BRAC re-location and many home developments are being built. Isn't this a chance to make it right?...Or Is this just possibly a first step to see if it can go further based on need? Or did someone forget about Cecil County altogether???

Is Cecil County still a part of Maryland?

[ThirdRail7]

This is great and all... But what about weekend service from PERRYVILLE MD to DC on the weekend? I mean... I like to go to DC / Baltimore also... There are football and baseball games...even hockey. Museums with the kids..etc..etc... Does the Governor and Transportation President forget that people in Cecil County also like to take trains too? In fact many areas in Cecil are building up for BRAC re-location and many home developments are being built. Isn't this a chance to make it right?...Or Is this just possibly a first step to see if it can go further based on need? Or did someone forget about Cecil County altogether???

Is Cecil County still a part of Maryland?

Most people don't realize it, but it actually part of Canada. Once you pay that toll outside of Newark and travel 4 miles past Elkton, you've technically left the United States.

[Bobby S]

LOL! ... Yep... Those are funny replies! Actually it's Ceciltucky!... And I am from North New Jersey and still work there!...Soooo I guess my expectations are WAAAY higher than the norm for down here! lol So I want WEEKEND SERVICE TOO!!!! Oh yeah... A later morning weekday train would be nice too!!

[dt_rt40]

As I've posted previously, weekend service north of Baltimore will not happen for the foreseeable future. (i.e., ever) Cecil County is the last truly rural county along the Northest corridor; even if its residents were of the mind to utilize such a service, and they are not, you'd barely have enough volume to justify it. It's 3.5X less population than, say, Mercer County, NJ, which is the probably one of the more sparsely populated counties served by NJ Transit. Harford County may have a Wegmans* and some slightly fancier McMansion developments and horse farms, but for all intents and purposes it's very similar. Frankly we are lucky to have what we have during the week. It is good that they made one of the return evening runs a revenue trip, because years ago I had several times been railfanning at Perryville in the evening and have some yokel show up and ask "I can take this train to Baltimore, right", and I'd had to explain to them they could only do so in the morning. Now, you could make a case that having the weekend service terminate at Martin State would bring in some passengers. That I could buy to a greater degree, but I think for quite a few of those people it will be just as convenient on the weekend (vs. the week since there is less traffic going to Baltimore) to drive to Balto. Penn. In other words they already live in a place like Towson and just use Martin State because it's easier to commute to in traffic than going to downtown Baltimore.

As for the Baltimore-Washington segment, it's positively insane it took this long. Surely the PRR must have had Baltimore to DC weekend shuttle type services at some point before bankruptcy and Amtrakification? It will take a while for a market to build, but I can't imagine the hipsters of either city won't take to it like a, well, insert substrate and desired thing of your choice here. Also will be of benefit to tourists; but again it takes a while to build these markets. I still encounter people commuting to BWI on the MARC train who have "lived in DC for 4 years" and "just found out" there's a train they can take to an airport other than National.

* which btw is a terrible Wegmans compared to the nearby ones, even the one in Cockeysville. They don't even bother to carry organic apples anymore because nobody was buying them besides me, apparently.

[mmi16]

I can see the idea of the Penn line running from DC to Penn Station on weekends along with the Camden and Brunswick lines running on weekends. But north of Penn Station. I dont see weekend service in that area. Even with weekend service fewer trains would run weekends then weekdays. I know SEPTA Regional Rail runs strictly Silverliner IVs on weekends and on weekdays they run Silverliner IVs Vs and the Comet Push pulls. NJT I dont know the entire situation but I know the ACL mainly runs Comet 2-4s and the other routes I havent been on.

Don't look for weekend service on Camden, Brunswick or VRE routes without HEAVY DUTY negotiations with CSX

[TheOneKEA]

I can see the idea of the Penn line running from DC to Penn Station on weekends along with the Camden and Brunswick lines running on weekends. But north of Penn Station. I dont see weekend service in that area. Even with weekend service fewer trains would run weekends then weekdays. I know SEPTA Regional Rail runs strictly Silverliner IVs on weekends and on weekdays they run Silverliner IVs Vs and the Comet Push pulls. NJT I dont know the entire situation but I know the ACL mainly runs Comet 2-4s and the other routes I havent been on.

Don't look for weekend service on Camden, Brunswick or VRE routes without HEAVY DUTY negotiations with CSX

I doubt we will see weekend service on the Brunswick Line ever, and nothing more than an hourly service on the Camden Line. In fact I'd be shocked if anything more than crowd busters ran on the Camden Line on weekends to help bring people to M&T Bank Stadium and Oriole Park at Camden Yards.

[ExCon90]

I can see the idea of the Penn line running from DC to Penn Station on weekends along with the Camden and Brunswick lines running on weekends. But north of Penn Station. I dont see weekend service in that area. Even with weekend service fewer trains would run weekends then weekdays. I know SEPTA Regional Rail runs strictly Silverliner IVs on weekends and on weekdays they run Silverliner IVs Vs and the Comet Push pulls. NJT I dont know the entire situation but I know the ACL mainly runs Comet 2-4s and the other routes I havent been on.

A little OT, but for the record SEPTA does run Silverliner Vs on weekends; it's just that as on other days it's hard to predict which trains they're going to be on. But if anyone is thinking of going to Philadelphia to look for them you have as good a chance on a Saturday or Sunday as any other day.

[ThirdRail7]

I can see the idea of the Penn line running from DC to Penn Station on weekends along with the Camden and Brunswick lines running on weekends. But north of Penn Station. I dont see weekend service in that area. Even with weekend service fewer trains would run weekends then weekdays. I know SEPTA Regional Rail runs strictly Silverliner IVs on weekends and on weekdays they run Silverliner IVs Vs and the Comet Push pulls. NJT I dont know the entire situation but I know the ACL mainly runs Comet 2-4s and the other routes I havent been on.

Don't look for weekend service on Camden, Brunswick or VRE routes without HEAVY DUTY negotiations with CSX

I doubt we will see weekend service on the Brunswick Line ever, and nothing more than an hourly service on the Camden Line. In fact I'd be shocked if anything more than crowd busters ran on the Camden Line on weekends to help bring people to M&T Bank Stadium and Oriole Park at Camden Yards.

If you recall, CSX dropped kicked the baseball specials off their territory because they didn't want to be bothered with passenger service on weekends. It would take a lot of effort to persuade them to change their minds.

[RRspatch]

As for the Baltimore-Washington segment, it's positively insane it took this long. Surely the PRR must have had Baltimore to DC weekend shuttle type services at some point before bankruptcy and Amtrakification? It will take a while for a market to build, but I can't imagine the hipsters of either city won't take to it like a, well, insert substrate and desired thing of your choice here. Also will be of benefit to tourists; but again it takes a while to build these markets. I still encounter people commuting to BWI on the MARC train who have "lived in DC for 4 years" and "just found out" there's a train they can take to an airport other than National.

Weekend service on MARC and VRE has been discussed off and on for many years now. The one thing you have to remember is that both services are geared toward serving Washington DC. Now Washington basically has two industries (if you will), the government (government employees) and Tourism (people who come to look at the government). Most government agencies run Monday through Friday 9 to 5. While some, such as Defense and State and possibly Justice run 24/7, most government offices shut down for the weekend. Since both services are geared towards commuting government employees there simply isn't enough of them on the weekends to justify service.

As far as tourist are concerned, they never were a big factor in MARC or VRE ridership. Most of them stay downtown in expen$ive hotels. A few of the smarter ones stay in hotels located at the ends of Metro lines that are within walking distance of the Metro station or offer free shuttle bus service to the station.

As someone who grew up in the DC (1957-1981) area I will be interested in seeing just how much weekend ridership MARC and VRE manage to attract. Remember, this isn't New York, Philadelphia or Boston we're talking about. The government is the major traffic generator in the DC area.

[RRspatch]

If you recall, CSX dropped kicked the baseball specials off their territory because they didn't want to be bothered with passenger service on weekends. It would take a lot of effort to persuade them to change their minds.

IIRC the incident that caused CSXT to drop MARC baseball specials was an after the game train that stopped short of Washington due the crews HOS being up. The game ran into extra innings and the return train departed Baltimore much later than planned. CSXT must have known that the crew was running short on time but (I'm guessing) took a gamble that the train would just make it to Union Station. It didn't. The train stopped at "F" interlocking just across from Ivy City where it waited for two or three hours until a relief crew arrived. The negative publicity this incident received caused CSXT to refuse to run anymore MARC to the game baseball specials. Nowadays Washington area baseball fans can get their baseball fix via the Washington Nationals so there is no longer a need for baseball specials.

[dt_rt40]

Gosh, knowing CSX they probably deliberately did something stupid like that just to generate enough bad publicity that MARC would never ask them to run a special again. I mean, "fer reals" guys. The time it takes a train to go from Balto. to DC along the Camden line is generally-known fact at this point, isn't it? Did that sneaky line get a little longer after midnight? And stopping at Ivy City because you can't drive those 6-7 more minutes it takes to get to Union Station? Talk about pouring fuel on the anti-union fire in this country. I would have organized a mob to kick the engineer out of the cab and drive it on to Union station ourselves.

[dt_rt40]

"While some, such as Defense and State and possibly Justice run 24/7, most government offices shut down for the weekend. Since both services are geared towards commuting government employees there simply isn't enough of them on the weekends to justify service."

Yes, this is almost exactly what I've previously posted about the matter. (just search my profile if you must) But the overarching issue isn't the nature of the local job market; it's that rail transit is integrated into the mindset of the northeast in a way that it isn't in the DC area. I've ridden NJ transit into NYC several times on the weekends; the crowd is definitely not a majority people of going to work. Merely working in the private sector doesn't mean you have work all weekends, all the time. (but, yes, having worked around guvvies as a contractor, I can say the notion of burning the weekend oil is more alien to them than it is to many private sector workers) I guess some people are going to work, but most people are just people who are going into NYC for whatever reason: to visit people, go shopping, go to shows, etc. The northeast is densely populated but it's also densely traveled. I've been on a train leaving Manhattan for Trenton at 8pm that was packed, on a Saturday.

BUT I'm sure there could be a market for weekend service between DC & Baltimore. No, not 10 trains a day each way. No, not trains that are 8 cars long. But enough to justify a service. Look at BWI if nothing else. Has to be the busiest MARC station besides the termini.