Amtrak Borealis: fka Empire Builder 2nd Daily Frequency Chicago - St Paul

STrRedWolf wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2024 10:52 am This, basically, is the key. Stairs on trains slows loading times. METRA requires folks to go up to board the train in their gallery (*shudder*) cars,

You gotta lay off the dramatics. Metra is a very well run agency that moves lots of people downtown for 40+ years. The gallery cars board very quickly becuase it's a wide stairway, automatic doors, and each car opens. There is very little beef with those cars in Chicago and some have lasted since the Eisenhower years.

The beef with the current Hiawatha situation is that the crew utterly refuses to open more than 2-3 doors, claiming its too much work or something. Around the other side of the lake, the South Shore guys open up all doors and traps since 1926. It's not hard, but you have to actually do your job.

The gallery cars are an almost 70 year proven design. Probably the most successful plan in continuous revenue use of any standard floor height car design.

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Yes, and they are not claustrophobic, like the "Kaw" cars out east.

Tadman wrote: ↑Tue Dec 03, 2024 11:01 am You gotta lay off the dramatics. Metra is a very well run agency that moves lots of people downtown for 40+ years. The gallery cars board very quickly becuase it's a wide stairway, automatic doors, and each car opens. There is very little beef with those cars in Chicago and some have lasted since the Eisenhower years.

The beef with the current Hiawatha situation is that the crew utterly refuses to open more than 2-3 doors, claiming its too much work or something. Around the other side of the lake, the South Shore guys open up all doors and traps since 1926. It's not hard, but you have to actually do your job.

Well hold up there. The gallery car is good with the wide doors that can be auto-opened but it's a different style compared to the Hiawatha, which is using ether Siemens Venture equipment that needs the stairs to auto-expand out... or it's Amfleet that would require a conductor at every door. Compare with MARC equipment where the staff knows to open both side doors.

However, from a low platform point of view, you still have climb stairs, which is by nature slower than just walking on the train that's at the same level. That's what METRA's getting rid of with the new Alstom/Bombardier equipment: the need to climb stairs at the door. Have to climb stairs once you're on board? That's okay, because you have boarded, and the stairs are not right at the door, under a trap.

I bet it was cheaper than raising the platforms at every station.

I can't wait for METRA to get the new equipment.

STrRedWolf wrote: ↑Fri Dec 06, 2024 8:36 pm
I can't wait for METRA to get the new equipment.

Thats an odd statement for a Maryland resident where there are no gallery cars. Do you have reason to ride gallery cars with any regularity? I used to and nobody complains about them. The passengers, the crew, the management (had a few railway managers live nearby). It's a problem that barely exists and evidently dwell time is not bad. I used to ride in from Downers on the BNSF line in less time than the brown line from Lincoln Park so there's not much time for improvemnt. It's a margin of diminishing returns affair.

Yeah, I don't really get that aversion to the gallery cars. The new equipment that Metra is getting still has stairs, they're just going to be in a different place. If there's a perceived bottleneck of entry and exit, all you've done is move the bottleneck.

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I'm not too enamored with the fixed seats and more closed in seating areas. Love the gallery cars.

If a platform is built up to the floor level of a Superliner , can the trap cars still use it ?

doing a googlemaps tour , i see there appears to be no crossover between tracks from just south of the the intermodal center, to south of Sturtevant( by the Hiawatha cafe).
so to serve the Airport station , amtrak is restricted to one track for approx 20 miles.

David Benton wrote: ↑Sat Dec 07, 2024 7:20 pm If a platform is built up to the floor level of a Superliner , can the trap cars still use it ?

Superliners have a nominal floor height of 18" and typically platforms for use with Superlines are designed to be 8" or 15" above top of rail (ATR). Trap cars can work with platforms at 8", 15", and 48" ATR.

See chapter 8 of the Amtrak Station Planning and Development Guidelines.

David Benton wrote: ↑Sat Dec 07, 2024 7:20 pm If a platform is built up to the floor level of a Superliner , can the trap cars still use it ?

Yes but not sure why we would do this. There are portable ramps that make it very easy to board a Superliner from the 8 or 15" platforms. You still don't have any better accessibility to the trap cars.

Tadman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 07, 2024 9:23 am

STrRedWolf wrote: ↑Fri Dec 06, 2024 8:36 pm
I can't wait for METRA to get the new equipment.

Thats an odd statement for a Maryland resident where there are no gallery cars. Do you have reason to ride gallery cars with any regularity? I used to and nobody complains about them. The passengers, the crew, the management (had a few railway managers live nearby). It's a problem that barely exists and evidently dwell time is not bad. I used to ride in from Downers on the BNSF line in less time than the brown line from Lincoln Park so there's not much time for improvemnt. It's a margin of diminishing returns affair.

Okay, let me explain. VRE has gallery cars, and during one of the Amtrak train days I went down and got a chance to go in them. I was not impressed.

Now, color me jaded, because the bilevel I was first introduced to was the MARC III cars. I felt those were more efficient on space usage for seats (namely, it has more space for seats period, and it wasn't a pain to get in and out of said seats).

Yes, my hatred is on the technical level, and it doesn't help that a major of them are 50 years old, with the only exception of Nippon-build cars which are at least 20 years old. While the big center door is wide, 139-ish seats vs 148 seats in the new equipment coming in?

I could go on, but I'd rather get back on the Borealis. Maybe next time I'm in Chicago I'll ride it out, but don't count on it -- it's going to take a major convention move to get me back there.

STrRedWolf wrote: ↑Sun Dec 08, 2024 7:18 pm While the big center door is wide, 139-ish seats vs 148 seats in the new equipment coming in?

.

The capacity of the N-S cab cars is 135, and trailer cars are 145.

Capacity on the Alstom cars will be 138 on the cab car, 148 on the trailers.

So, not sure what the excitement is about when the capacity is essentially a wash.

eolesen wrote: ↑Sun Dec 08, 2024 10:28 pm

STrRedWolf wrote: ↑Sun Dec 08, 2024 7:18 pm While the big center door is wide, 139-ish seats vs 148 seats in the new equipment coming in?

.

The capacity of the N-S cab cars is 135, and trailer cars are 145.

Capacity on the Alstom cars will be 138 on the cab car, 148 on the trailers.

So, not sure what the excitement is about when the capacity is essentially a wash.

It's a new day, I have more rest & coffee... and I just noticed something. How can there be 145 seats in a Gallery Car trailer when you're missing two full columns of seats on the upper level? What is the seat pitch between the Gallery cars and the Alstom's? Is it tighter on the older cars?

I must be missing something. Are they contemplating running the Borealis with gallery cars?