Amtrak Empire Service (New York State)

Starting November 17, Amtrak Empire Service between New York City and Albany will offer a new on-board food service operated by the SUBWAY® restaurant chain.

AWSOME AWSOME AWSOME and TOTALLY COOL.

I have pitched this idea several years ago, probably on this board as the way that Amtrak would totally spruce up its food service. Why?

1) One, you can fit a Subway just about anywhere. Hell, you could fit in a handicapped Amfleet bathroom.

2) The modular nature of a Subway restaurant fits in with the AmCafes.

3) The food is a much better value and plain much better than Amcrap microwavable food.

4) Hopefully this will do away with the Cafe being closed for half the trip and the surly staff.

5) If the service is popular enough Amtrak might be able to SELL the space on the cars, instead of having to pay Subway to operate the mini-restaurants.

6) Most terminal stations usually have Subways already so you can get the food and staff from those cutting down on the overhead (if this idea keeps spreading that is). I know that Philly has one, Baltimore has a Subway a block away, New Haven has one too.

The only downside is that I see this being SO popular that the line might stretch out of the cafe car and into the other cars and/or they run out of food too quickly.

Subway is good, its like an actual meal, hell, I just CAME from Subway. I am eating a footlong meatball sub AS I TYPE THIS. So the first move after the canning of Gunn is a + for Amtrak.

Mr. Jay,
Superliners on the Cardinal was a Warrington move.

Very interesting...I hope that they succeed in this endeavor. I love Subway, btw! I go there more than I should, but hey, I'm single and too lazy to cook, and it sure beats McDonalds!

Who is taking the initiative in this? Did New York decide that it should offer food service? Was this the plan all along, and if so, why are they playing these games? Couldn't they have instituted a more seamless transition that didn't leave customers without food service for months?

Amtrak's board of directors spoke extensively in its most recent strategic initiative report about forthcoming initiatives in outsourcing food service. It comes as no suprise to me that Amtrak would do so in a manner that displaces workers earning living wages instead of doing something really creative, like implementing this program on the Keystone Corridor, where there is no food service at all. Buy, hey, maybe this way President Bush and Secretary Mineta will receive a couple "your so cool" letters from Harriet.

A few of my thoughts:

First, according to the press release, Subway is actually paying Amtrak a commission on its sales for the franchise of being able to work on the trains. I guess that's a good thing. It will be very interest to see, however, who will be responsible for maintaining the food service equipment, and whether this franchise fee covers the costs that Amtrak must bear to make this space and equipment available to Subway.

Second, although I have never been a critic of Amtrak's front line employees, I certainly admit that Amtrak has historically operated its food service cars in a poor manner. I have never been able to identify the root of the problem. But no one on this board needs to be reminded of absurdities of cafe cars not being opened until 20 or more minutes after departure and closing 20 or more minutes before arrival, and then often not being properly stocked with even the short list of items available on the menu. So it will be interesting to see whether Subway can do better. I noticed that the press release suggests that each cafe car will be likely staffed with at least two employees, otherwise there would be no way to deliver food to people at their seats. I will be very interested to see how many low-wage Subway employees it will take to do the job of the one living-wage Amtrak employee that they displaced, and whether they manage to do it better.

Third, sanitation has always been a significant challenge in Amtrak's cafe cars. This issue has always prevented Amtrak's sole LSA from being able to prepare any fresh menu items onboard. It will be interesting to see how Subway handles the issue.

Fourth, like everyone else, I am just very interested to see how Subway manages to pull this whole service off. The counter space allotted in a cafe car is extremely small. I seriously wonder whether Subway will be able prepare fresh sandwiches onboard at any kind of speed that will be acceptable to passengers waiting in line for service.

Fifth, I wonder whether the new low-wage Subway employees will participate in Railroad Retirement.

Sixth, I wonder whether this initiative will be profitable for Subway. Afterall, Amtrak's cafe cars are not exactly the cheap real estate that Subway so often uses in its business plan. And anything that moves is more likely to need frequent repair. Finally, although the audience is captive, the window of opportunity to sell is limited, and the scheduling of trains necessitates a lot of down time.

Here's my prediction:

This giddy, neocon experiement will fail miserably by every measure.

Today's Albany Times Union:
http://www.timesunion.com/AspStories/st ... 11/15/2005

I can't imagine how the 2 employees will be able to make freshly prepared food on demand in the food car and deliver it to passengers' seats. This has got to be bogus. And, Subway will pay Amtrak a commission? Won't Subway need to install different equipment in the food cars to make all this freshly prepared food? Where is there even room to make sandwiches? And if they have to change the configuration of the cars for this service, who pays? And if they change the cars, will they no longer be available for regular, non-Subway food car service?
Or, are they just going to replace the regular Amtrak food car stuff with premade Subway sandwiches, which will have the same problems as regular Amtrak food? That would reflect badly on Subway and, as they say these days, "dilute the brand."
Somebody's been smoking funny cigarettes. This is another load of BS from the Administration.

It is supposed to start tomorrow (thrus.). I wish I had a copy of the rules and regs the conductors are to follow when I go in this pm Ill get one, makes for very interesting reading. From what I remember Subway will also lease the vacant commisarry space at ALB for storage and staging. They will be given special parking at alb and passes to deadhead to and from assignments.

This is just another attempt to see how the unions will react, bringing non union subcontractors in to replace a union job. They say they can because its "new service" just because they changed the train numbers. I know I wont be crossing any picket lines

Facts about the Subway initiative, as I understand them:

Yes, Subway is paying Amtrak a percentage of their total sales, for the right to use the equipment. Remember, even though Amtrak eliminated their food service, the same cafe cars have continued to run on these trains.

Yes, the Subway 'business plan' calls for there to be three Subway employees on every train, with at least one person roaming the train selling items.

Yes, the Subway employees will be paid both an hourly wage (I would assume much lower than Amtrak's) and a percentage of thier actual sales. This should incent them to be open, ready for service when passengers board the trains and to remain open until the trains arrive at the end point (BIG PLUS over Amtrak service levels).

I doubt that all of the usual Subway sandwich options will be available on the trains (six types of breads, multiple fresh vegtable toppings, etc.??), but it will be fresher than the current commercial products used by Amtrak.

Three low-wage Subway employees on every train. Interesting.

Everytime Amtrak contracts out, the private vendor shows up with more employees to do the same job that outsourced Amtrak living-wage employees used to do. I was amazed to learn how many employees the privately operated commissary in Albany was using to stock the trains, and the trains were still not stocked any better than when Amtrak operated the commissary with considerably few employees, and the food was no more better, either (just more expensive).

With two professional LSAs earning a living wage, Amtrak used to provide full lounge and tray meal service on the Boston section of the Lake Shore Limited. The two employees, working together, offered counter service (for consumption in one half of the lounge and back in the seats) and sit down table meal service at mealtime in the other half of the lounge. The meals were largely preplated and heated in convection ovens. Fresh accompaniments, like the salads, were prepared by the second LSA onboard. The service was really quite good. The tables were set with steel silverwhere, linens, and fresh flowers (sometimes provided by the LSAs at their own expense).

I wonder how close the three low-wage Subway employees will be able to come to these high standards set by Amtrak's employees when they were given the proper resources to do their jobs.

JoeG wrote:I can't imagine how the 2 employees will be able to make freshly prepared food on demand in the food car and deliver it to passengers' seats. This has got to be bogus. And, Subway will pay Amtrak a commission? Won't Subway need to install different equipment in the food cars to make all this freshly prepared food? Where is there even room to make sandwiches? And if they have to change the configuration of the cars for this service, who pays? And if they change the cars, will they no longer be available for regular, non-Subway food car service?
Or, are they just going to replace the regular Amtrak food car stuff with premade Subway sandwiches, which will have the same problems as regular Amtrak food? That would reflect badly on Subway and, as they say these days, "dilute the brand."
Somebody's been smoking funny cigarettes. This is another load of BS from the Administration.

The sandwiches will be premade at the regular Subway restaurants shortly before train departures at the NYC and Albany end, and thus not suffer the day or two old syndrome. (hopefully)

Pre-made Subway sandwiches served by three low-wage employees. This is going to be just hilarious.

Lets assume Subway is able to find some people who would be willing to work for, lets say, seven dollars per hour, plus, if reports are correct, some kind of commission. Even at that rate (with healthcare benefits being left for social service agencies to provide at taxpayer expense), we are talking about an hourly labor rate of of $21.00 per hour, plus a commission, to staff this mickey mouse operation.

Of course as many people have already noted, the Subway brand is marketed as being a high-quality, fresh sandwhich. I can see some serious waste if Subway wants protect its brand from being stained by Amtrak's sick little adventure in outsourcing.

Rhinecliff wrote:Three low-wage Subway employees on every train. Interesting.

Everytime Amtrak contracts out, the private vendor shows up with more employees to do the same job that outsourced Amtrak living-wage employees used to do. I was amazed to learn how many employees the privately operated commissary in Albany was using to stock the trains, and the trains were still not stocked any better than when Amtrak operated the commissary with considerably few employees, and the food was no more better, either (just more expensive).

With two professional LSAs earning a living wage, Amtrak used to provide full lounge and tray meal service on the Boston section of the Lake Shore Limited. The two employees, working together, offered counter service (for consumption in one half of the lounge and back in the seats) and sit down table meal service at mealtime in the other half of the lounge. The meals were largely preplated and heated in convection ovens. Fresh accompaniments, like the salads, were prepared by the second LSA onboard. The service was really quite good. The tables were set with steel silverwhere, linens, and fresh flowers (sometimes provided by the LSAs at their own expense).

I wonder how close the three low-wage Subway employees will be able to come to these high standards set by Amtrak's employees when they were given the proper resources to do their jobs.

Odds are, Rheincliff, they will not. To those making the decision, it doesn't matter.

That's the thing I really don't understand about the whole outsourcing bit with food service. It seems to me the types who advocate whacking people like LSAs have experience with management only in a small business. They have no sympathy for unions, or even consider the extent to which the actions they propose may be within state and federal laws, or not. All they look at, is a dollar figure. That seems to be the only language they understand.

This is not to say that one cannot come from a small business, and successfully run a railroad. It is to say when management forgets they deal with people's lives, the desired result over the long-term probably won't be achieved.

Sam Damon wrote:

Rhinecliff wrote:That's the thing I really don't understand about the whole outsourcing bit with food service. It seems to me the types who advocate whacking people like LSAs have experience with management only in a small business. They have no sympathy for unions, or even consider the extent to which the actions they propose may be within state and federal laws, or not.

I suspect the problem with unions in the food service, is not the overall collective bargaining process, but the difficulty in firing a member who performs below par. (These forums have often had postings about service employees whose performance was lacking.) It is very difficult to fire someone for below par performance when there is a reasonably strong union behind them. The tendency of unions is to protect the mediocre members. However, with a contractor, Amtrak can simply direct the Subway management to replace someone and it is done. Even if the Subway employees were unionized, the issue resides with Subway and not Amtrak. Subway would simply have to furnish a replacement union worker the next day.

From the content of other recent posts on this thread, it would appear that the chief complaint is not the absence of food service itself, but the loss of "ambience" due to outsourcing. I can remember a "Trains" article in the dark days just before Amtrak's inception when "the only passenger eating dinner on the B&O that evening", had to content himself with self-service cuisine from an automat on rails.

Sorry, but that's just economic trends at work. The food service industry is fond of pointing out that the percentage of food consumed outside the home has increased multifold over the past few decades, but most of that is in the economy-consicous "grab and go" market represented by fast-food chains and convenience stores. Dining out just isn't enough of an event to command a premium price anymore, even if it is on a train.

Add to this the fact that the quality of restaurant help has slowly edged downward. I spent most of one college summer (recession year 1970) working in a fast-food joint when my normal factory job failed to materialize. We were expected to be fast and accurate; serving within 60 seconds was the rule. Today, even in rural areas, these jobs are held by retirees, immigrants, and the bottom of the labor force. A better-educated and more courteous young adult can work at a higher-quality facility, where some tips can be anticipated.

Subway is about as refined as things are likely to get. I doubt if even a Ground Round or Applebee's, for example, could be adapted to Amtrak's operating conditions.


"You get no bread with one meat ball." (Calvin Russell)

I don't think a Subway on Amtrak is a bad idea but there are some concers with a possible OBS Strike that worres me. Here's a good Commerical to promote this. Hi I'm Jared and Welcome to Amtrak try one of our Sandwichs on Amtrak with 6 Grams of Fat or less. Yea I made this one up in Math today.