Hampton Roads/Norfolk/Newport News NE Regional Service

jstolberg wrote:Four weeks away from the first run and Amtrak has agreed to add 4 cars to the train leaving Norfolk December 12th.

RICHMOND-- Demand for tickets on the new Amtrak Virginia service from Norfolk has lead the rail service to add an additional four cars with 280 more seats for the first day of service, December 12, 2012.

http://www.wvec.com/news/Amtrak-adds-4- ... 47311.html

Before long they'll either be talking about lengthening the platform or adding another train. At least there's plenty of parking available at Harbor Park.

There are a lot of dignitaries that intend to ride and they are taking up passenger space. I believe this is the reason why they are adding more equipment. I checked the numbers around the holidays, and for a new service, the numbers are impressive. More impressive are the city pairs from NFK. The "through" trend continues to build. I guess Mr Arlington and Mr O'keefe are on to something.

ThirdRail7 wrote:

jstolberg wrote:Four weeks away from the first run and Amtrak has agreed to add 4 cars to the train leaving Norfolk December 12th.

RICHMOND-- Demand for tickets on the new Amtrak Virginia service from Norfolk has lead the rail service to add an additional four cars with 280 more seats for the first day of service, December 12, 2012.

http://www.wvec.com/news/Amtrak-adds-4- ... 47311.html

Before long they'll either be talking about lengthening the platform or adding another train. At least there's plenty of parking available at Harbor Park.

There are a lot of dignitaries that intend to ride and they are taking up passenger space. I believe this is the reason why they are adding more equipment. I checked the numbers around the holidays, and for a new service, the numbers are impressive. More impressive are the city pairs from NFK. The "through" trend continues to build. I guess Mr Arlington and Mr O'keefe are on to something.

Thanks! We'll have to see how they do over the course of the next year or so...

So I take it right now we are talking about something along the lines of a 12 car train "special" for the first day of service? Sounds like quite the impressive sight, especially at the brand new station.

The ability for Virginia Service trains to serve the whole market all the way up the Northeast Corridor is proving a boon and a money-maker. These Virginia trains make money because they have people not just traveling to Richmond and Washington but traveling to Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, and even Boston. New equipment is not needed because these trains are just extensions of trains that used to end at Washington or Richmond. Pennsylvania should follow suit and institute a second daily Pennsylvanian by extending a current Keystone train (preferably the express). They might surprise themselves and break even as well.

gokeefe wrote:So I take it right now we are talking about something along the lines of a 12 car train "special" for the first day of service? Sounds like quite the impressive sight, especially at the brand new station.

I hope that the platform is well lit because that's a lot of people for a train that leaves at 04:50 on a December morning.

ThirdRail7 wrote: I checked the numbers around the holidays, and for a new service, the numbers are impressive. More impressive are the city pairs from NFK. The "through" trend continues to build. I guess Mr Arlington and Mr O'keefe are on to something.

<blush> The airlines and (and Amtrak) clearly share a highly-stratified view of the market that should make for a profitable "market division" for all the carriers. The fare differentials essentially mean that if your time is worth less than $90/hr (weekdays), you're going to take the train:

NFK/ORF - NYP/LGA/JFK travel Dec 13/14: (dollars and hours rounded )

Nonstop Air: $700 1.5 Hours (Delta to LGA/JFK)
Connecting Air: $300 3.5 Hours (US to DCA, DL to LGA/JFK)
Amtrak Day: $100 9.0 Hours
Amtrak Nite: $ 70 9.3 Hours (via Bus via NPN)

And for comparison from LYH to NYP

Air Nonstop: (none)
Air Connect: $400 4.0 Hours
Crescent: $150 8.0 Hours
Amtrak VA: $ 80 8.0 Hours

ORF - PHL

Air Nonstop: $700 1.0 Hours
Air Connect: $250 3.5 Hours
Amtrak Day: $ 70 7.0 Hours
Amtrak Nite: $30 7.0 Hours

The EGE wrote:

afiggatt wrote: From the images and drawings of the Norfolk Harbor Park station, it has a long platform, although low level.

The platform is definitely high level. There was an image briefly on Wikipedia (since deleted because of doubts over whether the uploader owned the images) that clearly showed a high-level platform.

I found this 5 MB viewgraph presentation from April, 2012 on the plans and status of the Norfolk Amtrak station. There are drawings and overhead photos of the planned station and site. There is a photo on page 13 of a platform which does not look high level, but maybe that photo is of the The Tide Light rail platform? Since the Norfolk station is on pullover tracks, no reason it should not have a long high level platform so the station can be compliant with the US DOT requirement for level boarding for new stations (unless blocked by freight rail clearance).

Must be someone in the Norfolk region who has gone to the station to take photos of the station and platform under construction?

afiggatt wrote:Must be someone in the Norfolk region who has gone to the station to take photos of the station and platform under construction?

The last I saw (on the interwebs) was that the platform was done but that the station was not going to be ready in time for the start of service. With abundant free parking and most clientele arriving by car (in the early AM before The Tide / HRT starts running) I suspect it will be more like a village's commuter rail stop, with most passengers cocooning in their cars until there's some sign that the train is starting to board.

Plenty of parking at Norfolk. At Richmond, there are over 300 cars parked in 288 spaces.

HENRICO, Va. (WTVR) – Amtrak is warning customers in Central Virginia that there are no more parking spaces at the train station on Staples Mill Road.
In fact, officials said the parking was full Friday morning and will likely stay that way through the holiday weekend.

http://wtvr.com/2012/11/23/no-parking-l ... k-station/

Interesting and informative; from Start 0:00 to 6:40:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=en ... 18RPU&NR=1

This thread should probably called "Hampton Roads/Norfolk/Newport News" NE Regional Service

Its worth noting that in advance of the launch of Norfolk Service, the Newport News service has broken into the black for the fiscal year ending Sep 30 2012, contributing 1.8c per Seat-Mile.

Page 48 of http://www.amtrak.com/ccurl/34/894/Amtr ... r-2012.pdf

The very interesting sign is how quickly VA and NC are being knit into the Northeast Corridor, with the Carolinian (another train from NYC passing through Richmond and Petersburg as the Norfolk train will) *also* showing a profit (of 0.7c per SM)

So the only 3 servcies "outside" the NEC that show a profit on a fully-allocated basis are Lynchburg (+5.7c), Newport News (+1.8c), and Carolinian (+0.7). No wonder they are fairly confident that NFK service can be profitable very quickly.

Arlington wrote:This thread should probably called "Hampton Roads/Norfolk/Newport News" NE Regional Service

Its worth noting that in advance of the launch of Norfolk Service, the Newport News service has broken into the black for the fiscal year ending Sep 30 2012, contributing 1.8c per Seat-Mile.

Page 48 of http://www.amtrak.com/ccurl/34/894/Amtr ... r-2012.pdf

The very interesting sign is how quickly VA and NC are being knit into the Northeast Corridor, with the Carolinian (another train from NYC passing through Richmond and Petersburg as the Norfolk train will) *also* showing a profit (of 0.7c per SM)

So the only 3 servcies "outside" the NEC that show a profit on a fully-allocated basis are Lynchburg (+5.7c), Newport News (+1.8c), and Carolinian (+0.7). No wonder they are fairly confident that NFK service can be profitable very quickly.

Be careful in interpreting the Total Revenue column on the Route Performance tables because it includes the state subsidies in some cases such as the Carolinian. From Amtrak's viewpoint, the money they are getting from the state is additional revenue for the service as are the food & beverage sales, so those are added in on that table. A better guide would be to use the total ticket revenue in the ridership and revenue tables. But the ticket revenue on page A-3.5 does not include food & beverage income for the train, so for the trains with food service and state subsidies, we have to guess what the (small) amount of F&B revenue was.

For the Lynchburg and RVR-NPN trains, there does not appear to much, if any, of state subsidy amount shown in the Route Performance FY12 table. The difference between $11.41 million in Lynchburg ticket revenue and $11.8 in total revenue could well just be food & beverage sales. May be that with the VA services operating at an actual profit, that Amtrak is not drawing on the VA state subsidy accounts. Based on ticket sales, the Carolinian and the Empire Service & Maple Leaf trains to Niagara Falls are not that far from breaking even.

afiggatt wrote: For the Lynchburg and RVR-NPN trains, there does not appear to much, if any, of state subsidy amount shown in the Route Performance FY12 table. The difference between $11.41 million in Lynchburg ticket revenue and $11.8 in total revenue could well just be food & beverage sales. May be that with the VA services operating at an actual profit, that Amtrak is not drawing on the VA state subsidy accounts. Based on ticket sales, the Carolinian and the Empire Service & Maple Leaf trains to Niagara Falls are not that far from breaking even.

The deal with Virginia was for a revenue guarantee, not a subsidy--the state would get the services only to "break even."
[EDIT] With revenue-sharing above break even[/EDIT]

If they are showing a profit, it means that Virginia doesn't have to pay (isn't paying) anything, and since LYH got into the black, I've never heard anyone talk about Virginia having to pay anything for the LYH and NPN services (because LYH paid for both, intially, and now that NPN is in the black too, the money will go to Richmond and Norfolk startup)

Arlington wrote:This thread should probably called "Hampton Roads/Norfolk/Newport News" NE Regional Service

As you wish.

Low level platform visible in photo of test run in this "how to ride the new Norfolk train" (click photo for article)

http://hamptonroads.com/2012/12/ready-r ... eres-guide

NFK's 4:50am Northbound departure is crushingly early, its true. But consider that a single-occupant car trip to get to DC in rush hour is no picnic either, and to get to DC before rush hour your drive would start crushingly early--and you'd be doing the driving.

Until now the choice has been fly at high prices, make a long, difficult drive, or go the night before. Suddenly, 4:50am is looking pretty sweet. Also note that today's 9:15am and 5pm weekday NPN northbounds have their own problems: arriving in ALX at 1pm and 8:20pm (I'm rounding to nearest 5s). The NFK train won't cannibalize the NPN service much--rather the 3 make a nice pattern of service, (early) morning, (early) midday, and post-workday in both directions.

To add a train in the early AM, timed for those early-rising military types to get to morning meetings or to stay late but still make it home after a "full day" of work, it was going to take a second overnight siding somewhere in Hampton Roads (Train 95/94 lays overnight at NPN), and the choice was to put another at NPN or, for the same money to put a train overnight in NFK and get back to the bigger, busier Southside Hampton Roads (ignore, $100m to upgrade the rails and just focus on where the best return could be had on the layover). Nice.

The other wildcard is Petersburg and south-exurban Richmond. I suspect that ridership there will be pretty strong too (with the trains operating at more civilized times)