Tadman wrote:I'm finishing up a trip WAS-NPN and back. I notice there are 2x each way to NPN and 1x to Norfolk. I can't seem to make sense of this. It's the same metro area. Now you have two terminals to maintain, staff, and clean. You have two train storage areas. And you have a run time 35 minutes longer to Norfolk. Given that they run connecting busses to Norfolk for every NPN train, why bother with the Norfolk train?
As someone who grew up in that area, allow me to share my perspective:
While Hampton Roads is one metro area, the seven cities that make it up are VERY distinct from each other. And the region is rather sprawling because of this. Sure, Norfolk is probably the most "urban", but Newport News, Hampton, Va Beach all have their own "downtowns" and all function largely independently. This is especially true of each side of the harbor. Thus it's fair for some purposes to consider each half of the region as its own market.
The main connection between the two halves of the region is the Hampton Roads Bridge-Tunnel, which is VERY congested, and a nightmare for anyone who has to deal with it regularly. Running trains to Norfolk in addition to the bus connections to Newport News allows people to avoid that headache. It's easily an hour drive from Va Beach to Newport News, without traffic at the HRBT. If you're going to drive an hour and potentially sit in traffic before even getting on the train, you might as well just keep driving. And I guarantee you no one from the Peninsula would drive to Norfolk (30-60 minutes in the wrong direction) to then take a train to Richmond or beyond.
Finally, sure, NFK might be 35 minutes farther away than NPN, but it's also a 35 minute drive without traffic between the two.
So adding NFK trains draws in passengers from the Southside without sacrificing Peninsula riders. Both trains are doing splendidly on both ridership and accounting, so I don't think this setup is exactly hurting Amtrak.