Long Distance (LD) Capacity Limitations

https://www.trains.com/trn/news-reviews ... -analysis/

Is this a matter of Amtrak exploiting the laws of "supply and demand"? Cost-cutting and revenue enhancement, perhaps? Or can they just not get cars added? It seems to me that once a train approaches sell-out, throwing on an extra coach or sleeper at the last minute would NOT affect demand pricing, but bring in additional revenue? Is the juice worth the squeeze for an extra coach?

Is this a revenue strategy, or a capacity issue?

Amtrak mobility, pricing affected by sidelined long-distance equipment: Analysis
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Demand for long-distance travel was the strongest among the company’s product lines as travel resumed following the pandemic, but capacity issues meant those trains could not fully meet demand [see “Analysis: coach sellouts hinder …,” Trains News Wire, Jan. 4, 2021]. And the company did not sufficiently reverse the long-distance shortfall as it bulked up departures elsewhere.
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The long-distance capacity issues have their roots in the reduction of service from daily to three or five times per week (along with the suspension of the Silver Meteor for eight months in 2022). This permitted Amtrak to store much of the equipment and decrease the workforce necessary to run daily schedules. Though frequencies have been restored, management has not prioritized returning enough sidelined Superliners, Viewliners, and Amfleet II coaches to active duty. (Amtrak has regularly cited an ongoing shortage of maintenance personnel for the large number of cars still out of service)
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The diminished long-distance fleet has led to numerous sellouts, high fares for the limited available space [see “Amtrak long-distance capacity to remain tight …,” News Wire, ” Nov. 16, 2022], and a litany of mechanical breakdowns or outright cancellations when freight congestion or weather disruptions occur [see “Amtrak Chicago departure delays mount,” News Wire, Feb. 4, 2023].
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It's a strategy... put a bunch of equipment in storage to keep the operating budget down, and run with less equipment to make the ridership percentage numbers look better... amazingly, LD will suddenly exceed 50% average load factors.

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While some of this is true to a point. The fact of the matter is when the pandemic hit Amtrak took what it felt was excess equipment and stored it. Not properly mind you just put it yards and let it sit. Water and blue water don't do well with the freeze thaw cycle, electronics don't like moisture, pipes burst mice take up residence all kinds of fun stuff. . Now to get those cars and engines back in service it takes more time and money to procure pieces and parts to rebuild said equipment.

Railjunkie wrote: ↑Sun Apr 09, 2023 10:50 am While some of this is true to a point. The fact of the matter is when the pandemic hit Amtrak took what it felt was excess equipment and stored it. Not properly mind you just put it yards and let it sit. Water and blue water don't do well with the freeze thaw cycle, electronics don't like moisture, pipes burst mice take up residence all kinds of fun stuff. . Now to get those cars and engines back in service it takes more time and money to procure pieces and parts to rebuild said equipment.

Not only that, the Superliners were due for inspections over the pandemic's years. Now they need to staff up just to do those inspections... and since they're past due, they can't run 'em!

To give an example. The Crescent had the highest number of revenue passengers from 2019 - 2023 for Januarys in 2023. Many days Crescent in Jan had sell outs. Now if Amtrak would have just added another coach(s) and sleepers the no telling how many passengers it could have carried? All Amtrak could have done is remove / add cars at ATL to carry the needed capacity north of ATL.

Now we do have to recognize that Crescent might have only carried many shorts and not have had as much revenue passenger miles. But sleepers sold out ATL <> WASH is evident for just sleeper loads.

How much extra crew is needed if more cars are added? The reason I say this is because we have very low ridership on most Keystones. Taking an Amfleet 1 off all those consists could be what’s needed to add a car to the Crescent IMO.

I think the problem is not just extra train crew for each route, but additional crew is also needed at Beech Grove to get cars through the inspection/refurbishment/rebuild process. I'm fairly certain that unless additional cars were carried to New Orleans, adding and removing cars in Atlanta would require that Amtrak hire cleaning and light maintenance crews in Atlanta as well as find service and storage facilities and maybe even keep a locomotive in Atlanta for the purpose of pulling that coach.

Put simply, dropping/adding a coach to an existing route meet partial demand on that route where there is not an existing service facility can be more expensive than just running the coach for the entire route.

I think the Pennsylvanian carries the Amfleet II coach to provide business class travel; as the amenities and service levels on that train are set by the state of Pennsylvania, Amtrak may be obligated to find a replacement business class coach if those two coaches were pulled to supplement the Crescent (ignoring that the Pennsylvanian only requires 1/2 the number of train sets the Crescent does).

Atlanta is not set up for that. They can annul and turn trains there but dropping/adding would take time and require ground personnel. In places like Albany that’s feasible.

I think Atlanta-DC is more worthy of a daylight frequency from DC. That would require the aforementioned ground crew of course.

The sleeper sell out is problematic. It’s important that they get these cars road-worthy and positioned in places like NYP, CUS, etc.

Jeff Smith wrote: ↑Mon Apr 10, 2023 5:35 am Atlanta is not set up for that. They can annul and turn trains there but dropping/adding would take time and require ground personnel. In places like Albany that’s feasible.

I think Atlanta-DC is more worthy of a daylight frequency from DC. That would require the aforementioned ground crew of course.

The sleeper sell out is problematic. It’s important that they get these cars road-worthy and positioned in places like NYP, CUS, etc.

For more context, ATL is basically one platform with a near-by wye. To do anything more, it needs to be at a yard, and you need room for that... which means moving the station.

Some plans have the station moving to around CNN Center/Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

I would contend building a rail tunnel under a rail-to-trail, reconfiguring CSX Huxley Yard, and building the station at the MARTA King Memorial station would be a better option.

STrRedWolf wrote: ↑Mon Apr 10, 2023 6:21 am Some plans have the station moving to around CNN Center/Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

Allow me to note that this area, known as "The Gulch", remains an active rail facility and further where both Terminal (SRY, SAL, CofG, AWP) and Union (L&N, ACL, GA) Stations were located

Without getting too far "off-track" (pun intended) there's also talk of locating an ATL stop in Buckhead I think, so one could transfer to MARTA. Downtown would be better, of course. The current ATL is a former SRY commuter station named after the street it sits on, Peachtree. Of course, everything in Atlanta is named Peachtree-something.

Again, and a bit off-track, pun still intended, I think you could find a place to service a daylight train turn there. And a daylight train won't require sleepers, just additional coaches. Of course, those are in short-supply as well.

Back "on-track".

I completely agree that it's totally silly for a (non-fixed trainset) train to "sell out." A great advantage of trains is that capacity can be added or removed on the fly. Got an extra 100 people who want to travel? There's no need for an additional departure, just add some coaches!

Of course, such "flexibility" costs money, since it means that one has extra crew, equipment, consumables, waiting around at the right locations to be used when needed. How we measure whether Amtrak is working well or not also goes into the equation. As others have noted, measuring success as % of capacity used can create a perverse incentive to limit supply so that utilization rated can be maxed out. If we cared only about ridership, then Amtrak could simply create mammoth trains with virtually free fares.

Unfortunately, it's a mix of those things and more, with friend and foes alike cherry-picking stats to bolster their cases to fund/defund. So, we end up with a situation where "nobody takes Amtrak because it's too crowded".

You know what they say: there's lies, damn lies, and statistics.

Good time to reno the View I's. Replacements coming for the Superliners, but they really do need them out there.

Jeff Smith wrote: ↑Mon Apr 10, 2023 7:34 am Without getting too far "off-track" (pun intended) there's also talk of locating an ATL stop in Buckhead I think, so one could transfer to MARTA. Downtown would be better, of course. The current ATL is a former SRY commuter station named after the street it sits on, Peachtree. Of course, everything in Atlanta is named Peachtree-something.

Again, and a bit off-track, pun still intended, I think you could find a place to service a daylight train turn there. And a daylight train won't require sleepers, just additional coaches. Of course, those are in short-supply as well.

Back "on-track".

Technically it *is* in Buckhead but it could go "up-track" to MARTA's Lenox station (yes, I've mused about this elsewhere on this forum). There's a bit of land that can be used to make an Amtrak station here.

That said, back to the thread's line, I can agree we need to make those V-I's into V-II's and hope Amtrak's looking at Superliner replacements.

Well, they're done with the V-II order, so they'll have to get those V-I's upgraded. I think the Superliner sleepers are a lower priority. As the newer single-level coaches come in, they can shift the older coaches to the eastern LD's.