Why does Amtrak still serve North Philadelphia & Cornwells Heights?

ExCon90 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 05, 2021 9:14 pm

NortheastTrainMan wrote: ↑Thu Aug 05, 2021 1:38 pm

Correct me if I'm wrong but here were a few issues why NJT didn't run PHL - NYP:
- Politics, NJT was given a tough time building a train yard in Morrisville, PA which is a mere 2 miles away from Trenton. Imagine running into PHL.

- Lack of demand. In my experience SEPTA's Trenton line trains are typically 2-5 cars, with the exception of a handful of 6-7 car trains during peak times Mon-Fri. NJT's NEC Line trains are typically 8-10 cars, with some 12 car Arrow 3 sets. As convenient & cost effective it would be to take NJT commuter rail PHL to NYP, the stretch from TRE to PHL might not be financially worth it. Even when I took NJT from NYP to TRE to transfer to SEPTA, almost everyone got off at Trenton.

Similar to the point raised in the Lackawanna Cutoff thread: it's difficult to imagine New Jersey subsidizing passengers from Pennsylvania traveling through New Jersey to spend money (and earn money -- and pay wage taxes) in New York. As to the comment above about the difference in loadings east and west of Trenton, I often rode an evening clocker from New York to Philadelphia -- the rear half got off the train at Princeton Jct. and the front half at Trenton; the rest of the trip to Philadelphia was practically an equipment move with a few passengers.

Interesting. I never had the opportunity to ride a Clocker but I always wondered how those trains could keep schedule as they were routinely 10-14 cars long. I know a fair amount of E60s hauled them along with AEM7s but still, those things were huge! I wonder what it was like heading PHL to NYP. Was it virtually empty until Trenton?

In later years Clockers used NJT ALP46s.

The final schedule for the Clockers (11/1/04, Clockers were not listed in the 4/25/05 edition, though ran
through October 2005) was:

NB:
622 dp PHL 533am, ar NYP 713am
624 dp PHL 630am, ar NYP 823am
628 dp PHL 705am, ar NYP 853am

All stops between PHL and PJC (PHN, CWH, TRE) with 628 added stop at NBK

SB:
627 dp NYP 515pm, ar PHL 655pm
629 dp NYP 530pm, ar PHL 705pm
633 dp NYP 609pm, ar PHL 745pm

All stops between PJC and PHL (627 skips CWH, 633 skips PHN)

R36 Combine Coach wrote: ↑Fri Aug 13, 2021 12:46 am In later years Clockers used NJT ALP46s.

The final schedule for the Clockers (11/1/04, Clockers were not listed in the 4/25/05 edition, though ran
through October 2005) was:

NB:
622 dp PHL 533am, ar NYP 713am
624 dp PHL 630am, ar NYP 823am
628 dp PHL 705am, ar NYP 853am

All stops between PHL and PJC (PHN, CWH, TRE) with 628 added stop at NBK

SB:
627 dp NYP 515pm, ar PHL 655pm
629 dp NYP 530pm, ar PHL 705pm
633 dp NYP 609pm, ar PHL 745pm

All stops between PJC and PHL (627 skips CWH, 633 skips PHN)

Yep, I mentioned earlier in the thread that Amtrak used NJT's ALP-46s in the later years of the Clocker too.
Thanks for the schedule with the station stops. Were the Clockers typically punctual given the long consists they ran with? I doubt those trains, especially with the ALP-46s could reach anything above 100 MPH if that.

I never got to ride behind the ALP46 on a Clocker but between 1993 and 1998 they were pretty punctual. That is, running times were accurate. Actual start time at PHL or NYP was questionable but the ride between PJC and NYP was generally fast and efficient. They were very empty west of PJC. Frequently SRO East especially as the consist would be short frequently. The worst was the week of the NJ Chamber of Commerce special when at least one Clocker consist would end up being all cafe cars.

Were Clockers subsidized by State of New Jersey or costs reimbursed at least, given NJT weekly/monthly passes
were honored and most ridership was NJT commuters? Service was not 403b.

Earlier 1 or 2 AEM-7s pulled the clockers. Amtrak had a problem if they mixed one with P control and other with regular 8 notch control.

andegold wrote: ↑Fri Aug 13, 2021 8:53 am I never got to ride behind the ALP46 on a Clocker but between 1993 and 1998 they were pretty punctual. That is, running times were accurate. Actual start time at PHL or NYP was questionable but the ride between PJC and NYP was generally fast and efficient. They were very empty west of PJC. Frequently SRO East especially as the consist would be short frequently. The worst was the week of the NJ Chamber of Commerce special when at least one Clocker consist would end up being all cafe cars.

Oh dear
I'm laughing but I know it wasn't funny to those riders.
I just wonder what the conversation was like amongst the crew.
"Hey Bill, our consist today is all Cafe cars, no food though." Looking at it now, I can understand why Amtrak discontinued the Clocker. Those giant trains apparently took a ton of cars and at times took what they could. I saw one on YouTube that had MARC Cars, and it didn't appear to be around Thanksgiving either. Plus they used a few ALP-46s from NJT.

I wish I could've rode one, but now I'm not sure if I missed out. I enjoy the relative peacefulness of my Keystones & Pennsylvanians. An SRO Amtrak just seems crazy to me.

Cbattz wrote: ↑Thu Aug 12, 2021 11:48 am As someone who makes the NYC-PHL trip at least twice a month (sometimes over 6x) I'm curious to what capacity, if at all, Septa was involved with the restructuring of services to replace the Clocker in '05? It seems like adding 1 or 2 reverse-commute express trains that allow cross platform transfers with NJT Super Expresses would be a no brainer? The few times I've had to make a very early morning trip from Philly to new York, i was able to do so in about 2 hours riding the one reverse commute express to Trenton. Given how expensive last-minute morning rush Amtrak tickets can get, it was a very agreeable alternative!

Funny / Not Funny Story. Once I was heading to NYC and I took SEPTA & NJT.
Our train was behind schedule and one of the passengers essentially asked a conductor if he could tell the SEPTA engineer to hurry up so he (we, because I echoed his sentiment in my head) doesn't miss the connecting NJT train at Trenton. We BARELY made it, the Sprint from Track 5 to Track 1 was nerve wracking. Good times.

But looking at the schedules it looks like once the Clockers were done, NJT and SEPTA didn't work to coordinate meets between their express trains (NJT) and local trains (SEPTA, they barely run expresses). I once pulled off an 1 hr 40 minute ride from NYP to PHL with a 39xx NJT train that met a SEPTA local at Trenton. But that's rare. Most of the time the meets are with NJT's locals that take around 90 mins to reach NYP. The expresses conveniently almost never meet SEPTA's locals.

NRGeep wrote: ↑Fri Aug 06, 2021 7:01 am Inevitably it will be fully gentrified featuring million $ plus condos and the folks living there now will be priced out and and there will be a beautiful new station in North Philly with $10 lattes.

For better or worse I can see that reality. It's pretty much happened near Temple University too.
That's a whole other conversation, but I hear you. Once that happens around PHN I'm sure Amtrak might add a train or 2 there.

Ken W2KB wrote: ↑Sat Jul 31, 2021 8:32 am Additionally, there is ferry service in Kingstown to Martha's Vineyard, MA.

From Kingston? Not that I'm aware of. There is ferry service from Point Judith, about 10 miles south, to Block Island, but not to the Vineyard.

R36 Combine Coach wrote: ↑Fri Aug 13, 2021 5:11 pm Were Clockers subsidized by State of New Jersey or costs reimbursed at least, given NJT weekly/monthly passes
were honored and most ridership was NJT commuters? Service was not 403b.

From the Clocker Wiki page. I well remember taking an afternoon Clocker from Newark to 30th Street in the early 2000's, most of the pax detrained at Princeton Junction, a few more at Trenton. There were maybe a dozen riders left to 30th Street.

During the 1990s, NJ Transit started contracting with Amtrak to accept their monthly passes on the Clocker trains. These two decisions drastically shifted the clientele on the trains. Passholders from New Jersey preferred the Clocker trains over the NJ Transit trains because they were faster and more comfortable, meanwhile, Amtrak's passengers avoided the Clocker trains because they were slower and frequently crowded. Also, the pass holder program meant that few passengers traveled to or from Philadelphia.

Until 2002, the 7:59 AM Clocker from Princeton Junction included a private club car known as Club 200 that members paid up to $1,200 per year to join. This was the last private club car used in regular commuter service on the Northeast Corridor.[3]

When the Acela Express was introduced in 1999, Amtrak launched what it called the Capstone Program, a short-lived plan to re-brand the NortheastDirect, Keystone Service and Empire Service trains as Acela Regional and the Clocker trains as Acela Commuter.[4] Following mass rider confusion between this service and the high-speed Acela Express service, the name reverted to Clocker in 2003.[5]

By the early 2000s, NJ Transit was paying $6 million per year to compensate Amtrak for passholders riding Clocker trains,[6] and was loaning Amtrak its new ALP-46 locomotives to haul the trains' Amfleet coaches.

R36 Combine Coach wrote: ↑Fri Aug 13, 2021 5:11 pm Were Clockers subsidized by State of New Jersey or costs reimbursed at least, given NJT weekly/monthly passes
were honored and most ridership was NJT commuters? Service was not 403b.

that was the end of the clockers essentially, dispute over how much Amtrak was paid for what turned out to be a lot of the seats. why pay Amtrak prices when you can drive to NJ and ride subsidized? At least as I've heard it, Amtrak felt the math didn't make running them worthwhile. ideally prices would have been more equal between the states as a lot of njt passengers that far west (PJC) are also PA residents. It would make a lot of sense for a clocker type service to exist imo, run out of PCY.

My guess is that some source of funding is connected to serving a certain number of stations in PA, even if only with two or four trains per day. I wish there were more NEC service to PJC, many of the pharma and finance companies nearby have employee shuttles. I'd rather commute there on Amtrak from PHL rather than dealing with traffic to King of Prussia.

I bet Eddington on SEPTA's Trenton line will be closed soon, half the trains already skip it.

DerTeufel wrote: ↑Thu Sep 16, 2021 10:43 pm My guess is that some source of funding is connected to serving a certain number of stations in PA, even if only with two or four trains per day. I wish there were more NEC service to PJC, many of the pharma and finance companies nearby have employee shuttles. I'd rather commute there on Amtrak from PHL rather than dealing with traffic to King of Prussia.

I bet Eddington on SEPTA's Trenton line will be closed soon, half the trains already skip it.

I genuinely think Princeton Junction should have the same level of service as Metropark. Trenton operationally makes more sense, it's a junction and has the lines/platforms etc - but Princeton is economically going to be a larger market for business travel (and leisure/inbound).

Being a major park/ride, how come Cornwells Heights never had the same success as Route 128/Westwood or
Metropark?