First time on Acela - wow does Amtrak suck

I thought that's how Amtrak initially ran - host road locomotive crews.

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eolesen wrote: ↑Thu Jun 16, 2022 7:42 pm Who is the only shareholder of the National Railroad Passenger Corporation? The Government.

Who appoints the board? The U.S. President.

Where does all of Amtrak's funding come from? Congress.

Play technicalities all you want, but you're Federal employees one step removed....

Amtrak has also common stock owned by a few class 1 railroads and the successor of the former penn central.

"Here's the scoop" on Amtrak issued Preferred and Common Stock (source Audited Financial Statements FY21) :

Preferred and Common Stock

For funds received from the Federal Government prior to December 2, 1997, the Rail Passenger Service
Act (49 U.S.C. 24304) required Amtrak to issue to the Secretary preferred stock equal in par value to all
federal operating payments and most federal capital payments received subsequent to October 1, 1981, as
well as capital and certain operating payments received prior to that date. As of September 30, 2021 and
2020, 109,396,994 shares of $100 par value preferred stock were authorized, all of which were issued and
outstanding. All issued and outstanding preferred shares are held by the Secretary for the benefit of the
Federal Government. The Amtrak Reform and Accountability Act of 1997 (the Act) resulted in significant
modifications to Amtrak’s capital structure. The Act abolished the voting rights and the liquidation
preference of the preferred stockholder and abolished the requirement that additional preferred stock be
issued by Amtrak in exchange for federal grants received. At the time of enactment of the Act, the
minimum undeclared cumulative preferred dividend in arrears for all series issued and currently
outstanding approximated $5.8 billion and ranged between $0.02 and $97.08 per share. Each share of
preferred stock is convertible into ten shares of common stock at the option of the preferred stockholder.
As of September 30, 2021 and 2020, 10,000,000 shares of $10 par value common stock were authorized,
of which 9,385,694 shares were issued and outstanding. The common stockholders, who acquired their
stock from four railroads whose intercity rail passenger operations Amtrak assumed in 1971, have voting
rights for amendments to Amtrak’s Articles of Incorporation proposed by the Board of Directors and for
certain other extraordinary events.

The Preferred Stock was issued under ARAA 97 for Federal funding during the period Oct 1-81 and Dec 2-87 (dare ARAA97 was enacted), Prior and subsequent to that period, the Funding was simply credited to Paid In Capital. Why that fiction was included escapes me - as if the SECTRANS was ever going to receive a return on his/her "Investment" escapes me.

Who actually owns the Common Stock is proprietary and hence "shielded" from FOIA. For example, Union Pacific Corp would need to have a Court Order served in order to disclose I hold a position (I just did right now, but that is my prerogative to do so), which comes into play when a company is subject to a hostile takeover (think Spirit-Frontier-Jet Blue) and the "hostile" party wants to directly communicate with those, or some of them, regarding their intentions - and all the great things that will come to pass if they assent.

Amtrak has in the past solicited the Common Shareholders to redeem their shares for, IIRC, thirty five cents ($.35) a share; but no takers.

wigwagfan wrote: ↑Thu Jun 16, 2022 12:50 am It seems people want two different Amtraks:

Amtrak sells classes of service: coach, business, first. So passengers can reasonably expect "different Amtraks" (read: customer experience) at different levels of service.

What the OP experienced--in large part and minus the dumb things done out of frustration and anger--was a scene of a school bus with bratty kids and a cooked-off adult "monitor" riding along to manage the zoo. Yet Acela is only first and business class.

Doing a calibration with even the slightly troubled DB is embarrassing to Amtrak (and according to the transitive property that eolesen succinctly invokes) to the government, and thence, ultimately, to the electorate.

Which is to say that We, the People, obviously haven't figured out what we want out of passenger rail in this country, so it's in a state of near suspended animation dating from 1971, which was the last time a consequential decision about it was made.

Doing a calibration with VIA Rail, however, points out how difficult it has proven for continental nation-states to figure out passenger operations.

I re-read the original poster's message, and remember a few items from pre-pandemic. Namely, how we had a fuss about "security" at major stations and ticket-checking before getting out onto the platform.

Now... the lady with the kids? That's an entitled "Karen" who forgot that "The customer is always right" is followed by "in matters of taste and style." I'm glad she finally moved, probably under threat of being kicked off.

The NJ Transit riders who "mistakenly" took the Acela? I bet nobody was checking tickets in NYC proper and jumped on board.

...which boils down to a staffing issue at Amtrak.

eolesen wrote: ↑Fri Jun 17, 2022 1:24 am I thought that's how Amtrak initially ran - host road locomotive crews.

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Early on, Amtrak had to purchase service from the railroads. It took them a few years to bring both service and operations in house.

carajul wrote: ↑Tue Jun 14, 2022 8:03 am My first time on Acela was last weekend with my 2 friends. 3 of us total. We took Acela from PHL to NYP and it was NOT cheap. (Saturday-Sunday June 11-12)

We get to 30th street station 30 mins before departure time and find out the train is delayed 1 hour. After 1 hour it's delayed another 20 mins. Then after 20 mins its delayed yet 40 mins. At this point we could have just drove (but who wants to pay NYC tolls, fight NYC traffic, and pay NYC parking???). Amtrak staff at the station were terrible, rude, no help at all. Just useless.

We finally board and go to the seats we selected (Acela is assigned seating). We selected table seats so we could work. A woman and her 2 kids ages 8-10 are sitting in our seats, sprawled out with food and tablets. She looks up at us and says "oh, yea, about these seats. See these are my kids and for some reason I couldn't select seats online an I need to sit together with my kids. You'll need to sit somewhere else". Ok this is my problem how? She refuses to move and expects the 3 of us to sit all over the sold out train. I had to call the conductor over who 15 mins later finally shows up as we are standing there in the vestibule with the entire coach now watching us. He checks everyone's tickets and tells her she must take her assigned seat, it turns into a screaming match until she finally moves to the first car.

Food in the cafe was overpriced...

We only booked one way tickets as we were not sure of our return date. When our return date was decided, I was half asleep in bed and book our one way return. I screwed up the date as the Amtrak app defaults to todays day when our return was 1 day later. I realize the mistake later in the day and call Amtrak to change. Sorry, it's more than 1 hour after your train time NO REFUNDS and NO CREDIT. Are you kidding me-I just spent $900!!!! Sorry, no refunds. Had to spend another $900 for the correct day. Called Amex who promptly reversed the first (over) charge.

We get on our return train - table seat. Guess what...a couple with their laptops and headphones on is sprawled out in our seats on a sold out train. And they refuse to move.

Throw on top of everything screaming infants, screaming toddlers. OMG. And you wouldn't believe how many idiots bought NJ Transit commuter tickets and "accidentally" got on the Acela. The conductor threw them all off at the next stop...

CJ - I read your rant about the problems that you experienced on your recent PHL-NYP trip...
First - Was it so important to ride Acela services that you and your friends did not consider other Amtrak trains
that would have offered a much-lower fare - Regional or Keystones? With the delay noted I would have opted for
something more reasonable price-wise for the 90 mile 1 hour 15-30 minute one way ride instead of the delayed
Acela train if possible...With the "table" seats was this Acela Business or First Class? Was the woman with the two
children actually supposed to be in that car noting that they had to be moved out of your assigned seat?

Second - You complain about the Cafe Car expenses and the driving to NY City alternatives yet you were willing
to pay $300 one way fares NYP-PHL when there was other Amtrak service alternatives that would have been
probably just about as fast as as an Acela train would have been for much less money...Depending on what
the original three PHL-NYP Acela fares were it might have actually been cheaper to have gone with a for-hire
limousine service or rideshare for the amount of money that you claim to have spent on Amtrak...

Third - You were lucky that you were able to get AMEX to stop payment on the $900 fare charges after the date
mixup and failing to cancel the original NYP-PHL reservations before the scheduled departure time...
This was actually a good move after what could have been a VERY expensive error...

Four - I remember that those boarding Amtrak trains with NJT tickets were once subject to being charged the
Amtrak one-way fare in effect for the service level along with an extra $8 on-board penalty - judging by what
CJ notes this was NYP-NWK - The Train Crew chose to make the NJT passengers get off at Newark...

Everyone - I decided to talk to Julie to see what walk-up fares were available NYP-PHL at the time of my post...
In case anyone is unaware same day "walk-up" Amtrak fares can be the most expensive options...
Fares between New York Penn Station and Philadelphia-30th Street on a mileage basis (90) are some of the
most expensive that Amtrak charges in the entire NEC and Northeastern region as a whole...
Fridays and Sundays are considered "Peak" travel days in the NEC...
Friday June 17 NYP-PHL: (Note how these examples vary...)
2:00 PM Acela - Sold Out
2:02 PM > 3:22 PM Regional
2:11 PM > 3:33 PM Keystone Both trains $114 One Way Coach
2:41 PM > 4:12 PM Keystone $38 One Way Coach
3:00 PM Acela - $212 Business; $315 First Class
3:05 PM Regional - Business $164
3:35 PM Regional - Business $108
4:03 PM Keystone - $128 One Way Coach

In closing Amtrak Regional and Keystone services can be not only cheaper - depending on the schedule
they come close time-wise for a relatively short ride between NYP and PHL...MACTRAXX

John_Perkowski wrote: ↑Fri Jun 17, 2022 12:36 pm

eolesen wrote: ↑Fri Jun 17, 2022 1:24 am I thought that's how Amtrak initially ran - host road locomotive crews.

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Early on, Amtrak had to purchase service from the railroads. It took them a few years to bring both service and operations in house.

JP and EO - At one time Conrail - operating what was inherited primarily from Penn Central - was the
largest Amtrak contract operation - comprising around half of the trains in the entire Amtrak system...

On January 1, 1983 Amtrak directly employed Train and Engine Service crews for the first time from Conrail...
As an example this coverage included the entire Northeast Corridor between Boston and Washington, DC...
MACTRAXX

As Mr. MACTRAX notes, Train & Engine were the final crafts to be assumed by Amtrak (I was gone when that occurred).

First was the Clerks and the first activity by November '71 was, drumroll, Revenue Accounting (I was there for that).

"Gotta get the money, money"

M of W occurred when Amtrak acquired the Corridor on C-Day. M of E during that same window. I find it commendable that Amtrak has negotiated Agreement with these crafts upon their assumption - there was no "let's just pick up the existing Agreement".

The Train & Engine Agreements were truly groundbreaking providing for crew consists of Engineer only and Conductor and Assistant. They also converted the long standing mileage agreements, abetted with Arbitraries literally for taking an extra breath to a "quite clean" hourly based pay structure.

In short, no one has ever heard me say "Amtrak can't do anything right", for in the field of Labor Relations, they have.

Unfortunately all freight RR locos are geared for 70 MPH max speeds.

The NEC mostly is always on time . As well its on time has closer metrics where an on time LD would not be on time on the NEC. Isn't Acela on time 10 minutes max.

MACTRAXX wrote: ↑Fri Jun 17, 2022 1:45 pm CJ - I read your rant about the problems that you experienced on your recent PHL-NYP trip...
First - Was it so important to ride Acela services that you and your friends did not consider other Amtrak trains
that would have offered a much-lower fare - Regional or Keystones?

Ding ding ding, we have a winner. Buy in advance and Keystone tickets can be as cheap as $18 per person each way. The Acela NYP to PHL is a massive waste of money.

west point wrote: ↑Fri Jun 17, 2022 3:15 pmUnfortunately all freight RR locos are geared for 70 MPH max speeds.

Some freight railroads must have piggyback or intermodal locomotives geared for higher speeds so they can run those trains at 70 m.p.h. It's not a good practice to run at the exact geared limit.

GirlOnTheTrain wrote: ↑Sat Jun 18, 2022 11:42 am

MACTRAXX wrote: ↑Fri Jun 17, 2022 1:45 pm CJ - I read your rant about the problems that you experienced on your recent PHL-NYP trip...
First - Was it so important to ride Acela services that you and your friends did not consider other Amtrak trains
that would have offered a much-lower fare - Regional or Keystones?

Ding ding ding, we have a winner. Buy in advance and Keystone tickets can be as cheap as $18 per person each way. The Acela NYP to PHL is a massive waste of money.

Agreed. PHL/NYP is roughly 1h30m by a Regional and Keystone and 1h15m by any other service (Acela and LD trains). The only reason to go First Class on an Acela for that short of a time is to get a free meal you have to wolf down anyway, and we know the food's mainly microwave meals. No, you can get better in NYP or PHL.

To be honest, I only consider Acela going up from DC or Baltimore to Boston and back, which is a 6h50m trip vs a nearly 8h trip on the Regionals. DC to NYC is 3h on the Regionals and 2h55m on Acela, which doesn't make a lot of sense. The "better than what I can get at 7-11" food makes more sense past the 4 hour mark.

Once upon a time, back before Acela, there were Metroliners between Washington and New York, one of which left 30th St. at 8 am. From about 7.30 on a line began to form at the head of the stairway in the main concourse. During that time a Regional arrived and left, with a New York arrival ahead of the Metroliner. Nobody deserted the Metroliner queue to take the Regional at a lower fare -- it wasn't a Metroliner, and name recognition is powerful.

My traveling days are over, but I found that the best deal for Acela First Class was a late afternoon departure from Boston, with dinner served at the time of your request (after New Haven and the scenery), in plenty of time for a Philadelphia arrival, and the waitstaff solicitously ensuring that the inside of your wine glass was never unduly exposed to the air. STrRedWolf is right: if you don't get a damned good meal out of it, you're just as well off with Acela Business Class or a Regional, and that depends more on the times than anything else.

It may be with all the CAT work and raising some sections to 160 MPH that the AX-2 times might come to be 1:00 hour NYP - PHL on that 91 miles. That might become a strong incentative for there to be may more persons especially commuters that could use it especially those that could connect to the various commuter agnencies at PHL, TRE, NWR, NYP