Visiting a college campus... take Amtrak and save!

http://www.campusvisit.com/

Just saw this on the news a few minutes ago. It doesn't say which schools are part of it, just the cities... interesting many major NEC cities aren't listed.

This is a "pay to play" kind of sort of travel agency.

Of course, here are just a few schools that are you may as well rent the car at the airport, since you're going to have to rent one to get from the station to the campus anyway, they are not on Amtrak routes:

The University of Missouri, Columbia MO pre Amtrak: Wabash/N&W

Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS pre Amtrak: UP

Pittsburg State University, Pittsburg, KS pre Amtrak: KCS

Cameron University, Lawton, OK pre Amtrak: Frisco, but when last passenger service is ?

The University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY pre Amtrak: UP

The University of Nevada-Las Vegas, Las Vegas NV pre-Amtrak: UP

My child is a HS junior; it'd be nice if Amtrak served the schools he's looking at, but it doesn't with any degree of convenience (UN-Lincoln is served by 5-6, but he has to go to Galesburg and then wait for a Mule or 3-4... that spells a waste of time and $$$ in my book).

Off-topic Amtrak, but on-topic for "how it was' 45 years ago. The only campus visit I had by rail that could still be made by such today was to my alma mater - the University of Illinois/Urbana.

Others I made in the fallen flag dept.

NY-Chi Century; Chi-Marion City of Portland (Coe College Cedar Rapids, IA)

Hoboken-Meadville PA ERIE (Allegheny College) Bus to Pgh, Bus Washington PA (Wash & Jefferson College) , Pgh-NY Pittsburgher (PRR #60)

NY-Phila PRR Red Arrow Norristown Bus Collegeville (Ursinus College) and return.

Others were "the usual'; load up the station wagon (that is now called a crossover, younger folk), with Mom and Dad. "If you're real good, we might even let you drive".

Funny how my secondary school guidance counsellors all thought in terms of either Ivies (out of the question) or small Liberal Arts; funny how I wanted something else considering how most of those LA schools only offered about 15 hours of Accountancy - you don't even get in the door to SIT for the CPA without about 27.

Though you wouldn't know it by looking at the above link, it seems that this offer applies to the Downeaster and the University of New Hampshire. The promotion is mentioned on the Downeaster website. It's a good thing, too. I don't think there are many Amtrak stops that get you closer to a college campus! Definitely an easy trip for anyone in the Boston area.

This just points up the folly that is Amtrak service in Florida:

FSU, Tallahassee, FL - OUT OF SERVICE SINCE KATRINA
UF, Gainesville, FL - OUT OF SERVICE EXCEPT BY BUS OFF THE SILVER
STAR
Gov. Crist, are you there?

Having lived on a college campus 2000-2004 and 06/07, it's my impression kids are too busy rocking out in their Grand Cherokee, Discovery, or Audi that daddy bought them to even realize Amtrak exists. I have no experiance out east, and it sounds like NEC kids take Amtrak to college, but not here.

I had no Amtrak service for undergrad, even though the Cardinal came through town. It stopped twenty minutes down the road in Hamilton Ohio, but that was early morning and I'm not sitting on a desolate platform in Hamilton after dark, waiting for an erratic train.

I now have the Chief, and I love it! I usually fly home and take the train back here. Of course, I just went out and got a dog, so my Amtrak habits are somewhat curtailed... However I have dog friends that love to babysit Hank while I'm out of town. I have no idea how Hank reacts to trains, as we've been pretty busy - we went to watch #3 come into town saturday night, but as everybody knows, that train was kinda late.

Long story short, midwestern kids that do really well in college get good jobs in Chicago and ride the CTA to work - other than that, nobody in Manhattan, Bloomington, or Lawton care about the train. I have seen big crowds at Lafayette waiting for the Cardinal though. It's unreal, because that train could be so late WB getting in that one could drive to Chicago and back twice in the "lateness window".

I took my daughter by train for a campus visit to Boston four years ago, mainly because I was experiencing severe leg pain at the time and could not drive long distances. We rode up on Acela and came back on a convention train. The Back Bay station was just a few blocks from our hotel and the college "campus" and we didn't even need to use cabs.

If you're going to visit a school in a heavily urban area like Boston, New York or Philadelphia, there are definite advantages to traveling by train. Most suburban and rural schools are usually a good distance from any train stations. A few exceptions in the metropolitan New York area are Adelphia University (Nassau Blvd., LIRR), Drew University (Madison, NJ Transit) and, of couse, Princeton University (Princeton, NJ Transit).

And, if you're visiting the wonderful school where I work, The City College of New York, you have two choices from Penn Station, the number one train to 137th St./City College station (also stops at Columbia University) or the A train to 145th St./St. Nicholas Ave.

Loads of schools in Northern PA and Central NY, plenty of rails, <I>no reliable public transportation.</i>

Maybe this is silly, but would there be any way of restoring temporary service to places like this? Remember taking crowded busses up to Central NY for school, and seeing all the abandoned rail lines in those areas.

MODERATOR'S NOTE:

The subject is AMTRAK service to colleges... not Metra, not MARC, not NJT, not the LIRR.

John_Perkowski wrote:MODERATOR'S NOTE:

The subject is AMTRAK service to colleges... not Metra, not MARC, not NJT, not the LIRR.

A school like Binghampton would be much more attractive if it had rail service from Amtrack or anybody else for that matter as it once did. Lots of schools advertise their accessibility to big cites and this appeals to many students. Even though it had much in common with Rutgers I turned down because it had no rail service and siting on busses to NYC every weekend didn't sound fun.

Like many other places all the tracking is in place for passenger service, just nothing goes on it. Service would not only appeal to students, but also to teacher; I know many teachers and doctors at Rutgers and the area med school who take the train from NYC, some teach half the week there and half the week at somwhere like NYU. You might even say that rail atracts better teachers. Often these schools are self-contained vibrant cities in the middle of nowhere, direct rail serice to the nearest big city might encourage more people to just move or stay there when they graduate and commute.

Obviously your not gonna have service as regular as the NEC, something like 2 or 3 times a week like some current LD routes would be better than nothing.

SUNY Binghamton is a very competitive school. Most of the students who attend have "A" averages. It hasn't had passenger train service since the EL quit in 1970. Many excellent colleges in upstate New York are located in places that do not have rail service, e.g. Cornell, Colgate, SUNY Geneseo (which is more competitive than Binghamton) and SUNY New Paltz, to name a few.

The lack of rail service may limit their appeal to rail fans, but these schools are doing quite well without passenger rail. Thank you very much.

SUNY Binghamton is a very competitive school. Most of the students who attend have "A" averages. It hasn't had passenger train service since the EL quit in 1970. Many excellent colleges in upstate New York are located in places that do not have rail service, e.g. Cornell, Colgate, SUNY Geneseo (which is more competitive than Binghamton) and SUNY New Paltz, to name a few.

The lack of rail service may limit their appeal to rail fans, but these schools are doing quite well without passenger rail. Thank you very much.

Yes, but these schools have loads of students, from the metropolitan NY and at times Boston areas. I went to one of these "competitive," schools in that area, and there were bus services that were making a killing via a daily service that ferried students to New York City. On weekends the buses would be very crowded, even when they left once per hour.

Also I hate to say this but housing prices in the NY area are skyrocketing! Housing prices in Binghamton are a joke in comparison....if someone were to run a train where the commute were not so bad...

The Downeaster, which connects Boston, MA to Portland, ME, features a stop on the campus of the University of New Hampshire. The service also allows students at any school to buy six-ride passes for a rouhgly 50% discount.

According to the UNH travel survey linked at the end of this post, 58% of UNH students have taken the Downeaster at least once, 36% ride at least once per semester, and 14% ride at least once per month.

The station is convenient to the campus, trips are short, the service is marketed, and the cost is not prohibitive. I'm sure all of this contributes to the pretty decent ridership from UNH (and for the service as a whole).

Link to Report: http://www.unh.edu/transportation/tpc/d ... Report.pdf

UNH was so concerned that the Downeaster would make it so easy for students to skip class that the trains didn't initially stop there Monday-Thursday. Glad to see the service is working out so well, and that the train stops there 7 days a week now. I was in Durham visiting family before that change and had to go to Dover to catch the train for a day trip to Boston.

As for the Central New York demand for Amtrak as a result of the colleges there, I don't think the demand is that high. The only time the demand might justify Amtrak service is at Thanksgiving and spring break, and just only for getting to or away from campus. Ithaca, Binghamton, etc don't really need Amtrak service 365 days a year, though it would be nice for those who are there and hate USAirways, ShortLine, or driving.

Upstate New York - Albany, Schenectady, Syracuse, Rochester and
Buffalo all have colleges/universities and the students at these locations
make considerable use of Amtrak.
New England beside what was previously mentioned, Burlington, White
River Junction (for Dartmouth), New London, Springfield and my gosh
loads of cities have schools and their studens are big time customers of
Amtrak. I am sure that there is more of this type of travel south of New
York as well.
It has always been a plus for a college town to have passenger trains
even if it is only one or two trains a day.
Noel Weaver