by Station Aficionado
To continue the diversion, do any of the San Joaquin trainsets make a roundtrip on the same day? I think that would be about 600 mi. total.
Railroad Forums
Moderators: GirlOnTheTrain, mtuandrew, Tadman
Station Aficionado wrote:To continue the diversion, ...Thanks to Mr. Norman and others who've added information. If the moderators deem appropriate, maybe they could carve this discussion out into a new topic.
delvyrails wrote:On this site about a year ago, we discussed what could be done to get more mileage out of existing equipment. There were many good suggestions. Trouble is that it's not relevant unless the extra miles run can be supported by more operating subsidies.This idea was tried for some time under Warrington, I believe, with Empire Builder and City of New Orleans trainsets being alternated from one service to another. Trouble was, they were running too much, with very little margin for delay or for repair. The idea was sound in that it allowed the Builder's equipment to thaw out, but in practice it didn't work as well.
The exception would seem to be where service through end points can be combined so that the through service can use one fewer train set than the separate services (like through routing the Southwest Chief with the Capitol Limited). Even here, the saved equipment will stand still unless there is more money to operate it somewhere usefully.
mtuandrew wrote:This idea was tried for some time under Warrington, I believe, with Empire Builder and City of New Orleans trainsets being alternated from one service to another. Trouble was, they were running too much, with very little margin for delay or for repair. The idea was sound in that it allowed the Builder's equipment to thaw out, but in practice it didn't work as well...........resulting in more equipment lost at Bourbonnais than would otherwise have been the case.
Gilbert B Norman wrote:I remember the reference but you may want to refresh some novices. Bourbonnais was a derailment of the City of New Orleans as I recall in the mid 1990's. Was this a case where the Empire Builder and City trainsets were alternated shortening the cycle time?? Was the derailment attributed to a shortened service cycle??mtuandrew wrote:This idea was tried for some time under Warrington, I believe, with Empire Builder and City of New Orleans trainsets being alternated from one service to another. Trouble was, they were running too much, with very little margin for delay or for repair. The idea was sound in that it allowed the Builder's equipment to thaw out, but in practice it didn't work as well...........resulting in more equipment lost at Bourbonnais than would otherwise have been the case.
MISSOULA — A petition urging Congress to restore the defunct North Coast Hiawatha passenger rail route — which formerly ran through Missoula, Helena, Bozeman, Billings, Glendive and Miles City, among others cities — is now online for people to sign.Here is a link to the petition.
Students at the University of Montana, along with help from the Montana Public Interest Research Group (MontPIRG), are working to rallying support from students at 25 other colleges and universities along the passenger train route, which stretches from Seattle to Chicago