Restarting the Broadway Limited

Interesting to note that there are imminent plans for a frequency increase from Michigan. That's a good sign that to me indicates NS will be more than willing to accept additional passenger trains over their lines. They are certainly getting plenty of investment in their core Chicago network for it.

If timed to perfectly serve the NYP-PGH market what is the timing separation between a Broadway Limited and the Capitol Limited and Lake Shore Limited? As it stands right now the Capitol Limited and Lake Shore Limited are barely an hour apart in the morning heading into Chicago.

gokeefe wrote: ... If timed to perfectly serve the NYP-PGH market, what is the timing separation between a Broadway Limited and the Capitol Limited and Lake Shore Limited? As it stands right now, the Capitol and Lake Shore are barely an hour apart in the morning heading into CHI.

Good question.

Well, I read here, or at a very similar site, that the freights hate the Amtrak trains for seriously disrupting their own schedules, by at least two hours either side of the passenger train, and talking about "priority'. I can see their point.

A frequent compromise has been Amtrak schedules within an hour or two of each other, making only another hour or two of disruption, instead of a whole new four-hour swath out of the day from schedules that are 8 or 10 hours apart. (See also, Meteor and Star in South Florida, where two trains arrive Miami late day, instead of one morning and one evening.)

Meanwhile, with three LD trains, why aim them all to perfectly serve the NYP-PGH market? Penn DOT is fixing to fix that with another state-supported regional train or two. Not an Amtrak problem. And the end-to-end market East Coast-CHI isn't so big anyway.

Can't one of the three NYP-CHI trains be perfectly timed to serve the overlapping city pair corridors PGH - Youngstown - CLE - TOL [connection to Dearborn-Detroit-Ann Arbor] - Waterloo (Ft Wayne) - CHI? These cities get messed over twice already. Why plan for another set of stops in the dark? Out in FlyoverLand, many folks like trains. Let's give them a well-timed daylight train.

Woody wrote: Meanwhile, with three LD trains, why aim them all to perfectly serve the NYP-PGH market? Penn DOT is fixing to fix that with another state-supported regional train or two. Not an Amtrak problem. And the end-to-end market East Coast-CHI isn't so big anyway.

Can't one of the three NYP-CHI trains be perfectly timed to serve the overlapping city pair corridors PGH - Youngstown - CLE - TOL [connection to Dearborn-Detroit-Ann Arbor] - Waterloo (Ft Wayne) - CHI? These cities get messed over twice already. Why plan for another set of stops in the dark? Out in FlyoverLand, many folks like trains. Let's give them a well-timed daylight train.

Sounds like my Liberty Limited proposal.

Woody wrote:Meanwhile, with three LD trains, why aim them all to perfectly serve the NYP-PGH market? Penn DOT is fixing to fix that with another state-supported regional train or two. Not an Amtrak problem. And the end-to-end market East Coast-CHI isn't so big anyway.

I think that's exactly the point none of the current two trains going to CHI directly serve NYP-PGH at all. Naturally CHI-PHL is completely out of the question as is anywhere beyond PGH. I respectfully acknowledge those who have pointed out that transfer is an option. I just think that Amtrak should be serving this market in order to strengthen their overall operation.

I do think that the more service Amtrak offers in the Northeast, Midwest, California Pacific and East Coast the easier it is going to be for the Southeast and Southwest to get more service, state supported or otherwise.

Something worth considering from the FY '16 Budget, Business Plan, and FY '17 Budget Justification and Five Year Plan (See PDF Page 59 of 164)

Approximately 15% of total ridership comes from Long Distance trains, along with 17% of Amtrak’s total revenue. Much of this ridership and revenue connects with other trains in the Amtrak system – for example, a FY14 analysis showed that, in both Chicago and Washington, DC, 41% of Capitol Limited passengers connect to or from other Amtrak trains.

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I think its worth noting that for the sake of discussion of a reactivated Broadway Limited we should exclude any change which would require retiming the Capitol Limited. This is an extraordinary amount of through ridership. I had no idea it was so high.

gokeefe wrote:Something worth considering from the FY '16 Budget, Business Plan, and FY '17 Budget Justification and Five Year Plan (See PDF Page 59 of 164)

Approximately 15% of total ridership comes from Long Distance trains, along with 17% of Amtrak’s total revenue. Much of this ridership and revenue connects with other trains in the Amtrak system – for example, a FY14 analysis showed that, in both Chicago and Washington, DC, 41% of Capitol Limited passengers connect to or from other Amtrak trains.

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I think its worth noting that for the sake of discussion of a reactivated Broadway Limited we should exclude any change which would require retiming the Capitol Limited. This is an extraordinary amount of through ridership. I had no idea it was so high.

The report I attached previously had the transfers at DC to be 54,750 with 20,303 to the NEC, 14,165 to state supported routes, and 20,281 to LD (interestingly those numbers add up to 54,749!)

A later departure/earlier arrival into CHI would only help the Chicago connections. As for Washington, leaving 1-2 hrs. earlier shouldn't affect NEC or state supported connections that much since they can probably just take a later train. As for LD, it would eliminate the CL-SS connection (which is only guaranteed one way now) but the CL-SM would remain intact for travel to/from Florida. So I don't see how slightly adjusting the CL to better serve Pittsburgh would hurt overall connections in Washington that much.

So all this talk of transfers is nice and all, but for these numbers isn't this a zero-sum game? How often are Pennsylvanian and Cap Limited sold out? And if we're taking all these poor transferring souls (who are somehow enduring the unimaginable torment of 2 hours in Pittsburgh right now) and putting them on a new train, with new expenses, just to make MORE empty seats on the existing trains... I gotta wonder what the point is.

It is not a zero sum game because a new train with a better schedule would almost certainly attract far more riders. Orders of magnitude greater ridership. Some of these NEC passengers would transfer in Chicago to other trains. Some of these passengers would open up space on the Lake Shore Limited which is often sold out. This would allow passengers from points north of NYP to make better use of the Lake Shore Limited.

In general the "network effect" from this additional capacity is potentially quite significant as it would enable connections to Amtrak's densest population corridor and take pressure off sold out trains operating out of Penn Station. If the Pennsylvanian was running more than "once per day each way" it almost certainly would have much higher ridership than it does right now.

In general the answer is that the entire situation is artificially under sold because of poor connection times, lack of frequency and lack of service to key population points. A restarted Broadway Limited might perhaps be the greatest example of "network effect" service in the history of Amtrak, especially at the current levels of demand for inter city passenger rail service.

By making the system more fluid it makes all of the potential pairings CHI-NYP more viable.

JoeBas wrote:So all this talk of transfers is nice and all, but for these numbers isn't this a zero-sum game? How often are Pennsylvanian and Cap Limited sold out? And if we're taking all these poor transferring souls (who are somehow enduring the unimaginable torment of 2 hours in Pittsburgh right now) and putting them on a new train, with new expenses, just to make MORE empty seats on the existing trains... I gotta wonder what the point is.

For the record, the Pennsylvanian is a very successful line, with 231,720 pax in FY 2015, up from 195,000 way back in 2009.

NARP says Pittsburgh accounted for 94,075 of those riders. Considering that the Pennsylvanian is much like another Regional NYC-Philly, and much like a Keystone Philly-Harrisburg, ...

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...then for the western end just throw in Altoona/24,900, Johnstown/24,039, and Greensburg/14,773 -- Wait! These NARP numbers do not compute! The activity per station figures add up to far exceed the passenger total. WTF?

http://www.narprail.org/site/assets/fil ... s_2015.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Time out!

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Anyway, it's no wonder that Penn DOT is looking to add another run or two. They could grab a Keystone slot to use NYP, and deal with NS thru the mountains. Another couple of frequencies could be enuff to brighten up the dreary Pittsburgh station, to add people and entice some vendors. And the evidence is (see, Piedmont corridor from 2 to 3 frequencies, Lincoln service from 3 to 5, added Cascades over 15 or 20 years) that added trains can double ridership -- or more. So I hope Penn Dot can get them going a.s.a.p.

Then I want another frequency PGH-CLE-TOL-Waterloo (Ft Wayne)-CHI with daylight service to those cities. But that's another subject.

Woody wrote: For the record, the Pennsylvanian is a very successful line, with 231,720 pax in FY 2015, up from 195,000 way back in 2009.

NARP says Pittsburgh accounted for 94,075 of those riders. Considering that the Pennsylvanian is much like another Regional NYC-Philly, and much like a Keystone Philly-Harrisburg, ...

...then for the western end just throw in Altoona/24,900, Johnstown/24,039, and Greensburg/14,773 -- Wait! These NARP numbers do not compute! The activity per station figures add up to far exceed the passenger total. WTF?

http://www.narprail.org/site/assets/fil ... s_2015.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Time out!

The per-station numbers are for "Activity per station", i.e. boardings + alightings. The per-station totals are exactly twice the route's passenger totals, as one would expect outside of perverse "Charlie and the MTA"-style scenarios.

CComMack wrote:

Woody wrote: ... the Pennsylvanian is a very successful line, with 231,720 pax in FY 2015, up from 195,000 way back in 2009.

NARP says Pittsburgh accounted for 94,075 of those riders. Considering that [the first part of] the Pennsylvanian is much like another Regional NYC-Philly, and much like a Keystone Philly-Harrisburg, ...

...then for the western end just throw in Altoona/24,900, Johnstown/24,039, -- Wait! These NARP numbers do not compute! The activity per station figures add up to far exceed the passenger total. WTF?
http://www.narpril.org/site/assets/file ... s_2015.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Time out!

The per-station numbers are for "Activity per station", i.e. boardings + alightings. The per-station totals are exactly twice the route's passenger totals, as one would expect outside of perverse "Charlie and the MTA"-style scenarios.

Thanks for the clear and simple explanation. Maybe I need an adding machine?

Well, as I was saying, PGH at 47,000 is 20% of the total ridership (with help from connecting pax off the Capitol Ltd.. Throw in Lewiston/9,000, Huntington/7,000, Tyrone/3,000, Altoona/25,000, Johnstown/24,000, Latrobe/5,000, and Greensburg 15,000 for another 88,000 ÷ 2 = 44,000, again almost 20% of the total. So 91,000 riders, a full 40% of the Pennsylvanian's total traffic, comes from or goes to the points west of the Keystones' terminus at Harrisburg.

Now my formula: an added frequency more than doubles ridership (see Piedmont corridor, Lincoln service, Cascades). Hey, 180,000+ ridership from the beyond-Harrisburg segment, on top of riders on the Keystone's frequency and a Regional's NYC-Philly frequency.

I wouldn't worry about selling enuff tickets for a 2nd or 3rd Pennsylvanian to be viable.

Yeah it's a lot. A LOT of additional ridership and it would probably happen almost from Day 1. One of the more intangible benefits is the additional ridership on the Lake Shore Limited coming from Connecticut. It might also help relieve pressure on the NYP-WAS corridor by taking riders off the train at PHL who might otherwise be riding through to NYP (e.g. Delaware to New York City). All of this in effect adds up to additional seats for Amtrak to sell to their very best market and right now every seat available for sale out of NYP counts.

NYP-PVD essentially has no other option to get to Chicago. No, this isn't the lead in to an argument for a dedicated long distance train on that route as well. But it is a good point to note. The train is less competitive out there against the air market anyways.

These aren't official numbers but 215,000 back in 1991 was pretty good. At that point the Broadway had MORE passengers than the Capitol Limited (170,000). So Amtrak kept TWO Chicago-NEC trains with fewer riders to kill the Broadway. And I believe the CL goes through West Virginia too, sounds like Byrd written all over it.

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/r ... ?4,2993507" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I was riding a SEPTA train today when I saw one of the maps on the train. It had "Amtrak to Harrisburg, Pittsburgh, CHICAGO" (Chicago wasn't in caps but you get the point). I would've taken a picture but the battery on my phone had died. The map on SEPTA's website only has Harrisburg and Pittsburgh listed (sigh!)

Running more service between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh would make a lot of sense and I think it would atrract a good number of passengers as well. Restoring the Broadway would not make a lot of sense because Pittsburgh already has a through train to and from Chicago and Philadelphia also has a tri-weekly train to and from Chicago. I think it is up to the State of Pennsylvania to come up with some money in order for any improvements to occur. As for the territory west of Pittsburgh both Ohio and Indiana have shown practically no support for any improvements in passenger service by rail in their states so it will probably remain as it is. Money talks, BS walks.
Noel Weaver