Seat Capacity Limitation Gone 5/23

Good Morning Everyone,

I received a couple of e-mails from Amtrak this morning about ticket changes to two upcoming Acela & Regional trips. It looks like they're back to booking every seat and no longer blocking rows. Having a full table to ourselves was nice while it lasted!

Here's Amtrak's statement...

Starting May 23, Amtrak will no longer be limiting capacity. When searching for travel, the percentage of seats sold displays next to each trip option and adjusts as more reservations are made, which gives customers the opportunity to book a train that is less crowded. Even while we're still limiting capacity, customers should not expect that there will be an empty seat next to them. If capacity exceeds comfort levels, customers can change their ticket without incurring a fee (fare difference may apply).

https://www.amtrak.com/planning-booking ... virus_tab2

Interestingly enough, only our Acela seats were changed. Our Regional is still showing seat blocking.


- Jesse -

The Carolinian BC car is still showing blocked off seating for June. I'm trying to get both my parents moved to the same 4 top as me.

Sent from my SM-G998U using Tapatalk

I just got my business seats bumped from the table this morning; looks like it's a slow rollout.

Keystones were showing seat availability until recently and stopped. The Pennsylvanian is still showing for in mid June.

So are they stopping seat selection at the same time?

You still need to select seats on the Regional and Acela. Because I had table seating they changed my tickets to standard seats. Since there's two of us for travel in August I just selected the table for two, and for our trip in October where there'll be four of us I put us all at the same table. On the Regional I just chose regular seats.

I guess since mask wearing has been extended until September 13th, at least, they figure they can start packing the cars again. https://www.wjcl.com/article/tsa-extend ... l/36304083

I'm just grateful that Antrak may start returning to normal. It just seems so strange to not get to sit with people on a journey.

As an aside, I'm equally grateful for the mask mandate, as I really don't like people seeing how ugly I am.

Can anyone tell me what Amtrak has done to improve the air filtration process in their cars?

From Amtrak's YouTube channel:
https://youtu.be/1om9qiEoBJw

And per their website:

Customers can travel with extra confidence knowing all our trains are equipped with onboard filtration systems with a fresh air exchange rate every 4-5 minutes.

https://www.amtrak.com/coronavirus

Hopefully they'll keep the seat selection, or else review their experience of reserved seats and then decide to do it routinely on lots of trains. Funny they're just doing it on the NEC now; that's the one place with frequent service where it would seem to make sense to cater to walk-up passengers rather than reserved-in-advance pax.

If capacity is going up, will fares come down? Sleeper fares quoted for July and August are insanely high, while percentages sold shown on the web site are relatively low. I assumed that because they're selling fewer rooms, they reach the highest fare bucket quickly. If they start making more rooms available, will that trigger inventory ratio to drop fares back into lower buckets?