Texas Eagle Discussion

The Eagle-to-Sunset through cars has always baffled me. It seems like a great way to create extra work and potential for delay on a 3x/week schedule. As long as we're making up odd connections, why not connect a few cars from the Builder to the Capitol or the CofNO to the Lakeshore? (I don't need reasons why we don't do that, just illustrating the randomness of the Eagle-Sunset through cars).

Years ago I remember The National Limited used to have through cars and a sleeper from New York to LA as well. I think they were transferred in Kansas City.

Also the Montrealer had a through sleeper to Florida through Washington, DC. I traveled on this in the 70s .

Tadman wrote:The Eagle-to-Sunset through cars has always baffled me. It seems like a great way to create extra work and potential for delay on a 3x/week schedule. As long as we're making up odd connections, why not connect a few cars from the Builder to the Capitol or the CofNO to the Lakeshore? (I don't need reasons why we don't do that, just illustrating the randomness of the Eagle-Sunset through cars).

It's not that random, they're the only trains that visit San Antonio. Your other examples meet in Chicago which has seven long distance trains visiting it? Which trains would you switch the cars between? The Empire Builder joins and split trains in Spokane, so it's not unusual to switch Superliner trains in route. The Lake Shore Limited joins also split trains in Albany, so it's not unusual to switch Amfleet trains in route. So it isn't as unique a situation you suggest.

It's also a matter of time of day. The trains in Chicago connect during the daylight hours. There is a distinct advantage to not rousing passengers from their sleeping quarters to change trains at 3 in the morning in San Antonio.

The Empire Builder does the same thing at 1 am in Spokane.

Back in the early years of Amtrak,there was a "transconn" sleeper,NYP-NOL-LAUPT
came from NYP off the Crescent at NOL, on to LA on the Sunset LTD.

Station Aficionado wrote:Amtrak's Texas Eagle is, in part, a reincarnation of the Missouri Pacific's Texas Eagle, not ATSF's Texas Chief (which later became the Lone Star). The Texas Chief operated Chicago-KC-OKC-Ft Worth-Houston. The only portion of that route that the current Eagle uses is Ft. Worth to Temple.

The Lone Star didn't revert to Texas Chief because it was discontinued in 1979, and ATSF didn't let Amtrak resume use of the Chief moniker until, IIRC, 1984.

Oh I didn't realize that. How long was it after the Lone Star was discontinued that the Texas Eagle was inaugurated? I wonder why they picked the MP train over the Santa Fe. Was Santa Fe trying to prevent a new passenger train over its ROW or was the MP route more heavily populated?

Tadman wrote:The Eagle-to-Sunset through cars has always baffled me. It seems like a great way to create extra work and potential for delay on a 3x/week schedule. As long as we're making up odd connections, why not connect a few cars from the Builder to the Capitol or the CofNO to the Lakeshore? (I don't need reasons why we don't do that, just illustrating the randomness of the Eagle-Sunset through cars).

I wonder if it would be worthwhile to try to combine the Texas Eagle and the Sunset Limited into a single route. The train would just arrive in San Antonio and turn West. There could be a separate train connecting San Antonio to Houston and New Orleans.

That very idea was studied extensively by Amtrak back in September 2010. The train would do just that, run directly from Chicago to LA via San Antonio with a connecting train running from NOL to San Antonio. In the report, Amtrak seemed like they liked the idea, and at the moment they were "working with" the freight railroads to make it happen. Not sure where we stand on that three and a half years later, though.

Dreezy wrote:How long was it after the Lone Star was discontinued that the Texas Eagle was inaugurated? I wonder why they picked the MP train over the Santa Fe. Was Santa Fe trying to prevent a new passenger train over its ROW or was the MP route more heavily populated?

Interesting topic. The Amtrak version of the Eagle was born as the Interamerican in the early '70's, I think originally as a Ft.Worth-San Antonio-Laredo(!) connection to the Texas Chief/Lone Star. Later (but before the demise of the Chief/Star), it became a Chicago-San Antonio train (the Laredo leg dropped somewhere along the way), I believe on its current route. Thus, at one time, Amtrak ran two Chicago-Texas trains at the same time. I assume the Interamerican survived the Carter cuts because the combined ridership/financial numbers were better than for the Lone Star. Perhaps one of the folks who was paying attention to such things back then can shed more light. The Interamerican picked up a Dallas (maybe Ft. Worth)-Houston section when the Lone Star bit the dust. When the Interamerican became the Eagle in the early '80's, the Houston section was dropped, only to be revived later, and then dropped again.

lirr42 wrote:That very idea was studied extensively by Amtrak back in September 2010. The train would do just that, run directly from Chicago to LA via San Antonio with a connecting train running from NOL to San Antonio. In the report, Amtrak seemed like they liked the idea, and at the moment they were "working with" the freight railroads to make it happen. Not sure where we stand on that three and a half years later, though.

Based on some of the things stated in the report, it sounds as though combining them would have been a fairly straightforward proposition. One of the most intriguing parts I thought was the possible creation of a New Orleans-San Antonio service (besides the obvious benefit of adding daily service between SAS and LAX). An SAS-NOL route would be under 750 miles. I wonder if Texas would be interested in supporting such a train.

I think the nature of the SAS-NOL 'shuttle' being as just an extension of the current Sunset Limited would exclude it form the state-support-750 mile requirement. However, if Texas would be willing to spend some money on rail, there's nothing saying an additional round trip or more could be added in on the state's behalf.

I was reading the New York Times piece on the Pullman/CONO service and thinking about the near paralleling of the CONO and TE but with limited interconnections between them. Looking down the maps I noted TE pulling away south west at Poplar Bluff, somewhat reminiscent of how Maricopa stands in for Phoenix.

Routing the train into Memphis (albeit with a backing move to access the station) would provide interconnection between the routes, double frequency CHI-MEM, create direct STL-MEM and MEM-DAL routes and provide impetus to a TXA-MEM higher speed service going which could soften the impact to end-to-end times the diversion would cause as a precursor to the aspirational high speed project.

First of all, has this been studied and discounted in the past, in which case I'll move on from this?

Second, are there currently available alignments which could carry STL-MEM and MEM-LRK trains at reasonable speeds, without dogged opposition from the track owner and which MO, AR and TN might be tempted to throw some cash into?

dowlingm wrote:Second, are there currently available alignments which could carry STL-MEM and MEM-LRK trains at reasonable speeds, without dogged opposition from the track owner and which MO, AR and TN might be tempted to throw some cash into?

AR doesn't have money available to subsidize any train. TN would think Memphis already had train service and would rather spend their own money on trains servicing other cities without any services today, like Nashville, Knoxville, and Chattanooga. Likewise, MO wouldn't be interested spending more than they already do for a train to Memphis when there are cities within the state without services, like Springfield and Joplin.
Obviously there's enough interstate traffic that could support a train along I-40, but much of that traffic extends beyond Little Rock to Memphis. For a train to work, it'll have to be a much longer train, at least from Raleigh all the way to Albuquerque. A train that long would be long enough to not require any state subsidies. Additionally, the Sunset Limited follows I-10 a great distance, yet it doesn't attract sufficient ridership to warrant a train more than thrice a week even with the nation's 4 largest city, I'm afraid a train along I-40 would see worse ridership.

Personally, I believe that it would make more sense to create a Memphis to Oklahoma City service...along the lines of the former Choctaw Rocket of the former Rock Island.

However, I'm not sure that there is a direct ROW in place between these two cities.

Some years ago (when Tom Downs was Amtrak president, IIRC), Amtrak considered combining the TE and the CONO between Chicago and Memphis, as a cost saving move. But the cost of restoring a connection south of the Memphis station, annd the gazillion dollars in improvements UP wanted for use of the exMP west of Memphis put a quick end to that idea.