Amtrak Vermonter / Montrealer

I don't find it hard to believe. Anderson isn't running for election; he was appointed by a corporate board responsible to no one but themselves, as far as I know. And his mission may not be to improve service but to cut costs. Fewer trains = lower costs.

Can Vermont find another operator for the trains? I'm sure New England Central wants no part of it, but could they find someone else? Or set up their own agency and run the trains themselves?

You know I wondered why there hadn't been any discussions of the Pan Am stretch of track in Mass. I'm sure MassDOT and Pan Am will point fingers at each other as to who was supposed to go through the process. It should be exempt as Pan Am is Class II and they are still the operator of the line under MassDOT ownership but they should have still gone through the proper process. I wonder however if added Knowledge Corridor trips could trigger a PTC requirement along this stretch

Effective June 9th the Vermonter no longer serves Berlin, Connecticut and Wallingford, Connecticut. June 8th will be the final day that the Vermonter stops at those two stations.

I believe you, but source? Amtrak hasn't uploaded the schedules yet.

Hartford Line schedule had it on there before and indicated that they would not be stopping there BUT I just remembered they have since taken Vermonter off the schedule on their page (since its not taking Hartford Line tickets.)

At this point you can go here: https://tickets.amtrak.com/itd/Amtrak" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Click schedules and you can view the schedule for Wallingford to New Haven as an example pre-June 9th and post-June 9th.

Hopefully they will release the new PDF schedules shortly.

Two days in a row I have been watching the new SONO WEB CAM placed at National Historical tower on the NEC near South Norwalk CT and I watched the Vermonter go North (late both times) with 6 cars in tow. But when it goes by me at Windsor CT (even later) there are only five cars in tow. Do they drop a car off in New Haven? Do they pick it up on its return ( I will have to watch the SONO Web Cam to see if they add the car back on.
FYI, also, already running at 50 minutes late north, Scanner said that there was Police activity near Windsor Locks and 56 was to be held for further info 3:05pm today.

The first coach comes off at NHV and is added onto 55/57. They were held for police activity in Longmeadow. Mass State Police, Connecticut State Police, Springfield Police, Longmeadow Police, Enfield Police and Amtrak Police were searching for armed home invasion suspects from Springfield that crashed their car on I-91 on the state line.

Thanks on answering my questions. Now if they can just get the cars washed, they look terrible coming through Windsor CT.

Larry wrote:Thanks on answering my questions. Now if they can just get the cars washed, they look terrible coming through Windsor CT.

Lets not get too crazy

This upcoming week is the last week Vermonter will stop in Wallingford and Berlin with next Friday the 8th being the final day. Amtrak shifts to the new post NHHS schedule for Springfield line starting that Saturday (the 9th.) Surprised that Amtrak has still not released any advisories regarding the changes. We should see the official timetable soon - they just posted the new Virginia version and New York - Philadelphia - Baltimore - Washington version of the NEC timetable both effective June 9th. Boston / Springfield - New Haven - New York - Philadelphia - Washington version should be on there soon.

asull85 wrote:Work on the ground power starts next Monday. A conductor flag job was put up for bid to protect the contractors from themselves.

Looks like they are nearing completion on the first part of the ground power at SPG (it does seem like it got hung up for a bit) the cabinets for tracks 2a and 8 have been installed and work has been done in the main electrical room in the former freight tunnel. They then have to move onto tracks 4 and 6. I would imagine that work has to be coordinated with the reconstruction of the platform and tracks 4 and 6 work.

lordsigma12345 wrote:This upcoming week is the last week Vermonter will stop in Wallingford and Berlin with next Friday the 8th being the final day. Amtrak shifts to the new post NHHS schedule for Springfield line starting that Saturday (the 9th.) Surprised that Amtrak has still not released any advisories regarding the changes. We should see the official timetable soon - they just posted the new Virginia version and New York - Philadelphia - Baltimore - Washington version of the NEC timetable both effective June 9th. Boston / Springfield - New Haven - New York - Philadelphia - Washington version should be on there soon.

Actually, the timetable states that service to Wallingford and Berlin is " temporarily suspended". So, that means that service should resume eventually.

I was under the impression CTDOT let them drop those stops with the added Amtrak and CTrail service coming online. I would imagine Amtrak was happy to do so as most of the Vermonter's state-supported business is people north of Springfield traveling to NY/Philly/DC/etc (Dominated by the Northampton/Amherst area in MA, and the Brattleboro and Burlington areas in Vermont.) For stations on the Springfield line the direct Northeast Regional and Shuttle/Northeast Regional options tend to be more attractive, at least from my perspective as they are usually lower cost and you don't have to worry about the train being late coming south from Vermont. The smaller stations along the Springfield line are the lowest ridership stations on the Vermonter. I actually suspected before the schedule was revealed that they may drop Windsor Locks and Meriden from the Vermonter too and just have it stop in Springfield and Hartford. Given the limited usage and the fact that these towns have many other options it seems to me it would make sense to do this to try to improve the Vermonter's schedule. I guess we'll see maybe they will readd these stops eventually. Note that when viewing the Vermonter ridership it only includes trips where at least one end of the trip terminates at a station north of New Haven. For trips contained within the NEC part of the train's route (New Haven to DC) the trip is credited to the Northeast Regional service line.

Yes, I agree about the 400 series shuttles and few Northeast Regional Trains being better for those people traveling anywhere within the Springfield Line. Of course, there is Ctrail too but they don't run very much north of Hartford. Plus those trains aren't clean inside them.

Actually, I've been surprised when boarding the southbound Vermonter at Windsor locks there were 8-10 people getting off. It's been that way a couple of times. Likewise, when getting off the northbound Vermonter in Windsor locks, there's a fair number getting on.

Given what I suspect are quite low numbers for Vermonter passengers to/from north of Springfield to Berlin and Wallingford, dropping those stops makes sense...especially now that there's 16 trains each way stopping there with the startup of CTRail. And for the north of Springfield passengers going to/from Berlin and Wallingford, whoever meets them or drops them off will have to drive a few extra miles...or they take a shuttle/CTRail from Meriden.

Considering that the Vermonter is a limited consist size consist due to turning constraints at St Albans, anyone buying a seat from the 'lesser' stops south of Springfield to New York, or anywhere along the NEC, is potentially preventing a passenger from Vermont or northern Massachusetts from getting a ticket.