The big ax just fell. Long distance to 3x/week.

[John_Perkowski]

Admin note

We are railroad net. If you want to talk law, law fare is a great place to do so.

[justalurker66]

The president's ability to sign any bill may be limited/ 25th amendment leaves a lot to be desired.

The president signed H.R.8337 on Thursday October 1st and it became law.
The senate amendments were tabled September 30th. The house version became law.
No mandate for maintaining daily service.

[eolesen]

There's nothing stopping the cuts from going in at this point, folks.

There are no votes planned in the Senate right now aside from judges, and if the Senate goes into pro-forma session for the next two weeks (which is likely with the number of Senators testing positive for COVID), it's unlikely there will be a standalone relief bill for airlines or Amtrak.

Even general relief won't happen unless the House takes up the latest Senate bill without amendments, and that's highly unlikely.

[BandA]

Moderator Note: redacted

[John_Perkowski]

Admin note

Thanks for participating. Locked.

[Jeff Smith]

Politics is allowed, but keep the flames out.

[Gilbert B Norman]

Now that this topic is again open, we should note that today will be the first day in which there will NOT be a #5, Zephyr, by my vantage point.

#3's, Chief, first absence will be next week.

Sun, Tue, Fri; "gonna get a little lonesome" looking for WB's, and Sunday there won't be any in either direction. Only Amtrak on those days will be #383, Illinois Zephyr (#381, Carl, annulled "for the duration").

[eolesen]

Based on public announcements, there will not be any action on a COVID relief bill until next month.

[mtuandrew]

Based on public announcements, there will not be any action on a COVID relief bill until next month.

The way I interpret that, there might not be any until next month but possibly not until January.

[Gilbert B Norman]

Although I must agree there is always a chance someone in both houses could "slip in" restoration of Daily LD frequency, what portion of the Bills relating to Amtrak funding will likely be related simply to keep running what they presently have. Increased frequencies of any service, Corridor or LD, will only come about when more bodies are lined up at the ticket windows (oh whoops, pardon the "dating" of myself; logging on and clicking "purchase").

[justalurker66]

Based on public announcements, there will not be any action on a COVID relief bill until next month.

The way I interpret that, there might not be any until next month but possibly not until January.

Unless the relief includes a mandate to provide daily service where daily service existed in September any COVID relief will not stop reductions to 3x per week. I'm not seeing a huge push in congress to add such a mandate. Congress seems to be looking at other relief.

[mtuandrew]

Unless the relief includes a mandate to provide daily service where daily service existed in September any COVID relief will not stop reductions to 3x per week. I'm not seeing a huge push in congress to add such a mandate. Congress seems to be looking at other relief.

Yep. Congress can walk and chew gum at the same time, but is having trouble doing those while juggling swords, singing the Star-Spangled Banner, and walking on lava.

[lordsigma12345]

Mr. Flynn submitted a letter this week to formalize a request for just under $5 billion in operating subsidies as part of a future Covid relief bill. - as well as $5 billion in capital stimulus proposals (total request $10 billion). Essentially if they don’t get supplemental funding there could be large cuts on all the corridors and over 2000 additional furloughs.

[Gilbert B Norman]

Gotta say, this Tri-Weekly stuff is reminding me of "Bright College Days".

The "City of Miami" went through Champaign on alternate days or "Tri-and a half-Weekly". How often at the frat house did I hear on Thu or Fri "Hey Light Bulb" (my name), on day or off for the Miami?". It had an Extra Fare of $1.00, or about two."suds", but was a good half hour faster than the "on its markers, Creole", which one Brother remarked to me "this looks like something out of Dr. Zhivago".

[jp1822]

Amtrak’s need of the $10B would add up pretty fast I think......

- State commuter agencies have to be putting the screws to Amtrak, wanting to pay less for NEC access fees due to less commuter trains running. SHORTFALL of revenue from state commuter agencies.
- State supported trains have not been fully restored (e.g. Vermonter, Adirondack, full train schedule on the Keystone Corridor). SHORTFALL of revenue from State Supported trains.
- NEC revenue is SIGNIFICANTLY down, but fixed costs remain to be paid.
- Even one or two trains operating on the NEC can bring down the catenary that will need to get repaired. A wayward 100+ bridge that won’t close properly dispatches the maintenance and repair crews. .

I think Amtrak needs to cut even more costs on the NEC - reduce even more trains in operation, and even look at closing some ticket offices at stations. Folks, the traffic is NOT there on the NEC. The East Coast has been ravaged by COVID-19, many states are barring travel between states, many workers are now working from home remotely. Would it save costs to turn the catenary OFF except between Newark, NJ and New Rochelle, NY? The new Acela II’s are coming, but to what traffic counts? Depressed traffic counts for sure. It takes a lot of money to maintain high speed infrastructure, but right now, it’s for very few passenger counts. The NEC traffic will rebound, but if Amtrak just cut LD trains to 3x per week, is it enough in balance with operations on the NEC for the near term?