Equipment Utilization – Amtrak’s “Achilles’ Heel”
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From the beginning of Amtrak in 1971, any attempt to add new routes, trains or frequencies has been met with Amtrak’s standard reply that “We don’t have enough equipment.” A lack of equipment is now being given by Amtrak as one of the reasons to eliminate service on the Texas Eagle, Pioneer, Desert Wind, and Boston section of the Lake Shore Limited.
Fifteen of my twenty-one years as an Amtrak employee were directly or indirectly related to Amtrak locomotives or passenger cars. I have inspected new cars at the factory where they were being built, and have made quality assurance inspections in the yards or shops where the rolling stock was being repaired or maintained. It is as a result of this involvement on a daily basis that I long ago came to the conclusion that Amtrak fails to obtain the full earning potential from its modern passenger car fleet. It can and must do much better.
When the Texas Eagle was operated by the Missouri Pacific Railroad, trains #21-22 required only two train sets to provide daily service over a distance of 921 miles, with each train making a one-way trip per day between St. Louis and San Antonio. The Dallas/Fort Worth section of the Texas Eagle averaged 742 miles per day. The Colorado Eagle between St. Louis and Denver averaged 1,021 miles per day, and it was not uncommon for many of the postwar streamlined trains to achieve average utilization of between 700-1000 miles per day. These trains operated at higher average speeds than do most Amtrak trains (except those in the Northeast Corridor.) The high utilization of that era was achieved with short turn around times at endpoint terminals, close and thorough inspection, and superior maintenance…