United Rail Passenger Alliance

Volume 3 Number 15

1. Food and beverage service on Amtrak doesn’t have to be something akin to a national shame. It has the potential to be pleasant, profitable, and nourishing. It has the potential to be good, rather than a necessity begrudgingly dished out by a common carrier with no ambition for good passenger service.There is a myth in railroading, that dining cars and the food service business are perpetual money losers. This is analogous to an urban myth that just won’t go away. Some will quickly say that even the private, pre-Amtrak passenger railroads didn’t make money on dining cars. Harrumph. Railroads have been manipulating financial numbers for over a century and a half to suit their needs, and dining car numbers were no exception. Back in the dark old days of the 1960s, at the end of private passenger rail service as we historically knew it, dining cars were shown to be money losers simply as a tool to get rid of them and in turn ultimately get rid of the trains they served.

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Volume 3 Number 14

1. And, the hits just keep on coming. Here’s an unsolicited e-mail received by URPA this week. Read more…

Volume 3 Number 13

1. From a TWA reader:
   

   “Opening lines from a story in The Wall Street Journal, reprinted in today’s [local daily newspaper], on how cruise lines are positioning their ‘discretionary travel’ product: ‘A number of cruise lines are upgrading their amenities to attract more luxury-focused cruise-goers. … Carlson Companies … Seven Seas Cruises … plan[s] a new suite design, upgraded furnishings, down comforters, brand-name linens, … flat screen TVs and iPod music systems. Other lines promising more luxurious cruising include Celebrity Cruises, which ordered two ships last month that will have larger standard staterooms, more balconies and new ‘guest-inspired’ service and amenities. Holland America Line, which started a $225 million upgrade for its fleet, … will include more plush mattresses and flat screen TV sets.’

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