United Rail Passenger Alliance

1. Things are on the upswing at Amtrak with the naming of the new Vice President of Transportation. Longtime Amtrak star Richard Phelps is moving from Los Angeles to Washington, transitioning from General Superintendent of the Southwest Division to Vice President. Here is the letter from Amtrak Chief Operating Office William Crosbie announcing the appointment. Read more…

Volume 4, Number 10

By Paul A. Wilson, Ph.D.

Unique Positive Aspects of Conventional Speed Passenger Rail Read more…

1. Amtrak has started its winter/spring leisure travel advertising campaign for 2007 by placing ads in 12 top markets. Target marketing, of course, is very important, and getting the biggest bang for every marketing buck is critical, too. However, Amtrak does serve over 500 destinations in the continental United States, plus some locations in Canada. It’s kind of tough to expect many results from just advertising in the top 12 markets …
2. Here’s a fascinating bon mot turned up by one of URPA’s numbers crunchers, derived directly from Amtrak data: Revenue and ridership are up, but during the last fiscal year (2006), passenger miles dropped once again to 5,361,517,000. In FY 05 the figure was 5,419,720,000, and a decade or more ago, it was around 6.5 billion revenue passenger miles per year.This means even though the false measurements of increased ridership and revenues may be climbing, the actual number of revenue passenger miles – the only true measurement used in the real world of common carriers – has declined.The most likely cause of this is an increase in short haul trains (which are the most expensive to operate and can’t cover their costs with true accounting numbers that include all appropriate allocated expenses) and small increases or decreases in long distance train travel, most likely due to the alarmingly short consists of most long haul trains as compared to a decade ago when much more of Amtrak’s long distance fleet was roadworthy.
3. A regular commuter rider on Amtrak’s Empire Service in and out of New York City provided this fascinating use of an Amtrak diesel locomotive: Read more…

1. Oh, my, it seems that some “amateurs” are trying to do the wrong thing, according to National Association of Railroad Passengers Executive Director Ross Capon.The restoration of the Sunset Limited east of New Orleans has been high on the passenger rail agenda for many of us here in Florida and along the Gulf Coast. Gone since Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the absent Sunset has created a large hole in Amtrak’s national network of trains. CSX, the Sunset’s host railroad east of New Orleans, released a newly repaired main line to Amtrak for service April 1, 2006, after damage from Katrina was fixed. Some station damage has remained, but nothing worse than Amtrak has routinely dealt with in other locations while still providing passenger train service.

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Volume 4 Number 7 — February 22, 2007

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Volume 4 Number 6 — February 18, 2007

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1. (Sigh) There is Amtrak winter naughtiness again in Chicago. Many of us had optimistically thought the Winter of ’07 was going to be the winter Amtrak got over its many bad weather operating problems in Chicago. Alas, that doesn’t seem to be the case.Here’s what Amtrak’s internal daily report had to say about the Cardinal, running from Chicago to New York City via Indianapolis, Cincinnati, and Washington. Read more…

January 30th marks the 10^th anniversary of the passing of Byron Nordberg. Called the “heart and soul” of RailPAC, his influence on Rail Passenger service is still being felt nation wide. Read more…