Amtrak Long-Distance Train Equipment Shortages to Continue Through 2023

About 11 percent of the equipment Amtrak once assigned to its long-distance trains remains sidelined awaiting mechanical restoration.

Amtrak Vice President of Long-Distance Service Larry Chestler told members of the Rail Passengers Association this week that it will be more than a year before that equipment is back in service meaning reduced consists are likely to be norm through much of 2023.

Speaking during an RPA online event, Chestler also said full-service dining is expected to return to the New York-Miami route early next year but did not indicate that Amtrak has plans to move away from the flexible dining model of serving meals in a bowl on other eastern long-distance trains.

Although Amtrak has experimented with allowing business class passengers to buy dining car meals on the Los Angeles-Seattle Coast Starlight with the experiment expected to be soon extended to coach passengers.

However, there apparently are no plans to extend that practice to all long-distance trains anytime soon.

Chestler did indicate that coach passengers on two other trains will eventually be able to buy dining car meals. The overall thrust of his comments was that dining cars meals will continue to be largely limited to sleeping car passengers for the time being.

The equipment shortages that cut the number of coaches, sleeping cars and lounge cars assigned to long-distance trains stems from Amtrak’s decision during the COVID-19 pandemic to sideline a sizeable number of cars at a time when ridership had collapsed.

At the same time, the passenger carrier reduced the size of its mechanical force and is now struggling to hire enough mechanics to get sidelined equipment back in service.

Also exacerbating the availability of Superliner equipment were derailments involving the Empire Builder in 2021 and the Southwest Chief in 2022 that took more cars out of service.

Chestler said Amtrak has yet to complete a schedule for returning idled passenger cars to service although he said such scheduling could be achieved “in the coming weeks.”

As for when that equipment might return to service, he said Amtrak’s objective is to reduce the 11 percent gap during 2023 with an eye toward restoring “as much of the equipment as is feasible” by 2024.

Amtrak also has begun the planning process toward acquiring new equipment to replace the existing passenger car fleet assigned to long-distance trains.

That process is in the design phase and requests for information will be issued to passenger car manufacturers later this year.

Chestler said Amtrak expects to issue a request for proposals by late 2024.

During his presentation Chestler said Amtrak is developing new procedures that call for senior management to get involved in situations in which a train on the road has lost head end power and the crew has been unable to resolve the situation.

Related to that, he said Amtrak is increasing the number of personnel assigned to contact passengers affected by service disruptions as well as seeking ways to make rebooking easier for passengers whose travel plans have been adversely affected.

A report on Chester’s comments can be found at https://www.trains.com/trn/amtrak-long-distance-capacity-to-remain-tight-through-2023/

Website Launched for Amtrak Routes Study

A study of potential new Amtrak long-distance routes has taken its first step with the launching of a website.

The site, which is administered by the Federal Railroad Administration and went active on Oct. 28, can be found at https://fralongdistancerailstudy.org/

The home page notes that the study is in its early stages and thus far does little more than describe the agency’s project to examine the possibility of reviving routes discontinued by Amtrak at various points during its 51-year history.

The study was mandated by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021.

The study also will consider the prospect of making daily the twi-weekly Sunset Limited (New Orleans-Los Angeles) and Cardinal (Chicago-New York).

“This study will ultimately create a long-term vision for long-distance passenger rail service and identify capital projects and funding needed to implement that vision,” the FRA said on the site’s homepage.

Many of the discontinued Amtrak long-distant route vanished in October 1979 and May 1997.

Among them have been the Floridian (Chicago-Miami/St. Petersburg), National Limited (New York-Kansas City) Lone Star (Chicago- Houston), Broadway Limited (Chicago-New York); Three Rivers (Chicago-New York) North Coast Hiawatha (Chicago-Seattle), Desert Wind (Salt Lake City-Los Angeles) and Pioneer (Seattle-Denver).

One challenge of reinstating some of these trains is that key segments of their route have since been abandoned and the trains would need an alternative route.

A similar challenge is that existing segments used by some trains have since been downgraded to much slower speeds.

The FRA website indicated that the study will be developed over the next year. An FRA spokesman told Trains magazine that the study also will consider new routes that Amtrak has never operated.

ALC-42 Charges Now on 3 Routes

Amtrak’s new ALC-42 Charger locomotives are operating on three long-distance routes, but not all trains on those routes are yet pulled by the Siemens-built locomotives.

A report on the website of Railfan and Railroad magazine said Chargers have seen service in recent weeks pulling the Empire Builder (Chicago-Seattle/Portland), the City of New Orleans (Chicago-New Orleans) and the California Zephyr (Chicago-Emeryville, California).

Four ALC-42 locomotives were in the motive power of a recent eastbound California Zephyr, although just two of them were online with the other two new deliveries being towed.

Those new deliveries were later towed by the Chicago to Washington Capitol Limited.

Amtrak spokesman Marc Magliari told the magazine that it will be some time before all runs on the three aforementioned routes will be covered by ALC-42 units.

Magliari said 11 Chargers are in service in long-distance train service but not all 11 are necessarily operating at the same time.

At least 25 locomotives are needed to cover all runs of the three routes.

The ALC-42 Chargers debuted last spring on the Empire Builder. It was a troubled inauguration with technical issues hindering the positive train control system of the locomotives.

Those issues largely have since been worked out.

The Railfan and Railroad report said that often an ALC-42 is paired with a P42DC. The report said typically the Charger trails the P42 on westbound trips of the Empire Builder.

However, Chargers have worked as solo units on the City of New Orleans in recent weeks. Between Chicago and Carbondale, Illinois, on the City route, Amtrak crews are already familiar with similar locomotives, the SC-44 Chargers.

On the Empire Builder route, an ALC-42 often leads Train 7 from Spokane, Washington, to Seattle as a solo unit while a P42 pulls the Portland section.

Amtrak has agreed to purchase 125 ALC-42 units and all of them are expected to be in revenue service as replacements for P42 and P40 units by 2029.

My First Look at an ALC-42 Charger

Shown above is the first of what I expect to be dozens if not hundreds of photographs of Amtrak trains pulled by Siemens-built ALC-42 Charger locomotives.

The City of New Orleans is just under an hour late as it rips through Humboldt, Illinois, on the Champaign Subdivision of Canadian National with No. 304 in charge.

Amtrak began phasing the new Charger locomotives into revenue service last spring on the Chicago-Seattle/Portland Empire Builder. The CONO was the second train to receive the units.

However, not all CONO train sets have the ALC-42s. The day before this image was made, the northbound CONO was pulled by a P42DC.

Over the next few years the ALC-42 units will replace P42 and P40 locomotives on long-distance and select corridor service trains. In the Midwest, corridor trains have been pulled for the past three to four years by Siemens-built SC-44 Chargers.

The ALC-42s have introduced Amtrak’s Phase VII livery, which features a dark blue carbody with red accenting and white stripes.

Perhaps in time I’ll become as tired of seeing this livery and locomotive as I’ve come to be with seeing the P42DC in action in the Phase V scheme. But that day is years away for now.

Dates Set for Amtrak Service Restorations

Daily operation on three Amtrak will be phased into place during the first week of October.

Trains magazine reported on its website that daily operation of the New York-New Orleans Crescent will resume on Oct. 4 and for the City of New Orleans between Chicago and New Orleans on Oct. 8.

Those dates correspond to the first dates that those trains would not have operated under the current operating conditions of running five days a week.

The New York-Miami Silver Meteor, which has been suspended since last January, will resume operating on Oct. 3.

The Trains report said that originally Amtrak said it would reinstate daily service on all three routes starting Sept. 11. But the service suspensions have been extended into October.

In suspending service on these and other routes last mid-January Amtrak cited a shortage of workers in its mechanical and onboard services departments as well as COVID-19 pandemic complications.

The suspended service on most long-distance routes has since been restored.

Amtrak has also restored some suspended services in the Northeast Corridor, including an overnight train between Boston and points in Virginia.

The New York-Toronto Maple Leaf was restored over the length of its route on June 27 and a second St. Louis-Kansas City Missouri River Runner was restored on July 17.

Still suspended are the New York-Montreal Adirondack, the Chicago to Carbondale, Illinois, Saluki, and the Carbondale to Chicago Illini.

Trains reported service restorations made or planned thus far reflect Amtrak’s belief of what service can be reliably supported with the existing labor force and the equipment that is operable.

4 Amtrak LD Trains to Resume Daily Service

Amtrak will restore daily operation to four long-distance trains the week of May 23, Trains magazine reported Tuesday.

Resuming daily operation will be the Chicago-New York/Boston Lake Shore Limited, the Chicago-Los Angeles Southwest Chief, the Chicago-Seattle/Portland Empire Builder, and the Chicago-San Francisco Bay California Zephyr.

Starting May 2 Amtrak will end a joint equipment sharing plan involving the Chicago-Washington Capitol Limited and the Chicago-San Antonio Texas Chief.

Consequently, the Texas Chief will resort to its previous schedule because there will no longer be a need for a long layover in St. Louis to inspect the equipment.

However, Trains reported, the New York-Miami Silver Meteor will remain suspended through Sept. 11. The Chicago-New Orleans City of New Orleans and the New York-New Orleans Crescent also will remain five-day-a-week trains for now.

The Chicago-New York Cardinal will get a marginal boost in capacity when unused sleeping car accommodations in a crew car will begin being sold to the public.

Those accommodations are in a dorm-baggage car that runs on the rear of the train.

The southbound Chicago to Carbondale, Illinois, Saluki, and northbound Carbondale to Chicago Illini will remain suspended through Sept. 11. Both trains were suspended in late January.

The Trains report cited a planning document that it obtained.

That document also indicated there will be additional trains added in the Northeast Corridor.

The document said some train consists are being adjusted to account for lower than expected passenger car availability and continued onboard service worker shortages.

In a statement provided to the magazine, Amtrak acknowledged the additional services and cited increased demand for business and leisure travel.

To read the article visit https://www.trains.com/trn/news-reviews/news-wire/amtrak-to-restore-four-long-distance-trains-to-daily-service-in-late-may/

Some Trains to Resume Daily Operation

Starting Monday, Amtrak’s Chicago-Washington Capitol Limited will begin sharing train sets with the Chicago-San Antonio Texas Eagle.

The move coincides with both trains resuming daily operation rather than the five-day-week operation they have been following since late January.

At that time the Capitol Limited began departing Chicago and Washington on Sunday through Thursday with no departures on Friday and Saturday.

At the time of the service reduction, Amtrak cited staffing shortages in reducing the operation of most long-distance trains from daily to five-days-a-week.

A report on the website of Trains magazine said the equipment from inbound No. 29 will make a same-day turn with minimal maintenance to become No. 21 for Texas.

Three days a week the Texas Eagle interchanges in San Antonio through cars to and from Los Angeles with the Sunset Limited.

Trains said the equipment sharing between the Eagle and Capitol will reduce the number of equipment sets needed to cover both trains from seven to six.

Currently, Amtrak assigns three equipment sets to Nos. 29 and 30 and four equipment sets to Nos. 21 and 22.

The trains will continue to be treated as separate for purposes of ticketing and those who are connecting from the Capitol to the Eagle or vice versa must disembark in Chicago rather than remain onboard.

The Eagle and Capitol have similar equipment sets of two coaches, a sleeping car and a Cross Country Café that serves as a dining car for sleeping car passengers and a café car for coach passengers.

The Eagle operates with a third coach between Chicago and St. Louis.

As part of the change, Amtrak plans to shift the federally-mandated 1,500 mile equipment inspection to St. Louis rather than Chicago.

To accommodate that, Amtrak is adding additional dwell time in St. Louis so that the Eagle will sit there for two hours in each direction.

During the St. Louis dwell time passengers will either have to disembark for the entire dwell time or remain in their coach seat or sleeping car room.

Amtrak wanted to retain the same schedule between St. Louis and San Antonio in both directions so it modified the schedule between Chicago and St. Louis.

No. 21 will now depart Chicago at 11:55 a.m. rather than the current 1:45 p.m. It will depart St. Louis at 9:22 a.m. and arrive in Chicago at 3:21 p.m. Currently, No. 22 departs St. Louis at 7:55 a.m. and is scheduled to arrive in Chicago at 1:22 p.m.

Currently, the St. Louis dwell time for the Texas Eagle in both directions is 30 minutes.

A potential challenge for the new schedule can occur if the inbound Capitol Limited is excessively late arriving in Chicago.

It is common for No. 29 to lose time while operating over host railroad Norfolk Southern west of Toledo.

In addition to the Capitol Limited and Texas Eagle resuming daily operation, the Los Angeles-Seattle Coast Starlight will also begin operating daily next week.

Although Amtrak’s website shows all other long-distance trains now operating five days a week resuming daily operation on May 23, that is not guaranteed even though passengers are being allowed to book travel on days those trains currently do not operate.

Amtrak spokesman Marc Magliari told Railway Age that the daily operation shown on the website for all long distance trains effective March 23 is the carrier’s spring schedule and the summer schedule has yet to be posted.

Amtrak has thus far declined to say how long the less-than-daily operation will continue.

That means the Lake Shore Limited, Crescent, City of New Orleans, Southwest Chief, California Zephyr and Empire Builder will continue to operate on their present five-days-a-week schedules.

Also uncertain is when the New York-Miami Silver Meteor will resume operation.

Some corridor services will resume operating on March 28, including all trains in the Chicago-Milwaukee corridor and some Empire Service trains that had been suspended between New York and Albany-Rensselaer, New York.

However, in the Chicago-Carbondale, Illinois, corridor the southbound Saluki and northbound Illini remain suspended.

The former departed Chicago in the morning while the latter departed Carbondale in late afternoon.

Some shuttle trains between New Haven, Connecticut, and Springfield, Massachusetts, also remain suspended.

A few Northeast Corridor trains also have yet to return, including overnight Nos. 66 and 67 between Boston and Washington.

This is not the first time Amtrak has operated equipment sharing for long-distance trains in Chicago.

In past years the Capitol Limited has shared equipment with the Southwest Chief, the Texas Chief has shared equipment with the City of New Orleans, and the Empire Builder has shared equipment with the City of New Orleans.

Magliari told Railway Age that combining the equipment sets for the Capitol Limited and Texas Eagle was done due to shortages of operating and maintenance employees.

Another factor, he said, is that both are one-night trains, rather than taking two nights.

Racing North Near Leverett

To appreciate this image it probably helps if you grew up in a place with a lot of flat farmland.

Shown is Amtrak’s City of New Orleans racing northbound toward Chicago near Leverett, Illinois, shortly after sunrise on a Sunday morning.

No. 58 was more than an hour behind schedule leaving Champaign. The train is on the Chicago Subdivision of Canadian National, which at one time was the mainline of the Illinois Central between Chicago and New Orleans.

As for what I, an east central Illinois native, see in this photograph, I see familiarity. There are no striking physical features such as mountains and valleys, just farmland and in the distance traces of urbanization in Champaign-Urbana. Above the Superliner cars you also can see the top of the grain elevator at Leverett.

This is all familiar to me and in a way comforting.

I would not have been able to get this image had No. 58 been on time as it would have been dark as it passed through here. It was a nice way to get a day of railfanning off to a good start.

If you look closely, you will see there is frost on the crossties of the CN track. Temperatures were in the 20 when I made this photograph on a winter morning.

I later checked and determined No. 58 halted at Chicago Union Station 58 minutes late.

January Amtrak Service Cuts Seem Likely

Amtrak Service reductions in January appear to be a near certainty.

The passenger carrier’s president, Stephen Gardner, told a congressional hearing last week that the service cuts, which are expected to involve long-distance trains, are due to expected crew shortages stemming from a COVID-19 vaccination rule the carrier imposed.

Gardner said 94 percent of Amtrak workers are full vaccinated and 96 percent have received at least one immunization.

However, the company is expected to find itself short staffed as workers who have failed to be vaccinated are terminated. Another factor, Gardner said, is a wave of retirements during the COVID-19 pandemic.

He said Amtrak also has faced slow going in hiring new workers to replace the retirees and vacancies expected to be created by those who do not comply with the vaccination rule.

Gardner said vaccination rates among workers are lowest in the ranks of workers assigned to long-distance routes.

Amtrak imposed the vaccination rule in compliance with an executive order issued by the Biden administration requiring employees of government contractors to be fully vaccinated by Jan. 4, 2022.

That mandate has been challenged in federal courts and last week a judge in Georgia issued a stay of the order. Unions representing workers at Amtrak and various Class 1 railroads have filed lawsuits challenging the rules imposed by the carriers.

It is unclear how these developments might affect the expected Amtrak service reductions.

Amtrak officials have been indicating for several weeks that the passenger carrier doesn’t expect to have enough fully vaccinated workers by January to support its full national network as well the various corridor services that it offers.

An announcement of which routes will see reduced service is expected to be made next week.

Those service cuts are expected to be similar to those imposed in October 2020 when most long-distance routes were reduced to tri-weekly or quad-weekly frequency of operation. The impetus for those reductions was low patronage cause by the pandemic depressing travel.

Those service reductions were restored on a route-by-route basis in last May and June.

During his testimony, Gardner said the long-distance route service cuts are expected to be temporary with full service restored by March.

In some crew bases that serve long-distance routes, Gardner said the rate of noncompliance with the vaccine rule is relatively high.

Passengers whose trips will be disrupted by the service cutbacks will be contacted and offered the opportunity to rebook their trips.

The hearing was held by the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Rail Subcommittee hearing and was titled, “Leveraging Infrastructure and Jobs Act: Plans for Expanding Intercity Passenger Rail.”

Amtrak Begins Recalling Furloughed Workers

Amtrak was to begin the process of recalling furlough employees on this week.

An internal memo said 1,250 furloughed workers would be recalled between March 16 and 29 while noting that it would take 90 days to get all of them back to work.

During that 90-day period the furloughed workers will be tested and requalified as needed in their respective positions.

The recalls were mandated in the recent $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill that was approved by Congress and signed by President Joseph Biden.

The legislation appropriated $1.7 billion in supplemental funding for Amtrak to, among other things, restore daily service to 16 long distance trains that operated daily until last year.

The restoration of daily service is to take place on a rolling schedule on May 24, May 31 and June 7.

The Amtrak memo indicated that the first employees to be recalled would be those in train and engine service followed by onboard service personnel.

The affected workers will be contacted by a phone call that will be followed up with a certified letter.

In the memo Amtrak indicated that although workers are expected to respond to the recalls within the time frame outlined in their craft’s collective bargaining agreement, the carrier is seeking to provide some flexibility so workers can take care of personal matters before reporting back to work at Amtrak.