asciibaron: the Northeast was a zigzag maze of railroads with service from anywhere to damn near anywhere else.

And now a lot of those rails have been pulled out for hike and bike trails. Oh, well!

JonnyBGoode: theorellior: I thought it was the whistles that made that noise.



/approves

Ahhh BubbRubb -- is there anything he can't do/comment on? :-)

filth: How much stimulus money would we need to shut down Amtrak entirely?

Way too much, airport and roadway expansion is quite expensive.

Are the people hired from the car companies getting (or expecting) similar pay, benefits, and conditions as they had at their former employers?

The article mentions a $37,000 expenditure composed of 950 man hours. That's nearly $40 an hour. I wonder if that's typical and if it's the total cost or just the labor cost for that project.

For their sake, I hope the union mentality of entitlement doesn't take over.

gustakooka: Oh noes! .005 percent was used on something other than what you hoped for?

Came for this!

I know that they have been promised a couple hundred million here to develop a train that will connect Columbus to Cleveland.

The train ride will take 6 hours one way and cost 20 dollars a person... Actual drive time is 2.5 hours. Sounds like a winner!!!

Go Obama stimulus plan!

Pro Zack: You'll see. eventually the money will trickle down from the government, then we will all be happy!

Direct government payments to workers in the field is a little less "trickle-down" than hoping rich people hire another gardener with their larger tax refund.

theorellior: Speaking of stimulus funds, I drove over some very nice asphalt yesterday that was paid for by my taxpayer dollars. I have to say I was pleased that no Iraqi insurgent would try to blow up this investment of my money.

Everybody loves fresh pavement.

Commies, neo-cons, insurgents, terr'ists, blowhards, entitlement whores, revenue farming cops...

Congratulations, Amtrak. You just polished a turd.

Bocanegra: "B..B..But that's only the first $700,000. You need to give it 3 more years for the rest of the money to start working."

Its already working, what are you talking about?

I just tried to call the phone number for the Recovery.gove website and got a busy signal.


/V.2.0 soon
//will be nice to track where the money is wasted

tweekster: swaxhog: Father Jack Hacket: Schadenfreude ist die schoenste Freude: One of my favorite things to do when I'm waiting around in Zurich airport for the train is to watch all the American tourists who saunter down to the platform for their 8:03 train at 8:07 and wonder where their train is.

heh, there has to be a joke here about making the trains run on time.....

I thought it was a joke about waiting for a train in an airport but the OP was in on it too.

Milwaukee airport has an Amtrak stop. A lot of times they ship people from Chicago to catch connecting flights.

1. Amtrak doesn't run from MKE to ORD. In fact, it doesn't even run to MDW. You have to take the amtrak to something and then take the orange line to get to MDW. (i think its the orange line?)
2. I've taken the CoachUSA bus from MKE to ORD before.

\\thought the joke was about trains running on time as well.

BlorfMaster: Man, i love amtrack.

orlando to NYC in a private room with a huge picture window, my own toilet, and a bed. Sit and drink and watch the world go by. And the whole trip only takes 24 hours, 8 of which i am peacefully snoozing away.

the rest of it drinkin' & barfin'

Perducci: The article mentions a $37,000 expenditure composed of 950 man hours. That's nearly $40 an hour. I wonder if that's typical and if it's the total cost or just the labor cost for that project.

It sounds high, but if you have to do electrical work then the going rates around here for electricians is $70/hr. I'd say for skilled labor $40/hr might be about right. You really wouldn't want minimum wage workers refurbishing your rail cars.

mattharvest: Hire them to get the existing trains up to snuff (instead of having engines that fail when the train is full in the summer).

Epic 10/10

tedbundee: Its already working, what are you talking about?

LOL.

tweekster: BlorfMaster: Man, i love amtrack.

orlando to NYC in a private room with a huge picture window, my own toilet, and a bed. Sit and drink and watch the world go by. And the whole trip only takes 24 hours, 8 of which i am peacefully snoozing away.

How much is the private room for that trip. I was looking at taking the empire builder to WA

its pricier in the summer, but come later in august the private viewliner room is around $300. that includes a decent dinner in the dining cart.

jbc: OMG! The easier-to-finish stuff was finished first!

Dammit Subby, real life isn't "Railroad Tycoon". You can't just start throwing down tracks willy-nilly and expect to be hauling passengers over long distances immediately.

Yeah! You have to wait 2 game months and have the train stop at the stations on a line at least once to get demand going.

joegekko: Mordant: doublesecretprobation: mattharvest: This is akin to hiring people to dig and re-fill ditches.

they hired people to break the train cars, then paid others to fix them?

Exactly what they probably did. And why did they have to refurbish them instead of getting them up to snuff ?

And barring that, they could at least have been used to make sure the cars cut the mustard.

But if they can't chew snuff, how can they do their jobs?

xtragrind: I know that they have been promised a couple hundred million here to develop a train that will connect Columbus to Cleveland.

The train ride will take 6 hours one way and cost 20 dollars a person... Actual drive time is 2.5 hours. Sounds like a winner!!!


the point is not to connect those two cities, it's for the people along the route to got to either of those places.

BlorfMaster: Man, i love amtrack.

orlando to NYC in a private room with a huge picture window, my own toilet, and a bed. Sit and drink and watch the world go by. And the whole trip only takes 24 hours, 8 of which i am peacefully snoozing away.

You know you could fly there in less than 3 hours right?

Jubeebee: It's not a train from coast to coast. The two projects that (I believe) are still competing for the funds are a San Francisco - Los Angeles line and a Midwest hub and spoke system centered in Chicago.

The $1.3 billion won't fully build either, but it'll be a hell of a start.

$8 bil is for high speed rail, and the Portland-Seattle corridor is competing for funds as well as Florida. I think the NY State corridor from Buffalo to NYC is also potentially in the running. Washington's DOT already has extensive plans to get the trip time reduced by about 1 hr between Portland and Seattle already, including a lot of EIS', they just don't have funding for a number of projects to make it happen yet. I'm not as familiar with the other projects, but I've seen them mentioned as contenders for some of it.

The $1.3 bil is for traditional system upgrades as I understood it, not for converting/building a high speed system.

helix400: Honestly, this sounds like a North Korean propaganda headline

"Shiny refurbished traincar put back into service, courtesy of your government. Recovery and future success is on the way!"

/Ya, a bit too much hyperbole.
//But still, we should be excited over one Amtrak traincar paid for with stimulus money? Really?

You really hate when the government does anything right, dontcha? Stimulus advertised as a way to rebuild the infrastructure and get people working...the story is an example of just such a dynamic in action.

If this were akin to a NK propoganda headline, the one refurb'd car would be shiney and polished on one side, rusted through everywhere out of view and completely gutted inside. There would be no rail line for it to run on and 3 million people would be dying from starvation.

So I have to go with 'No, no it doesn't' on that one.

BlorfMaster: its pricier in the summer, but come later in august the private viewliner room is around $300. that includes a decent dinner in the dining cart.

Is that in addition to the ticket? I think thats how the empire builder works but I didn't look that far into it.

sigdiamond2000: I read in another article somewhere else inside the internet that told me that half the money went towards the development of dining car menus written in MuslimIslamic.

Pet peeve.

mattharvest: (instead of having engines that fail when the train is full in the summer)

That's the thing. Aside from local commuter rail (which Amtrak doesn't handle) and the Acela between NYC and DC, these trains are nowhere close to being full. Intercity passenger rail has not turned a profit since air travel became available.

joegekko: And barring that, they could at least have been used to make sure the cars cut the mustard.

I hope it's not Gray Poupon you're thinking of!

dualplains: sigdiamond2000: I read in another article somewhere else inside the internet that told me that half the money went towards the development of dining car menus written in MuslimIslamicAn actual language.

Pet peeve.

Wait, I think the stimulus is near worthless, but why is subby implying that $700k to refurbish a car is bad when it costs so much more to buy a new one? Seems like a rare decent use of funding for once.

Walker: You know you could fly there in less than 3 hours right?

Yeah, and you can fast-forward through a movie in 15 minutes. Some people actually like the journey.

/not to mention Journey

mattharvest: You want to hire those people? Great. Hire them to get the existing trains up to snuff (instead of having engines that fail when the train is full in the summer). Hire them to rebuild tracks to be more reliable. Hire them to set up a bullet train.


You know, most tracks Amtrak runs on aren't owned by them and they have no actual rights/permission to maintain or upgrade them.

tweekster: BlorfMaster: its pricier in the summer, but come later in august the private viewliner room is around $300. that includes a decent dinner in the dining cart.

Is that in addition to the ticket? I think thats how the empire builder works but I didn't look that far into it.

the ticket is like $117, and then you upgrade to the room for another $200

For those that actually do use the trains in the States, what's the best way to go as far as a good balance of comfort an affordability for a long trip? (Maybe not coast to coast, but at least across a few states.) Do you have to book early like a plane? Certain times of year? Middle-of-the-weeks? I'm getting pretty good working the airlines for deals, but the trains still stump me.

I like the idea of the leisurely, comfortable trips, but whenever I do need to travel I can rarely find prices that aren't business-class in a jet type expensive. If I'm gonna' pay that much I might as well just fly. And cattle class may suck, and I have to have my luggage UPS'd, but I only have to put up with it for a few hours and I'm there for half or less. =/

theorellior: Direct government payments to workers in the field is a little less "trickle-down" than hoping rich people hire another gardener with their larger tax refund.

I'll believe it when it works.

BlorfMaster: tweekster: BlorfMaster: its pricier in the summer, but come later in august the private viewliner room is around $300. that includes a decent dinner in the dining cart.

Is that in addition to the ticket? I think thats how the empire builder works but I didn't look that far into it.

the ticket is like $117, and then you upgrade to the room for another $200

That's a pretty good deal. Also I like train travel so the sleeper car would be really fun for a longer trip. I use the Milwaukee to Chicago line about once a month.

skinink: Unfortunately a lot of routes were cancelled, but if the Vegas route was there I'd do it again.

One of the reasons routes were cancelled is that a number of years ago, Amtrak adopted a policy where broken cars simply were just taken out of service - not replaced, not repaired. They would then pull a car from another train to replace it, if the broken car was on a high-traffic train.

Eventually, routes started seeing decreased ridership - which makes sense when you have less seats to fill - and Amtrak decided to pull the plug on them. What they did to the Sunset Limited after Hurricane Katrina was epic level stupidity and probably illegal.

BunkoSquad: /not to mention Journey

Don't stop believing.

What are the chances of getting some more Mountain/mid-west lines? I'd love to get from Denver to Houston without having to go through Chicago or Los Angeles.

from Chicago to Portland on the Empire Builder with a roomette is $688.00

Pro Zack: I'll believe it when it works.

WWII good enough for you?

MasterThief: That's the thing. Aside from local commuter rail (which Amtrak doesn't handle) and the Acela between NYC and DC, these trains are nowhere close to being full. Intercity passenger rail has not turned a profit since air travel became available.

The Amtrak Cascades seemed pretty full last time I took it. They only had one train all day that had a seat available on it, and that was business class only.

Of course, you'd have to be a moron to fly from Portland to Seattle, since the train ride's only about 3h20m, and a flight requires check in and all, and still takes about an hour of travel time. If you're trying to go downtown to downtown add another 60-70 minutes travel time to get to/from the airports as well.

Flying may save half an hour if you drive to the airport, pay for parking, and rent a car at the other end, but by then you may as well have just driven instead.

For distances of about 50-250 miles a train (especially if sidings and passing areas are readily available) can easily compete with air travel.

gustakooka: dualplains: sigdiamond2000: I read in another article somewhere else inside the internet that told me that half the money went towards the development of dining car menus written in MuslimIslamicAn actual languageTerroristic.

Pet peeve.

filth: How much stimulus money would we need to shut down Amtrak entirely?

Dis

What can you say... some rides need to be pimped...



/hotlinked

davidphogan: Jubeebee: It's not a train from coast to coast. The two projects that (I believe) are still competing for the funds are a San Francisco - Los Angeles line and a Midwest hub and spoke system centered in Chicago.

The $1.3 billion won't fully build either, but it'll be a hell of a start.

$8 bil is for high speed rail, and the Portland-Seattle corridor is competing for funds as well as Florida. I think the NY State corridor from Buffalo to NYC is also potentially in the running. Washington's DOT already has extensive plans to get the trip time reduced by about 1 hr between Portland and Seattle already, including a lot of EIS', they just don't have funding for a number of projects to make it happen yet. I'm not as familiar with the other projects, but I've seen them mentioned as contenders for some of it.

The $1.3 bil is for traditional system upgrades as I understood it, not for converting/building a high speed system.

Ah, thanks for clearing that up.

I'm really hoping the Midwest line wins; I'd love to be able to ride up to Minneapolis for the weekend, drink myself stupid at their brewpubs, and not have to worry about driving all the way back on Sunday.

/the alcohol and cheap hotel industries need stimulus too

Jubeebee: LessO2: $1.3 billion would be a small fraction of cost to build a bullet train in the U.S.

It's not a train from coast to coast. The two projects that (I believe) are still competing for the funds are a San Francisco - Los Angeles line and a Midwest hub and spoke system centered in Chicago.

The $1.3 billion won't fully build either, but it'll be a hell of a start.

Coast to coast bullet train wouldn't really suit the US I don't think - because flying makes a lot more sense over that distance. Competing with car routes between major cities on the heavily populated coastal areas makes a whole lot more sense. The core train service really needs to be going 150mph+ (and limited amount of stops) to make up for the hassle of getting to and from each station in most cases for passenger routes to be worthwhile. Ideally then you want local commuter networks, tram, bus and taxi that all centre on the high speed train network (and connect to airports as well for more flexibility).

MasterThief: Intercity passenger rail has not turned a profit since air travel became available.

you mean since air travel has been heavily subsidized by the government, right?

_thisis an outrage!

JusticeandIndependence: The work on the first completed car began on April 17 and required the hiring of 52 new workers, many of whom had lost their jobs at the former Chrysler plant in Newark and the General Motors plant near Newport, which will close later this month. Others had been laid off from their unions because of lack of work. About half the cost of each car's $1 million refurbishing goes toward workers' salaries, officials said.


Boy that sounds terrible.

Came here to say this.

asmodeus224: You really hate when the government does anything right, dontcha? Stimulus advertised as a way to rebuild the infrastructure and get people working...the story is an example of just such a dynamic in action.

Yes...this is right.

We're rebuilding the infrastructure with a few refurbished traincars. For eternally failing Amtrak. And we're going into debt for this. And we're pumping money into failing government programs instead of getting the private sector moving again.

Yes...I hate it when the government does things right.