Hotline #913 - January 19, 1996

Through-cars will be introduced between Chicago, Pittsburgh, and New York on the Capitol Limited and Three Rivers, on February 1. Two Amfleet II coaches will be used. The coaches are already available for sale, identified as trains 446 and 447. NARP worked hard for this improvement.

Illinois Governor Edgar, in an interview today specifically about Amtrak, repeated his doubts that the State of Illinois should continue to fund Amtrak trains. It is absolutely vital that Illinois residents keep pressing state legislators and the governor this week on state funding for passenger trains.

Amtrak has reduced the size of its pending high-speed train order. Instead of 24 electric sets, there will be 18. There still will be two fossil-fuel sets, two maintenance facilities, and some sort of deal on management services. Also pending is an order for 15 electric locomotives, which may or may not be lumped into the train-set order.

An agreement has been reached between California officials and the Southern Pacific on a $67-million state funding package for track and signal improvements between Emeryville and Sacramento, according to today's Sacramento Bee. Of that, $10 million would come from the Southern Pacific. The California Transportation Commission still must approve the much-delayed deal. A fourth Amtrak round-trip on this line could start very soon after final approval.

Amtrak Intercity will expand capacity on the City of New Orleans around Mardi Gras. Also, a special all-sleeper section of the train will run south on February 16. On February 21, which is not a normal day of operation for the City of New Orleans, both a regular and an all-sleeper train will run.

Amtrak Northeast is issuing a new timetable this weekend. There are only minor schedule changes, but the format is said to be different, and most train names are being replaced with just a category and train number. For example, the Bankers becomes NortheastDirect train 141; the Mohawk becomes Empire train 284.

Amtrak Intercity will install video ticketing machines this year in North Carolina at Cary, Durham, and Salisbury. Also planned are some in California and the Northeast.

Illinois Central announced this week it would acquire the Chicago, Central and Pacific, a line from Chicago through northern Iowa to Omaha, spun-off by the IC in the 1980's. This was the route of Amtrak's Black Hawk to Rockford and Dubuque until 1981.

An MBTA commuter train hit a flatbed truck stuck on a grade crossing at Wakefield, Mass., the evening of January 16. Fortunately, the locomotive -- not the cab-car -- was leading. There were 21 injuries, mostly minor. This is one of three crossings in Massachusetts with a gate tender. He tried to phone the dispatcher but was too late. Very likely, the accident could have been avoided if the tender could have spoken to the train's engineer directly by radio.

Today's Washington Post quotes NARP, who criticized Washington Metro for ordering train operators to go to manual control only when given permission. Automatic operation on icy tracks figured in the January 7 collision that killed a Metro operator.

Car sharing has become popular in Germany and may come to the U.S. The National Station Car Association is converting some Geo Metros to electric propulsion and keeping them at commuter rail stations in Boston to see if two-car households can do with one car. The Metros would be available for other types of errands. A national demonstration with between 3,000 and 5,000 cars will be made in 1997.