Amtrak Routes And Fares

AMTRAK RECEIVES $562.9 MILLION RRIF LOAN TO FUND NEW GENERATION OF ELECTRIC ...

Improves reliability and performance for Northeast Corridor passengers

WASHINGTON (MMD Newswire) July 1, 2011 - - Amtrak President and CEO Joseph Boardman made the following statement regarding a Railroad Rehabilitation and Improvement Financing (RRIF) loan from the Federal Railroad Administration. Additional information is attached.

"Record numbers of passengers are riding Amtrak trains across our national network of intercity routes. To better serve our customers, we are implementing a fleet replacement and renewal plan to improve the reliability and performance of our equipment.

"As a result of the RRIF loan announced today by the Federal Railroad Administration, Amtrak's purchase of 70 new, energy efficient and higher performing electric locomotives is fully funded. These locomotives will operate on the Northeast and Keystone Corridors beginning in 2013, replacing units in service between 20 and 30 years with average mileage of 3.5 million miles traveled.

"The Amtrak fleet strategy plan will provide new and modern equipment for passengers, and develop and sustain the domestic production capacity needed for the long term viability of intercity passenger rail in the United States.

"We appreciate the strong support of the Obama administration in advancing passenger rail in America."

About Amtrak®:

Celebrating 40 years of dedicated service as America's Railroadsm, Amtrak is the nation's intercity passenger rail provider and its only high-speed rail operator. A record 28.7 million passengers traveled on Amtrak in FY 2010 on more than 300 daily trains - at speeds up to 150 mph (241 kph) - that connect 46 states, the District of Columbia and three Canadian Provinces. Amtrak operates trains in partnership with 15 states and four commuter rail agencies. Amtrak also is a strong financial performer achieving an 85 percent cost-recovery ratio in FY 2010. Enjoy the journeysm at Amtrak.com or call 800-USA-RAIL for schedules, fares and more information. Join us on facebook.com/Amtrak and follow us at twitter.com/Amtrak.

NEW AMTRAK ELECTRIC LOCOMOTIVES

- In April 2011, Amtrak released its updated Fleet Strategy Plan that analyzes the company's need to replace its existing conventional and high-speed fleet and manage capacity to meet the forecasted growth in ridership across its national network.

- The report lays out the basis for recapitalizing the entire fleet over a period of time in a manner that will not only provide new and modern equipment for passengers, but will also develop and sustain the domestic production capacity needed for the long term viability of intercity passenger rail in the United States.

The Antiplanner :: Intercity Buses: The Fastest-Growing Mode ...

Tomorrow, the Cato Institute will release a new report on intercity buses that Antiplanner readers can preview here . This is an expansion and update from an Antiplanner article posted almost exactly two years ago.

For that post, I reviewed schedules for about a dozen different bus companies in the Boston-to-Washington corridor and calculated that they collectively operated about 3.4 billion seat miles of travel in the corridor in 2009. This is about the same as Amtrak, but the bus companies reported that they filled a higher percentage of seats than Amtrak, so I concluded that buses move more people than Amtrak in the corridor.

For tomorrow’s paper, I updated this calculation and found that, in 2011, some 16 different bus companies move about 4.0 billion seat miles in the Northeast Corridor. Amtrak claims about 6 percent of the travel market in the corridor, so buses have about 8 to 9 percent. (Airlines have about 5, with the other 80 percent being automobiles.)

The current pinnacle seems to be LimoLiner , whose Boston-to-New York buses have only 28 seats, on-board meals, and movies. This is reminiscent of the old Trailways Golden Eagle service that had hostesses serving coffee and snacks. (I remember getting donuts aboard one of these buses between Portland and Seattle in the 1960s.)

Intercity bus service has been the nation’s fastest-growing mode of travel, says Joseph Schwieterman of DePaul University. Since 2006, bus ridership has grown almost twice as fast as Amtrak’s.

This growth has been stimulated by what bus industry insiders call the “new model” of bus service, which includes internet ticket sales, curbside pick up and drop off, and non-stop service between major city pairs. Many new model bus companies also offer on-board amenities such as free wifi, and some use “yield management” to price tickets, meaning the first seats sell for as low as $1, with prices going up as more seats sell.

The new report finds that various bus companies offer faster, more frequent service at far lower fares than Amtrak in numerous corridors, including New York– Buffalo, New York–Toronto, New York–Raleigh, Washington– Richmond, Raleigh–Charlotte, Chicago–Minneapolis, and Chicago–Indianapolis to name a few. Nationally, buses carry at least three times as many passengers and passenger miles as Amtrak. Yet subsidies to the bus companies are roughly 1 percent of subsidies to Amtrak.

Official railway guide

Intercity Passenger Rail, Financial Performance of Amtrak's Routes

Fodor's New York State

Amtrak trains and travel

Reagan, in his own hand, the writings of Ronald Reagan that reveal his revolutionary vision for America