How would you fix Amtrak?

>electrify all their rail.
>use engines that are diesel and overhead catenary powered. so they can keep going in a black out.
>for amtrak footing the bill for electrification. their trains get priority on the lines owned by cargo rail. which means faster and more reliable travel.
>every amtrak train that isn't always full of passengers. has one car replaced with a car that carry passenger cars. fuck I would go by train more if I could bring my car with me and avoid rentals.

>Cut money losing long-distance routes
>Promise butthurt senators from states losing train routes something in return
>Use funds to electrify some lines
>Make deals with freight companies for more frequent passenger service
>Buy new trains
>Lower workers' salaries (U.S. railroad workers make triple what their European counterparts do)
>Where possible buy lines
>In the end if possible privatize the whole thing (Amtrak will still keep the tracks it owns it'll just lease them out like Britain)

>>1024166
Forgot to mention
>Replace wooden ties with concrete ones
>Coordinate schedules so Amtrak trains never run into freight trains
>When there's enough money build passenger-only track alongside regular track so Amtrak can stop mooching off freight railroads
>Freight trains and Acela trains get dedicated tracks so Acela can reach higher speeds
>Now Acela trains don't have to be built to retarded FRA regulations
>Straighten out old Shore Line NYNH&H track from New York to Boston to increase speeds
>Make profits, end subsidies

>>1024163
>1. Give Amtrak more money.
>2. REALLY give Amtrak more money.
>3. Establish regional corridors with trains at least every 2 hours, use short trains or EMUs/DMUs if demand is low
>4. Improve tracks and priority, if necessary assume 100% of cost of improving private rail lines.
>5. Offer euro-style 6-person sleeping berth cars on long-haul trains with prices that are competitive with overnight coach travel.
>6. Also offer shorter, 8-14hr overnight trains with seats and berths, priced similar to coach travel.
>7. ???
>8. Profit!

>>1024170
Nah senpai just end long distance routes entirely

>>1024171
No fuck you if coaches have demand you can compete with that. Poor people are a growing market.

>>1024171
but some of us like the long trips through the plains and mountains.

>>1024172
but amtrak is slower than a bus and more expensive than flying.

>>1024172
>poor people are a growing market
>what are buses
Intercity coaches are less expensive and it actually makes sense. The only people who really use long haul routes are retirees. Plus buses don't have to wait on sidings for three hours because a freight train has to pass.

>>1024173
That's a niche market that the private sector can handle.

>>1024176
>>1024175
Because the only options are expensive. Having a small room to yourself makes much less efficient use of train space. You need more cars, and tickets get more expensive.
HOWEVER couchette cars with 6 berths per room carry a lot of people, so you can offer cheaper tickets. If you get ticket prices to be about the same as by coach everyone will take the train because a berth is still better than a seat.

>>1024180
I can drive from Atlanta to Washington DC in 12-13 hours and in single day. three tanks of gas, lunch and some mountain dew. which puts it about the same time and cost as a coach ticket. though taking the train then means I need a rental, but it does save the exhaustion of driving all day.

for the cost between a first class seat and a sleeping berth. I can fly to DC in two hours. plus the 2 hours of getting to the damn airport before the flight because of security lines.

>>1024183
right now there is demand for cheap coach travel, so maybe you're not the demographic at stake, but there's a lot of people who do use coaches. It's only logical that if there's demand for coaches that demand could also be met with trains.

>>1024184
if more trains could bring passengers' cars along, and keep the cost of hauling below what it will cost to rent a car for how ever long they need it. then you might see more people using the trains.

Divide Amtrak into separate companies based on region (one for the NEC, one for the Pacific Northwest, etc.), then cut off all of their government subsidies. The majority will go out of business, but some will be able to survive. There's no point in keeping passenger rail service active in specific parts of the country if no one uses it.

>>1024190
go away ronald reagan nobody likes you

>>1024192
Don't be a negative Nancy.

>>1024163
Oh shit, I used to walk over that exact bridge all the time.

>give them enough money for infrastructure improvements, including purchasing or building right of way

Problem solved. Amtrak will never come close to 100% farebox recovery, but that's okay because we also subsidize the shit out of all other forms of transportation.

>>1024165
>not travelling to places where you don't need a car

>>1024227
that would be horribly expensive.

you either spend a crap load buying the land, or you spend a crap ton tunneling.

>>1024163
Change that awful god damn shitty logo

>>1024163
Privatize amtrak and allow it to buy it's own land for its own uses (develop it as well).

Voila!

>>1024401
>service is taken over by the government because it's not profitable but needs to keep operating
>HURRRR JUST PRIVATIZE IT DURRRRR
kys

ditch all the trains outside the NECorridor.

Add passenger cars to cargo trains outside the NECorridor.

>>1024476
>add passenger cars to cargo trains
holy shit this is a good idea

but I think it's illegal

>>1024479
It's the government. I'm sure they can figure something out.

>>1024165
Auto Train is already a thing though

>>1024486
there is only one and it runs between florida and DC only.

>>1024163
Isn't Amtrak's fairbox recovery ratio already >70%? I'm sure they can find a way to cover the other 30%.

Which reminds me, GO transit in my area has an FBR of 78%, not bad.

>>1024443
Very good goy

>>1024490
the problem is that for the price and travel time. All it is saving you is, the exertion of driving your self.

>>1024584
If you can't make the drive in one day it saves you the hotel room for the night

>>1024163
>eliminate bullshit boarding procedures
There I've fixed amtrak already

but to do more
> run dmus and railcars
> eliminate conductors and run wanman trains (if legal)
> run intercity trains that aren't all-stops
> pay to double-track some lines
But really with fucked up boarding procedures and stopping at every tiny-ass town, amtrak is really destroying their city-city ridership

Amtrak shouldn't get more money until they stop doing stupid bullshit

>>1024586
Might as well fly if it is that far

Have it take people to places they want to go.

Trying to prove to myself that rail is worth if I've been trying to find useful trips from my city and I see none.

Amtrak leaves the easy to get to downtown Tucson area and goes 30 miles South of Phoenix so I can't save time or brain power there. It stops in El Paso (gross), and then goes on to some cool Texan Cities. Going the other way it runs to LA (but only goes three times a week).

I can't get to the Grand Canyon from here. I can't to get to Utah. I can't get to Colorado or any major Cities in New Mexico. I can't get to Vegas.

In fact, no one can get a train to Vegas because there are NO trains to Vegas. Y'know, the city that thrives on bringing in schlubs for a few days to a week. One of the largest tourist destinations in the world. That Las Vegas has had ZERO rail service for nearly 20 years. I have no business there and its not on my bucket list, but its indicative of the uselessness of the passenger rail "network".

And knowing that I can only get a train to Texas or LA means I should never bother considering rail travel for the rest of my time in the Southwest.

Thanks /n/!

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>>1024163

1. Go back to Phase I paint job because Phase IV is garbage.

2. Scrap Amfleet, Superliner, Acela, and P42s and replace them with A E S T H E T I C modern version of the Streamliners of the old Heritage fleet. Complete with bulldog nosed E-units and dome/tavern cars.

3. Buy/build more track. Especially high-speed rated track, which is probably one of the leading causes of slow trains (the GE Genesis)

4. Strike up deal with the governments of major cities and crooked real estate developers to reopen or rebuild closed down terminal stations (Norfolk Terminal for example) in exchange for retail rights to turn them into glorified malls (like they do with airports) and ditch the cheap tiny, stations that were built in the 70s.

5. Extend service into Mexico and Canada (Mexico in particular, has had a virtually non-existent passenger rail service since 1994 when Ferrocarriles Nacionales de México shut down) providing the only way for Mexicans to sneak into the United States since Donald Trump's wall only opens for the occasional train.

6. Carry the CIA's drug shipments across the border on said trains at outrageous prices to pay for all the mentioned above.

7. Bribe politicians into sabotaging highway repair bills to make rail travel more appeasing with the appalling increase in road accidents.

8. Do the same with airline regulations

9. Privatize everything and resell it to Class I railroads.

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>>1024619

Why Amtrak ditched the Desert Wind I will never understand.

Hell, I don't get why those idiots in the CA state legislature voted to build HSR to Oakland (a shithole no one wants to go to) instead of Las Vegas. Especially since they could probably get the casinos to foot part of the bill in exchange for allowing slot machines to be installed on the trains.

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>>1024362

/thread/

Repaint the whole goddamn fleet in Phase I too. Because every paintjob since then has been awful.

Or even better yet, repaint all the trains into colors based off the railroad that originally ran them (Illinois Central's brown, red, and black for City of New Orleans, Burlington Northern orange/blue and black for Empire Builder, Southern Pacific red, black, and orange for the San Joaquin/Coast Starlight etc.) to fool people into thinking there's a difference in the trains they're riding.

>>1024169
> >Coordinate schedules so Amtrak trains never run into freight trains
You don't know much about railroading, do you, son?

>>1024163
Stop subsidizing the interstate

Done

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>>1024637
>put a lot of money into a public enterprise
>then just give it away to some fatcat who hangs out with politicians
yeah worked out great when they did this in russia

>>1024163
That is the train station in San Luis Obispo! That is what I saw when I first arrived, by amtrak. Used to live two blocks away. It was a bad time in my life but that image brings back warm memories. Forgive my tangent, I am interested in this thread.

>>1024479
Mixed trains(the actual term for it) are not illegal, they're just not very common and they never were common.

>>1024169
>Replace wooden ties with concrete ones
Why would you even suggest this? Do you know what the differences between the two are?

>>1024163
By fixing it :^)

>Ditch long distance routes (Coast Starlight, Empire Builder, etc).
>Focus on commuter rail in the top 20 MSAs

They need major updates to their ticketing and reservation system. I don't know if this is true but I was told Amtrak uses the same system as an airline, meaning a seat that is sold from one interim stop to another actually reserves the seat for the entire trip - end to end.

i.e.: a ticket from Seattle to Bellingham means that seat is not available from Bellingham to Vancouver.

>>1024736
Prohibited by law. Routes with distances less than 300 miles must be subsidized by the state's themselves.

>>1024749
At least half the suggestions in this thread would be prohibited under current regulations. You act like laws can't be changed...

>>1024751
>Thinking that the black sheep that is Amtrak will ever receive wide support by congress.

>>1024753
Literally the point of this thread is "How would you fix Amtrak". It isn't "How would you negotiate the complex system of laws and regulations to manipulate Amtrak into improving incrementally to balance current needs and limitations."

>>1024759
Well if we're going to live in fairy tale land, I'd give Amtrak a bajillion dollars and have all the trains be really fast and run on time. :^)

>>1024163
Hope that one of the swing states goes to a third party candidate tomorrow, and the Supreme Court and House of Representatives fumblefuck around until inaguration day. At that point the law says Joe Biden is President, ushering in a new era of properly funded Amtrak service.

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>>1024761
>suggesting how you'd like Amtrak to be
>not how to fix it
why do people always miss the point when talking about how to fix something and either focus on why you can't fix it, or how you'd like the end result to be?

>>1024890
>Armchair railroad executives in this thread that have never worked the ground in their life thinking they know what it takes to make a railroad work.

>>1024797
that isn't how the 12th amendment works.

Republican House and Republican Senate holds a special session. They elect Trump and Pence.

Trump takes office at the normal time.

or

They wait till the new congress. Someone gets appointed interim president until March. New congress which is still going to be Republican House, still likely Republican Senate. Depending on how much the Republicans lost and how much they feel like it was Trump's fault. They might pick McMuffin or Johnson instead.

In no scenario does a Republican House pick Hillary. It would be political suicide for the House republicans in their 2018 primary. Too many incumbent republicans lose their primary. Then the general elections get more dicey as democrats might be able to take seats.

Then there is the everything has gone to shit scenario. Republicans retain house and Democrats get senate. McMuffin or Johnson gets to be president. Senate puts in Kaine as VP.

>>1024912
>what does "hypothetical" mean

>>1024163
we need separate lines for amtrack, so we can have high speed rail

>>1024165
>for amtrak footing the bill for electrification. their trains get priority on the lines owned by cargo rail. which means faster and more reliable travel.
They already do.

>>1024163
Get rid of the old train cars because they smell bad. The new double decker ones are really comfy.

>>1024490

I did the numbers out myself using their annual report for both 2015 and 2016. They are currently at 80% fare recovery (excluding contributions to state routes by the states, so it's actually way, way higher than that).

In 2016, the following routes had over 90% fare recovery:

-Acela: 190%

-Washington-Lynchburg: 145%

-Northeast Regional: 138%

-Washington-Newport News: 122%

-Auto Train: 104%

-Washington-Richmond: 104%

-Special State Corridor Trains: 100%

-Washington-Norfolk: 99%

-Carolinian: 97%

A bunch of others would be there were it not for track work.

Notably, if Amtrak could cut the Long-Distance routes other than the auto train, they would actually make money and not have to take much in the way of subsidies for state routes. I can upload this as a google sheet for people if they'd like, I've calculated out just how much each route would need to grow in order to cover its costs.

>>1024163

The answer to this is actually extremely simple: the only reason Amtrak loses money is the Long Distance Routes. Don't believe me? I did out the numbers using Amtrak's annual performance reports.

In 2015 if all the Long Distance routes were eliminated (even including the money-making auto train), Amtrak would be making $41,101,136 a year off of ticket revenue ALONE, nevermind advertising space and food services which aren't calculated by route. In 2016, they would be making $10,375004. This drop is almost entirely due to the fact that they have millions in lost revenue and increased costs due to track repair on the Wolverine and Empire corridors. Were their costs and services at normal levels, Amtrak would be making close to 60-100 million a year.

There are two solutions to this, the Australian solution and the European solution.

-In Australia, long-distance trains make a ton of money and are run by private companies. How do they do this? Every train is an auto train. Think about it: you need a car to get around LA and many other cities, no exceptions. Unless you live in the hyper-dense downtown cores or nearby to a public transit stop on a good transit line, intercity train travel is 100% out of your reach. Flying is cheaper...but then you have to rent a car to get around. If it were cheaper to just auto-train your car across the country and drive around, you could easily boost ridership to money-making levels.

-In Europe, trains aren't city-to-city, they are corridor trains. Right now, cities like Denver are served by one train a day that goes from Chicago to LA. That is pathetic and absolutely must stop. If we want to see the long-distance routes actually work without turning them into auto-trains, you need to increase frequency of service to make them viable options for people living along the corridor. There are lots of 2am stops in Arizona and New Mexico and Nebraska or Kansas. What the fuck does that do for anybody?

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>>1024163
>buy hyperloop™ from elon musk™
>build hyperloop all over the us
>buy lots of hyperloop trains
>build an amtrak exclusive hyperloop around
the world
>build a hyperloop bridge to mars
>profit

>>1025762
>upload
please do so

>>1025765
this

For the Australia case it's yes and no. There are 2 truly long distance private routes - The Ghan and the Indian Pacific and they take 3 days, so there's a grand total of one departure a week from each end. On one of them, the Motorail service was cut in half, no longer servicing Sydney. Additionally, the bulk comes from the luxury travel market where it's upwards of $1700. It's cheaper and easier to just fly business class if you're doing Sydney-Perth
For the 1000 km range long distance service, there is no motorail service (because seriously, it's faster, cheaper and easier to drive). It's bleeding money and run by state governments as a service to connect remote areas

>>1024163
Actually fund it so new infrastructure could be built and existing ones maintained. And actively promoted as a better alternative to being a cagefag.
Priority over freight.
Investment in general

>>1024340
>that would be horribly expensive
4U

>>1024443
Don't you know that privatization is the key to solving all of this country's problems? That's half the Republican platform.

>>1024476
No, other areas need rail.

>>1024577
Get fucked

>>1024619
>Have it take people to places they want to go.
Unthinkable!

>>1025868

Here you go, senpai.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1S4zlhla4ynXFSdXYeAGJLZUJcmAtpWrK0gHApU5X1Lw/edit?usp=sharing

Some of the top findings:

-The state supported routes have very high per-mile costs. This is due to two things: Amtrak being on the line for track repair, and private railroads overcharging for services. I saw somebody do the numbers out, Union Pacific overcharges Amtrak like hell in California.

-The best performing route that is not partially on the NEC is the Auto Train.

-The best performing non-NEC route is the Hiawatha, which has a ton of trains per day. This helps confirm what most serious railroaders have always known: Amtrak sucks because it lacks frequency, not because it lacks demand.

-The worst performing long-distance routes were the thrice weekly ones. This is because the crew costs are the same regardless of if they run the train, in fact they are higher because they have to put the crew up in hotels on either end of the system.

-The Sunset Limited is the biggest budget waste of all time and should be eliminated entirely, holy shit, $35 million dollar loss per year on a route that doesn't even serve the biggest cities along it (Phoenix and suburbs).

>electrified rail
>catenaries
>Aerodynamic intercity trains
from DB Bahn replace old carta
>Modern Hub stations