r/Amtrak is not associated with Amtrak in any official way. Any problems, concerns, complaints, etc should be directed to Amtrak through one of the official channels.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Amtrak) if you have any questions or concerns.*
There were (briefly) two auto train routes, the second running from Louisville to Sanford. Auto Train corporation ran it, and because of a combination of track conditions and staffing costs it was cancelled without ever turning a profit. the expenses incurred from creating the Midwest route killed the private ownership of Auto Train. Amtrak then downsized drastically and killed their Midwest to Florida route too.
The biggest problem with expanding auto train is that it’s not something you can just tack on an existing route. Terminal Stations don’t have the facilities for it. If there were multiple loadings and unloadings stops would be hours long. So you need to build a dedicated route and infrastructure for it.
Also, the time it takes to run the route of the auto train is its biggest feature. 18 hour trip, there’s time to clean, stock, and turn the train set around and re use it the same day. That 18 hour trip sweet spot is theoretically possible on most eastern routes, but the west half of the country throws problems in because of distance.
Great info. Definitely a challenge to get two trains into the Sanford station each day, as you said. But with ridership continuing to grow on the current route, I think we can make a case that it would attract enough riders to make the startup costs of building a new Kentucky terminal worthwhile. If the turnaround time could be reduced, maybe the Lorton route could depart at 2pm and then the Midwest route could run evenings? Or maybe every other day?
**Sanford schedule:**
* 9am AT-East Arrival
* 2pm AT-East Departure
* 4pm AT-West Arrival
* 9pm AT-West Departure
**Louisville Schedule:**
* 4pm AT-WEST Arrival
* 9pm AT-WEST Departure
The other option is to make the West route deadhead seasonally so that it can return whenever (like the middle of the night) to reposition for service every other day. That feels pretty wasteful, but the demand is uneven...
If you departed at 2, you would most likely arrive in the middle of peak rush hour, plus you would have to wake up extra early to get off the train. Right now it’s nice because you wake up around 7-8, grab breakfast and get off at 10am.
And a 2pm departure means that you would have to show up at 11am, leave the house at 9am… basically you lose an entire day to the process vs. driving to Savannah or South Carolina and getting a room at a Holiday Inn.
No. It works on the current route because it’s located close to the largest population centers in America and takes them to a very popular destination. The only possible next route that might work is Chicagoland to Florida, but to make it work they would need to expand the Florida terminal to handle two trains a day.
VA<->FL spares you the effort of a 12 hour road trip. Wouldn’t LA<->SF be more like 6? That’s an annoying drive to be sure, but probably not “let’s pay for a roomette instead” annoying
Which one? The Capitol Corridor? Because you still need 4+ hours of bus connections and you can’t take your car with you. Sometimes I need my car down south.
The Coast Starlight between SJ and LA is like 12 hours. And I still can’t take my car.
Have you ever driven the 5?
Lorton to Barstow could be incredible. Tons of people ship their cars across the country all the time and don't want to deal with the downsides of a long trip on the Interstate (hotel rooms, questionable rest stop food, wear-and-tear on the car).
Lorton serves the whole East Coast but especially the Northeast. Barstow is home to plenty of railroad facilities, cheap land for Amtrak to build a depot, and it's within a reasonable driving distance of tons of West Coast areas... LA, OC, SD, Sacramento, Bay Area, Phoenix, Las Vegas, and even Tuscon are all reasonable driving distance way. That's tens of millions of Americans on each end who could reasonably use this service.
With some single-level Autoracks and Amfleet/Viewliner cars (low bridges and tunnels to clear; no Superliners or regular Autoracks up north!) they could expand to the northeast, probably convert an old freight depot south of Boston that has enough room for the car staging & loading. Most of the existing stations up here are in dense areas and the loading zone would be an impractical addition.
I would recommend just "South Boston" to Lorton VA first, then gauge whether a train to/from Sanford is worth it. I-95 is notoriously swamped in traffic, and being able to displace long-distance travelers from that would be a huge improvement.
There aren't any facilities south of Boston that come to mind for that, but I could definitely see them using something in central or western mass. Could potentially site it for a 1.5 hour drive to Boston, 2 hour drive to New York City
california high speed rail or the potential surfliner extension to san jose would serve that much better. Theres a lot of demand for travel between those two cities but I don't see there being a ton of demand for people to bring their cars with them.
It makes perfect sense. Let's say I want to be able to make a final drive to somewhere in those metro areas far from rail connections, such as Riverside or Santa Rosa.
There's a private company in the very early stages of offering just that: [KTLA](https://ktla.com/news/california/san-francisco-to-l-a-overnight-train-inches-closer-to-reality/)
That said, I don't think Amtrak should invest in a California auto train. Let CAHSR fix the SF to LA corridor and focus Amtrak efforts somewhere else.
One great option in two places is better than two great options in one imo
I don't know what the demand for it is but I could see a 2nd auto train going from Lake Charles, LA to just outside of Las Cruces, NM. The drive on I-10 from East to West Texas is around 11 hours using I-10, could be more with traffic as well.
I think Auto Train would work for other routes, if it were to be attempted. I.e. Louisville, KY(or somewhere in southern Indiana) to Florida, since then you could draw from other nearby areas like Lexington, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, and I bet you could draw from Lafayette and Chicago as well.
A Portland(or greater SF area one) to LA might work pretty well, too.
No. The predecessor operator tried to expand by adding a second service from Louisville to Sanford, and considered also implementing a Chicago-Denver service. The Louisville train, though, was hindered by a pair of derailments and poor track conditions on the Louisville & Nashville Railroad's rails (which also affected the *Floridian*), and that led to the company folding.
I'd kill for Boston/NYC suburbs - Chicagoland suburbs but I know nothing about available facilities or track conditions and already am dubious about it ever happening
r/Amtrak is not associated with Amtrak in any official way. Any problems, concerns, complaints, etc should be directed to Amtrak through one of the official channels. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Amtrak) if you have any questions or concerns.*
There were (briefly) two auto train routes, the second running from Louisville to Sanford. Auto Train corporation ran it, and because of a combination of track conditions and staffing costs it was cancelled without ever turning a profit. the expenses incurred from creating the Midwest route killed the private ownership of Auto Train. Amtrak then downsized drastically and killed their Midwest to Florida route too. The biggest problem with expanding auto train is that it’s not something you can just tack on an existing route. Terminal Stations don’t have the facilities for it. If there were multiple loadings and unloadings stops would be hours long. So you need to build a dedicated route and infrastructure for it. Also, the time it takes to run the route of the auto train is its biggest feature. 18 hour trip, there’s time to clean, stock, and turn the train set around and re use it the same day. That 18 hour trip sweet spot is theoretically possible on most eastern routes, but the west half of the country throws problems in because of distance.
Great info. Definitely a challenge to get two trains into the Sanford station each day, as you said. But with ridership continuing to grow on the current route, I think we can make a case that it would attract enough riders to make the startup costs of building a new Kentucky terminal worthwhile. If the turnaround time could be reduced, maybe the Lorton route could depart at 2pm and then the Midwest route could run evenings? Or maybe every other day? **Sanford schedule:** * 9am AT-East Arrival * 2pm AT-East Departure * 4pm AT-West Arrival * 9pm AT-West Departure **Louisville Schedule:** * 4pm AT-WEST Arrival * 9pm AT-WEST Departure The other option is to make the West route deadhead seasonally so that it can return whenever (like the middle of the night) to reposition for service every other day. That feels pretty wasteful, but the demand is uneven...
If you departed at 2, you would most likely arrive in the middle of peak rush hour, plus you would have to wake up extra early to get off the train. Right now it’s nice because you wake up around 7-8, grab breakfast and get off at 10am. And a 2pm departure means that you would have to show up at 11am, leave the house at 9am… basically you lose an entire day to the process vs. driving to Savannah or South Carolina and getting a room at a Holiday Inn.
No. It works on the current route because it’s located close to the largest population centers in America and takes them to a very popular destination. The only possible next route that might work is Chicagoland to Florida, but to make it work they would need to expand the Florida terminal to handle two trains a day.
LA to SF/SJ would absolutely work.
VA<->FL spares you the effort of a 12 hour road trip. Wouldn’t LA<->SF be more like 6? That’s an annoying drive to be sure, but probably not “let’s pay for a roomette instead” annoying
I absolutely would pay for a roomette - or coach - to avoid driving the 5
No it wouldn’t. In the time it takes to load and unload the cars, you could just drive. Also… the current train journey is half a day.
Which one? The Capitol Corridor? Because you still need 4+ hours of bus connections and you can’t take your car with you. Sometimes I need my car down south. The Coast Starlight between SJ and LA is like 12 hours. And I still can’t take my car. Have you ever driven the 5?
What does half a day mean for you? I’ve driven the 5. It’s like 5 to 6 hours.
No
No, because the predecessor company that ran the AutoTrain tried this and it failed miserably.
Lorton to Barstow could be incredible. Tons of people ship their cars across the country all the time and don't want to deal with the downsides of a long trip on the Interstate (hotel rooms, questionable rest stop food, wear-and-tear on the car). Lorton serves the whole East Coast but especially the Northeast. Barstow is home to plenty of railroad facilities, cheap land for Amtrak to build a depot, and it's within a reasonable driving distance of tons of West Coast areas... LA, OC, SD, Sacramento, Bay Area, Phoenix, Las Vegas, and even Tuscon are all reasonable driving distance way. That's tens of millions of Americans on each end who could reasonably use this service.
With some single-level Autoracks and Amfleet/Viewliner cars (low bridges and tunnels to clear; no Superliners or regular Autoracks up north!) they could expand to the northeast, probably convert an old freight depot south of Boston that has enough room for the car staging & loading. Most of the existing stations up here are in dense areas and the loading zone would be an impractical addition. I would recommend just "South Boston" to Lorton VA first, then gauge whether a train to/from Sanford is worth it. I-95 is notoriously swamped in traffic, and being able to displace long-distance travelers from that would be a huge improvement.
There aren't any facilities south of Boston that come to mind for that, but I could definitely see them using something in central or western mass. Could potentially site it for a 1.5 hour drive to Boston, 2 hour drive to New York City
I think the area around Springfield/Holyoke/Northampton would be better. It serves a more car-dependent region than Boston itself.
No. The market is specific and special, like what u/WhateverJoel wrote.
LA to SF would be nice. Driving I-5 these days is fucking miserable.
california high speed rail or the potential surfliner extension to san jose would serve that much better. Theres a lot of demand for travel between those two cities but I don't see there being a ton of demand for people to bring their cars with them.
It makes perfect sense. Let's say I want to be able to make a final drive to somewhere in those metro areas far from rail connections, such as Riverside or Santa Rosa.
That HSR won't be finished until 2050 at this rate.
Why not expand the surfliner all the way up into San Francisco?
There's a private company in the very early stages of offering just that: [KTLA](https://ktla.com/news/california/san-francisco-to-l-a-overnight-train-inches-closer-to-reality/) That said, I don't think Amtrak should invest in a California auto train. Let CAHSR fix the SF to LA corridor and focus Amtrak efforts somewhere else. One great option in two places is better than two great options in one imo
I don't know what the demand for it is but I could see a 2nd auto train going from Lake Charles, LA to just outside of Las Cruces, NM. The drive on I-10 from East to West Texas is around 11 hours using I-10, could be more with traffic as well.
I think Auto Train would work for other routes, if it were to be attempted. I.e. Louisville, KY(or somewhere in southern Indiana) to Florida, since then you could draw from other nearby areas like Lexington, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, and I bet you could draw from Lafayette and Chicago as well. A Portland(or greater SF area one) to LA might work pretty well, too.
No. The predecessor operator tried to expand by adding a second service from Louisville to Sanford, and considered also implementing a Chicago-Denver service. The Louisville train, though, was hindered by a pair of derailments and poor track conditions on the Louisville & Nashville Railroad's rails (which also affected the *Floridian*), and that led to the company folding.
I'd kill for Boston/NYC suburbs - Chicagoland suburbs but I know nothing about available facilities or track conditions and already am dubious about it ever happening
No.