December
1996General Membership Meeting, January 25th, 1997, at 1pm.
After a derailment early Saturday morning on the Gila (Main) Line between Piedra and Sentinel AZ, Friday's (11/15/96) Amtrak #2, the eastbound Sunset Limited from Los Angeles, was held at Yuma. Passengers were moved via bus to Phoenix Union Station and onward to their destinations.
The trainset apparently stayed at Yuma for over a day and then came eastward as a deadhead move, crossing the Phoenix West Line late Sunday morning (11/17/96) and stopping for a crew change in Phoenix Arizona at about 1:30PM.
A fatigued rail joiner was blamed for the derailment; a transient riding the freight train lost his life.
This is the second time in as many months that a derailment has forced trains to be rerouted over the Phoenix West Line.
Related News: Phoenix West Line Update
- Rob Bohannan
I attended the Phoenix transit forum the evening of October 21. I hope all of you who are residents of Phoenix, were able to attend one of these.
Upon entering the room and signing in, each participant was handed a device like a TV remote with a key pad on it. Each device had a "number" (I was "39").
At the front of the room, a screen was set up. A projection TV device was set up to show either a video or a computer screen. First, a nine minute video was shown, following a verbal "disclaimer," in which it was explained that, in previous fora, the video had been "misinterpreted" as a sales pitch! It was, he assured us, meant only for "informational purposes." When the video was shown, I saw what was meant. It was so pro-rail, it could have been produced by ARPA. The video contrasted Phoenix traffic jams with pleasant scenes of persons boarding the "Coaster" (just like ours does).
Anyway, after the video was shown, the projection switched to the computer mode, and we were given a series of "A or B" type questions. Example: Which is more important: Passenger Rail Service or more left turn signals?
Thirty-six of these choices were given covering a range of issues the city wanted to touch on. One voted by pressing numbers as indicated on the "remote." The device communicated with the computer is a "cellular" fashion from anywhere in the room. The computer "knew" whose votes had registered, and listed the missing numbers on the screen so that the facilitator could hassle those who were taking too long to vote and/or send someone to see if they were having technical problems. When the dust settled, the computer compared all the responses on the spot.
As you may have read or heard, rail came out on top, as it has consistently at all the fora. In our case rail tied with "more buses and more routes" as most important. However, people were more willing to spend tax dollars on rail than anything else.
According to the Arizona Republic, of the 310 persons who attended Phoenix' transit fora, "More buses" was ranked most important by about 72%, with "Rail" a close second at about 68%.
In addition to these respondents, 1,007 returned comment cards. The paper reports: "'I cannot remember an issue where we had 1,000 people write in,' said an incredulous Councilwoman Peggy Bilsten."
As for taxes, support for a ½ cent sales tax was strong (68%) for buses and dial-a-ride improvements, again closely followed by the addition of rail (64%). The Republic also reports that "one oddity… was the high number of people [52%] who had never taken a city bus" - the strongly pro-transit results emphasize even further that people want to get out of their cars, but currently have little choice.
In related news, Phoenix Channel 5 KPHO (CBS) on October 22's 10pm News presented the results of a call-in survey and also announced that results of Valley-wide Transit Forums would determine the future course of transit planning.
The results of the survey were:
89% Mass transit critically needed 5% Somewhat needed 5% Not required
Effective November 10th, the Thruway bus connecting Phoenix with Tucson and the Sunset Limited no longer stops in Tempe, home of Arizona State University. The depot there, renovated by the City at their own expense, will no longer be used as a passenger station.
But Tempe is not alone. Read what Mineola, Texas, mayor Celia Boswell testified before Congress on September 10: "It took us six years to get a stop. It came April 14. We had a big celebration April 29. Then on August 8, I got a phone call from Amtrak…"
In spite of this recent cutback, bus-train connections could soon be getting much better; read on:
From an Amtrak press release: "Improved connections between intercity trains and intercity motor coaches -- and a new spirit of cooperation -- are being announced by Amtrak and Greyhound Lines, Inc.
"The two companies, while in some instances serving similar markets, have determined they can provide improved services and increased connectivity for customers by joining efforts…
"Some of the schedules announced by Amtrak and Greyhound put cities on the Amtrak route map that have been without direct rail service for many years, such as Louisville, Ky., and Macon, Ga. Other schedules provide service along routes where trains run less than daily, such as between Chicago, Indianapolis and Cincinnati."
Says Thomas Downs, Amtrak President, Chairman and CEO, "We are able to use existing Greyhound schedules to bring more cities into the Amtrak and Greyhound systems by making changes as small as providing Greyhound stops at rail passenger stations."
According to the Arizona Republic (November 25th, 1996) the Greyhound station in Phoenix has moved from its former downtown location to 22nd Street, near the airport. A new station will be built to replace the current temporary shelter. This location is only about half a mile from the SP (UP) railroad tracks.
courtesy The Arkansas Association of Railroad Passengers
[The Texas Eagle is combined with the Sunset Limited west of San Antonio TX - Ed.] All reservations for the Texas Eagle were purged in early August 1996, after Amtrak made the (ill-advised) decision to kill this route. The train inventory was not restored until early October, after Congressional action provided a six month reprieve for the Eagle and other "hit list" trains.
The SOT [Status of Train] report for Train #22 of November 24 shows the following advance reservations as of today, October 28: Coach ridership peaks first at Temple, TX with 242 coach passengers on board, and again north of Texarkana with 240 coach passengers. Sleeping car passengers peak north of Longview, TX with 88 passengers. These numbers represent a totally sold out train, both coach and sleeper, and in fact this number of coach passengers probably represents standee conditions with the three coaches Amtrak assigns to this train.
This strong ridership is typical of Thanksgiving travel on many trains, but it is particularly noteworthy on the Texas Eagle this year given Amtrak's mishandling of the route. The fact that the train has sold out from a point of zero inventory in less than four weeks is an excellent validation of the healthy demand for rail passenger service on this route. Amtrak management would do well to utilize all available equipment to capitalize on this demand, rather than fabricating reasons for retiring otherwise serviceable ex-Santa Fe high-level coaches.
Read the entire article on the Arkansas Rail site
Here are a few other changes from the November 10 timetable:
As the discussion of what to do about or growing "brown cloud" continues in Metro Phoenix, take a look at some facts presented by the Chicago Tribune.
"Whatever happened to the American gas-guzzling automobile? Look around. The lean and efficient cars created by demans of government and marketplace get better gas mileage than the magnificent metallic whales they replaced… yet they still drink more gas.
"…Since 1970, the population of Illinois has increased by about 7.75 percent, but in that same period, gasoline consumption in the state has gone up 22.5 percent."
The reason, say authors Peter Kendall and Larry Washburn, is that Illinoisans are driving far more than before the energy crises of the '70's:
"In 1970, there were 5,722 miles driven per person annually in Illinois, By 1995, that figure had rises to 9,867."
Here in Arizona, the figures surely are similar. Suburban sprawl, the lack of walkable neighborhoods, and the low levels of transit available all contribute.
The Tribune article suggests that improving streets, mass transit, and other infrastructure in our cities and close-in suburbs will make them more attractive to business and prospective residents. With residential units currently springing up in downtown Phoenix, improved bus service in Tempe, and the possibilities of some sort of rail system here looking better than in many years, we can but wait, hope, and do our best to help this State overcome our automobile dependency.
The Amtrak cuts which were to have taken effect on November 10th have been postponed. The Texas Eagle, Pioneer, and Desert Wind were "saved" by Congressional action - but only for six months. After that time, look for their discontinuance. In the meanwhile the trains which were to have gone to daily service remain at their previous levels. To sell space on the trains which had been cancelled but now were again running, Amtrak ran a half-price sale; however, it canceled all reservations on the trains which were to have gone daily. Does this seem like a good way to attract customers?
"The 1995 Amtrak route cutback plan has proven to be a costly failure. Amtrak now admits that cutting trains like the Empire Builder to less than daily service costs more revenue, sometimes much more revenue, than it saves in costs avoided. WE TOLD THEM THAT, for free; Mercer [not for free] told them otherwise...
"They didn't know that route eliminations and less-than-daily frequencies on well-patronized long haul routes cut revenues faster and deeper than they cut costs. These trains almost always produce a net positive cash flow based on their own operating costs. The fixed costs which Amtrak arbitrarily allocates against these trains do not abate when individual routes are cut, they just get reallocated to the remaining trains.
"They didn't know that route cutbacks had been tried before, and almost always failed. Cancellation of the InterAmerican in 1979 ended up costing Amtrak more than $10,000,000 a year in net losses… Cutting the Empire Builder in February 1995 to 4-day a week service west of St. Paul cost Amtrak more than 100,000 customers - high revenue long distance customers - and more than $25,000,000 in lost revenues.
"As long ago as 1966-67, the Western Pacific Railroad's analysis of the losses it was incurring with the original California Zephyr showed the WP that cutting the train to three or four day a week operation wouldn't help - they would lose most of the off-days' revenues, and avoid some direct operating expense, but would eliminate none of their passenger infrastructure costs. Even in a crisis that threatened the solvency of the whole company, the WP wisely chose not to cut the frequency of the train.
"Now, Amtrak has learned the lesson, again, that it can't starve itself into prosperity. One of its senior managers said this summer that they now understand that to be involved in any market, they have to be there on a daily basis. Better late than never that they come to this understanding.
"Another Amtrak official told the press that they had learned that people wouldn't arbitrarily change their travel plans to fit Amtrak's limited services."
"In late August, San Francisco was forced to shut down its Central Freeway to repair damage from the 1989 earthquake, but traffic chaos predicted by California road engineers failed to materialize. Instead, there were fewer cars on the road.
"In the weeks before the closure, Caltrans officials scrambled to set up commuter hotlines, eliminate on-street parking along alternative routes, and hire additional traffic police for key intersections in the affected areas. Caltrans' Bay Area Director of Operations Paul Hensley predicted bumper-to-bumper traffic for 45 miles east across the Bay Bridge and south of San Francisco.
"Yet according to a 9/24 L.A. Times piece, Caltrans officials are now trying to explain a decrease in rush hour traffic along several major corridors.
"New Yorkers encountered the same phenomenon when the West Side Highway fell down in 1973, and when 'deferred' maintenance caused the closure of the Williamsburg Bridge in 1988. Neither instance caused serious traffic problems.
"British transportation officials concluded recently that new highways create additional traffic, and that many government road building schemes were therefore of dubious value. It also stands to reason that less road capacity will discourage some car trips.
"Highway officials in the U.S. may not even consider these questions, but instances such as these cast doubt on continuing highway construction here.
"Regardless of where all the San Francisco cars went, many residents are content to know that the city hasn't ground to a halt without the Central Freeway. With the removal several years ago of the waterfront Embarcadero Freeway (also due to earthquake damage) and the subsequent revitalization of the area with pedestrian space and a light rail line, residents in the path of the Central Freeway are hoping the same could be possible in their neighborhood."
May 4th through the 15th, 1997: Train tour of England starts and ends in London, through much of the country. From steam to modern Inter-City. $2,995 per person double occupancy includes tax-deductible contribution. Contact ITS Travel 602/949-7171.