With rising fuel costs and concerns about my carbon footprint, I decided to take the train on a recent business trip. Although I've often used high speed trains in Europe and Japan, riding the rails in America outside the Northeast corridor promised a new adventure.
When visiting the East Coast I often use Amtrak to traverse the Northeast corridor between Boston and Washington, D.C., instead of flying the air shuttles or driving the toll roads of I-95. The Acela Express and even the regional trains on those routes are often quicker than flying or driving, particularly if your origin and destination are within the city centers.
Train travel also bypasses the hassles and rigors of airport security and traffic-clogged highways. There are no middle seats, no seat belts, no forbidden electronic devices, no fuel surcharges, no fees for seat selection, no liquids ban, and train seats offer far greater comfort and personal space than any economy seat in the sky. Snacks and full course meals are available for purchase and the relative serenity of the railroad car provides an uninterrupted environment for working, sleeping, reading, iPod listening or DVD viewing on the entire length of the journey.
In inclement weather, when the air shuttles are grounded, I often see commuters dashing for the airport exits, heading to the train station and the prospect of getting to their destinations that same evening. The trains are often still running long after the airports have closed and snow and ice have blanketed the roads. The two-and-a-half-hour Acela trip between New York and Washington, or four hours between New York and Boston, is hard to beat. That's why Amtrak carries 27,000 passengers each day in the Northeast corridor and carries nearly half of the air/rail passengers between New York and Boston and more than 60% of the air/rail passengers between New York and Washington, D.C., according to Amtrak spokesman Cliff Black.
But that is only the Northeast corridor. In California, where I reside, and most other parts of the country, Amtrak is a completely different product offering. In the Northeast, trains attain operating speeds of 125 to 150 miles per hour, according to Black. On the 423-mile stretch between Oakland and Los Angeles aboard Amtrak's daily Coast Starlight train, the scheduled travel time is more than 13 hours. Though the train reaches 79 miles per hour on some segments, the average speed on this day-long marathon ranges between 25 to 35 miles per hour.
Slow travel speeds are caused by a combination of mountainous terrain and sharing the tracks with freight trains. Outside the Northeast corridor, freight railroads generally own the tracks. In most places double tracks have been removed because they are too costly to maintain. As a result Amtrak must continually wait on sidings for other trains to pass, and the freight trains operated by the host railroads that own the tracks often take priority over passenger trains.
My train sat for what seemed like hours at many places along the way and at one point was delayed 30 minutes after we rammed a shopping cart someone left on the tracks. With all these impediments it is no wonder few business travelers use Amtrak outside the Northeast corridor.
Nonetheless I packed my laptop and lots of reading for my 26-hour round trip. At $55, my one-way Amtrak ticket was comparable to the most heavily discounted airfares on that same route. The $8, 10-minute taxi ride from Union Station to my downtown Los Angeles hotel was far more convenient and substantially less expensive than a shuttle, taxi, or rental car from any Los Angeles area airport, not to mention the frustration of navigating L.A.'s overcrowded freeways.
I was also pleasantly surprised to learn that Amtrak offered free parking at my home station, saving me as much as $100 in airport parking or taxi/shuttle costs during my one-week trip. The Hertz car I rented for $39/day at the Sheraton Hotel in downtown L.A. cost far less than the $70/day I would have paid for the same car at LAX or Burbank Airport with the exorbitant fees and surcharges now imposed on car rentals at many major U.S. airports.
Besides slow travel times, there is only one through train per day between the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles vs. hundreds of flights serving the eight airports in both metro areas. Developing a dedicated high speed rail link would likely encourage more business travelers, but at what cost?
Besides speed and frequency, there were other downsides to my train trip. By the time the Coast Starlight arrives in Los Angeles, the downtown car rental facilities are already closed for the night. Amtrak offers several other options between Oakland and Los Angeles but they involve changing between train and bus en route. The bus/train combination reduces travel times by several hours, but the thought of changing en route to a much more confining and uncomfortable bus held little appeal for me.
Unlike many U.S. airlines, Amtrak won't charge you for two checked bags, but not all trains accept checked luggage. A colleague had to retrieve the bags he'd checked from Los Angeles to Chicago and carry them on board his connecting train to Detroit because that train didn't offer checked luggage service.
Consistency is also an issue aboard Amtrak's long distance trains. I was delighted to discover an abundance of electrical outlets on my outbound train to L.A. But on my return, the coaches had not been refurbished and electrical outlets were scarce, a huge impediment to travelers counting on laptops and other battery driven devices to be productive during such a long trip.
Overall, riding Amtrak was a pleasant experience and I'd do it again … time permitting. Plus it felt good to do something – however small – for the environment, as Amtrak is 17% more fuel efficient than air travel and 21% more fuel efficient than automobile travel, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.
Amid rising fuel prices Amtrak ridership increased by 12% in the past 10 months, and that growth will likely continue as fuel prices climb, but until this country invests in high speed rail, travel times will remain long, frequencies will remain few, and most business travelers will opt for the plane or automobile.