I traveled 6/26-27 Dallas-St. Louis on the Texas Eagle. Husband was out of the country, so my three children and I got psyched about trying something new. Train was an hour late to Dallas. You all warned me about that, and we were not in a hurry and as advised, planned nothing for the morning of our arrival. I was a little annoyed that all information, calling and internet, assured us that even though the train was running an hour late, it would likely make up the time. SOOOO we arrived and waited and waited, not the worst but would have loved more honest info (found out later that it was the full hour late into Ft. Worth, no way to make it up at that point-we would have rather waited the extra hour at home....).

Agents at Dallas were helpful enough. Reading others trip reports warned me that the cabin attendant makes all the difference. Therefore the disappointment. We boarded to a seemingly indifferent attendant. The steps up to our rooms were sticky and dirty. Our rooms were dirty and the connecting door was not open as requested at ticketing. Shower floor area of one room had toilet paper dried to the drain and stuck in corners in one bathroom, yuck. Sheets and linens were very clean. Windows, carpet, under seats, bathroom floors, and one sink were dirty.

After departing I asked Gloria if we might get the door opened between the rooms, heavy sigh and moaning that "that takes a special key and I will have to go all the way to the front of the train." Having two children in that room, I couldn't back down, so I told her we'd look forward to her return and could we do anything to help? Another heavy sigh and she handed me two slips of paper, marked 6:45. "These are your dinner times." I asked if we shouldn't get to choose our times.....? "No, this is what he gave me." No need to make a stink so we went with it. While "dining" 30 minutes later she stopped to tell us "they are working on it." I appreciated the update.

Dinner: Not much different than current first class airplane food. I thought it would be noticably better. Attendant in the dining car was wonderful though. Her attitude made up for the pretty bad food. Interestly, she seemed was very appreciative of our tip, which was suprising. Kids ordered the "special"-Chicken Fried Steak. I had cod filets. Would not order either again. I heard later, from regulars and Gloria, that the chicken and the pork chops are much better, oh well. Dessert was good, except the fruit, which is from a can! I had never tasted canned melon, another yuck!

12 and 9 year old thought rooms were pretty neat especially once connected. We took off our shoes and settled in. Within 10 minutes the bottoms of our feet were black. Didn't know to bring lots of sock/slipper changes. Thanks to whoever recommends bringing wet wipes!

Lounge attendant was wonderful, lounge areas were really dated. The three coach cars were 1/2 full. Two looked older, one was pretty nice. Most passengers were friendly. When waiting near the downstairs door in the last coach car (because that was the door that was going to open at our next stop) my children were cussed at violently by a "lady" in the front row. She was laying across two seats and they couldn't see her therefore had no idea someone was sleeping there. She seemed to believe the area was her bedroom and behaved poorly in front of children. Otherwise everyone was great!

I had to convince the room attendant that she actually could (and should because it is one of the selling points of the sleeping rooms) bring us room service in the morning. We figured it couldn't taste worse from a plastic box, than from a plastic plate. I wrote out the order and told her she could bring it at her convienence.

The beds were suprisingly comfortable. We slept pretty well. I slept better than I have ever slept in a plane (even in the lay-flat beds). That was the greatest part of the trip. We arrived into St. Louis about an hour and a half late. Didn't matter to us.

We tipped our attendant, who didn't seem to particularly appriciate it. She grew on me, maybe just fimiliarity, but it was still hard to tip for a cabin that was not very well cleaned and services that were some work to obtain.

Overall, Amtrak over promised and under delivered BUT it was interesting. Not a good value for the money, but that wasn't what we were going for. Just over $1000 for 4 people to get to sleep on a train. 16 hours vs. 2 hours on a plane. Being rocked to sleep was wonderful...but kind of pricey.

I was curious about the difference between employees. Some were wonderful, some pitiful. The good and the bad were all ages. Are the good ones new and they just can't get rid of the bad? Or do they start out here and leave for other hospitality businesses? I admit, cabin-attendant seems like a tough job-when do they rest? If they had cleaning help it might improve the look of things and people willing to pay for it might become repeat users and Amtrak would be ahead. I don't think "donating" more tax dollars is the answer. If my cabin attendant had taken more pride in her cabin we would have been more satisfied. I want to say we will try it again, but I'm not sure. The other sleeping car may have offered a completely different experience. I am glad we gave it a try.

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Great report! I love trains but have only been on overnight trains in Europe or Canada (and 20-30 years ago at that!).

Your report gives a nicely detailed picture of the experience -- thanks for taking the time to post. ^^

-C

Thanks for the report! I have my first overnight Amtrak journey coming up in a few days, New Orleans to Los Angeles on the Sunset Limited. Of course I'm going into it with the attitude that it's an adventure, and that I'm not going to let anything really ruin the trip. I know the Sunset is almost always late, the food has been downgraded significantly, the equipment is not as maintained as well as it should be, and the staff isn't always the most pleasant. Still, I'm mainly looking for the chance to get the experience of taking an overnight, cross-country train in a sleeper compartment, something I've always wanted to do. And this is really a mini-vacation and break from work where I want to be able to relax, catch up on some pleasure reading, watch a couple of DVDs, and maybe meet a few new people, all while I watch the world go by.

Thanks for the good report; it basically embodies the inconsistency one can expect on Amtrak. There are great trips and bad trips, but usually somewhere in between. I always tell first-timers: Don't expect a cruise ship, and don't expect Greyhound!

Would you agree that we should create a free market and stop "donating" tax dollars to aviation infrastructure (which underwrites the losses of the pitiful airline industry) and crumbling interstate highways (which is a de facto subsidy for trucking and autos)? Could it possibly be that Amtrak is weak because it's survived as a political football, always getting just enough public investment to squeek by, but never any long-term vision or sustainable financing?

I just returned from Japan, where Japan Railways were regionally privatized... only after an $80 billion public investment. Just maybe, that might have contributed to the quality and quantity of the world-class Shinkansen and local rail services I enjoyed?

Sprite,

Thanks for your trip report, it�s always nice to hear about Amtrak trips good and bad ones. I�ve got a few quick comments just to clarify a few points and not necessarily to excuse the bad things that you encountered.

First, those tentative arrival times are computer generated based upon various factors, including what�s called padding. For example in your case at Dallas, Amtrak allows 35 minutes for the train to go from Dallas to Fort Worth. However, going the other way Fort Worth to Dallas they allow 1 hour for the same trip. I�ve no doubt that the computer was counting on that extra 25 minutes to get the train closer to an on time arrival. I can only assume that yet another delay was encountered and that extra time was eaten up by that delay.

That said, a good rule is, if the train is running 1 hour or less late, expect that it could arrive on time. More than 1 hour, expect that at best it will make up one hour.

Next the sticky stairs are something that your attendant should have and could have fixed. However, the mess in your bedrooms in particular the bathrooms, was the failure of the cleaning crew in San Antonio. That was not her fault, she is only responsible for making up the beds and ensuring that clean linen is on them. On the other hand, she does have some means to try and clean them if you point out the problem to her. But don�t blame her for their condition, that wasn�t her failure.

Her heavy sigh upon asking for the connecting door to be opened was uncalled for, and she should have had the key on her ring. I�ve got to wonder why she didn�t.

Turning to dinner times, if you had boarded before 3:30 � 4:00 PM, then you would have gotten your pick of times by and large. However since you were boarding later, what happens is the dining car steward who walks through the sleeping cars to take reservations from the passengers, then asks the attendant how many people they have boarding further down the line during the diner hour.

The Steward then gives the attendant reservation slips for those passengers, using whatever times he/she has open at that point, while paying attention to the expected boarding times of those passengers. Once that�s done, the Steward then visits the coaches for anyone there who would like to make a reservation. Coach passengers usually get the worst times. So had your attendant not secured the 6:46 seating for you, you might well have been stuck with a 9:00 PM seating.

Turning to breakfast, again she shouldn�t have needed convincing, that was just laziness on her part. She knows that it is her job to do that if asked. I will admit that it does place an extra burden on her especially with a large family and many attendants use the time while people are at breakfast to make up the room for seating and get the linens changed for arrival into the last station.

As for the differences between employee attitudes, based upon my observations, age seems to have no bearing on things. I�ve seen good and bad at all ages, it all comes down to the person themselves IMHO.

Alan, Your experience helps explain the small problems. As far as the room service breakfast goes, I did tip her as I would have the diner attendant and let her know she could bring it as early as she wanted (which she did). I'm still curious if you, or anyone else, think(s) the more steller employees are newer or older? I guess I am hoping that attitude is getting better, not worse. I didn't mean age of employee, I meant years of service on Amtrak. All said, I would not recommend somebody not try the train! It was an experience quite out of the ordinary and will be a special memory for the kids. Thanks for clarification on some train travel idiosyncrasies!

Thanks for the great trip report! It was helpful and enlightening to me, in that it convinced me never to take an overnight train in the US, especially since I can fly. I did my adventures in Europe... no need to satisfy any curiosity here ^

Amtrak staff varies considerably across the map. Sometimes, you get good teams that work regularly together. Other times you have a few good ones and a few indifferent ones.

One rule of thumb seems to be that some employees are not inclined to do more than the minimum, because that will be frowned upon by coworkers. So, even motivated newer employees can quickly become drones. It takes a special employee to ignore those pressures. I.e. "if you bring breakfast to Room 8 in your car, then somebody will want me to bring breakfast to their room, too". As if that was the end of the world!

Amtrak workers are unionized and are generally paid well. Thus, they do not rely on tips as a significant part of their income. What likely happens is that some passengers will tip even with poor service because of the novelty of their trip. Others will not tip even with great service. So, the worker tends to see little or no correlation between the service provided and the tips given.

Anyone planning a long distance trip these days does need to mentally prepare for it, and to have sufficient flexibility to deal with late-running trains. Many times late trains bring other problems with them....crabby crews who have worked long hours, and slim supplies and strained equipment with failures and cleanliness issues.

With all of this kept in mind, a long distance train trip can still be a decent travel experience. Indeed, with advance psychological preparation, it may turn out much better than expected. But....

Good point. People often point to the so-called "money losing" Amtrak yet shell out BILLIONS for fixin' every single street from their driveway on and all the airports.

One statistic I heard is that the billions spent on one highway projecdt - the big dig - could have paid for Amtrak's entire history!

Or the federal subsidies given airlines (in terms of airport construction, FAA, pilot training via the air force- an oft' overlooked subsidy- etc. comes out to $30 billion a year, what Amtrak has been given in three decades.

As a traveler, I want ALL forms of transportation to get their fair share so ALL can be of use!

That will be a good trip. There's some good scenery in west Texas.

Unfortunately, the railroad that owns the tracks - the U.P. - chokes the line up with freights. Guess what happens! Amtrak trains are often put on the siding and made horribly late.

But guess who gets the blame for the tardiness.

Just understand that the private railroad owners for the most part dislike Amtrak and the country's political leaders won't fund it so you get what you pay for.

Thanks. Yeah, I was totally aware of the chronic lateness of the Sunset Limited and that it's UP, not Amtrak, that is responsible for that.

So this afternoon I arrived at Los Angeles Union Station after making the trip. Overall, it was a very enjoyable journey. My Superliner Roomette was quite comfortable for one person. The sleeping car attendant was friendly, and while he didn't go above and beyond the call of duty, my bed was always promptly made in the evening when I was ready, and both mornings when I returned from the shower it was put away. The sleeping car was fairly clean, although it could have been better; but it was far nicer than the coach cars I walked through.

I loved the interesting mix of passengers of all ethnic backgrounds and educational and income levels. I met some fascinating people of all ages. One common question was "Why do you take the train?" The answers varied greatly -- some couldn't afford to fly, others wanted a long, relaxing journey where time wasn't an issue, others were die-hard "rail fans." But regardless of socio-economic status, race, age, etc. -- all seemed to have a strong desire to see Amtrak improve, and for the government to provide the support necessary to make long-distance travel by rail more accessible and more feasible, with better schedules, more frequency, and more routes. This seemed to be the case regardless of political affiliation too. I met some very conservative passengers who totally disagree with what the current President and Congress has been doing to Amtrak over the last few years. For once, my liberal-minded self found something to agree with these die-hard Bush fans on.

Food service was fine. Nothing I had was really bad, and a couple of items were rather good. The dining car staff made the best of the current situation, although the lady in charge of the dining car did not hesitate to tell the story of "Simplified Dining" and the mandate from Congress concerning cutting food costs to anyone who commented that the food was not what it used to be. Last night our server did steer me away from ordering the cod and toward the chicken, which turned out to be very tasty. Apparently the cod is very salty and has been getting lots of complaints. The worst meal I had was breakfast this morning. The omelet was OK, but I've had better in first class on airlines. Of the three sausage patties on my plate, one was very good, but the other two were bland. I found this odd; would have thought they all came from the same source. Overall, the chef did a very good job with what he was given to work with. Every plate that came out was attractively presented and the food service was far better than I expected based on some of the reviews and photos I found online before the trip.

The biggest complaint I heard over and over again was the lack of the lounge car. People missed having a place to socialize beside their seats, having movies, and having a larger snack bar/lounge area. There was a small snack bar in the lower level of one of the coaches, but it was very inadequate.

As for being late... We left New Orleans Wednesday morning right on schedule. We had a few short delays between New Orleans and Lafayette, but never more than 10-15 minutes. We were only about half an hour late pulling into Houston, and only about 15 minutes late departing Houston. Overnight there were a few delays that had us late getting into San Antonio, but we pulled out right on time. Things moved along great until mid-morning when a few stops for passing freight traffic started to put us behind schedule. By that evening, we were about 90 minutes late getting to El Paso. But this was nothing compared to what was to come today. I slept through all this, but during the night, we had major delays between Demming, NM and Tuscon. When I woke up about 6:00 AM, we were just outside Maricopa, AZ, and running about five hours late. Several times we stopped between Yuma and Palm Springs for freight traffic, adding to the delays. After we finally cleared Palm Springs, it got very slow again and by the time we arrived at Ontario, we were running about six hours late. We made good time from Ontario to Los Angeles, but there were still a lot of upset passengers. At Palm Springs those who had bus connections from LA to Bakersfield were taken off and put on a bus directly to Bakersfield. Other passengers who had train connections at LA were being told to call Amtrak Reservations to be accommodated.

I realize the delays are beyond Amtrak's control, and that Amtrak really has almost no support in the current administration in Washington to put pressure on the freight railroads concerning this issue. However, it seems like they could impose some sort of fine structure that penalizes the freight operators for not clearing Amtrak trains through with higher priority. Additionally, Amtrak could do a better job of managing passenger expectations with regards to the schedule. For a route like the Sunset Limited, which is almost always several hours late, it would make sense to me that Amtrak studies where the delays are occurring, and adjusts the schedule to allow for more time between station stops where delays are common. This would at least provide a schedule that's more realistic, and keep passengers from scheduling connections that look good on the schedule but in reality are almost never possible to make. This part of the equation is under Amtrak's control. At breakfast this morning I sat with a couple that was saying they had never taken an overnight Amtrak train before, and never would again because they had missed train connections going both ways on their trip due to the Sunset Limited being several hours late. They had paid for a bedroom on the train, and were on a round trip from LA to Arkansas, so they were on a pretty high fare. I don't blame them for being frustrated. But the frustration level could have been decreased had Amtrak managed their expectations by publishing a schedule that accurately reflects when a train should be at a certain point, rather than a schedule that could only be adhered to if Amtrak had more control over dispatching trains on the freight routes.

Overall, it was a very enjoyable trip, and I would definitely do it again. I fly all the time, but this was a nice change, and I saw a lot of the country that I'd flown over countless times but never really seen up close before. It also made me an even bigger believer in the need for a high quality, efficient national passenger rail system. I'm not convinced that Amtrak in its current incarnation is capable of delivering on that idea... there's a lot that is good with Amtrak, but there's a lot that's very broken as well. I realize that Amtrak has had its strings jerked around in a thousand different directions by the President and Congress for over three decades now, and that's why it's in the shape it's in now. The current environment makes it almost impossible for Amtrak to succeed. No amount of "simplified dining" with pre-cooked food, reduced dining car staff, and disposable plates and cups will make up for the fact that Amtrak lacks a clear vision of where it should be going, has some poor executive management, is overly burdened with unionized employee groups and negative labor relations, and is underfunded by an administration that would prefer to see it cease to exist. I'd love to see Amtrak fixed, but I don't think our "leadership" in Washington has the know-how to fix it even if they weren't trying to kill it off. I will be writing my Congressional representatives to tell them my experience in traveling nearly 2,000 miles on Amtrak this week. I doubt it will make a difference, but at least I'll feel like I've done my part to preserve, and improve, passenger rail service in the US.

I do hope long-distance rail travel will still be around for me to take another trip like this one in the future. As I said, I was going into this with the idea that it would be an adventure, and without any time constraints that would cause the trip to be ruined if we were several hours late. Within that frame of mind, the trip was actually better than I had expected it to be, and I am very glad I spent nearly 54 hours of my week on the train.

I knew that "in the future" that they planned to eliminate the lounge car and combine the dining car and lounge car into one car, but I didn't realize that they have eliminated the lounge car already!

Actually, Amtrak has made adjustments to the schedule for the SL already. Because of the chronic delays, the schedule added (IIRC) 8 hours eastbound and 6 hours westbound.

The eastbound departure from LA used to depart at around 10 or 11 PM. Now it departs around 2 PM, eliminating any chance of a connection from the CS from the north!

Only the Sunset Limited has had the lounge car eliminated so far, and it had nothing to do with the plan that Amtrak calls Diner Lite. That plan, Diner Lite, combines the lounge car and the dining car into one car. The Sunset Limited is still running with a full dining car. The lounge, as noted by Ssullivan, was in the bottom of a coach car. Amtrak has a few of these coach cars that were built for short haul runs, with cafe facilities on the lower level.

I heard nothing on a time table for the implementation of Diner Lite so far, thankfully. It may still be coming, or it may be that Amtrak is waiting to see what SDS (Simplified Dining System), which reduced staffing in the dining cars, saves in terms of money.

I do know that 2 cars have come out of Beach Grove (Amtrak's heavy maintenance/rebuild facility), rebuilt for Diner Lite. But two is not enough to impliment the plan, and those 2 came out several months ago. I haven't heard that any more are actually under construction.

Since the freight RR's are private companies, Amtrak cannot impose penalties for late trains. It would take an act of Congress to do that, and even then I'd bet that the Supreme Court would overturn any such law passed. Congress should not have let the Freight RR's out of the clause that Amtrak ran under for its first 25 years, where the freight RR's had to run passenger services on time.

However, when Amtrak's original agreement with the freight RR's came up for renewal after the first 25 years, Congress let that provision expire.

Now that said, Amtrak actually does have a program in place that rewards freight Co's that keep Amtrak train on time. Due to the lack of Federal funding, the reward program isn't as substantial as it could or should be, but it still is decent. But some freight RR's just don't seem to care about that extra money over and above the normal fees that Amtrak pays for passage.

BNSF (Burlington Northern Santa Fe) routinely collects at least some bonus money, and often collects the maximum. UP, on whose tracks the Sunset runs, has to my knowledge never collected a bonus. They just don't care!

As The_Traveler alluded to, Amtrak has adjusted schedules for the Sunset Limited. However, his statement isn't exactly accurate; he's missing a few hours. In the last 6 years, Amtrak has added 12 and 1/2 hours to the schedule in the east bound direction. That's half a day that has been added to the schedule and it's still not enough, because UP in part simply doesn't care and in part because UP failed to properly manage their growth.


Sadly Amtrak had some vision in David Gunn, until the Amtrak board fired him last year.

As for the union's, please don't heap too much blame at their feet. I for one do believe that the unions do need to concede some work rule changes to Amtrak. And I think that the unions shouldn't be fighting to keep the jobs of those workers who don't do their jobs.

However on the other hand, most Amtrak workers could make more money by working in the private sector. They are not by and large overpaid as some might have you believe. For example, the average waiter on Amtrak does make more per hour in base salary, than a waiter/waitress in most restaurants. However, most waiters in restaurants do far better in tips than waiters on Amtrak trains. Additionally most waiters don't work 18 hour shifts, Amtrak's do. Most waiters go home each night to their own beds, Amtrak's don't. They are away from home for half a month most times. Part of that is spent on the train, part spent in a hotel hundreds of miles from home. Amtrak workers are trained in safety procedures that are unique to trains and are responsible for the passengers under their care, resturant workers are not. Finally most waiter/waitress' don't have to carry a tray full of drinks and/or food in a restaurant that is bouncing down the tracks at close to 80 miles an hour. It's a real art to manage that without spilling things, especially while working in the close confines of the dining car.

Most Amtrak conductors and engineers could make more working for the freight RR's and/or commuter RR's, than they make at Amtrak. And finally, none of Amtrak's workers has had a raise in 5 years, since there has been no new contract in that time.

AlanB and the_traveler, thanks for the clarification on a few things.

As for my comment about the labor unions and such -- I do agree that Amtrak's workers probably aren't overpaid. There is a huge difference between working in a restaurant in a 4-8 hour shift 5 days a week and doing a 3 day cross-country run on a train working 5:00 AM-10:00 PM every day. But it does appear the current system creates a situation where some employees don't care so much about providing a high level of service, as just doing the bare minimum to keep the job and collect the salary. This was evidenced on my trip by the difference in service levels between our sleeping car, and the one from the Texas Eagle that was added in San Antonio. While we had pretty attentive service, I repeatedly heard passengers that were in the car that joined us from the Texas Eagle complaining about how their call buttons were never answered, and they had to walk throughout the train in the evening to find their car's attendant to get their beds set for the night. In the mornings, they had the same issue about getting the beds put away for the day. At first I thought these comments were just coming from picky passengers that demanded to be waited on hand and foot, but this was not the case. The last evening of the trip there was a group of about six passengers from that car that made it all the way up to our car, which was the first one behind the crew's sleeping car, looking for their attendant. This was about 11:00 PM, and no beds had been made for any passengers in that car, and the attendant had not been seen in their car since before dinner. Our attendant told the group he'd go get the attendant for their car out of the crew car, which he did. But it was apparent that there was a big difference in the service level between the two sleeping cars on that train. That's where things need to change. I don't know if that's a union issue, or Amtrak management, or both, but that type of lapse in customer service is what drives people away, which just further hurts the business.

What I really find most disturbing is that it seems like the current attitude is that Amtrak can cut costs through service reduction to the point where it begins to approach a break-even balance sheet. Anyone who knows anything about service-oriented industries would tell you that while cost-cutting can help some in the short-term, it doesn't take long before it translates to severe reductions in service levels, which drive off customers, resulting in lower yields. It's a nasty cycle all the way down to bankruptcy. Cost-cutting should only be part of the equation. A little can help, but it has to be done in ways that don't drive off paying customers. What seems to be happening now is that costs are being reduced in the wrong areas (taking away the things passengers really notice) and this can only result in driving away business.

Of course, I'm sure I'm just preaching to the choir on here!