Amtrak Town Hall Meeting

[railohio]

Trains magazine is sponsoring a town hall meeting in March in Chicago with Amtrak's CEO Joe Boardman and board Chairman Tom Carper. It looks like it'll be geared towards the railfan's interests covering photography, equipment, and long-distance trains. And best of all there's a discount code for Amtrak travel to Chicago that weekend!

[OwlCaboose2853]

Illinois Senator Meets With Canadian National CEO http://www.masstransitmag.com/online/ar ... 3&id=10635

[railohio]

That's really not related...

[RailCanon]

I'll be at this meeting. Anyone else here going?

[railohio]

*raises hand*

[railohio]

Amtrak held a town hall meeting in Chicago on March 6 in conjunction with Trains Magazine. Topics discussed included Amtrak's photography policy, upcoming equipment acquisitions, and the future of long-distance trains. To summarize the photo policy, photography at Amtrak-owned stations on limited access platforms (those that are staffed or in large cities) will be limited to ticket-holding passengers who are boarding or de-training. The photo policy does not apply at stations not owned by Amtrak (which make up two-thirds of the stations they use). Amtrak is also working on a railfan registration program similar to that developed by BNSF Railway. For upcoming equipment purchased, the immediate future holds twenty to sixty electric locomotives for use in the Northeast and up to 170 additional Viewliner-design cars to replace the remaining Heritage equipment and expand the single-level sleeping car fleet. Beyond that replacing the Amfleet I cars in the Northeast and acquiring bi-level corridor cars for the Midwest are also near-term possibilities. There is a 40 year plan to replace the entire current Amtrak fleet. Finally, the future of the long-distance trains is secure. Amtrak is undertaking a long-range plan to improve on-board service and reliability. Copies of many of these documents are available on Amtrak's web site. After the meeting was over guests were left to tour a display train at Chicago Union Station made up of three rebuilt Superliners and the first GE P40 diesel rebuilt with stimulus funds.



Trains Magazine editor and North Carolina native Jim Wrinn goes over notes with an Amtrak staffer.




Emmett Fremaux, Vice President, Marketing and Product Development, shows off new advertising for various Amtrak route brands.




Trains Magazine publisher Kevin Keefe looks on at Amtrak's first rebuilt P40 with a Beech Grove shop employee.




President Boardman's car, Amtrak 10001, Beech Grove, brings up on the markers on Saturday's edition of train 48/448, the eastbound Lake Shore Limited at Chicago Union Station.


More photos are available on flickr.

[signmasters]

Very nice report and photos thank you.

[A No.1]

Funny how nice and CLEAN their equipment is. Walk down to your local Amtrak station and see how shiny Your train is. LoL.

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.p ... 18&nseq=37

[redside20]

i concur on the above posts. Brian did you get to talk to anyone who put this together.

[CSX_CO]

Funny how nice and CLEAN their equipment is. Walk down to your local Amtrak station and see how shiny Your train is. LoL.

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.p ... 18&nseq=37

Its a PR thing, so of course you are going to put your best foot forward. No different then your local town sprucing things up when the President comes through. No different then the IC painting the trackside face of the depot, while letting the backside go to shambles for the Railroad's OCS.

Practice Safe CSX

[GP30M4216]

Thank you for the report. Glad to hear Amtrak's responses on all three topics you mentioned.

As for the equipment, of course it's shiny, it's fresh out of the shop! As for Amtrak trains which don't seem clean, it's funny to me how the long distance trains get a trip to the wash rack after every run, but it seems like corridor equipment can go for weeks and never be cleaned on the outside. But washing the train doesn't pay the bills. And I wonder if the NPCU F40 cabs are never very clean because they are always cut off before the cars go through the wash track....because they're unpowered? Anyhow, thanks for the update.