Zephyr Suspended

[kevin_standlee]

With the pandemic restrictions and requests not to travel, use of transport services is down everywhere. I read that Amtrak was reporting a 90% drop in passengers. Watching the daily California Zephyr passing, we could see that the cars were all but empty. So it came as no surprise to hear that Amtrak has temporarily suspended service on the CZ between Denver and Reno, with trains 5/6 terminating/originating in Denver and running from/to Chicago. The Reno train station is closed. No alternative transportation is offered between Reno and Denver.

The announcement is a bit misleading in certain ways, and it would have been more accurate to say that trains 5/6 are suspended between Emeryville and Denver. There are ways to get between Emeryville and Reno on Amtrak, however, on the combination of the Capitol Corridor trains and Amtrak Thruway buses that operate between Sacramento and Reno, serving Roseville, Rocklin, Auburn, Truckee, and Reno. One place is totally out of luck along the California segment of the CZ, and that's Colfax, which isn't on the Thruway schedule but was served by the CZ.

As of this morning, I'm not seeing any CZ services on Amtrak's "Track my Train" map, so possibly the remainder of the service Denver-Chicago has been suspended without Amtrak having updated their web site.

I'm not complaining about the suspension of the train. It does make sense to do so, with people being urged not to travel and nobody actually riding that train. FWIW, maybe they will have a chance to do a deep cleaning and disinfection of the train sets that I assume are sitting idle. I only hope that someday things get back to the point so service can restart. Our current plans are to go to next year's Worldcon in DC by train, and I hope that we'll be able to travel freely and safely again by then.

Comments

[garyomaha]

From the "Stop Complaining, Gary, This Is Not Important And Virtually *Every* Other Problem Being Experienced By *Everyone* (Including Me)Is More Serious Than This" Department:
In trying to find some new fun things to do at home, I've discovered links to additional railcams, including several that normally show the CZ. Except for now, when it isn't running. Sigh.

[delosharriman]

My concern is that, as we have seen with the Sunset Limited, once a service is suspended, no matter how temporary the reason, it may never be restarted. And things had been looking up for Amtrak, despite the Administration's attempts to destroy it, with increased ridership & strong support in Congress.

[kevin_standlee]

That is my concern as well. We know that the current top management at Amtrak appears to think they can starve themselves to prosperity. I think they figure that if they abandon all long-haul routes, they can sell off anything that appears nominally profitable to some cronies, then shove the rest off onto states and say, "Problem solved."

We need to be vigilant about attempts to slide in abandonment by the back door.