Adirondack operating indifference continues: Analysis

MONTREAL — Some Amtrak trains are sorely in need of an advocate. A recent Trains News Wire round trip to Montreal underlines that today’s Adirondack has none. It remains a hapless victim of indifference on the part of multiple overseers who show little inclination to make the train the unique and attractive transportation choice it has the potential to become.

The New York-Montreal train faces another setback next month, after cooling its wheels out of Canada for most of the last two summer travel seasons while Canadian National and Amtrak haggled over who will pay to upgrade track north of the U.S. border and when the work will be completed [see “Adirondack resumes Monday …,” News Wire Sept. 7, 2024].

On Nov. 10, as part of a constricted-capacity plan while East River tunnels are taken out of service [see “Amtrak combines Capitol Limited, Siver Star …,” News Wire, Sept. 23, 2024], the Adirondack is being combined with the New York-Toronto Maple Leaf between New York and Albany-Rensselaer, N.Y.

Passengers on both trains will suffer. Northbound, the Adirondack’s current 8:35 a.m. departure from Penn Station will be pushed ahead to 7:15 a.m., when the Maple Leaf leaves. But the Adirondack’s departure from Albany remains at 11:40 a.m., stalling passengers at the station for 110 minutes instead of 27 during the change from a dual-mode locomotive to diesel power. The current schedule, available at the Rail Passengers Association website, already has a lengthy delay built in at the Canada-U.S. border to allow Canada Border Services Agency personnel to examine travel documents. This consumed 78 minutes on Sept. 29. Four U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents boarded the southbound train two days later at Rouses Point, N.Y.; it departed on-time after 57 minutes.

Southbound, Maple Leaf passengers will wait an extra 65 minutes for the Adirondack. The two trains’ lack of connectivity to Northeast Corridor service caused by early departure and late arrival at New York will be exacerbated.

A logical remedy would be to advance the northbound Adirondack’s departure from Albany by 1 hour, 20 minutes to eliminate the extended layover. Utilizing current running times, this would allow a Montreal arrival by 7 p.m. Backing up the next day’s Canada departure an hour to 10:10 a.m. — thus keeping the same operating crew layover time intact — would thus eliminate both pauses at Albany-Rensselaer.

Operators may offer many excuses why this change has not been orchestrated. Existing slots with CPKC (Schenectady-Rouses Point, N.Y.), Canadian National (Rouses Point to Montreal), and VIA Rail Canada at Montreal Central Station would have to be renegotiated. Additionally, the southbound Albany-Rensselaer “shuffle” would coincide with combining the Lake Shore Limited’s westbound Boston and New York sections, though the Maple Leaf engine swap now occurs at the same time. Restringing schedules and revising operations to everyone’s satisfaction may be challenging, but it is not rocket science.

The lack of such a move is not surprising, given the fact that none of the train’s operators or funders have demonstrated any sense of urgency on behalf of the traveling public. In April 2023, the Adirondack became the last Amtrak route restored following the COVID-19 pandemic, only to be shut down months later [see “Amtrak abruptly suspends Adirondack …,” News Wire, June 26, 2023].

During the next year, the parties simply could not resolve their differences over who would pay for north-of-the-border track improvements to Class 3 standards that would allow 60 mph operation when temperatures rose above 85 degrees Fahrenheit. So the summer hiatus occurred again in 2024.

Crews report that some work has been completed. News Wire clocked a few 50-mph segments over portions of CN’s route through rural Quebec, but tie, ballast, and rail replacement is still in progress, resulting in periodic slow orders.

Symptomatic of the Adirondack’s second-class status is what happens at both Rouses Point, N.Y., and Cantic, Quebec. At both locations, the Amtrak engineer must stop the train while a conductor walks ahead to hand-throw a switch that is normally lined for a route taken by freight trains. At Rouses Point, Canadian Pacific trains use their own tracks to Montreal, not the branch over to the Canadian National at Cantic. That’s where another switch is always lined for CN trains to St. Albans, Vt. After the Adirondack trundles through these turnouts, conductors must line and lock the switches back to their “normal” position.

Eliminating the lengthy border stops by constructing a pre-clearance customs facility at Montreal’s Central Station, similar to what Amtrak’s two Cascades round-trips to Vancouver, B.C. utilize, has been authorized by a Canada-U.S. treaty passed in 2017. But that initiative languishes for a variety of reasons that boil down to a lack of will, money, and again, a sense of urgency among all stakeholders who are in a position to make it happen.

New York’s Department of Transportation has a vested interest in boosting ridership and revenue because it pays Amtrak to run the train, but the agency has been unable to exert sufficient oversight or demands that would successfully correct the Adirondack’s shortcomings. That’s too bad, because even without a little extra effort, attention, and promotion, the train is a unique gem that must do better to become relevant.

Still to come: More images from the round trip on the Adirondack.