Commentary: A train with no name is just not the same

blue and silver Amtrak train on tracks by station

A train with no name… With the world changing at an accelerating pace, there’s something comforting about standing on a station platform, putting your left foot on the standard Amtrak-issue yellow step stool, and climbing aboard a train. Not any old train, mind you, but a passenger train with a name. A train that carries […]

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Gotthard Base Tunnel set for full reopening Sept. 2

Tractor working inside tunnel

FAIDO, Switzerland — Work in the Gotthard Base Tunnel to repair damage from an August 2023 derailment is complete, SBB, the Swiss Federal Railways, announced Thursday. Plans are to resume full operations through the tunnel on Monday, Sept. 2. The reopening will restore service in less than 2 hours between Zurich and Lugano, and end […]

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Durango & Silverton restores full operations

A Durango & Silverton train in Silverton, Colo., in October 2018.


DURANGO, Colo. — Full Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad service to Silverton, Colo., will resume today (Friday, June 28), the railroad announced Thursday afternoon. Service to Silverton, the railroad’s northern endpoint, has been suspended since the morning of June 22, when a rock slide was discovered that had covered the tracks at milepost 485.9, […]

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Virginia Museum of Transportation board members resign

Logo of the Virginia Museum of Transportation

ROANOKE, Va. — Six members of the Virginia Museum of Transportation board of directors have resigned, WDBJ-TV reports. The group submitted letters of resignation at the board’s annual meeting last week. It reportedly included several of those who led the museum’s excursion efforts, leading to speculation about future plans for the steam program with Norfolk […]

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Appropriators proposal trims Amtrak fiscal 2025 budget: Analysis

Passenger train passing boarded-up two-story station

WASHINGTON — The process that determines how much money Amtrak will receive for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1, 2024, began Wednesday with release of the U.S. House of Representatives’ Transportation, Housing, and Urban Development Committee’s “Department of Transportation Appropriation Act of 2025.” Funding levels for the U.S. DOT and its related highway, rail, and […]

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Federal court orders FRA to allow BNSF Railway to expand track inspection program

WASHINGTON — A federal appeals court has ordered the Federal Railroad Administration to allow BNSF Railway to expand its automated track inspection program while simultaneously reducing the frequency of traditional visual inspections. Railroads are permitted unlimited use of automated track inspection systems that rely on lasers and other technology to find track geometry defects. But […]

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